New Mexico
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Livestock grazing negatively impacts more public lands in the West than any other industry. Photo George Wuerhner Legislation that would have given the federal government authority to close grazing privileges on public lands was recently withdrawn. Grazing permit buyouts allow the federal government to close public lands to future livestock grazing permanently. New Mexico’s U.S.…
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Cattle grazing is the greatest threat to the Greater Gila Ecosystem in New Mexico. Photo George Wuerthner Livestock grazing is the biggest scourge to Southwestern ecosystems. No matter where they are found, domestic livestock poses a significant threat to wildlife and ecosystem function. Feral livestock currently roams the 558,065 Gila Wilderness, and the Gila National…
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Ponderosa pine in New Mexico Blue Range Wilderness. Photo George Wuerthner A new paper, Indigenous fire management and cross-scale fire climate relationships in the Southwest United States from 1500 to 1900 CE, was recently published. Based on solid scientific research, it makes the important point that indigenous fire management was local rather than landscape or…
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The Sangre De Cristo Mountains of New Mexico where the Hermit Peak Fire occurred. Photo George Wuerthner The Forest Service released a review of the Hermit Peak Fire, which began as a prescribed burn designed to reduce fuels in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains of Northern New Mexico. The Gallinas Watershed Prescribed Fire, Las Dispensas…
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Fuel reductions are a major part of the Forest Service’s wildfire reduction plan. Photo George Wuerthner Recently the Federal government released its Confronting Wildfire Crisis plan to control wildfires in the West. As with all previous programs, it focuses on removing “fuels” as its solution and calls for escalating fuel reductions (read logging) up to…
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The aftermath of the 2011 156,000-acre Los Conchas Blaze in the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico. Photo George Wuerthner A recent commentary 30×30 not the answer to stop destructive wildfires by Jerry G. Schickedanz, has numerous inaccurate assumptions about wildfire. His comments repeat many common misunderstandings of fire ecology and how natural systems function.…
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Arizona and New Mexico might be calming down a bit as the multitude of wildfires are now igniting to the north- May and June are almost always the peak months of wildfires in the southwest — Arizona and New Mexico. By late June monsoonal rains usually dampen these fires. In the meantime, the cooler and…
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A massive forest fire and sudden right-wing politics makes survival of the rarest wolf slimmer still- New Mexico had a pretty good governor, Bill Richardson, in terms of wildlife, but he retired and was replaced by Susana Martinez of the far right. She replaced four members of the New Mexico State Game Commission, and they…