Kelly Springs

Released to the Wild

Unwanted pets take a toll on ecosystems

Stepping through the tall grass, a family made their way to the edge of Kelly Warm Spring, a geothermal spring with a temperature that hovers around 77 degrees Fahrenheit year-round, in Grand Teton National Park.

Mussels

Cancer to the Rescue?

A potential solution to invasive mussels

One hundred thousand quagga mussels can live in a single square meter, and 450 trillion of them infest Lake Michigan alone.

Christy Bell holding a bee

Unsung Pollinators

Native bees are forgotten in the clamor to save exotic pollinators

Christy Bell rifled through a series of shallow drawers lining the walls of a dark, windowless lab.

A mountain goat peers down from a cliff

To Kill or Not to Kill?

Managing charismatic ungulates in the Tetons

The first time Michael Whitfield saw bighorn sheep in the high country he stood on a ridgeline in the shadow of the Teton Range and watched a group grazing along a plateau.

Animal collage with birds, sagegrouse, biker, windmills, and ungulates

Editor’s Note

Here in the West, we ask a lot of our public lands. As the photo collage on the cover illustrates, we pile demands onto the federal and state lands that surround our communities.

Prairie and dirt road with hills in distance

Federal lands in public hands

The long history of Congressional intent to keep public lands public

Bob Keiter is the Wallace Stegner Professor of Law, University Distinguished Professor, and Director of the Wallace Stegner Center of Land, Resources, and the Environment

Federal Lands Infographic - for text equivalent, see chart below

Your Federal Public Lands

The United States of America is unique in the world for its vast system of federal public lands, which make up more than a quarter of the country’s land area. Those federal lands, mostly concentrated in the 11 westernmost states and Alaska, span everything from rivers and canyons to sagebrush steppe and alpine peaks.

Two people on a canoe in a lake

Why We Have Federal Land

The citizens and leaders behind our public land heritage

On June 30, 1864, the US Senate approved a grant of federal land to the state of California, a tract in the Sierra Nevada at the headwaters of the Merced River “known as the Yo-semite valley…with the stipulation…that the premises shall be held for public use, resort, and recreation…for all time.”

National monument picture at sunset

National Monuments and Local Concerns

What it means to have protected public lands in your backyard

Waves lap the shoreline. An endless stellar canopy shimmers in the ink-colored sky. Smoky fragrance drifts from a campfire, and 20 middle school students sit around the dancing flames.

Banking on Trails

Banking on Trails

Laramie could be the next western town to cash in on public lands recreation

On a Thursday evening last March, a crowd of eager residents packed into the gymnasium of the Lincoln Community Center in West Laramie to learn more about the Pilot Hill Project

skier shadow on snow

Consuming Experiences Instead of Stuff

What quiet recreationists bring to the outdoor economy and how to reach them

With BLM maps in hand and fragments of descriptions from locals, Eric Krszjzaniek searches for an old Indian village in Wyoming’s Shirley Basin. As he walks across the landscape, he pauses often to reference his Rockhounding in Wyoming guide and note the types of rocks in the area.

Painting of deer crossing road

A Different Kind of Map

Social science reveals the contours of wildlife migration’s human dimensions

On an early June morning, I found Jessi Johnson and her hunting partner loading up a bright red pickup, deep in discussion about the best spot to scout for bedded-down deer.

wind-blow, old, dead trees in field of sagebrush

Belonging

An essay

Sunlight and wind circled me, a girl looking out over the Red Desert and the small stream below. Perched next to a gnarled, twisted juniper that had been dead for my entire life, I sat at the edge of the draw that held the green meadow

Aspen trees with aspen leaf in foreground

What to Do with Wilderness Study Areas?

A collaborative stakeholder group negotiates a solution

On a sunny afternoon in early May, twelve people sat around plastic tables in a classroom in the Carbon County Higher Education Center in Rawlins, Wyoming.

sheep on rocks

Where Domestic Sheep Still Roam

A court case challenges domestic sheep grazing on national forests

In any court case, there are two sides. But in a wood-paneled courtroom at the Federal Building and United States Courthouse in Butte, Montana, differences between the two sides headed to court were not immediately apparent.

Courtney Duchardt and David Augustine in field

Sharing Fences

Local knowledge guides research across public and private lands

“I’ve learned to tune out the incessant alarm calls of prairie dogs when I work,” says recent University of Wyoming graduate Lauren Connell. “It’s that or go crazy.”