In a new book, Fire and Ashes, author John N. Maclean leads readers through three sweaty-palmed stories about human encounters with wildfire. Maclean returns to the ground his father, Norman Maclean, covered in the 1992 book, Young Men and Fire. He joins the last living survivor of the 1949 Mann Gulch Fire in Montana to […]
Wildlife
Posted inOctober 13, 2003: The Big Story Written Small
In the field with fire
Federal spending on fire suppression is wildly out of control, forests are increasingly unhealthy — and everyone seems to have an opinion about how to fix the problem. A Season of Fire, by Seattle-based journalist Douglas Gantenbein, is one of the latest titles about fire in the West, and refreshingly, he doesn’t glamorize firefighters or […]
Posted inWotr
A grizzly attack that was bound to happen
One of the most egotistical notions humans have is that we can “commune” with unpredictable wild animals. News headlines over the last couple of weeks have revealed the depth of our folly. During Siegfried and Roy’s Las Vegas nightclub act, a tiger turned on trainer Roy Horn. Doctors still don’t know if he will survive. […]
Posted inOctober 13, 2003: The Big Story Written Small
Return of the King
Scientists finally have the seed they need to restore the beleaguered white pine — now they need a place to plant it
Posted inWotr
We need a sensible approach to fight wildfires
It’s the sweet time of year in northern Montana, late drying-out summer, easing into the rains of autumn, and in the soft low green hills of the Yaak Valley, on the Kootenai National Forest, the mornings are tinged, not unpleasantly, with the smell of wood smoke. Objects take on a golden glow, illuminated by the […]
Posted inSeptember 29, 2003: Harvesting Poison
Timber companies borrow a tool from environmentalists
Conservation easements help protect private forests — and keep logging jobs alive, too.
Posted inSeptember 29, 2003: Harvesting Poison
Hell’s fires burn in the Northern Rockies
If hell has mountains, they must look like the Northern Rockies. As my fire spotter and I fly an insignificantly small airplane over our territory in western Montana, we weave through brown tendrils of wind-shredded smoke that curl around granite peaks. Sudden explosions of dark ash rise into the air above stands of trees as […]
Posted inSeptember 29, 2003: Harvesting Poison
Extinction – by the clock
It isn’t easy being a cheerleader for a bottom-feeder, but I’m feeling up for the task. Montana’s two varieties of sturgeon — a miraculous, prehistoric fish that feeds at the bottom of lakes and rivers —have recently been given an expiration date, an official prediction of when they’ll become extinct. A doomsday clock all their […]
Posted inWotr
A rational response to wildfires
As summer weather breaks in the West and ushers in a cool and moist fall, all of us are breathing a sigh of relief. At the same time we cannot avoid being haunted by the question of whether there is something we ought to be doing to reduce the wildfire threat. Any rational response to […]
Posted inWotr
Some trees inspire true love
This is a love story about a small number of scientists and some pine trees in North America. I do not know if any hugging has taken place between the trees and the scientists, but tears of loss have been shed. Biologist Diana Tomback got to know the trees as a young graduate student, and […]
Posted inSeptember 15, 2003: The West's Biggest Bully
Hatchery runaways add to concerns about fish farms
Farm-raised Atlantic salmon — already discovered in 12 Puget Sound river systems — have infiltrated another Northwestern stream. In July, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife employees spotted 250 juveniles in Scatter Creek, near Olympia. John Kerwin, a state hatchery official, says the fish came from a Cypress Island Inc. hatchery that produces salmon smolts […]
Posted inWotr
Hell’s mountains are in the Northern Rockies
If Hell has mountains, they must look like the Northern Rockies. As my fire spotter and I fly an insignificantly small airplane over our territory in western Montana, we weave through brown tendrils of wind-shredded smoke that curl around granite peaks. Sudden explosions of dark ash rise into the air above stands of trees as […]
Posted inSeptember 15, 2003: The West's Biggest Bully
Yellowstone’s grizzly stalker
Chuck Neal is a retired ecologist whose nickname, “Wild Grizzly Stalker,” says it all: For more than 25 years, Neal has followed grizzlies around the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem — 28,000 square miles in and around Yellowstone National Park. Eschewing bear spray, bells and just about everything else, he has seen more than 3,000 grizzlies, and […]
Posted inSeptember 15, 2003: The West's Biggest Bully
Another roadside detraction
Next time you’re cruising the open highway or ambling along a backwoods two-track, be wary of hitchhikers with barbed seedlings and spiky thistles. New studies from the University of California, Davis show that roads significantly promote the spread of invasive weeds. Noxious weeds such as cheatgrass, leafy spurge and knapweed already occupy over 133 million […]
Posted inSeptember 1, 2003: Courting the Bomb
Bush administration stretches a lawsuit to get the cut out
In the Pacific Northwest, trees probably will start falling faster than they have in nearly a decade. In August, the Bush administration committed to more than double the amount of logging in public forests west of the Cascades — including massive old-growth trees. The commitment came in a legal settlement with 18 Oregon counties and […]
Posted inSeptember 1, 2003: Courting the Bomb
In fire’s aftermath, salvage logging makes a comeback
Bush administration pushes to cut trees burned by Oregon’s Biscuit Fire, science be damned
Posted inWotr
We keep dousing wildfires with money
Judged solely by headlines and political rhetoric, summer in the West has become a war zone of wildfire. The image is no longer of family picnics at the lake. The lake is busy filling giant buckets dangling from helicopters, which dump their taxpayer-funded loads onto fires that could not care less. One critic remarks that […]
Posted inAugust 18, 2003: Where the Antelope (and the Oil Companies) Play
In the rush to get out the gas, wildlife gets short shrift
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Where the Antelope (and the Oil Companies) Play.” One of the reasons the demand for natural gas is outsprinting the supply is that it takes too long to navigate the federal environmental rules. At least, that’s the story according to the industry and its […]
Posted inWotr
Extinction — by the clock
It isn’t easy being a cheerleader for a bottom-feeder, but I’m feeling up for the task. Montana’s two varieties of sturgeon — a miraculous, prehistoric fish that feeds at the bottom of lakes and rivers –have recently been given an expiration date — an official prediction of when they will go extinct. A doomsday clock […]
Posted inWotr
Searching for the true causes of the West’s fire problems
By now we’ve all heard — oh, how often have we heard –that a century of fire suppression has created a buildup of fuels that threatens an inferno across the forests of the West. Forest Service officials, once happy to pose for photos with Smokey Bear, now give grim news conferences to announce that natural […]