2+ day, 57+ min ago  (272+ words) Late winter and early spring in the West can be snowy and rainy one minute, sunny and 70 degrees the next. Seasonal shifts are everywhere: bright green new growth, the first wildflowers, birdsong and " periodic plumes of smoke? "Prescribed fires are…...

3+ mon, 2+ week ago  (489+ words) Montana was once a leader when it came to regulating pollution in its waterways. In 2014, it became the first state in the country to impose numeric water-quality standards on dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus, two major sources of nutrient pollution, in…...

6+ mon, 2+ week ago  (954+ words) This story is a collaboration with Puente News Collaborative, a bilingual nonprofit newsroom, convener and funder dedicated to high-quality, fact-based news and information from the U.S.-Mexico border. Sunland Park, New Mexico, is not a notably online community. Retirees have settled…...

4+ mon, 2+ week ago  (972+ words) On the day of a Nov. 11 federal deadline for states to submit a water management plan for the Colorado River, negotiations remain deadlocked. Without agreement, it is unclear how a water supply that millions depend on will be managed after…...

5+ mon, 1+ week ago  (91+ words) A nonprofit independent magazine of unblinking journalism that shines a light on all of the complexities of the West. High Country News" twice weekly email newsletter includes our latest on-the-ground reporting from across the West. Developers and Republican legislators are…...

5+ mon, 3+ week ago  (1823+ words) On the far edge of suburban Phoenix, a giant concrete arch spans the Central Arizona Project, dubbed a "Bridge to Nowhere" by developers and neighborhood activists alike. Nobody can use it; even pedestrians are barred by a chain-link fence sporting…...

5+ mon, 3+ week ago  (164+ words) High Country News" twice weekly email newsletter includes our latest on-the-ground reporting from across the West. "I"ve yelled at my wife and kids tons of times just in the week since he died," he said. "Archangel Michael and the…...

7+ mon, 7+ hour ago  (572+ words) High Country News" twice weekly email newsletter includes our latest on-the-ground reporting and investigations from across the West. A wildfire rarely creates its own tornado, or pyro-vortex. (Fire whirls, a fire tornado"s little brother, are more common and are…...

7+ mon, 1+ week ago  (585+ words) This story was originally published by Inside Climate News'and is republished here through a partnership with'Climate Desk. Just hours before the deal was set to go through, a federal appeals court temporarily blocked a land transfer in Arizona on Monday…...

7+ mon, 2+ week ago  (720+ words) When Tanisha Tucker Lohse sees the first saguaro flowers bloom in the spring, she dreams of bahidaj, the blood-red fruit the cactus produces. She envisions the'ancient tradition of harvesting bahidaj, her people tending to boiling vats of fruit pulp in…...