Innholdsfortegnelse for December Vol. 55, No. 12 i High Country News

CONNIE HOWELL has lived in Montana for 40 years, nearly half that time in a tan-and-brick apartment complex in Bozeman. It’s always been a pleasant place, with a small courtyard and distant views of the Bridger Mountains. But since 2015, the rent for the one-bedroom unit that she shares with her husband, Chris, has nearly doubled. The couple, who depend on Social Security and disability payments, now put about half of their monthly gross income toward rent. Affordable housing, in contrast, is generally defined as costing no more than 30% of a household’s gross income. Howell has seen friends leave Bozeman because they could no longer afford housing, and her daughter hasn’t been able to move back here for the same reason. Compared to them, she considers herself lucky. But…

SNOW FROM THE BEAVERHEAD Mountains feeds the Big Hole River in southwestern Montana, which snakes through forested mountains, grasslands and sagebrush steppe. But in 1988, drought hit the watershed hard. Water ceased flowing through the town of Wisdom for more than three weeks. The drought was bad for ranchers, bad for anglers and bad for fish — including the Arctic grayling, an iridescent silvery blue salmonid with a sail-like dorsal fin. Hot and dry conditions returned in the summer of 2021. But this time, the river didn’t run dry. To Big Hole rancher Cal Erb, the improved conditions were “a win” — and a sign that voluntary efforts to keep more water in the river for the grayling are working. The Montana population of the Arctic grayling was designated as a…

ON DEC. 28, 1973, President Richard Nixon signed the Endangered Species Act into law. For nearly two years, the legislation’s supporters had fought to keep its language straightforward and its directives clear, intent on its deceptively simple purpose: “to provide a means whereby the ecosystems upon which endangered species and threatened species depend may be conserved.” The law won almost unanimous support from Congress, thanks in part to massive public demand for environmental protection. The 1962 publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring had not only powerfully conveyed the far-reaching effects of the pesticide DDT but merged Progressive Era concerns about wildlife conservation and urban public health into a new and broader movement. Major environmental disasters, especially the Santa Barbara, California, oil spill in early 1969, underscored Carson’s warning — delivered…

On the global level, I work with some of the world’s brightest scientists, engineers, designers and artists and try to inspire them to look to nature for solutions — reconnecting to the living world and to each other to build a more sustainable and resilient future. On the regional level, I live at the headwaters of the Columbia River, in a landscape devastated by our insatiable demand for copper. I’ve conducted research on technologies for removing metals from infected waters, and I’ve looked at how we can empower communities to gain agency in cleanup decision-making. But the most gratifying and impactful work I do is at the hyperlocal level. I run a community bike shop in my neighborhood, where we give away bikes to those in need — mostly youth.…

Peter Bohler photographed the August cover story on wildfire in western Washington for High Country News. His work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic and Audubon, among many others. He lives in Seattle. Katie Daley has performed her work across North America on radio shows, riverbanks, street corners and national stages. Her chapbook, Any Closer to Home (Finishing Line Press), was released in November. Visit her online at www.katiedaley.com. Miles W. Griffis is a writer and journalist based in Southern California. He writes “Confetti Westerns,” a serial column that explores the queer natural and cultural histories of the American Southwest. Steven Hsieh is a freelance journalist, formerly of the Santa Fe Reporter, Phoenix New Times and The Stranger. He also owns a small vegetable farm with…

I hope you and yours are having a happy holiday season. I’m relishing being settled with family and friends. The past few months have been a whirlwind, visiting donors, hanging out with readers, spending some quality time with High Country News staffers in Paonia, Colorado, and making a special side trip to Laramie, Wyoming. When we sold our building at the end of last year and leased a cozy corner of it instead, it meant we had to sift through and clean up decades’ worth of papers, artifacts and memories. In January, I put the question directly to you in Dear Friends: What should we do with HCN’s archives? I had a few ideas about museums or educational institutions that might be willing to house more than 50 years of…

IN 2016, NOT LONG after the catastrophic North Star Fire ripped through north-central Washington, Confederated Colville Tribes wildlife biologist Jarred-Michael Erickson was walking through a burned forest on Colville lands when he found an unusual paw print in the snow: A lynx was on the move. “It’s lynx habitat historically,” said Erickson, who is now the tribes’ chairman. “It’s just there hasn’t been many lynx in the state since they’ve been hunted down.” Long threatened by hunting and habitat destruction, only a few hundred lynx are believed to remain in the continental United States, but with the help of federal funding through the Endangered Species Act, the Colville Tribes have released 25 animals on their 1.4 million acres and plan to release another 24. Tribal nations have a complicated relationship…

In the following pages, High Country News writers consider how this powerful law has shaped Western politics and landscapes — and how it will continue to do so in the decades to come. These stories inaugurate our Conservation Beyond Boundaries series, which will examine how Westerners are protecting and coexisting with ecosystems outside conventional parks and reserves. We’re looking forward to a sustained conversation with readers about this crucial and under-covered terrain, and we’d like to thank the BAND Foundation for its generous support of the series. Look for more Conservation Beyond Boundaries stories in future issues of the magazine and online at hcn.org.…

New Mexican ridge-nosed rattlesnake Crotalus willardi obscurus  Threatened. Listed in 1978. Historic range: Mountains of southern Arizona and New Mexico. Threats: Habitat disruption due to livestock grazing, wildfire, climate change and illegal collecting. Known for: Preying on scorpions, centipedes and lizards, as well as small mammals and birds. 2020 expenditures: $20,190 Gentner’s fritillary  Fritillaria gentneri Endangered. Listed in 1999. Historic range: Southern Oregon and Northern California. Threats: Habitat loss and disturbance from development, agriculture, timber harvesting and recreation; bulb collecting for gardens; invasive weeds. Known for: It was first identified by 18-year-old Laura Gentner in 1942. 2020 expenditures: $449,000 Southwestern willow flycatcher Empidonax traillii extimus  Endangered. Listed in 1995. Historic range: Across the Southwestern U.S. Threats: Habitat loss due to livestock grazing, urban development, dams and water withdrawals. Known for: Eating…

A PARK ON TOP of a busy underground highway was a first for Denver — a first, in fact, for the entire Mountain West. To outsiders, it seemed like a wonderful addition to Globeville Elyria-Swansea, or GES, a predominantly Latino community in North Denver. It featured an amphitheater, two soccer fields and a splash pad for overheated kids on hot days, though no splash pads were needed at the ribboncutting ceremony last November, when temperatures dipped into the 20s. About 160 freshly planted saplings, their bases powdered with snow, dotted the park’s four acres, and the Rocky Mountains rose dramatically in the distance. Plumes of smoke from the nearby Purina factory marred the view slightly, but overall, it was a peaceful scene, especially considering that 10 lanes of cars were…