Category: Western Resource Fellows

Making Water Real: Tribal Water Rights and the Infrastructure Gap in the Colorado River Basin – Alice Le Bihan

Posted on by Josh Blake

The next time you turn on your tap, think backwards. Imagine rewinding the journey of the drop of water in your hand. It flows back through the pipes in your home, beneath the streets, past treatment plants and pumping stations, until it returns to the river or reservoir where it first entered the system. That Read more about Making Water Real: Tribal Water Rights and the Infrastructure Gap in the Colorado River Basin – Alice Le Bihan[…]

The Middle of Everywhere – Change is Center Stage In the Jornada Del Muerto – Sam Jurado

Posted on by Josh Blake

A white sun hangs on the arch of heaven as purple mountains rest beneath a veil of dust. Shrubs sway, grasses wither, and sun-bleached skulls lie scattered across the desert floor. The Jornada del Muerto is many things: a parched basin at the northernmost reaches of the Chihuahuan Desert, a United States Department of Agriculture Read more about The Middle of Everywhere – Change is Center Stage In the Jornada Del Muerto – Sam Jurado[…]

Vegetative and Climatic Controls of Aboveground Net Primary Production and Radiation Use Efficiency Along a North to South Transect in the Western Great Plains – Isabella Goodman

Posted on by Josh Blake

Isabella is studying seven sites along a latitudinal gradient spanning nearly 1,800 miles from Kyle, Saskatchewan, Canada, to Marfa, Texas. She is using an ecosystem water balance model to estimate soil moisture to be used in linear models to determine the climatic vs. vegetative controls of radiation use efficiency along the latitudinal gradient in the Read more about Vegetative and Climatic Controls of Aboveground Net Primary Production and Radiation Use Efficiency Along a North to South Transect in the Western Great Plains – Isabella Goodman[…]

Ecosystems of Reform: Comparing Water Reallocation Strategies in the Western US and South Africa – Alaina Geibig

Posted on by Josh Blake

At the edge of the Atlantic, the blackened sea gave way to sandstone remnants of an ancient river valley floor, now suspended impossibly in the sky. These were the same Table Mountain monuments I saw twelve hours before. With boarding pass in hand, passengers filed down the metal jet bridge fashioned with askew glossy photos of dream destinations, including (most appropriately) Cape Town.   South Africa greeted me with golden Read more about Ecosystems of Reform: Comparing Water Reallocation Strategies in the Western US and South Africa – Alaina Geibig[…]

Op-Ed Published in the SL Tribune: Making the Case to Rename Mormon Crickets – Li Murphy

Posted on by Josh Blake

Yesterday, Yale School of the Environment student Li Murphy, a Western Resource Fellow with the Ucross High Plains Stewardship Initiative, published an op-ed in The Salt Lake Tribune calling for a rethinking of how we name and relate to “Mormon crickets” in the American West. The piece explores the ecological, cultural, and political stakes of Read more about Op-Ed Published in the SL Tribune: Making the Case to Rename Mormon Crickets – Li Murphy[…]

Some Favorites from a Summer in the Field – Isabella Goodman

Posted on by Josh Blake

This past summer I drove from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan to Marfa, Texas. This wasn’t your typical summer road trip. This was a field work campaign where we sampled herbaceous biomass (grasses and forbs) and collected soil samples to estimate aboveground net primary production and radiation use efficiency along a latitudinal temperature gradient.    During this field Read more about Some Favorites from a Summer in the Field – Isabella Goodman[…]

A Legal System for Everyone: My Summer at Cottonwood Environmental Law Center – Bella Amell

Posted on by Josh Blake

As the first in my family to attend college, the legal system is admittedly very intimidating to me. Even considering going to law school feels like a massive undertaking. An undertaking that I, as someone born and raised in a small town, feel massively underprepared to take on. The pre-law students I know are mostly Read more about A Legal System for Everyone: My Summer at Cottonwood Environmental Law Center – Bella Amell[…]

