Gazing up at mountains from their valleys down below, it's hard, if not impossible, to detect any change on the top of the mountains. But change is ongoing, especially in recent history as the climate continues to warm.

From Tacoma or Seattle in Washington state, the snowy summit of Mount Rainier National Park appears unchanged from how it's always looked. Snowy. But is that truly the case? What would you think if someone told you the top of the summit no longer is 14,410 feet high, that the high point of the park has actually shrunk?

Our guests today are Eric Gilbertson, a mechanical engineer and mountaineer from Seattle University, and Scott Hotaling, a watershed sciences professor from Utah State University, who have measured the thickness of the ice cap on the summit of Mount Rainier. What they have to say may surprise you.

The government shutdown has been record-setting in terms of its length. So, too, has been the time that many employees of the National Park Service have been furloughed without pay.

How has the shutdown affected the parks, and how have the friends groups that support the parks responded? We're going to discuss that today with Chris Lenhertz from the Golden Gate Conservancy, Jacki Harp from Smokies Life, Eric Stiles from Friends of Acadia, and Cassius Cash from the Yosemite Conservancy.

It's been said that the night skies are the other half of the National Park System. And it only makes sense, for when you're in a park and the sun goes down you tend to look into the night sky to spot constellations or, if you're lucky enough and in the right place, a comet overhead.

Keeping that other half of the park system in mind, today's podcast will be a somewhat dark one. Our guest is Jeff Pfaller, a fine arts photographer who spent five years capturing night skies over national parks and other public lands.

A book coming out in October by Pfaller showcases synchronous fireflies at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the famous illumination that makes Horsetail Fall in Yosemite National Park look like a cascading stream of lava, a shot of the whirling Milky Way against a colorful stump of petrified wood at Petrified Forest National Park, and many other nighttime images that remind us of that other half of the park system is overhead.

National Parks Traveler readers can obtain a $15 discount on the book's purchase price by using this link to order it.

It was just over a month ago when the federal government was staring at the possibility of a shutdown. Well, little seemingly has changed in the ensuing four weeks, other than that the House of Representatives has a new speaker in Mike Johnson from Louisiana, and the full chamber has settled on its budget numbers for fiscal 2024…which started back on October 1.
 
While most national parks likely will close if there is a government shutdown on November 17, what is more pressing for the National Park Service is what budget numbers Congress will settle on for the current fiscal year and whether President Biden will go along with them.
 
Our guests today are John Garder, the senior director for budget & appropriations at the National Parks Conservation Association, and Mike Murray, a long-time NPS employee and superintendent who now serves as chair of the Coalition to Protect America's National Parks. They're here to discuss the current situation facing the Park Service and Park System.

When a young park ranger was asked by his supervisor to clean out an old barn at Grand Teton National Park in the early 1970s, he discovered a dusty and stained blue, grey, and green poster inviting folks to "Meet the Ranger Naturalist at Jenny Lake Museum. This young ranger, Doug Leen, soon discovered that it was one in a series of posters created by the Works Progress Administration to put artists to work and promote visitation to the national parks during the late 1930s.
This week the Traveler's Lynn Riddick sits down with Doug to discuss his newly released book documenting his life-long journey to find the original WPA posters and protect them.

There are more than 2,000 species currently listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. And while species that gain protection under the act have a great chance to survive, not all do.
Just recently the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that 21 species – birds, fish, mussels, plants, and even a bat – were officially declared extinct. 
We're going to discuss that news, and the role of the Endangered Species Act in striving to prevent extinction, with Noah Greenwald, the endangered species director at the Center for Biological Diversity, and Lindsay Rosa, the vice president of conservation research and innovation at Defenders of Wildlife.

As you walk through the white gypsum sands of White Sands National Park in southern New Mexico, your footprints will likely be quickly erased by shifting winds. So it's somewhat of a phenomenon of nature that the oldest footprints ever discovered in North America are not only found here — in perfect form, having withstood time and weather — but show that ancient humans lived here much earlier than previously believed. 
A research team from the U-S Geological Survey earlier this month strengthened their findings released in 2021 that dated these footprints to as much as 23,000 years old. That finding erased previous theories that humans first arrived in North America some 11,000 years ago, after the end of the last Ice Age. 
This week the Traveler's Lynn Riddick talks with key researchers from the U.S. Geological Survey team about their initial analysis of the footprints as well as their follow-up study that confirmed the age dating…and what it all means to our long-sought understanding of human colonization on this continent.

