As the Wilderness Act nears its 40th anniversary, protecting wild lands requires a new kind of deal-making.
Wildlife
Posted inMarch 3, 2003: The Wild Card
Locals fight new railroad
Note: in the print edition of this issue, this article appears as a sidebar to another news article, “Grasslands take a step toward nature.” The new national grasslands plans ignore one potential impact entirely: The nation’s largest railroad construction project in more than a century. The Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern Railroad got a green light […]
Posted inMarch 3, 2003: The Wild Card
Wilderness on the move
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “The wild card.” IDAHO: Rep. Mike Simpson, R, is considering introducing a Nevada-style wilderness/development bill that would protect parts of the Boulder-White Cloud and Pioneer Mountains in central Idaho. The Idaho Conservation League is also working with local county commissioners and cattlemen to negotiate […]
Posted inMarch 3, 2003: The Wild Card
Peaks and valleys: Protected wilderness by year
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “The wild card.” The 1964 Wilderness Act instantly protected 9.1 million acres of wilderness. Since then, the wilderness system has grown to over 106 million acres. Much of that came in the late ’70s and mid-’80s, as wilderness areas identified by the Forest Service’s […]
Posted inMarch 3, 2003: The Wild Card
Wilderness provides a ‘safe haven’ for this cowboy
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “The wild card.” When I meet Cal Baird at a truck stop about 30 miles south of Vegas, he clears a space for me in the passenger’s seat of his Ford pickup (“I don’t know how we ever got by without extended cabs — […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 2003: Wyoming at a crossroads
Canada lays down the law on endangered species
After 10 years of debate, Canada has become the last country in North America to pass an endangered species law. The Species at Risk Act (SARA) passed Parliament in December, and goes into effect later in 2003. Unlike the U.S. Endangered Species Act, SARA protects only “federal species,” such as fish, migratory birds, and plants […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 2003: Wyoming at a crossroads
Spotted owl back under microscope
The timber industry is celebrating a court decision which forces the federal government to take another look at the most controversial of old-growth forest dwellers: the northern spotted owl and the marbled murrelet. Timber industry groups sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for failing to reassess the population and habitat of the birds, as […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 2003: Wyoming at a crossroads
Loggers got scant help as industry toppled
Loggers and their communities were left out in the cold during the collapse of timber cutting on federal lands in the late 1990s. This is the conclusion of a recent study of the Northwest Economic Initiative, launched in tandem with President Clinton’s Northwest Forest Plan in 1994. The study, produced by a nonprofit California think […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 2003: Wyoming at a crossroads
Timber proposal undercuts Quincy Library plan
A plan the Forest Service is touting as “a measurable, science-based assessment” of logging’s impact on California spotted owls and other forest species is raising hackles in California. The proposal, released in December, calls for cutting up to 600 million board-feet of timber — enough to build 60,000 houses — and bulldozing 160 miles of […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 2003: Wyoming at a crossroads
Where’d you get that cactus, partner?
Not only do southern Arizona cities get water from Colorado, Utah and Wyoming; now, they’re importing cacti from Texas. Prickly Trade, a new study from the World Wildlife Fund, reveals that cities such as Tucson and Phoenix are importing much of their drought-tolerant landscaping from west Texas. Between 1998 and 2001, almost 100,000 succulent plants […]
Posted inFebruary 3, 2003: The death of the Super Hopper
The death of the Super Hopper
How early settlers unwittingly drove their nemesis extinct, and what it means for us today
Posted inWotr
The message of trees marked in blue
In late December, just after the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated protection for all of the roadless national forests we have left in the West, I walked up Deadwood Ridge in southern Idaho to see what we’d saved. The trail climbs through a ponderosa pine forest that continues to evade logging. Back in 1996, […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2003: A breath of fresh air
84-year-old bird law no match for the military
The United States has once again declared itself to be above international law — this time, a law aimed at protecting birds. Last April, a federal judge ordered all branches of the military to comply with the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act, a law that protects 850 species of birds through agreements with Mexico, Canada, […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2003: A breath of fresh air
Wild Sky Wilderness could be downsized
The Wild Sky Wilderness may become a little less wild if the timber industry has its way. Had Congress approved the Wild Sky Wilderness Act during the fall legislative session, it would have designated 106,000 acres of wilderness in the valleys of the Cascades north of Seattle (HCN, 6/24/02: A wide-angled wilderness). Although U.S. Sen. […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2003: A breath of fresh air
Wilderness proposal or political ploy?
Rep. Scott McInnis, R-Colo., surprised Congress and environmentalists in November when he introduced legislation to designate 49,800 acres of land in northwestern Colorado as the Red Table Mountain Wilderness. The bill included provisions for motorized recreation trails, helicopter training by the Colorado National Guard, and guaranteed water rights for the nearby town of Gypsum. Richard […]
Posted inWotr
There’s a wilderness niche for mountain biking
I’m a mountain bicyclist. The pleasure of my life is pedaling through wild places, experiencing the views, the changing colors and textures of the plant life, the occasional animal sightings. On the trail, I’m renewed, and my commitment to public-land preservation is strengthened. I think that’s the way most mountain bikers feel, and historically, we’ve […]
Posted inWotr
Two legs good in wilderness, two wheels bad
Like many mountain bikers, I’m happiest when I’m charging up and down hills through the West’s spectacular public lands. I live in Durango, Colo., arguably the mountain bike capital of the world, and I ride every day. While I’ve spent most of my cycling years on roads, in the last five years I’ve been spending […]
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
Wayward wolf nabbed in Utah
A gimpy 2-year-old wolf that once charmed wildlife watchers in Yellowstone National Park recently gave Utahns a wake-up call of the wild. “Wolf No. 253” from the famous Druid Peak Pack in Yellowstone’s Lamar Valley stumbled into a leghold coyote trap 30 miles northeast of Salt Lake City on Nov. 30. He had trekked 200 […]
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
Forest planning gets a facelift
Critics say the new look will turn national forests into lawsuit magnets
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
Northwest braces itself for wolves
Wild predators are ready to reintroduce themselves to Oregon