Clipping My Way Through the Sagebrush Sea – Jianing Tian

Posted on by Josh Blake

Fieldwork always sounds romantic and serene from the outside: wide open skies, fresh air and soft breezes, fragrant sagebrush, and a mischievous choir of tiny creatures. But when your main task is clipping grasses and forbs for biomass, the reality is often more like an endurance activity, especially when you’re up against certain “special” plants Read more about Clipping My Way Through the Sagebrush Sea – Jianing Tian[…]

From the Field to the Lab Furnace: Wrapping Up Soil Sampling in Wyoming – Myroslav Bur

Posted on by Josh Blake

As summer winds down, so does the fieldwork portion of my research in Pinedale, Wyoming. The past weeks have been filled with long days in the sun, navigating sagebrush, and collecting soil samples from gas fracking sites—but the lab work is just beginning. With field sampling complete, I’m now turning to the lab phase at Read more about From the Field to the Lab Furnace: Wrapping Up Soil Sampling in Wyoming – Myroslav Bur[…]

Reciprocity & the Research Process – Carine Rofshus

Posted on by Josh Blake

Pueblo pottery signifies a reciprocal relationship between humans and clay, which is considered a sacred gift from Mother Earth. Before gathering clay, permission is asked, a prayer, and an offering are given to the Earth. Nuch-ochu-quijo, Unripe-earth-old-lady, then joins the potter in the creation process to form a new being, who takes its form as Read more about Reciprocity & the Research Process – Carine Rofshus[…]

First Month in the Field and Yellowstone Trip – Myroslav Bur

Posted on by Josh Blake

My first time stepping onto the soil of sagebrush-dominated steppe was a breathtaking experience for me, someone who grew up among the limitless forests of northern Ukraine. The contrast between this arid, open, mountainous landscape and the dense woods commonly observed during my entire lifetime still leaves me with admiration. Seeing the Wind River Range Read more about First Month in the Field and Yellowstone Trip – Myroslav Bur[…]

The kindness of strangers in the remote open prairies—Isabella Goodman

Posted on by Madeline Gupta

The northern great plains aren’t the most social space, they aren’t your typical eco-tourism destination, and the vast endless wide-open space doesn’t necessarily cultivate a lot of human-to-human interactions. We sometimes go hours without seeing another car.  This became apparent at the first site of my field work campaign. I am driving from southern Saskatchewan Read more about The kindness of strangers in the remote open prairies—Isabella Goodman[…]

Yarning: An Indigenous Knowledge Approach to Ethnographic Methods with Heritage Lands Collective—Carine Rofshus

Posted on by Madeline Gupta

My first week with Heritage Lands Collective, a non-profit organization dedicated to integrating Indigenous Knowledges (IK) into Tribal co-management of ancestral lands, was spent at the Bears Ears National Monument in southeast Utah. Bears Ears is the ancestral homelands of the Hopi, Ute, Navajo, Rio Grande Pueblos, and the Zuni. Joseph Gazing Wolf (Lakota/Amazigh/Nubian) and Read more about Yarning: An Indigenous Knowledge Approach to Ethnographic Methods with Heritage Lands Collective—Carine Rofshus[…]

Lessons from a Minolta X-700 —Alaina Geibig

Posted on by Madeline Gupta

My dad captured nearly my entire childhood on grainy-textured, saturated film prints. Recently, with him moving from the far side of Colorado, we endeavored to trim the photo contents of four sagging storage tubs. It was a slow task of recollection, necessitating hot tea and stories. With containers half-sorted, I noticed that the film record Read more about Lessons from a Minolta X-700 —Alaina Geibig[…]

Radiation Use Efficiency in the Western Great Plains

Posted on by Madeline Gupta

Aboveground net primary production (ANPP) in drylands is often estimated using the Monteith Model. This model relies on an estimation of radiation use efficiency (RUE), which is the amount of dry matter produced per unit of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation. While ANPP trends are well studied, RUE remains less explored, particularly regarding the role of Read more about Radiation Use Efficiency in the Western Great Plains[…]