wildlife

Pollinators making a run for the border

When most of us hear of undocumented border crossings between Mexico and the western United States, we immediately think of devastating social problems: refugees fleeing poverty and political oppression, or drug runners laundering money and offering controlled substances to our children. I think that I shall never see, a poem lovely as a bee. And […]

A review of 'The New Wolves' by Rick Bass

In The New Wolves: The Return of the Mexican Wolf to the American Southwest, Rick Bass ambles pensively and passionately through the controversial ground in Arizona's Blue Mountains where Mexican wolves are being reintroduced. He walks alongside a host of folks with divergent perspectives on the reintroduction effort: unflappable federal wildlife agents; bright-eyed students; newfangled "predator-friendly" ranchers; faithful volunteers; and a reintroduction foe who seems to have the wolves' best interests at heart. Bass takes in all their views and paints them with empathy and respect, while never letting go of his own deeply held belief that wolves simply belong on this land.

Riders on the Storm

No one in her or his right mind thinks the 106th Congress is going to pass a whole lot of actual free-standing legislation. It will likely take every ounce of strength this feeble Congress can muster to pass the essential spending bills that fund the government. So riders, those pesky little items that hope to […]

Don King Endangered

A review of 'Watching, from the Edge of Extinction'

Cynthia Salley makes an unlikely hero for an environmental fable. A Hawaiian cattle rancher, Salley has tussled for years with the National Audubon Society and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over an endangered species on her property. Yet the authors of Watching, from the Edge of Extinction credit her with saving the 'Alala, or Hawaiian crow.