-Nature is not only more complex than we think; it is even more complex than we can think,” said biologist Frank Egler, whose observation is one of dozens of quotations gracing a new, permanent exhibit at the High Desert Museum in Bend, Ore. Called The Changing Forest, the exhibit features ceiling-high trees and indoor and […]
Books
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Witness
-Each species is a masterpiece,” says biologist and writer E.O. Wilson in his introduction to Witness: Endangered Species of North America, a large-format book of 200 stunning black-and-white and color portraits. Photographers Susan Middleton and David Littschwager collaborated with the California Academy of Sciences and Chronicle Books to produce this collection, to try to focus […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Celebrate the West
Growth, politics and the future of the region will come under scrutiny at a “Celebrate the West” conference in Jackson, Wyo., Nov. 5-7. The conference honors Western historian and author Alvin M. Josephy Jr., who has helped Indians establish their voice in the telling of Western history. The gathering at the National Wildlife Art Museum […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Pay to play
The Southwest Idaho Mountain Biking Association believes mountain bikers should pay to use trails on public lands. The group wants Idaho to enact a $10 annual fee to maintain trails, create new ones and develop trail-etiquette education. Cyclists, who would register any bike that they ride off-road, could influence how funds are spent through advisory […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Home on the electric range
-How would you like it if you lost your jobs, your home and communities just because of an animal no one’s even heard of? Is that what America’s really about?” Tammy Jo asked every five minutes, every day, until she was unplugged. She is a member of the life-sized robotic ranching family that enthralled visitors […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Nevada Water Forum
University of Nevada professor Jean Ford has published the findings of a series of Nevada Water Forums held around the state last spring. The forums asked: “How should we manage and allocate water to help create the Nevada we want over the next 20 years?” Participants considered maintaining the current system of water allocation under […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Bambi takes a hunter safety course
Hey kids, remember when Bambi’s mother got blown away by the hunter? Tom Storm does, and because movies like Bambi have given hunters a bad name, he wants to teach people who don’t hunt all about the role hunters play caring for wildlife. In his book Stormy and The New West, Storm shows Stormy the […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
False alarm
Two years ago, the Department of Interior reported that nonprofit conservation organizations such as The Nature Conservancy were making “substantial” money buying land and selling it to federal agencies. Various conservatives and wise-use groups seized on the report, saying it proved that environmentalists exploit the federal government as ruthlessly as any corporation using the public […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Peak writing experience
Ten Native American writers from around the country will read from their work and participate in panel discussions Oct. 7-9 in the mountain town of Telluride, Colo. The Native American Writers Forum will take up the appropriation of Native American lore by non-Indian writers and how Native American literature and tribal oral histories can be […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Evolving wetlands
-Change in the West: The Evolution of the Watershed Approach” is the title of the sixth annual conference of the Colorado Riparian Association, Oct. 5-7 in Alamosa, Colo. Representatives from federal agencies, The Wilderness Society, The Nature Conservancy and Western universities as well as local ranchers will talk about shifting demands on riparian areas, case […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Leopold floats us to an understanding
A View of the River Luna B. Leopold. Harvard University Press, 1994. 298 pages. $39.95 plus $3.50 postage and shipping; Customer Service Dept., Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. 02138 (800/448-2242). Review by C.L. Rawlins Anyone concerned with flowing water – river rats, lawyers, architects, irrigators, fly fishers and land managers – will learn to love […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Water planning in the desert
Residents of the driest state in the nation use more water per person than almost anyone else in the country. But change may be forced on Nevada by sustained drought and record population growth. The State Division of Water Planning is drafting a new policy to guide water-planning decisions for the next 20 years. The […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Hikers can bear grizzlies
Restoring grizzly bears to Washington’s North Cascades and Idaho’s Selway-Bitterroot ecosystems won’t interfere with hunters, hikers or horseback riders, says a conservation group in Bellingham, Wash. The group, Greater Ecosystem Alliance, examined closures of trails and campgrounds caused by grizzlies in 11 national forests and two national parks. All had little effect on recreation. Blocked […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Bigots in Big Sky
-Montana is and always will be WHITE MAN’S COUNTRY,” reads a recruitment pamphlet distributed by white supremacist groups in rural areas of the state. More than 20 such hate groups, targeting African Americans, Jews, homosexuals and Native Americans, blight the landscape in Big Sky country, according to a 57-page report by the Montana Advisory Committee […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Saved from subdivision
A letter-writing campaign to members of Congress last year helped protect 18,000 acres of privately owned land within central Colorado’s Roosevelt National Forest. The area, known as Cherokee Park, was owned by Union Pacific Railroad and targeted for sale to developers for recreational homes. Once alerted, the Trust For Public Land, a San Francisco-based organization, […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Sole source
The EPA may grant special protection status to an aquifer that covers 14,000 square miles in eastern Washington and portions of western Idaho. A local environmental group, the Palouse-Clearwater Environmental Institute, petitioned the agency in 1992 to designate the Eastern Columbia Plateau aquifer as the “sole source” of drinking water for the area. The EPA […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
New look at a river basin
The market-oriented environmental group that helped McDonalds get rid of Styrofoam wants to save the Colorado River Basin. The Environmental Defense Fund recently launched its Colorado River Basin Initiative, a project that begins by re-evaluating the Colorado River compact. The compact has dictated water use in the basin for the past 70 years. EDF hopes […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
One down, three to go
Following the belief that conservation, like charity, begins at home, Ecotrust was founded three years ago in Oregon to save temperate rain forests in North America. The organization chose four rain forests to concentrate on. Now, thanks to a Canadian timber company, it can devote its resources to the three rain forests still at risk. […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
A climbing plan for Devils Tower
One hundred and one years ago, when William Rogers and Willard Ripley were the first climbers to top Wyoming’s Devils Tower, they also started a controversy. In the following decades the tower became a climbing mecca. Yet to some Native Americans it has always been a sacred place. To try to satisfy both interests, the […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
No room at the top
Climbing one of Colorado’s 14,000-foot peaks used to be a solitary joy. These days 50,000 people top the state’s famous “fourteeners’ each year, and in one weekend on Mt. Harvard near Buena Vista, 133 signatures filled the summit register. Marketed in myriad guidebooks, the climbing craze is shattering solitude and trashing ecosystems, reports the American […]