Articles & Essays
Fire in the hole: the Indigenous crews blasting the Alaskan rainforest to save it
After a historic land buyback by the US Forest Service, Tlingit crew members are demolishing culverts to restore streams, salmon runs and cultural history deep in the Tongass national forest. Photograph: blickwinkel/Alamy
Living in the Alaska rainforest with 1,000 bears: ‘Not the easiest place to be homeless’
As housing prices increase in the picturesque town of Sitka, those already living on the edge are pushed off further into the wilderness.
It Goes Up Like Tinder: Unprecedented Blazes Envelop Alaska
Alaska has seen more than 500 forest fires since the beginning of April, which have forced the evacuation of mining camps, villages and remote cabins.
We need the Tongass now more than ever
President Trump’s decision to direct his agriculture secretary to explore opening America’s largest national forest to logging comes as no surprise, considering that Friedrich Trump, the president’s grandfather, made his original fortune amid the Alaska gold rush.
We Need Salmon In Alaska and the Pacific Northwest, and They Need Our Protection
It’s winter king salmon season now in Sitka, trollers prowling the fishing boundary as chinook fatten up on needlefish, herring and krill, in preparation for their spring journeys home to their native streams.
Trees Older Than America: a Primeval Alaskan Forest Is At Risk in the Trump Era
Tongass is the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest, with trees more than 1,000 years old. But a pro-logging effort could uproot them.
Pebble Mine Threatens One of Alaska’s Last Great Salmon Rivers
Corporate gold diggers pan for profit where millions of salmon spawn.
Like a conveyor belt of salmon: A Southeast fishing run to remember
A few weeks ago, I began receiving satellite text messages from Eric Jordan aboard the troller IGotta, with detailed reports on daily chum poundages. Could I break free from obligations in Sitka and fly down to deckhand for a bit, catch some fish?
Guest Essay: A Gold Rush In Salmon Country
It is almost winter again here. The days shorten and the furrows of the volcano that looms over our town steadily fill with snow.
Protecting Alaska’s Old Growth Forest
One of the benefits of living in Alaska is that the rest of the country tends to forget about you. The frozen north, may they remain happy while gnawing on whale.
Trees Do Better Standing Up
Southeast Alaskans are on the front line of the fight to protect the Tongass National Forest from logging.
A Canadian Threat to Alaskan Fishing
From fall through spring, the fleet of commercial fishing boats here in the panhandle of Alaska stalk winter king salmon. In the mornings prisms of ice sparkle beneath the sodium lights of the docks, where I live on a World War II tugboat with my wife and 8-month-old daughter.