The endangered Southwestern willow flycatcher may get an additional 1,300 river miles of critical habitat set aside for it in 6 Western states, according to a new proposal from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The six-inch-long, olive and yellow bird nests in the dense vegetation along Southwestern waterways. In 2005, the agency set aside […]
Wildlife
Posted inWotr
A new chance for Snake River salmon
With his Aug. 2 ruling that the federal government’s plan for salmon recovery once again fails to meet requirements of the law, U.S. District Court Judge James Redden has opened the door to a hopeful approach in efforts for recovery of wild salmon in the Columbia and Snake Rivers. A better plan can be at […]
Posted inGoat
Ancient Fish Gets Techno Boost
In 1999, the U.S. Navy approached the University of Washington’s Applied Physics lab with a mission: develop a tool that could help harbor surveillance teams detect DIDSON was the lab’s techno-fabulous answer. The advanced sonar technology works much like an ultrasound—converting reflected sound waves into visual images—but relies on a special acoustic lens that creates […]
Posted inRange
Rants from the Hill: Ground truthing the “Peaceable Kingdom”
Last night I lay awake in bed listening to the sound of little claws scrabbling inside the walls of our house. Because the sheetrock acts as a drumhead, amplifying sounds within the wall, the scratching is disturbingly loud. It sounds as if there is an angry ferret in the wall, which is how I know […]
Posted inGoat
Reporter’s notebook: How to snag a grizzly
“Salmon carcass, cattle blood and time. In a barrel.” That’s the rank concoction that biologists in Washington state are using to coax rare carnivores in for a candid photo shoot, and to snag a few precious hairs. “Burns the nostrils,” says Aja Woodrow, a biological technician with the US Forest Service, wincing as he pours […]
Posted inWotr
Live and let live
Lion attacks have been in the news lately, but there’s one story I’ll never forget. It was in the Ogden, Utah, Standard-Examiner last year, and featured a hunter who’d shot an “angry” mountain lion while out hunting mule deer. Investigators from the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources determined that the hunter had acted in self-defense […]
Posted inGoat
Surf and turf update
After two decades of restoration, roughly 1,700 gray wolves now roam the Northern Rockies. But constant court battles over their management led Congress to end federal protection in May, using a budget rider to sidestep the Endangered Species Act (see our May 30 story). Last week, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy unhappily upheld the rider, […]
Posted inAugust 8, 2011: Ganjanomics
Settlements prompt federal decisions on hundreds of endangered species
Updated 8/8/2011 The Arctic grayling, found only in the Missouri River Basin’s upper reaches, became an endangered species candidate in 1994, meaning the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that it deserved federal protection but did not list it because other species took priority. The grayling has languished there ever since, along with more than […]
Posted inGoat
A wild week in Washington
In a remote alpine valley in 1968, Rocky Wilson shot the last grizzly bear to be killed in the North Cascades. Since then, biologists have longed for proof that any grizzlies remain; some wondered if they were all gone. But with the click of a camera, hiker Joe Sebille brought the North Cascades grizzly bear […]
Posted inGoat
Don’t Forget The Little Guys!
In May, the environmental advocacy group WildEarth Guardians struck a significant bargain with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that will require the agency to consider federal protections for more than 250 species under the Endangered Species Act. To solidify the agreement, The Center for Biological Diversity, which collaborated with the Guardians in earlier discussions […]
Posted inWotr
Is wildfire always a question of when?
Even before Arizona Sen. John McCain told the media that illegal immigrants were burning down the forests of Arizona, some local ranchers had begun spreading the same rumor. Then as the Chiricahua Mountains in southeastern Arizona burned, a different kind of smoke rose from my email inbox: “It’s those damn illegals, ya know.” “They found […]
Posted inArticles
Rocky Mountain wolf recovery leader was not your average bureaucrat
Ed Bangs has long been a lightning rod for the controversy around the return of wolves to the U.S. Northern Rockies. Based in Helena, Mont., he led the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s wolf-recovery effort from 1988, when the region had only a few naturally occurring wolves, through the reintroduction of Canadian wolves in 1995 […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
For steelhead, dirty water might be better than clean
The West Fork Little Bear Creek in northern Idaho winds through sloping hills and Palouse Prairie farmland on its way to the Potlatch River. The cool, shaded stream seems like typical steelhead habitat. But just above a narrow basalt canyon sits a wastewater treatment plant, which handles 110,000 gallons of sewage and other municipal waste […]
Posted inGoat
The Visual West — In Praise of Skunk Cabbage
On a recent trip to the Grand Mesa in Colorado, my eyes kept returning to the amazing stands of what many locals call skunk cabbage unfurling from the recently snow-covered meadows. The species, Veratrum tenuipetalum, is not related to the Eastern skunk cabbage. Other folks call the plant corn lily, though it is not a […]
Posted inWotr
Why the Southwest is burning
No big thing happens for just one reason. This season’s fires, cutting broad swaths across the Southwest, result from the convergence of three powerful forces: climatic drought, institutional tunnel vision, and old-fashioned human frailty. On the face of it, the drought is simple: There hasn’t been much rain or snow across much of the region, […]
Posted inGoat
The crow knows your nose
Cross-posted from The Last Word on Nothing. Crow diving at a masked researcher in Seattle. Photo by Keith Brust I have a running joke with my husband’s cousin, Roger. At family reunions, I tell him how much I like crows. He tells me how much he likes to shoot them. Hilarious, right? Here’s the satisfying […]
Posted inWotr
Bullies get their way in New Mexico’s wolf recovery program
There’s a sign near my house that reads, “Don’t just stand there, Stop Bullying!” I remember being teased by the cool girls in middle school during the 1980s. Having survived adolescence, I naively assumed that pint-sized tormenters mature before reaching adulthood. But not always: Adult bullies employing the tactics of gossip, misinformation and fear have […]
Posted inGoat
New Mexico wildfire poses a double threat
Although I don’t live in New Mexico, I worked as a journalist in Colorado’s part of the Four Corners region for a while, and spent a fair bit of time in the northern part of the Land of Enchantment. This connection is perhaps one reason why, on Monday, I became obsessed with the Las Conchas […]
Posted inJune 13, 2011: Under the Flight Path
Encountering a California condor takes one writer back in time
“There they are!” shouts one of my hiking companions on this perfect January day, unseasonably warm even for California. I squint toward the horizon, past the crooked ginger-tinted rock spires and slouching gray pines, but see only sky, awash in the glare of the midday sun. Finally, I spot a dozen or so tiny black […]