The Olympic Peninsula of Washington state is a wild and wooly place, even now in the 21st century. That's no doubt largely because the heart of the peninsula is taken up by Olympic National Park, a more than 900,000-acre jigsaw puzzle of glaciers and peaks, rainforests, rivers, and Pacific coastline.
You might view Olympic National Park as three parks in one: The coastal area battered by the Pacific Ocean, the inland rain forests that cloak the Hoh, Quinault, and Sol Duc areas, and the high, craggy landscape embracing nearly 200 glaciers. If you've never visited the park, or have only experienced it once for a few days, our guest on today's show will no doubt make you want to start planning for a trip to Olympic National Park. 
Tim McNulty is a prolific writer who lives in the shadow of the national park. He has a new book out. Salmon, Cedar, Rock and Rain, that is a perfect introduction on the ecosystem of not just the national park but of the surrounding Olympic Peninsula. 

Snow has fallen in the upper reaches of Yellowstone and Glacier national parks, and fall weather in general is making a national park trip in the northern half of the United States not terribly appealing.

October is a season of transition across the National Park System. Cooler, and in some cases colder, weather is sweeping across the northern states, while southern states are not as blazingly hot as they were just a month or two ago. But school is in session throughout the country, so if your vacation plans are tied to school, you're probably not heading anywhere now for an extended trip.

Which makes it the perfect time to start considering where you might want to go next year. Here in the U.S. you don't need to limit your choices to the National Park System. Canada is just a short drive, or flight, away. Rebecca Latson, Traveler's contributing photographer and columnist, just returned from a trip to the Canadian Rockies, and is here to discuss what she found and what you might consider.

For the second time in five years, and the third time in the past decade, the United States government was poised to shut down this weekend because of an impasse in the House of Representatives over how to fund the government. And, as a result, the National Park System was poised to shut down. Indeed, by the time you're listening to this episode, the parks might already have been closed and visitors already in them being told how soon they must exit.

Different administrations in Washington take different approaches to whether to shut down the parks or keep them open during a government shutdown. Back in 2013 the Obama administration elected to close the parks. Five years ago, the Trump administration decided to keep them open, albeit with skeleton Park Service staffs.

To learn more about the impacts of government shutdowns on the National Park System, both physical and financial, we're joined today by Bob Krumenaker, a recently retired Park Service veteran whose last position was superintendent of Big Bend National Park, and John Garder, the senior director for budget & appropriations at the National Parks Conservation Association.

For the past 240 weeks, the National Parks Traveler has brought you weekly podcasts examining life, news, and exploration of the National Park System. It's been a long-running series that has never lacked for topics.
 
We hope you've found those episodes as informative and interesting as we have. 
 
For this week's show, we're diving into shows from past years to bring you two we think you'll find fascinating. One revolves around the question of whether a gun can keep you safe from bears in the backcountry of parks. We discuss that topic with Tom Smith, a professor of wildlife sciences at Brigham Young University and a member of the National Rifle Association.
 
In the second part, we look back at Lynn Riddick's journey underground at Mammoth Cave National Park. 

Grand Teton National Park is an incredible place, rich in wildlife, mountaineering history, pioneer history, and Native American history. And, rightfully so, it's one of the busiest parks in the National Park System. In 2021 the park saw nearly 4 million visitors, as the public rushed back out into nature after the worst of the Covid pandemic. Last year it counted 2.8 million visitors. 

How many visitors are too many? How has that growing visitation impacted the health of the park, the tasks confronting the National Park Service staff in the park, and your experience as you explore Grand Teton? 

We're going to discuss those topics today with Chip Jenkins, the park superintendent. 

Bison have been in the news recently. The Interior Department this past week released $5 million to help fund both bison restoration and grasslands rehabilitation.  And next month Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan will release their latest documentary, The American Buffalo. The American Buffalo documentary traces the history of how bison nearly went extinct, and how they came back. It will be delivered in a two-part, four-hour series on public television.
Earlier this summer I talked to Dayton Duncan about the project, and we're rerunning that conversation to remind you of the documentary that is set to debut on October 16.

