Dear HCN,
I was really depressed by
the art work done by Greg Siple and cleared by your editors which
accompanied the cover article on Santa Fe (HCN, 2/5/96). Even this
dumb non-Westerner knows saguaros don’t grow naturally in New
Mexico. Maybe it was done for a laugh? OK, ha,
ha.
I am awfully tired of seeing saguaros
associated with all deserts and/or Western states. If it was in the
New Yorker magazine, I would write it off to stupidity. The High
Country News likes to tout itself as an authority on the West
(minus California, of course). It also likes to give the impression
that it is environmentally sensitive.
So stop and
think about it: Why do you think saguaros are being pirated from
their natural habitat and transported to Nevada casinos and God
knows where else? Usually they die, because they are unable to
adapt outside their normal range. It is precisely because of this
type of completely inaccurate, irresponsible depiction of what
their range is.
You could have drawn
yuccas.
George
Early
San Diego,
California
The editor
replies:
We regret misleading any reader
biologically, but felt we had to be culturally correct. As
observers of the “Santa Fe style,” we knew coyotes on everything
from billboards to cups must wear bandanas and be shown howling,
and a saguaro cactus must stand in for anything green in the
Southwest.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Wrong cactus and not funny.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
