Understanding the history of public lands is useful if one is to be the best advocate for the conservation of public lands.

This third try may be the charm in Senator Wyden’s long effort to enact public lands legislation to conserve wildlands in the Owyhee and lower Malheur Basins in Oregon.

Blumenauer’s bill would open up Mount Hood National Forest to new logging loopholes.

This is the first of two Public Lands Blog posts on the most consequential Oregonian yet to serve in the United States Senate. In Part 1, we look at his role in enabling the destruction of Oregon forests. In Part 2, we will examine his complicated legacy. While Oregon’s Mark Hatfield was a great US senator, it was not because of his record on the conservation of nature.

This is the third of three Public Lands Blog posts on 30x30, President Biden’s commitment to conserve 30 percent of the nation’s lands and waters by 2030. In Part 1, we examined the pace and scale necessary to attain 30x30. In Part 2, we considered what constitutes protected areas actually being “conserved.” In this Part 3, we offer up specific conservation recommendations that, if implemented, will result in the United States achieving 30 percent by 2030.

Two national monuments in Utah have been restored, but it isn’t over.

Oregon’s redrawn congressional districts will affect the prospects for federal public lands conservation.

This is the first of three Public Lands Blog posts that focus on Oregon’s coast. Part 1 looks at Oregon’s (and the nation’s) “blue carbon” and a congressional effort to conserve and restore it. Part 2 will examine coastal wetland loss, conservation, and restoration. Part 3 will describe a now very rare type of coastal wetland: the tidal swamp or tidal forested wetland.

Most fish and wildlife funding in the United States goes to game species. However, a third of our wildlife species are imperiled and/or vulnerable, and mostly not because of hunting and fishing

The Colorado Plateau, the Great Basin Desert, and the Mojave Desert come together in Washington County, Utah, where the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area (RCNCA) is generally centered. In this transition zone, unusual plant and animal species have evolved, including the dwarf bearclaw-poppy (Arctomecon humilis) and Shivwits milk-vetch (Astragalus ampullarioides), small native plants that grow nowhere else on earth.

The old forests of the Pacific Northwest are in far better condition today than they would be if not for Professors Jerry F. (for Forest!) Franklin and K. Norman Johnson. “Norm and Jerry,” as they are affectionately (or, depending upon your point of view, derisively) known, have had a greater positive impact on federal forest policy in the Pacific Northwest than any other individuals.

Soon after the first attacks on the roadless rule, legislation was introduced in both the Senate and the House of Representatives to “codify” the roadless rule into a statute, making it part of the United States Code. The first roadless area bills were introduced in 2002 in the 107th Congress. The bills have been reintroduced in most, but not all, Congresses since 2002 and are due to be introduced again.

“Despite spending over $17 billion on fish recovery efforts, Idaho salmon and steelhead numbers are not improving and will continue to get worse,” says Representative Mike Simpson (R-2-ID). “Will we spend $20 billion more in the next thirty years only to have them go extinct anyway? The worse they get, the more we will spend.”

The proposed River Democracy Act (RDA) would expand 42 existing wild and scenic rivers (WSRs) and establish 81 new wild and scenic rivers. All the proposed new and expanded components are listed at the end of this post.

This preremembrance is the first of an Oregon conservationist who never held elected office (though Brock tried once) or was the environmental soul of one who did. I’d had it in the back of my mind to preremember Brock, but other Public Lands Blog topics kept taking priority. Now the publication of Brock’s autobiography makes this preremembrance rise to the top.

Upon the election last November of Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr., as the 46th president of the United States, I felt an overwhelming sense of relief for the environment, the body politic, and the republic. Goodbye, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

This last post of the year to my Public Lands Blog is a bit different in that it focuses less on public lands and more on public democracy (though I haven’t forgotten public lands). It is also uncharacteristically short. I’m eschewing graphics, as any relevant images would be of politicians.

If not for the Cold War (1945–1991), there might well have been a national park in Oregon’s Cascade Mountains. In his brief time among us, Simons was instrumental in the establishment of North Cascades National Park in Washington and was just turning his focus to the establishment of a Cascade Volcanic National Park in Oregon.

This is the second of two Public Lands Blog posts on the public value of state trust lands and how such lands might be brought into public ownership. Part 1 was a national overview, while Part 2 focuses on state trust lands in Oregon.

This is the first of two Public Lands Blog posts on the public value of state trust lands and how such lands might be brought into public ownership. Part 1 is a national overview, while Part 2 will focus on state trust lands in Oregon.