Vessel-whale collisions are a significant concern in Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, where nutrient-rich waters support a seasonal influx of humpback whales and other marine mammals. As one of the most visited marine parks in Alaska, Glacier Bay sees a high volume of vessel traffic, including cruise ships, tour boats, and private craft.

This summer an adult humpback whale was seen with a fresh, one-foot gash behind its dorsal fin which appeared to be from contact with a boat propeller.  This week the Traveler's Lynn Riddick reaches out to biologist Chris Gabriele to discuss this incident and the park's strategies to reduce whale collisions, including monitoring whale activity, warning systems, and public education. 

It's been nearly eight years since a storm of historic proportions pounded Death Valley National Park and did extensive damage in Grapevine Canyon in the northeastern corner of the park where Scotty's Castle stands. The popular tourist attraction still has not reopened as repair work continues.
 
That storm was described as a once-in-a-thousand years storm.
 
A year ago, rainstorms again pounded Death Valley. In roughly three hours 1.5 inches of rain fell on the park and did considerable damage to roads and water systems and shut down the park. That storm also was described as a once-in-a-thousand-years storm.
 
Another powerful storm hit Death Valley National Park two weeks ago. On August 20, 2.2 inches of rain fell at Furnace Creek, according to the National Weather Service, making it the rainiest day on record in the park. For some perspective, during a full year the park usually sees only 2.15 inches of rain.
 
To discuss these storms and how the National Park Service is responding to them we're joined today by Abby Wines, the park's management analyst.

If you were to plan an extended trip through the National Park System, how would you do it?  Where would you go first?  How would you prepare? 

In this week's podcast, the Traveler's Lynn Riddick talks with Cristian Garza, who recently returned from a four-month jaunt through the parks. He clocked some 300 hours of driving across 17,000 miles of the U.S. and Canada and shares some of his experiences and perspectives with Lynn.

In 1964, passage of The Wilderness Act promised Americans that there would be lands designated for preservation and protection in their natural condition. It was a promise from Congress that the American people of present and future generations would be able to enjoy the benefits of an enduring resource of wilderness."
 
When President Johnson signed the act into law, he said that "If future generations are to remember us with gratitude rather than contempt, we must leave them a glimpse of the world as it was in the beginning, not just after we got through with it."
 
Where do things stand with that promise? Has it lived up to its lofty goal? To seek an answer to that question, and to get a better understanding of management of wilderness areas, and potentially wilderness, in the country, we've invited George Nickas and Dana Johnson to join us. 

George is executive director of Wilderness Watch, a national organization dedicated to defending the nation's National Wilderness Preservation System and keeping it wild, and Dana is the organization's policy director.

The New York Times recently summed up one of the biggest climate change stories of the year so far. The planet's average sea surface temperature spiked to a record high in April, and the ocean has remained exceptionally warm ever since, the paper reported. In July, widespread marine heatwaves drove temperatures back up to near record highs, with some hot spots nearing 100 degrees Fahrenheit. 

In late July, water temperatures off the southern tip of Florida surpassed 100 degrees Fahrenheit. What are the impacts of this hot water to Dry Tortugas, Everglades, and Biscayne national parks? We're going to explore that question with Dr. Steve Davis, the chief science officer for the Everglades Foundation. 

Majestic wildlife abounds across the National Park System. You can see wolves, grizzlies and bison in Yellowstone, California condors at Pinnacles and Grand Canyon, moose in Voyageurs, and sea turtles at Cape Hatteras and Padre Island, and elephant seals at Point Reyes National Seashore, just to name some of the possibilities.

Another charismatic species in the park system, but one you're not likely to see, are panthers. Also known as mountain lions, or cougars, depending on the region of the country. These are big stealthy cats, most often on the move after dark, which is why you're not likely to spot one. 

South Florida is best known as home for the Florida panther. Another reason you might not spot one of these cats is because there are so few of them.

Conservationists at the South Florida Wildlands Association fear the population of the iconic Florida Panther may have dwindled to as few as 100 cats.  They don't know for sure, though, because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has not released a species status assessment and population count since 2009. And without current information, the fight for the panther's existence and efforts to curtail development that threatens it, are more challenging than ever.  

