by Page Lambert John and I are driving down an unfurling ribbon of highway en route to the Black Hills of Wyoming and the small town of Sundance, population 1222. I’m doing battle with the State’s Department of Transportation, which has decreed to realign a major state highway through the pristine heart of the ranchland

Text by Olga Mironenko | Photos by David Rapport Our planet is populated by an incredibly wide variety of creatures. Coming in different sizes and with different sets of adaptations to their respective environments, they inhabit the so-called planetary envelopes: hydrosphere, cryosphere, lower layers of the atmosphere, and upper layers of the lithosphere, creating a

Text by William H. Thomas Social Network Analysis and graphs by Chris Leberknight I began working in New Guinea in 1988. My first teacher was a man named Tama. Tama was born and had spent most of his life in the heart of this island, roaming the forests at the headwaters of the Strickland River

by Jean Thomas . . For tens of thousands of years, the people of Papua New Guinea (PNG) have hunted animals for food. They used bows and arrows, made traps, and used poison vines. In the 1950s this all changed for the Wape people of the Torricelli Mountain Range, a remote area in northwestern PNG.

Katherine Dominique Lind . In 2014, Nature found her voice. Struggling against deforestation, gasping for air, and fed up with the carelessness of her tenants, Nature spoke up. No more passive-aggressive notes on the fridge; no more pleas imploring care and consideration. Nature put her foot down and reminded humans that she doesn’t need us,

by Joanna Dobson . I traveled to Altai for the second time in 2002. On my first visit there two years back, the landscapes of this small republic in southern Siberia made such a profound impression on me that I felt I had to return. When I recall this second journey, I find that I

by Tom Corcoran . To Walk in the Gamaran Protected Forest Given the myriad of contradictions, spending time in the ancient forests of West Sumatra with Minangkabau people (Minang) is perhaps a challenge for the mind and spirit of any conservationist. Traditionally a people of the forest, the Minang are the world’s largest matrilineal society, with

Photos and text by Sonja Swift When it rains in California I rejoice. I see the land drinking. I see grass blades emerging, shining jade green where there was only thatch, brittle and crisp, next to a stone-dry cow patty. I know the dusty taste of summer here, and the dread of summer prolonged. I know

by Katherine Zavala At 4,000 meters high, surrounded by mountaintops, looking over a deep blue lake, I am welcomed by a group of Indigenous Quechua members in the Andes Mountains of Peru. They are members of the Association of Communities in the Potato Park (ACPP), Parque de la Papa, which unites more than 6,000 members

by William H. Thomas Buried deep within the Western psyche rests a romantic myth that neither evidence nor exposure has been able to extinguish—the Noble Savage. Although it no longer has scientific currency, the idea that traditional societies uncorrupted by civilization are able to live in balance with their surroundings continues to subtly permeate the