Excerpt - From the Founders
"Courtney, the Berlin Wall fell down up here."

"These are the words Forest Service District Ranger Crockett Dumas used to describe the results of a workshop co-hosted by The Quivira Coalition in Peñasco, New Mexico, last June. He was referring to the wall between ranchers and environmentalists in the region.

"What did we do to bring down this "Berlin Wall?" Nothing more than invite reasonable people to a meeting, encourage them to listen to some new ideas about ranching and ecology, and give them a chance to respond. We also took a walk through the woods, literally, to see what the land looks like in real life.

"During the workshop, Dr. Craig Allen, an ecologist, told the audience what the ranchers already knew, that 50% of forest grasslands have disappeared over the last 50 years in northern New Mexico, mostly due to the proliferation of piñon pines and junipers. Fire, he said, was the key to restoring grass. His research detailed how low-intensity fires burned the forest every 7-15 years historically. The future of ranching, he concluded, is tied to returning forests to ecological health."

Contents:

• "The Southwestern Willow Flycatcher and Me" -David Ogilvie
• "From the Founders" -Jim Winder, Courtney White, Barbara Johnson
• "Handling Endangered Species - Species by Species or at Landscape Levels?" -Rex D. Pieper
• "The Case of the Rancher and the Black-Footed Ferret: a True Story" -Dan Dagget
• "Example of Good Stewardship: Phil Knight and the Date Creek Ranch"
• "An Outdoor Classroom on Rangeland Health - and Hope"
• "The Far Horizon" -Courtney White
• "The Wildlands Project and Cattle Grazing" -Rod Mondt