Keeping Wilderness WILD!
Read Wilderness Watch’s blog.
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It’s time to protect Wilderness from livestock grazing
Recent reporting has exposed some of the many ongoing problems with livestock grazing on federal public lands. These problems include great resource damage, little oversight or repair of that damage, and the oversized political influence of ranchers and wealthy…
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Domestic sheep grazing and Wilderness are always at odds
Stumbling over the rugged alpine landscape of the High Uintas Wilderness, a bighorn lamb is coughing and struggling, afflicted with pneumonia as the cold skies of winter set in. Here in northeastern Utah, a battle between domestication and wildness…
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Congressional Review Act: A new tool for lawmakers to radically meddle in public land management
Radical? Not me. In a House Natural Resources Committee hearing earlier this year, after one lawmaker finished complaining about “radical environmentalists” a second lawmaker bemusedly opined that no one is just an “environmentalist” anymore; nowadays all environmentalists are radical…
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They will not replace me if I leave: A wilderness ranger’s 2025 season
I’m a quarter mile into my hike when the tears start to fall. I can’t control them these days. I’m at work, wearing my uniform, and I do not want to be crying right now. I briefly contemplate walking…
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RIP NEPA
Our leaders are letting the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) die. But, maybe that’s okay. It’s time for a National Environmental Protection Act.
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Trump administration attacks iconic wildlands in Alaska
On October 23, the Trump administration launched fresh attacks on three iconic wildlands in Alaska, places that Wilderness Watch, our members and supporters, and our conservation allies have fought to safeguard for decades.
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Torching the “Range of Light”
Moved by the radiance of sunbursts bouncing between granite peaks, John Muir once called the Sierras the “Range of Light.” Now, a century later, millions of acres of Wilderness and wild forest in the Range of Light are under…
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Make a commitment to our shared wild places today
In 1989, I became a wilderness ranger with the Forest Service and spent 25 years working in the Selway-Bitterroot, Anaconda Pintler, and River of No Return Wildernesses of Montana and Idaho.
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Why roadless areas matter for Wilderness preservation
We should all be deeply concerned about the most recent challenge to the integrity of America’s national forests—the proposed repeal of the 2001 U.S. Forest Service Roadless Area Conservation Rule. This could open up nearly 45 million acres of…
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Thinking in wilderness time
“What goes too long unchanged destroys itself. The forest is forever because it dies and dies and so lives.” -Ursula K. Le Guin
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The “Eastern Wilderness Act” turns 50
The Eastern Wilderness Areas Act celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Like handfuls of statutes that designated multiple Wilderness areas, this statute—which technically declares no statutory title despite being commonly known as the “Eastern Wilderness Act”—designated 15 Wildernesses and…
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When the dust settles: Creating an agency worthy of Wilderness
The news is filled with stories of how the Trump administration and its so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have fired thousands of federal employees who work for our public land agencies. Though Trump had been talking about gutting…
Photo: Joseph Battell Wilderness, Vermont by Dawn Serra