The only independent, nonprofit news organization solely dedicated to reporting on the Adirondack Park.
By Phil Brown
Last weekend I paddled with our publisher, Tom Woodman, on four ponds south of Floodwood Road. Tom wrote about our trip for the Explorer’s Adirondack Dispatches blog, so I won’t cover the same ground (or water, rather). I’m just taking the opportunity to post a photo of one of my favorite wildflowers, blue flag. I…
By Phil Brown
David Gibson and Dan Plumley, both of whom resigned this month from Protect the Adirondacks, are thinking about forming a new environmental organization. “We’re talking a lot about the possibility. Nothing’s crystallized,” said Gibson, who once served as Protect’s executive director. Meanwhile, Charles Clusen, the chairman of the Protect board, said Protect expects to hire…
By Phil Brown
The state Department of Environmental Conservation released today a forest-ranger report for Memorial Day weekend. Nothing too exciting. A broken ankle. A missing hiker who turned up OK. And several small forest fires. The full text of the report follows. DEC FOREST RANGER MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND ACTIVITY REPORT High Peaks Search & Rescue…
By Phil Brown
Over the past four years, the number of endangered Indiana bats in New York State has plummeted about 50 percent. And that’s the good news. The populations of other bat species in the state have fallen as much as 90 percent. State biologist Al Hicks told the Adirondack Park Agency on Thursday that three species—the…
By Phil Brown
The state Department of Environmental Conservation is standing by its decision that the fire tower on Hurricane Mountain should be torn down to comply with the Adirondack Park State Land Master Plan. DEC’s recommendation apparently is at odds with the wishes of the Adirondack Park Agency board, whose members indicated last month that they’d like…
By Phil Brown
Hamilton County officials are livid over the state’s plan to close the Moose River Plains Recreation Area to motor vehicles, saying it will hurt the region’s economy, intensify political tensions, and harden stances against land acquisitions by the state. “It’s one of the worst ideas I’ve seen in recent times,” said Bill Farber, the chairman…
By Phil Brown
Because of the state’s fiscal crisis, the Department of Environmental Conservation doesn’t plan to open the roads in the popular Moose River Plains Recreation Area this year. The large tract of state land, located between the hamlets of Inlet and Indian Lake, has forty miles of dirt roads and 140 primitive campsites. The sites are…
By Phil Brown
Last week’s snowstorm notwithstanding, this is paddling season. In fact, the additional snowmelt from the storm will improve paddling on Adirondack rivers. This is a good time of year to explore the West Branch of the Ausable River on the outskirts of Lake Placid—a river that attracts schools of trout fishermen but is often overlooked…
By Phil Brown
The New York Post has raised questions about the state’s purchase of Lyon Mountain from the Nature Conservancy in late 2008 for $10 million. Four years earlier, the conservancy paid $6.3 million for the same twenty thousand acres. In an editorial on Wednesday, the Post called the rise in price “a staggering 57 percent profit…
By Phil Brown
Last week, I posted a list of rock-climbing routes that are closed to protect the postential nesting sites of peregrine falcons. This morning, the state Department of Environmental Conservation announced that it is adding the Upper Washbowl routes to the list. The following is an e-mail sent out by Joe Racette, a DEC wildlife biologist:…