In this week's podcast, the Traveler's Lynn Riddick speaks with the executive director of that organization to hear about their latest efforts to address the assaults on the panther's habitat and their approach in protecting this incredible, endangered creature.

Why expand the National Park System? That can be a controversial question. There are many folks who would love to see additional units added, and there are just as many who say the National Park Service does not have the staff or funding to adequately maintain the existing park system.

We've been exploring that question in recent weeks and months, and an argument can be made that since national parks carry the highest protection of natural resources in the country, we should expand the park system to better protect biodiversity and, if possible, help it grow.

In this week's show, Lynn Riddick helps me present you with a story that explores the question of expanding the National Park System for the sake of biodiversity. If you prefer reading the story, rather than having it narrated to you, the long-form post is on the Traveler.

At the end of our story about expanding the park system, Lynn returns with a short audio postcard from Big Cypress National Preserve.

This summer has been one of the hottest for the entire world, with temperatures rising above 100 degrees Fahrenheit quite frequently. Here in the United States, there are many places where the heat has gone well above 100 degrees. And at Death Valley National Park, the temperature this past week attracted crowds hoping to see it reach 130 degrees.

In the National Park System, there are places where summertime heat is routine, something the rangers have become accustomed to and know how to cope with, and something not all park visitors know how to deal with.

To get a sense for conditions this past week in two of the hottest places in the park system, we've reached out to rangers at Grand Canyon National Park and Death Valley National Park. 

There are seemingly endless guides to exploring the national parks: Moon, National Geographic, Lonely Planet, and various other corporate publishers. Indeed, it's rare these days that you find a writer who takes on the role of both guidebook author and publisher. 

Most of these guidebooks take the same approach: a nice overview of the park in question, followed by a breakdown of places to stay, where to eat, things to do, nearby attractions. Mike Oswald is swimming against the current with his park guidebooks. 

First he came out with "Your Guide to the National Parks," a thick, hefty volume that has won awards from the Independent Book Publishers Association. Along with the usual park basics, he fills his chapters with history, maps that point out some of his favorite hikes and don't-miss attractions, some details on plants and animals, a suggested vacation planner, and of course, full-color photographs of some iconic settings. 

Today we're sitting down with Mike to discuss not only his decision to "go independent against those giants in the guidebook publishing world," but also his latest park-related projects. 

When you talk about expanding the National Park System, any expansion should be strategic. Whether it's to protect a cultural or historical site, or one rich in natural resources. Today, if you want to protect natural resources, it should be done with an eye towards protecting biodiversity.

There is too much at stake today to expand the National Park System just for the sake of adding units. The country is losing too much of nature to development, bird populations have been plummeting, and climate change is challenging many other species. 

So where do you look to protect biodiversity from the human footprint? One possible area is the Mobile-Tensaw region of Alabama. To gain an understanding of what's there to protect, we've reached out to Bill Finch, Director of the Paint Rock Research Center in Alabama, and who has been involved in Alabama conservation for more than 30 years. 

Once upon a time, there might have been 60 million bison on the North American continent. The herds were so large that they covered prairies like immense horizon-stretching black cloaks, and their annual migrations carved such wide paths into the landscape that some were turned into roads by human travelers.

 As vast as bison herds were, the species came extremely close to extinction. By the end of the 19th century, there might have been two dozen bison left in the wilds, and they were deep in the heart of Yellowstone National Park. Today however, there might be 500,000 bison in North America, though most are in commercial herds meant for meat production. Designated the national mammal back in 2016, bison are truly charismatic megafauna. So charismatic, in fact, that Dayton Duncan and Ken Burns, who profiled America's National Parks back in 2016, are soon to release a documentary on the history of the bison.

Is nature nonpartisan? Earlier this year we had an interview with Dr. Caleb Scoville from Tufts University, who received an Andrew Carnegie fellowship to explore whether environmental issues are highly partisan.

It can certainly seem that here in America just about everything is partisan these days, but is nature partisan? 

As another of our guests pointed out, those who enjoy going out into nature come in all political flavors. That said, our guest today is Benji Backer, the driver behind the Nature is Nonpartisan campaign to get the American public – all of us – to convince the decision makers in Washington that the environment is too important to be a partisan issue.

