Bad News For Bears
By Mike Lynch
December 21, 2016
Bear encounters in the backcountry and in residential areas were much more common than usual during the summer of 2016 in the Adirondack Park.
The only independent, nonprofit news organization solely dedicated to reporting on the Adirondack Park.
Through its news reporting and analysis, the nonprofit Adirondack Explorer furthers the wise stewardship, public enjoyment for all, community vitality, and lasting protection of the Adirondack park.
Subscribe to our print magazine
Support our journalism
Sign up for our emails
Article Types Results:
By Mike Lynch
December 21, 2016
Bear encounters in the backcountry and in residential areas were much more common than usual during the summer of 2016 in the Adirondack Park.
December 20, 2016
As you approach through the autumn forest and stand over the simple graves blanketed in pine needles and obscured by a low canopy of ferns it’s easy to give in to the thought, these are lost souls. Two children placed in the ground nearly one hundred and twenty years ago. Two wooden crosses, side by…
November 22, 2016
Protect the Adirondacks lawsuit could clarify state constitution’s mandate against destroying trees in the Forest Preserve. By PHIL BROWN A rose is a rose is a rose, Gertrude Stein said. Defining a tree is not so simple. That question—what is a tree?—has emerged as a central issue in a long-running dispute over the construction of…
November 14, 2016
Retired Forest Ranger Steve Ovitt aims to connect North Creek with the wild lands around the community. By BILL MCKIBBEN To really understand this story, you have to bear in mind two distinctive things about North Creek. One, it butts up against the mountains much tighter than most Adirondack communities. Start on the path that…
By Mike Lynch
October 25, 2016
Observers say more money is needed to repair and maintain an antiquated network of hiking routes. By MIKE LYNCH When many of the High Peaks’ trails were cut more than a century ago, the work was done by guides and hired hands. Keene Valley’s Orson “Old Mountain” Phelps created the first trail up Mount Marcy in 1861; Verplanck Colvin’s survey workers cut routes up…
October 17, 2016
A coterie of climbers tames the cliffs at one of the wildest, remotest, and most sublime locales in the High Peaks. By ALAN WECHSLER Four and a half hours after our 4:30 a.m. departure from the Garden trailhead in Keene Valley, my two climbing partners and I dropped our packs and looked around. We were surrounded by cliffs: free-standing pillars, tiered walls, slabby…
October 6, 2016
By Tom Woodman A little over eight years ago, Margaret Hawthorn spotted the cabin of her dreams. Set on a small island in the Saranac River beneath a canopy of evergreens and with a view across a marsh to Adirondack peaks, the home spoke to her. “I was helping on the Ninety-Miler [canoe race], and I came through, took one look,…
September 22, 2016
Though on private timberlands, County Line Flow and Fishing Brook are open to the public as a result of Nature Conservancy deal. By PHIL BROWN The Adirondack Park has its share of uninspired names for lakes and ponds. Think of all the Mud Ponds, Grass Ponds, Deer Ponds, and Moose Ponds scattered over our topo…
By Mike Lynch
September 16, 2016
Guideboat makers carry on a craft born in the Adirondacks in the mid-1800s. By MIKE LYNCH Building a traditional Adirondack guideboat is a complex task, with ribs carved from spruce-tree roots and with thin hull planks held in place with several thousand tiny tacks. It can take many weeks to complete one. “I grew up working with…
By Mike Lynch
August 26, 2016
A sharp rise in hikers climbing some of the region’s highest mountains has lead to the degradation of natural resources and raises a variety of other issues.