Birdwatchers travel from far and wide to northwest Colorado to see male sage-grouse strut their stuff in hopes of attracting a mate. Early spring is prime season to catch these timid grouse dancing on the lek and shaking their tail feathers through organized tours.
In late 2012, the BLM released a draft amendment to the existing management plan that would dramatically increase the scope and intensity of oil and gas development in the region.
In that spirit, one of our favorite traditions in The Wilderness Society’s BLM Action Center is compiling a year-end list of the greatest achievements in conservation for our public lands.
When my career began in the late 1990s, one of my arguments for protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling was that we already had a place for Arctic resource development — a place that actually had “petroleum reserve” as part of its name.
Alaska is renowned for some of the most beautiful, wild scenery in the world. A land of epic wildlife migrations and vast undeveloped wilderness, Alaska truly is the nation’s last, great wild frontier.
The idea here is that certain places, like the Statue of Liberty and Dinosaur National Monument, deserve heightened protection from potentially harmful uses, such as development and vandalism.
It teems with migratory birds, caribou, polar bears, wolves and other wildlife, but is cursed with what may be the ugliest and most ill-fitting name of any wild landscape: the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
