When Utah environmentalists began complaining about new water-conservation proposals during a recent public hearing, farmer Howard Riley leaned toward the man next to him and muttered: “It depends on how you define conservation.” Riley, a director of the Central Utah Water Conservancy District, represents farmers in Juab County and southern Utah County who would receive […]
Energy & Industry
Posted inNovember 14, 1994: Land grant universities
Apple growers become patrons of science
Note: This article is a sidebar to one of this issue’s feature stories, Sexy weapon thwarts bugs. Washington’s asparagus growers will pay WSU scientists $12,000 this year to figure out how to prevent asparagus spears from softening during canning. Pea and lentil growers will spend about $50,000 on researching soil conservation. And the tiny cranberry industry […]
Posted inNovember 14, 1994: Land grant universities
Three agricultural fallacies
The poet laureate of cultivated land challenges the ‘experts’
Posted inNovember 14, 1994: Land grant universities
Sexy weapon thwarts bugs
Codling moths find frustration at end of pheromone trail
Posted inOctober 31, 1994: Water for the taking
Elk farming leads to wildlife slaughter
Gunners from the ground and the air shot dead 120 deer and other wildlife this August so that Montana officials could test the animals for tuberculosis. State veterinarians said tests were necessary because elk had developed TB at a game farm along the Bighorn River, north of Hardin, and the disease had been transmitted to […]
Posted inOctober 31, 1994: Water for the taking
Water for the taking
Some irrigators get loose with the law
Posted inOctober 31, 1994: Water for the taking
For the full scolding
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, Water for the taking. The Bureau of Reclamation has a new role in the West, and it’s high time the agency focused on management, not development, concludes an Interior Department audit on the unauthorized diversion of water. The July 1994 audit, Irrigation of Ineligible […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
A sunny future for nuclear test site?
The Nevada Test Site, home to nuclear weapons testing for more than 40 years, may have a brighter future. Clear skies and high insolation – the amount of solar radiation available at ground level – make the test site one of the best places in North America for capturing solar energy, according to a feasibility […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Open sesame, grazing boards
The public must now be allowed, if not welcomed, to sit in on Utah’s grazing advisory board meetings. In late June, the state attorney general’s office issued a decision that forces all five of Utah’s BLM advisory boards to open their doors, even to activists such as grazing watchdog Scott Groene of the Southern Utah […]
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
For sale: low mileage bomb factory
For sale: low mileage bomb factory Without much effort, a used-car and scrap dealer in Pocatello, Idaho, got his hands on $10 million worth of equipment needed to build nuclear bombs. In June 1993, a Department of Energy lab sold dealer Tom Johansen most of the major components to make bomb-grade uranium from spent nuclear […]
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 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Mining reform: dead or alive?
As Congress prepares to adjourn for the year, chances that it will pass legislation reforming the 1872 Mining Law grow slimmer by the day. Sen. Harry Reid, D, who emerged as a key negotiator for the Western Democrats, says the Senate would have approved a draft put forth by a House-Senate conference committee in early […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Judge rocks Montana’s open-pit mines
Montana’s hard-rock mining industry has enjoyed smooth sailing through state courts and regulatory agencies. But now a district court judge in Helena has rocked the boat, ruling that reclamation at open-pit mines must include the pit itself. Mining in Montana may never be the same. On Sept. 1, Judge Thomas Honzel ruled that the state […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Parental care for uranium tailings only goes so far
A couple of miles from Moab, Utah, and just 300 feet from the Colorado River sprawls a rare deposit: uranium tailings that haven’t yet been orphaned. The parent of the pile, Atlas Minerals Co., is the first uranium developer that can be held responsible for cleaning up its own mess. Typically in the West, nuclear-weapons […]
Posted inSeptember 19, 1994: Flame and blame in the Northwest
Dueling studies
Will an injunction prohibiting grazing on eastern Oregon’s Wallowa-Whitman and Umatilla national forests devastate the local economy? Yes, says Oregon State University economist Fred Obermiller. No, says Pacific Rivers Council, the environmental group whose lawsuit forced the injunction to protect habitat needed by endangered salmon. The dueling studies respond to a July federal court ruling […]
Posted inSeptember 19, 1994: Flame and blame in the Northwest
A clash of cultures: tribal versus nuclear
BLANDING, Utah – They came together to build a Native American cultural center seven miles south of here, near a small hill known as Avikan. In Ute that means a “place where I can lie down.” The members of a small nonprofit foundation bought 640 acres encompassing a kiva and a short rock-wall structure believed […]
Posted inSeptember 5, 1994: Can planning rein in a stampede?
Danger on the fairway
Working on a golf course can be hazardous to your health. A survey of 618 golf course superintendents who died between 1970 and 1992 revealed that an uncommonly high number perished from cancer of the lung, brain, intestine or prostate. The culprit could be pesticide use, which has caused the demise of thousands of birds. […]
Posted inSeptember 5, 1994: Can planning rein in a stampede?
Flu-ing with the river
When 88 Colorado River rafters – including 22 experienced river guides – came down with stomach flu-like symptoms this June, they sounded the alarm. “That’s a lot of cases in a relatively short period of time,” says Marlene Gaither, a Coconimo County health specialist. “When it’s 100 degrees on the river and you vomit and […]
Posted inSeptember 5, 1994: Can planning rein in a stampede?
Busted town pursues industrial recreation
ANACONDA, Mont. – Can famous golfer Jack Nicklaus reverse the sagging fortunes of this crumbling smeltertown by building a golf course on top of a hazardous waste site? The company that owns the site, Arco, is betting $10 million that he can (HCN, 11/29/93). “Some people will say I lost my marbles,” Nicklaus told Anacondans […]
Posted inAugust 22, 1994: Whose fault? A Utah canyon turns deadly
Ranchers face competition
In a break with precedent around the West, conservationists in Oregon will now be allowed to bid against ranchers for leases on state-owned land (HCN, 7/25/94). By a 2-1 vote, the Oregon Land Board gave the okay July 29 to competitive bidding and specified that state land can be leased for “conservation use.” Some parcels […]