Letter to the editor

Congratulations to Anna V. Smith on her great article (“Reclaiming the Klamath,” HCN, 6/11/18). It’s really well done. I was a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service managing the Klamath River Restoration Program from 1975 to 1980, and I worked closely with the Yurok Tribe, gathering salmon harvest and population data on the […]

“Pay for Prey” (HCN, 7/23/18), written by Gloria Dickie, nicely detailed Oregon’s efforts to manage both ranchers and wolves. Economic compensation programs exist in other Western states grappling with ongoing wolf colonization. Concerns raised in both camps with regard to data accuracy and program graft also persist. Still, cultural divides have always best clarified this issue, […]

Thank you, Anna V. Smith, for your article “Reclaiming the Klamath” (HCN, 6/11/18). And thank you, Amy Cordalis, for your hard work toward this end. A recreation outreach meeting was held in Copco, California, on June 12 by the Klamath River Renewal Corporation. Four community liaisons gave a presentation to an unfriendly, disruptive audience. Dam […]

I was touched and saddened by Ben Long’s eloquent lament on the extinction of the Selkirk caribou (“A quiet goodbye to the Selkirk caribou,” HCN, 5/28/18). He rightly points out the necessity of ecosystem services provided by healthy forests to avoid the “emergency room” of the Endangered Species Act. He closes by wishing that America […]

I always appreciate Jonathan Thompson’s excellent journalism, but I didn’t quite get the point of his recent essay on air travel (“Jet Lag,” HCN, 5/14/18). I just returned from a multi-week cross-country trip myself, which is why I only now got around to reading it. Certainly air travel is uncomfortable and at times dehumanizing, but far […]

While the serious potential economic (and other) costs of genetically engineered/genetically modified plants escaping into natural and agricultural landscapes (“Little Weed, Big Problem,” HCN, 6/25/18) are only beginning to be realized, they as yet pale in comparison to the massive and well-documented costs of the myriad non-genetically engineered/genetically modified plants that have escaped to invade […]

I find the update on the Kilauea Volcano (HCN, 6/11/18) puzzling in the extreme. First of all, it describes the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens as the backstory to Kilauea’s current eruption, claiming that “Lessons from Mount St. Helens are proving useful in understanding Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano.” The two volcanoes are entirely different with […]

Since the acquittal of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge occupiers in October 2016, HCN Associate Editor Tay Wiles has suggested that extremists on the radical right — bent on privatizing federal lands in the American West — have made great headway in rallying rural Westerners to their cause. “A Separatist State of Mind” (HCN, 1/22/18) argues that right-wing troubadours […]

What a lovely piece (“The benediction of a bird,” HCN, 5/28/18). I feel the same about the song of the horned lark — a weightless, upward jumble of notes that never fails to remind me of my home among the sagebrush of the high desert. Thank goodness for birds to fill the air with song […]

Bravo to Tay Wiles for her insightful profile of the Bundy family and their sympathizers (“Celebrity scofflaw,” HCN, 4/30/18). It is disturbing that there are actually people and politicians who believe that Cliven Bundy and his family are martyrs or folk heroes who have “legitimate grievances” in their battle with the U.S. government. They don’t. […]

Thanks for Wayne Hare’s article on Portland segregation (“ ‘Alienated’ in Portland,” HCN, 5/28/18). The process by which blacks are segregated and redlined is common everywhere. Our church here in Louisville, Kentucky, recently hosted a four-part series on systemic racism. We learned there that the same thing happened here — and happens everywhere. I had […]

Thank you for a well-written article on this amazing animal (“A quiet goodbye to the Selkirk caribou,” HCN, 5/28/18). Author Ben Long captured my thoughts on how we got them to this place, and the lack of voices for their needs to be heard. I saw them up close just over a decade ago, about […]

Ah, fond memories of growing up playing in the Animas (“The River of Lost Souls,” HCN, 5/28/18). I, too, well remember the dust from the tailings pile swirling through the valley and dusting the town. My brother, Woody, used to sneak over and ski the tailings pile. I’ve always wondered: Did the rare cancer that […]

“Death in the Alpine” (HCN, 5/14/18) reads like yet another article bemoaning millennials and their obsession with social media. However, given the increase in popularity of outdoor recreation reported on this same issue (i.e., on page 9, “Recreation is redefining the value of the West’s public lands,”) it seems a much more straightforward explanation simply […]

In response to “Jet lag” (HCN, 5/14/18), I’m wondering what Jonathan Thompson is so provocatively trying to say, and I’m reminded of Bob Dylan’s liner note to his seminal record Highway 61 Revisited record: “The subject matter, though meaningful as it is, has something to do with the beautiful strangers.” I’d like to walk through […]

I, too, have begun to question the assumed correlation between outdoor recreation and environmental conservation (“Your stoke won’t save us,” HCN, 5/14/18). I used to be a nearly full-time recreationalist masquerading as a “professional outdoor athlete.” I continue to half-heartedly follow the culture on social media. Along with the overused Edward Abbey quote, I’ve come […]

I disagree with the self-serving, condescending quote from Ted Stroll in the article on mountain bikes in the wilderness: “The real fear isn’t that mountain biking will cause problems, but that it won’t cause problems.” (“Bikes in wilderness?” HCN, 5/14/18). To me, the “real fear” is that some people refuse to leave their vehicles, cellphones, […]

I enjoyed Sean Prentiss’ review of two books about humans’ role in the wilderness and in sharing the experience of living within wilderness with your children (“Wildness for the next generation,” HCN, 5/14/18). My kids have the unique experience of getting to live on U.S. Forest Service land on the edge of a large wilderness […]

I still find it somewhat astounding that these “range rights” folks seem to forget, ignore or seem plain outraged over the simple fact that they are accessing resources that belong to everyone in the country and not managing private property (“Rebels vs. Reporters,” HCN, 5/28/18). What they are complaining about is not a property right, […]

I presume it was an intentional editorial decision by HCN, but the same issue that contains this article (“Your stoke won’t save us,” HCN, 5/14/18) also contains an article on how a group of mountain biking enthusiasts are seeking a legislative change to the Wilderness Act to allow mountain bike riding in designated wilderness areas […]