U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Wolverine, the sequel: Feds propose to bring tough weasel back to Colorado

Today is the last day for public comment on a proposal by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to bring the wolverine -- not the Marvel character with the sharp claws, adamantium skeleton and tortured backstory, but something even more awesome and much, much more badass than Hugh Jackman -- back to t ... More >>

Rocky Mountain Greenway announcement today had a rocky buildup

At 2 p.m. today, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar will join Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood and Governor John Hickenlooper to make a "major announcement" about the Rocky Mountain Greenway, and also celebrate the recent expansion that added 1,200 acres of wildlife habitate to Rocky Flats ... More >>

Reader: Rocky Flats land swap an attempt to make a turd look palatable

Patricia Calhoun has been following a Rocky Flats land swap that paves the way for another link in the controversial Jefferson County Parkway. One reader feels strongly that the deal isn't a good one.

Rocky Flats land swap goes through: Pardon our dust!

When the dust finally settled on December 31, a complicated $10 million land swap involving the Colorado State Land Board, Boulder and Boulder County, Jefferson County and the Department of the Interior -- which now owns Rocky Flats, the former nuclear weapons plant -- had gone through. And that pav ... More >>

Rocky Flats land swap waiting on judge's decision -- a year after the deal announced

Pardon our dust! Exactly a year ago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced a complicated land swap at the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge -- the former nuclear weapons plant, minus several hundred acres too contaminated to go public -- that would expand the refuge to the west in exchange ... More >>

Arapahoe Snowfly candidate for endangered list: What are other contenders?

The Arapahoe Snowfly is so small that you wouldn't notice if you inhaled it. At just .2 inches long, it's certainly not the kind of cuddly creature that appears on birthday cards and computer backgrounds. (Like mine, which just so happens to feature an effing adorable photo of two Denver Zoo polar b ... More >>

Golden accuses beltway proponents of sneak attack

For months the City of Golden met with Jefferson County and state authorities, trying to come up with a plan that would could increase and ease the flow of traffic in the metro area as it also protected the town. But those negotiations came to a halt at the very end of December, and Golden soon join ... More >>

Rocky Flats critics want radioactive material testing before Jefferson Parkway construction

​A group of local residents have just sent a letter to officials in Arvada, Broomfield, Westminster, Golden and Superior, urging them to request that the Environmental Protection Agencies and the state's health department test airborne dust in the area of Rocky Flats that could become part of ... More >>

Rocky Flats land swap: Department of Justice headed to court to lift roadblock

The Justice Department could be in federal court today, filing a motion to lift the roadblock that Superior (joined by Golden) put in the path of the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife's plan to transfer a 300-foot right-of-way on the east side of Rocky Flats to the Jefferson Parkway Public Highwa ... More >>

Rocky Flats land swap deal for Jefferson Parkway going nowhere fast

Last week, if all had gone according to plan, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would have been finalizing the exchange of a 300-foot right-of-way comprising approximately 100 acres on the eastern border of the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge for a 617-acre parcel on the southwestern corner of ... More >>

Rocky Flats land swap on the rocks after Golden files suit to stop it

Jacob Smith.​Last month it looked like the last roadblocks would be removed to a Rocky Flats land swap that would make 600 acres currently owned by the State Land Board on the southwest corner of the former plutonium-processing plant part of what's now a federal wildlife refuge -- and the U.S. ... More >>

Why Golden put the brakes on the Jefferson Parkway land swap

Despite the efforts of Governor John Hickenlooper and Don Hunt, the head of the Colorado Department of Transportation, the negotiations with Golden, Jefferson County and the group that would build the Jefferson Parkway wound up going nowhere...fast. In mid-December, Golden outlined a $57 million tra ... More >>

Plans for the Jefferson County Parkway are kicking up lots of dust

Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons plant could be a parkway or a bikeway -- way to glow!

​Sixty years ago, metro boosters celebrated the feds' decision to put a factory that would manufacture plutonium triggers for bombs sixteen miles upwind from Denver. Today, the government is still wrestling with what to do with the former Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant, now slated to become ... More >>

Preble's meadow jumping mouse conquers Wyoming -- again

​That gnashing of teeth and muttered cursing you hear is coming from energy companies and developers north of the state border. Last week, U.S. District Judge John L. Kane ruled that an obscure jumping mouse should be considered a threatened species not only in Colorado but in Wyoming, too -- ... More >>

Oil-shale plans could be derailed by ruling on Graham's penstemon, an endangered plant

Susan Meyer​William Blake saw heaven in a wildflower. The energy industry sees nothing but trouble. Last week, a federal judge in Denver ruled that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's decision not to declare an obscure plant as endangered was "arbitrary and capricious" -- a ruling that could ... More >>

Rocky Mountain Arsenal Visitors' Center opens to the public

​Over the past fifteen years, the federal government has turned the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, once one of the most contaminated Superfund sites in the United States, into a wildlife refuge, complete with nature trails, lakes for fishing and summer camps. Tomorrow, the Arsenal will open its newes ... More >>

Letters: "It seems as if every Colorado law-enforcement office is full of people who care absolutely nothing about the facts"

Rocky Mountain Arsenal's transition from Superfund site to wildlife refuge is complete

​Fifteen years after Shell Oil Company and the U.S. Army began a massive, $2.1 billion cleanup at Rocky Mountain Arsenal, one of the most contaminated Superfund sites in the United States, the Army is getting ready to hand over the last of its cleaned parcels to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Serv ... More >>

Preble's mighty meadow jumping mouse is back! Eeeek!

