By Heather Hansen, Red Lodge Clearing House Every year, from sunup ‘til sundown, from Memorial Day into October, there’s a traffic jam of sorts high above the Yosemite Valley floor. The trek to the top of Half Dome, Yosemite National Park’s iconic peak, is a destination hike for people from all over the world. The trail, which ascends […]
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Land of Disenchantment
The Territory of New Mexico became the 47th state of the union in 1912, so the state is celebrating its centennial this year. It’s also looking for a new marketing slogan to revive its tourism industry. For nearly 80 years, it’s been “the Land of Enchantment,” but the spell seems to be wearing off. As […]
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Lessons from the Musselshell: the aftermath
Editor’s note: This is the fourth blog in a series by contributor Wendy Beye, chronicling a restoration effort on Montana’s Musselshell River. Floodwaters dallied in Musselshell River’s floodplain for months, precluding any attempts at damage assessment or repair. The first priority was to restore community water systems and roads. Dump trucks, excavators, and graders were tied […]
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All (climate concerned) eyes on D.C. court
For environmental law wonks, the debate unfolding in a Washington, D.C., federal appeals court this Tuesday and Wednesday is the courtroom equivalent of the Super Bowl: the stakes are high and everyone is watching. Playing offense are a few states, including Texas, Utah and North Dakota, along with Big Coal, Big Oil, Big Ag, the […]
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Climate debate hearkens back to days of the bison
An old bison bone on my desk has me thinking about air pollution, climate change and the American mind. You remember the basics from history class: Tens of millions of bison roamed the Great Plains. Along came Manifest Destiny and market hunters shot them for hides, tongues and just to get the great beasts out […]
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Left out of the Arizona debate: energy
On Wednesday, February 23rd, the four Republican presidential candidates were in my town, Mesa, Arizona, for yet another round of “debate.” As everyone knows (and as Tom Zoellner’s recent book excerpt reminded HCN readers), Arizona is friendly turf for these guys, and conservative Mesa may be friendliest of all. The audience at the Mesa Arts […]
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The battle for new wilderness: A closer look at Montana’s Sleeping Giant
Editor’s note: This is the last story in a group of pieces produced for High Country News by students in the University of Montana’s online news class. They ran over a period of two weeks in the Range blog. You can see a list of all the stories here. By Daniel Viehland On Nov. 10, […]
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Friday news roundup: environmental antiheros and solar booms
Picking apart the news through the hurried swoosh of this stunted week, I leaned back in my rickety desk chair for a few minutes to consider which rugged individualist in this day and age concerns me more. Is it the ironman fugitive on snowshoes who vanished in the powdery woods of Southern Utah nine years […]
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Of tooth, claw and plane: Making my peace with predator control
Updated 3/6/2012 A troubling item appeared in the news last month, troubling to this news consumer and, if they could read, troubling to the predators of Alaska. Out of a desire to save caribou, moose, elk and in particular musk oxen, the state’s Board of Game now allows state officials to shoot bears from planes […]
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Uncontrolled release
This scintillating-looking snippet of paperwork was pulled from the PR portion of a materials containment plan filed with the state of Colorado by Suncor Energy’s oil refinery in Commerce City, which produces about 90,000 barrels a day of gasoline, diesel and asphalt. It was supplied to High Country News by Jeremy Nichols of WildEarth Guardians, […]
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Who’s the worst of all?
In his essay “The Second Rape of the West” published in 1975, Edward Abbey observed that when Westerners with certain attitude problems start talking, the conversation often features their representatives in the U.S. Congress. “Look at Senators Garn and Moss of Utah, Senators Goldwater and Fannin of Arizona, Governor Rampton of Utah, Congressmen Steiger and […]
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Risks remain from uranium mining near the Grand Canyon
By Heather Hansen, Red Lodge Clearing House When the 20-year withdrawal of nearly one million acres of public land from uranium development near the Grand Canyon was finalized last month, reaction was mixed. Conservationists, who’d been warning of contamination of surface and groundwater flowing into the Colorado River from mining activity, mostly exhaled in relief. (Never mind the […]
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Richard Hugo, revisited
Editor’s note: These stories were produced for High Country News by students in the University of Montana’s online news class. They will be running over a period of two weeks in the Range blog. See a list of all the stories here. By Annela Rova The celebrated American poet Richard Hugo chose to focus on […]
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Evolve or die
Cross-posted from The Last Word on Nothing. Updated 2-21-2012 to correct image of chipmunk. Several years ago, on a soggy but majestic mountain afternoon, I hiked into the Yosemite backcountry to meet UC-Berkeley mammalogist Jim Patton. Patton and his colleagues at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology were retracing the steps of renowned naturalist Joseph Grinnell, […]
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Fighting a pervasive invader: Crested wheatgrass
Editor’s note: These stories were produced for High Country News by students in the University of Montana’s online news class. They will be running over a period of two weeks in the Range blog. See a list of all the stories here. By Rachel Seidensticker Plastic netting lines the winding gravel road at the MPG […]
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Words are wind
From Twin Falls to American Falls, Jerome to Rexburg, a series of anti wind-energy billboards have been springing up around Idaho like mushrooms after a rainstorm. The big blue signboards feature pictures of windmills clustered around the campaign slogan: “Swindle” (the “wind” emphasized in bold red type), below which is written, “not cheap — not […]
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Friday news roundup: Inside the world of climate change deniers
Amid the excitement of the week’s federal budget proposals, an exposure of climate-change deniers’ tactics and GOP candidate reshuffling (Romney, what’s happening to you?), we at HCN headquarters were battling winter colds and coughs, reaching for DayQuil, NyQuil and Benadryl, when we weren’t keeping up on the news. Here’s what caught our watery, itchy eyes: ClimateDocuments […]
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Churches use punk culture to reach Montana teens
Editor’s note: These stories were produced for High Country News by students in the University of Montana’s online news class. They will be running over a period of two weeks in the Range blog. See a list of all the stories here. By Billie Loewen It’s an especially cold December night, with the kind of […]
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Anger over the lion’s share
In a classic cartoon, a hulky lion sits in a rink as a frenetic lion-tamer waves a stool in front of its face. The smug beast represents a nameless corporate lion watching patiently as the government espouses threats. As the cartoon suggests, federal regulators often talk a big game, but cracking down on misbehaving industries […]
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Tribes use funds to restore westslope cutthroat trout
Editor’s note: These stories were produced for High Country News by students in the University of Montana’s online news class. They will be running over a period of two weeks in the Range blog. See a list of all the stories here. By Russell Greenfield On the west-facing foothills of the Mission Mountain Wilderness, about […]