Trevor Leach remembers riding horses on Bald Knoll Road as a child in the 1920s. During the ’60s, Arlene Goulding and her kids used the route for hunting trips. The testimony of these Kane County residents helped the Bureau of Land Management piece together the history of Bald Knoll Road, which laces across public lands […]
Growth & Sustainability
Posted inArticles
Red Mountain miracle
In the late 1800s, some 3,000 people lived and worked in the Red Mountain Mining District near the top of Red Mountain Pass between Silverton and Ouray. Just about every acre was clear-cut, built upon or mined. Today, the miners are gone and aspen trees and tundra plants have reclaimed most of the area. The […]
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Free range
Livestock foraging on 160 million acres of public lands could roam more freely than ever, thanks to a recent policy change at the Bureau of Land Management. On Aug. 14, the BLM granted eight new “categorical exclusions,” designed to speed up the approval process for a slew of activities on public lands, including grazing, logging, […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2007: A Climate Change Solution?
A dustup over weed control
The BLM’s plans to spray nearly a million acres with herbicides have some environmentalists fuming, but many biologists and land managers welcome the policy
Posted inWotr
Why bad people do good things for our public lands
There I was out on the high prairie that angles up to the mountains of the Front Range of Colorado, digging out Mediterranean sage with a tool of torture called the pick-mattock. I couldn’t have been paid to do this. Not only was I there, but over 100 other people were there, too. The weather […]
Posted inAugust 20, 2007: Bonfire of the Superweeds
Scientists and the city
Urban ecology studies in Phoenix teach lessons for the West’s arid metropolises
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From weapons to wildlife
The Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant was once known for making plutonium triggers for the much-feared nuclear bomb. Today, Rocky Flats is seeking a new reputation – that of a wildlife refuge, where deer, elk, mountain lions and even bald eagles can roam in peace. Recently, the Environmental Protection Agency certified the completion of the […]
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A dustup over weed control
They race across the West covering 2,300 acres each day, devouring an area the size of twenty Wal-Mart superstores every minute. They reduce habitat for wildlife, dry up water tables and intensify the threat of wildfires on 35 million acres of public land. As the area covered by invasive plants grows, so does the amount […]
Posted inJuly 23, 2007: Hydrogen Highway Revisited
Fear in the Valley
Immigrants in southern Colorado live in the shadows of anxiety following a high-profile raid
Posted inWotr
When mud-boggers rip up the land, penalize them
Flashing red and blue lights sent me a strong message: I was busted. I’d just passed a truck as I drove into a small, southwestern Oregon town and neglected to slow down to 30 mph. I got a ticket. Deterrents work, yet there are places where deterrents don’t reach, and drivers of all-terrain vehicles know […]
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Advice from a horse
If going hunting twice in his life makes Mitt Romney a “lifetime hunter,” then you could say I’m a lifetime horse rider. Besides a couple of childhood pony rides, I took one riding lesson as a teenager from an instructor whose teaching style resembled that of a Russian ballet mistress — when she cracked her […]
Posted inWotr
A hope for Father’s Day from a divorced father
I will celebrate this Father’s Day by cashing in what’s left of my retirement account so that I can — once again — go to court to request more time with my kids. My almost 10-year status as a non-custodial parent has helped me become accustomed to the almost insurmountable odds and legal fees that […]
Posted inJune 11, 2007: Brave New Hay
Western open space: Land of intrinsic worth
In some parts of the West, conversations about land use can be hazardous to your health. This time, you can leave the brass knuckles at home; all you need is a bookmark. The writers in Home Land aren’t just old-time Westerners; they include a descendant of New York coal miners, a wildlife biologist, and a […]
Posted inJune 11, 2007: Brave New Hay
Tribal victory
Yakama Nation buys Lyle Point, ending decades-long struggle over fishing rights
Posted inWotr
Bring on the immigrants
Vanishing towns of the Great Plains and Midwest ought to open a welcoming door for immigrants.
Posted inWotr
Fees have become a public-lands shakedown
Scarcely anyone objected in 1996, when Congress authorized the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to charge the public new or increased fees for accessing its own land to fish, hunt, boat, drive, park, camp or walk. After all, it was going to be an experiment […]
Posted inMay 14, 2007: Two Views of the Verde
British writer tackles border politics
Make room on your bookshelf: Midnight Cactus will fit nicely between T.C. Boyle’s The Tortilla Curtain and Luis Alberto Urrea’s The Devil’s Highway. While Boyle provides a satiric fictional account of Southern California haves versus immigrant have-nots, and Urrea documents a deadly real-life journey across the border, British author Bella Pollen offers a lighter, though […]
Posted inApril 30, 2007: Rural Education 2.0
The granddaddy of all collaboration groups
One thing you quickly learn in the rural West is that ranchers come in all shapes and sizes. There are the fourth-generation ranchers hanging on by their toenails with overextended credit and the eternal hope that cattle prices will rebound, the drought will break, and most of their cows will be found on the mountain […]
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One of Interior’s departed returns to D.C. (for a short while)
On April 17, 2007, Ann Morgan got to do something that few Western conservationists have done since 2001: testify before a congressional committee. The subject before the Energy and Minerals Subcommittee of the House Natural Resources Committee was the BLM’s ongoing push to open up as much of the public domain as possible to oil […]
Posted inWotr
Killer commutes in the rural West
Every day a clot of drivers moving at high speed takes on the Gallatin Canyon between Bozeman and Big Sky, Mont. It is the second-busiest commuting corridor in the state, and the most dangerous. Between 5,500 and 7,500 drivers navigate the perilous gantlet of highway 191 on a daily basis, on their way to work […]