​Nothing moves swiftly in the upper echelons of government decision-making -- especially when the decisions have to do with a tiny rodent that can stall development projects. Today marks the public-comment deadline on the proposal for critical habitat designation of the Preble's meadow jumpi ... More >>

Ken Salazar's shakeup at Interior: Where will it all end?

There's a new sheriff -- and a lot of new acronyms -- in town.​In the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil slick disaster, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar is barreling ahead in his efforts to reform the embattled Minerals Management Service, the once-obscure agency responsible for overseein ... More >>

Ken Salazar sued by conservation group crying fowl over the Sprague's Pipit

WildEarth Guardians says this little guy deserves to be listed as an endangered species.​A prominent wildlife conservation group is suing Secretary of the Interior (and former Colorado Senator) Ken Salazar for reportedly failing to protect a prairie song bird that many say is nearing extinctio ... More >>

Ken Salazar's gotta be happy: The black-tailed prairie dog isn't endangered after all

Stop resting easy, pal. You're not endangered anymore.​Last December, when President Barack Obama first announced the nomination of Colorado Senator Ken Salazar as Secretary of the Interior, Tucson's Center for Biological Diversity criticized the choice, claiming that Salazar's environmental r ... More >>

See this bobcat? A Colorado couple has been charged with wanting to kill and skin it

A Flickr photo"If I ever see that Jeffrey Bodnar, I'm gonna rip him a new one."​ Hey, Jeffrey Bodnar and Veronica Anderson-Bodnar. If you're guilty of what a federal grand jury in Denver indicted you for earlier this week, you won't win a popularity contest among nature and animal lovers. The ... More >>

New website charts what parts of Colorado are being stimulated

A photo from the StimulusColorado.org website. StimulusColorado.org, a new website co-sponsored by Associated General Contractors of Colorado, the Colorado Association of Mechanical and Plumbing Contractors, Colorado Contractors Association, the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce and the Metro Denver ... More >>

Ken Salazar wants windmills in the ocean, but first he'll have to save the Interior Department

Get ready for the Gunnison sage grouse

The Waunita Lek near Gunnison, mating grounds for a large group of Gunnison sage grouse, is open for public viewings, and bird watchers will have good news to share with the rare species, which puts on an unusual and exotic springtime dance. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that i ... More >>

PETA in the news again: "Sea Kittens" campaign making me hungry

There is almost nothing I can say about this that wouldn't get me picketed.  Direct from the PETA website at www.peta.org: People don't seem to like fish. They're slithery and slimy, and they have eyes on either side of their pointy little heads--which is weird, to say the least. Plus, the smal ... More >>

Environmental group rips Obama's choice of Ken Salazar as Interior Secretary

Local coverage of Barack Obama's selection of Colorado Senator Ken Salazar as the next Secretary of the Interior has mostly been rah-rah, sis-boom-bah. Take the Denver Post editorial "Salazar a Wise Choice for West, Nation." But as noted in a National Public Radio story, assorted environmental gro ... More >>

Stop Bird Porn: The leading contenders for weirdest, most worthless DNC protesters

Going, Going, Gone

Will the first new American bird discovered in a hundred years be the next to go extinct?

A Split Decision for Mighty Mouse

For the Birds

Take a gander at the government's new plan.

Building a Better Mousetrap

Biologist Rob Ramey isn't afraid of taking risks -- but taking on environmentalists may be his riskiest move.

A Gopher in Your Pocket?

Douglas County's very own gopher is the latest endangered-species hopeful.

Best Wildlife Web Site

Greenwood Wildlife Rehabilitation Sanctuary

A Wing and a Prayer

The peregrine falcon is back -- and falconers want to get their hands on the bird.

The Missing Lynx

This Colorado biologist became an endangered species at the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Best Liquid Asset

David Jamiel

Wild Goose Chase

Ron Ruhr thinks a lot of himself, but not as much as Colorado wildlife officials did.

Pest of the West

Death comes for the prairie dog.

He Walks With the Animals

Maybe Jasper Carlton is a radical -- or maybe he's ahead of his time.

The Wild Life

Special agents of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service fight battles outdoors and in the office.

Dog Eat Dog

From shooters to lawmakers to developers to environmentalists, prairie dogs are wagging everyone.

Shy, but Not Retiring

Colonel Bishop, Rocky Mountain Arsenal boss, has left the Army--but he's already back on the job.

Of Mice and Men

What the battle to save an obscure rodent says about the cost of front range growth.

Off Limits

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