Pronghorn Herd Faces Obstacles from
Natural Gas Boom in Rocky Mountain West
The pronghorn, a close relative of the antelope, is the fastest mammal in North America and an iconic creature in the American West, where an estimated 700,000 roam the high desert and plains. In recent years, however, intensive development — including a natural gas drilling boom in Wyoming and Colorado — has begun to eat away at the pronghorn’s territory.
In a video report for Yale Environment 360, “End of the Range: Plight of the Pronghorn,” journalists Daniel Glick and Ted Wood, of The Story Group, examine the fate of one small herd of pronghorn that has migrated for more than 6,000 years from the Grand Teton Mountains in Wyoming to their wintering grounds. The several hundred pronghorn that still make the 160-mile round-trip migration now face an obstacle course of drilling pads, roads, fences, and new subdivisions.
The threats to this small band of pronghorn — part of the 46,000-strong Upper Green River Valley herd — prompted the U.S. Forest Service in 2008 to officially designate a section of the migration route as a federally protected migration corridor; scientists and conservationists now want that protection extended to the rest of the migration route. As Glick notes, “The West’s iconic landscapes and animals are paying a steep price for our energy addictions.”
7 April 2010
‘Rewilding’ the World:
A Bright Spot for Biodiversity
As burgeoning human populations place greater pressure on wild areas, a strategy is emerging for preserving threatened lands and wildlife. Known as ‘rewilding,’ it involves expanding core wilderness areas, connecting them via corridors that allow humans and animals to co-exist, and protecting and reintroducing top predators.
Yellowstone’s Grizzly Bears
Face Threats on Two Fronts
The magnificent creature at the heart of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem now confronts two grave perils: the loss of its key food source because of rising temperatures, and increased killing by humans. A renowned grizzly expert argues that it’s time to once again protect Yellowstone’s grizzlies under the Endangered Species Act.
Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy
of Mountaintop Removal Mining
During the last two decades, mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia has destroyed or severely damaged more than a million acres of forest and buried nearly 2,000 miles of streams. This video, produced by Yale Environment 360
, offers a first-hand look at mountaintop removal and what is at stake for Appalachia’s environment and its people.
Yale Environment 360 is
a publication of the
Yale School of Forestry
& Environmental Studies
Yale Environment 360
articles are now available in Spanish and Portuguese on Universia
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Business & Innovation
Policy & Politics
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Science & Technology
Antarctica and the Arctic
Central & South America
Tribal people and ranchers join together to stop a project that would haul coal across their Montana land. Watch the video.
is now available for mobile devices at e360.yale.edu/mobile
An aerial view of why Europe’s per capita carbon emissions are less than 50 percent of those in the U.S. View the photos.
Ugandan scientists monitor the impact of climate change on one of Africa’s most diverse forests and its extraordinary wildlife. Learn more.
video series looks at the staggering amount of food wasted in the U.S. – a problem with major human and environmental costs. Watch the video.
video goes onto the front lines with Colorado firefighters confronting deadly blazes fueled by a hotter, drier climate. Watch the video.
A three-part series Tainted Harvest
looks at the soil pollution crisis in China, the threat it poses to the food supply, and the complexity of any cleanup. Read the series.