There’s no question: They stink, they’re noisy, and they scare wildlife. Snowmobiles are truly obnoxious. But while I applaud Yellowstone’s contested ban on snowmobiles, I’ve had to rethink my own stance. For as much as I dislike the smelly machines, snowmobiles have their place. As a cross-country skier, I’ve never really cared for snowmobiling, especially […]
Writers on the Range
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The passing of a Yellowstone Cinderella
It’s mating season for wolves in Yellowstone, and the alpha male of the Druid Peak pack sits alone on a snowy ridge, howling mournfully. His mate, whose only name was the number 42, is dead. One of Yellowstone’s oldest wolves at eight, 42 was killed by a rival pack the previous night. She was also […]
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It’s time for voters to look at the whole picture
As John Kerry was firming up his frontrunner status in seven Democratic primaries Feb. 3, Oregon voters were defeating Measure 30, an $800 million package of income tax surcharges, cigarette tax renewals and minimum corporate-tax increases intended to restore dramatic cuts in education and basic services. “Defeat” isn’t quite the word. We crushed it 3-2, […]
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One national park could tell the truth about the West
The Black Canyon in western Colorado is one of the world’s most splendid examples of the depths to which erosion and uplift can go. A steep gash in ancient granite, nearly 3,000 feet deep and not much wider at its rim, the Black Canyon is the kind of geological anomaly we like to single out […]
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It’s time for a radical change on the range
At a recent get-together of 435 members of the Quivira Coalition in Albuquerque, N.M., I visited the future of the grasslands. In a dark bar, I even met the rancher’s worst nightmare — a Buddhist vegetarian. Yet my glimpse onwards filled me with hope. In fact, I’m surprised at how closely the time-to-come resembles the […]
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Looking for the curve on the Great Plains
I grew up in South Dakota, but spent my summers in Portland, Ore., with my mom. As an adolescent, I enjoyed how my city experience pushed me ahead of the curve when I got back home for school. I had my classmates beat by at least a year on the overalls-with-one-strap thing. It wasn’t all […]
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Death in the backcountry comes with the territory
Search-and-rescue teams have been busy the past few weeks in the mountains of Southern California, looking for lost hikers, and instead finding corpses. Six times since Jan. 1, men described by friends and family as “experienced” outdoor travelers have slipped from icy trails and suffered injuries that, if not fatal outright, proved to be so […]
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The nation’s premier environmental group is target of a coup
Last year, over 750,000 people joined or renewed their membership in the Sierra Club, presumably because they believe in its historic mission to protect America’s public lands and wilderness for future generations. John Muir and a small band of conservationists founded the Club in 1892, and it’s been working for more than a century to […]
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Why I’m running: Immigration is the ultimate environmental issue
Because I believe that environmental organizations have ducked the immigration-population issue too long, I am running for the board of directors of the Sierra Club. I am not part of a slate; I represent only myself and the issues I care deeply about. One of the most important challenges of public policy is to recognize […]
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Super-heated Yellowstone and the restoration of awe
In the Yellowstone ecosystem, super-heated water bubbles from fissures and cauldrons, cascades over rock, steams in sub-freezing air, encrusts trees, hair and clothing with frost. It’s a landscape of paradox: enchanting and fierce, suggestive of both eternal stillness and perpetual change, a reminder that — even now — we inhabit a molten world that existed […]
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Why a would-be jock plays mainly with his brain
It is a standard classroom, except for two things. First, it’s Saturday, and second, teenagers in the room don’t look bored or blank: they look elated or dismayed. They’re clustered in groups of four, each holding contraptions that look like bomb detonators. An adult at the front reads from a sheet of paper: “The category […]
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To lions, we may be just a link in the food chain
A 100-pound mountain lion can kill an 800-pound elk. Keep that in mind the next time you go hiking in cougar territory. If you are alone and unarmed, and one of these powerful predators attacks you — intent on killing and eating you, rather than merely trying to drive you away from its offspring or […]
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I’ve tried, but I can’t eat the view
I’ve given up on one of the great American dreams — owning a home of my own. Why? Because it’s becoming impossible to find affordable housing in the West, even in the non-resort towns. It’s easy to tell Missoula, Mont., is still a working class town. Just check out the traffic on the tree-shaded lanes […]
Posted inJanuary 19, 2004: Two decades of hard work, plowed under
Have another pig-brain/beef-blood/chicken-spine hamburger
I ate my final diner burger the other day. It’s not that I don’t like burgers (my last one was juicy pure delight) or that I want to become a vegetarian (the tofu diet isn’t for me), but thanks to some recent discoveries, I no longer believe that my last burger, was, in fact, a […]
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Defenders of public lands are needed now
Gifford Pinchot, pioneer in American forestry and conservation, learned the hard way about political power and influence. In his autobiography, Breaking New Ground, he recorded going West late in the 19th century to study Western forests. Instead, he discovered that commercial interests controlled and exploited land and people. Pinchot wrote: “Principalities like the Homestake Mine […]
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Just bury me out on the lone prairie
It’s not easy being buried green, but here’s how I want it to happen: Someone, preferably an old friend, dresses me in my oldest, softest clothes.Let’s see, how about my favorite and virtually threadbare navy blue flannel shirt and my tatty black sweat pants? If shoes seem important, hopefully they’llgo for my sheepskin bedroom slippers. […]
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The next wars may be fought over water
Water has been called the oil of the 21st century. The World Bank predicts that by 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population will not have enough drinking water. With scarcity making water an increasingly valuable commodity, private companies are tempted to corner water supplies and delivery. “We think there’ll be world wars fought about water […]
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Have another pig-brain/beef-blood/chicken-spine hamburger
I ate my final burger the other day. It’s not that I don’t like burgers (my last one was juicy pure delight) and I don’t want to become a vegetarian (the tofu diet isn’t for me), but thanks to some recent discoveries, I no longer believe that my last burger, was, in fact, a burger. […]
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Here’s to an honest man
Chances are you’ve never heard of Jim Alderson, and I’m willing to wager that no toy company is going to model an action figure after him. He’s more than a little balding on top and he’s working on a middle-aged paunch. You won’t find charisma to match that of California’s movie-actor Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. But […]
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Wanted: queer eye for the rural guy
When the aspens reached their peak color last fall, my friend Diane and I drove from our tiny, western Colorado town into the nearby mountains. We sat at the side of the road to enjoy the snow-dusted peaks, tumbling scree fields and golden-and-peach aspen forests. Soon enough, a truck pulling a camper with Washington state […]