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How to love the bear’s world

By John Horning
Photo by Becca on Unsplash

When a bear kills a person in the wild, that’s no reason to enact laws making it easier to kill bears. Rather respect that bears are wild creatures and be cautious when in their territor

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Looking back to when water was plentiful

By Dave Marston

During his 50 years in rural western Colorado, Jamie Jacobson has seen a lot of flooding. While caretaking a farm…

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What do we owe wildland firefighters?

By Jonathon Golden

Vacancies, of course, limit how much federal firefighters can do. If Western communities want to be protected, they need to ensure that their firefighters receive better pay and benefits.

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Call it Bindweed or thistle – Writers on the Range just won’t die

By Dave Marston

It sprouted again during a fall hike in 2019. Betsy, Steve Mandell, his wife, Terri, and I, agreed that Writers on the Range deserved to live again.

Photo by Denys Nevozhai on Unsplash

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Don’t bet against redband rainbow trout

By Brian Sexton

Photograph by Justin Miles

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You can explore the West and escape the crowds

By Molly Absolon

Here’s the dilemma: You want to explore the West’s huge treasure of public land, but you don’t want to be…

Lake Serene Washington, Photo by Jamie Coupaud, courtesy of Unsplash

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Wyoming may be too much like America used to be

By Bruce Palmer

May 31 By Bruce Palmer If you’re hankering for a true Western vacation, come to the Cowboy State, where we…

Grand Tetons at the end of a Wyoming Road, photograph by Leslie Cross, courtesy of Unsplash

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Killing wildlife to see who wins

By Ted Williams

Predators do kill game and livestock, but no game species in the United States is suppressed by predation, and overpopulated species like elk and deer lack the predators needed to maintain their health and that of native ecosystems.

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It all began with pizza

By Laura Roberts McHenry

In the mid-1960s, my dad served on the school board in Cortez, in rural southern Colorado.  He recalled that at…

Photograph by Helena Lopez, courtesy of Unsplash

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Housing prices in the West are over the moon.

By Jonathan Thompson

“But now the Zoom Boom-fueled market fire is spreading beyond the “best places” into the once-affordable bastions of working class neighborhoods, the bedroom communities, rural ranchettes and even trailer parks.”

Photograph by Phil Hearing, courtesy of Unsplash

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We blame the trees, but whose fault is it?

By Pepper Trail

“But it’s questionable that any amount of “thinning” could protect Ashland from a wind-driven firestorm coming out of the watershed.”

Photograph by Romain Le Teuff, courtesy of Unsplash

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The last thing we need is a gold mine

By Marcie Carter

“For us, the Nimíipuu, the value of the land, fish, wildlife and other natural resources will always be worth more than gold.”

Photograph by Curioso Photography, courtesy of Unsplash

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What others are saying See More

The Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction, Colorado places a premium on content that examines management of public lands and natural resources. We’re big fans of Writers on the Range. The contributors come from all walks of life, but their column always hit home with our readers, for whom access to public lands is an important part of the lifestyle in western Colorado. Cutbacks to the newsroom have seriously hampered our coverage of the environment. Most often these stories are best told by people who have first-hand experience dealing with a particular challenges — from loving favorite trails to death to rebuilding coal communities or threats to the sagebrush sea. Writers on the Range consistently identifies problems and solutions in a thorough and engaging way. We need more of this kind of advocacy journalism on our opinion pages because it fosters understanding and dialogue about the unique living conditions in the American West.

Andy Smith, Opinion Page Editor
Grand Junction Sentinel, Grand Junction, CO

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