A winter heavy in snowfall has slowed the start to the wildfire season across parts of the West, although the return of the El Niño weather pattern in the Pacific Ocean could reverse that start and contribute to another smoky summer in the National Park System west of the Continental Divide.

Climate change, coupled with the departure of the La Niña weather pattern over the Pacific Ocean and the arrival of the El Niño pattern, are making it more challenging to predict fire seasons and fire behavior from year to year.  

Last year when we talked with James Wallman, a meteorologist in the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, he said fire managers don't know what the "new normal" in wildfire seasons and behavior is because "everything is still changing."

With a somewhat slow start to the 2023 fire season in the Southwest, and drier weather patterns over the Northwest, what can we expect from this year's fire season across the National Park System? We'll be back in a minute with Mr. Wallman to see.

There always seem to be calls to expand the National Park System. And those calls always spur a number of questions. 

Why does the National Park System need to be expanded? What sites might be considered for expansion? Can we even afford to expand the system? After all, as the Traveler frequently points out, the National Park Service doesn't have the resources in human capital or financial capital to properly manage the park units it has. There have been a number of stories recently in other news outlets about adding new national parks. But some of those simply point to existing units that are not officially called national parks, and why they should be renamed as national parks. 

But is that really expanding the park system, or is it answering local chamber of commerce calls to rename the parks for economic benefit? Today we're going to dive into this topic with Elaine Leslie, who back in 2017 as chief of biological resources for the National Park Service, contributed to the National Park Service System Plan, charged with envisioning the growth of the National Park System.

Also in the conversation is Michael Kellett, who has spent roughly 40 years advocating for national parks, wilderness, national forests, free-flowing rivers and imperiled wildlife. Michael also is the co-founder and executive director of the New England-based conservation group Restore the North Woods. In that role he is director of the group's new national parks campaign, which is building a grass roots movement for New National Parks across the country.  

It's summer. Not officially, but close enough. Many schools have already taken the next few months off, others will soon join the summer break.

Summer for many is the peak travel time. Parks are a great destination, whether in summer or just about any other month of the year. To help you come up with some ideas of which parks to visit and why, we've invited two members of the Coalition to Protect America's National Parks – Maria Burks and Phil Francis – who collectively have spent more than eight decades working in the National Park System to discuss their favorites.

Horses can be found in many corners of the National Park System. You spot them running wild at Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota, splashing in the surf at Cape Lookout National Seashore in North Carolina and at Assateague Island National Seashore in Maryland and Virginia, and of course as pack animals and tireless steeds that carry both rangers and visitors to the parks.
 
But wild horses are somewhat of a conundrum in the National Park System. They're a conundrum because they technically are not wild, but rather feral, meaning they descended from domesticated horses. As such, they technically are not native wildlife, and that has become an issue. 
 
At Theodore Roosevelt National Park, the National Park Service has raised the question of whether the horses there, as livestock, not native wildlife, should be removed from the park. A recent comment period on that proposal drew more than 7,000 comments, just 45 of which supported removal of the horses.
 
Where the Park Service will come down on horses at Theodore Roosevelt remains to be seen.
 
Across the country, at Cumberland Island National Seashore along the coast of Georgia, there also are feral horses, and their plight has surfaced in the form of a lawsuit that claims that animals not only are damaging the seashore's environment and two federally protected species but are not being humanely managed by the National Park Service and should be removed from the seashore.
 
We're going to explore that issue today with Hal Wright, who brought the lawsuit, Patty Livingston, president of both the Georgia Equine Rescue League and the Georgia Horse Council, and Jessica Howell-Edwards, executive director of Wild Cumberland, an advocacy group for the seashore. 

There are external and internal influences that can impact units of the National Park System. Urban sprawl can strangle parks and their natural resources. Wildfires can sweep across boundaries and into parks. Rivers can flood and wash out trails and roads, as we saw last June at Yellowstone National Park.

Today we're going to be talking about looming threats to Yellowstone and Cape Hatteras National Seashore. 

In the case of Yellowstone, it's a gold mine proposed to be sunk into a mountain towering over the park's northern entrance at Mammoth Hot Springs.

At Cape Hatteras, it's the Atlantic Ocean and the natural dynamics of barrier islands, which were not designed by nature to remain in one place. Instead, they shift as the ocean erodes beaches and moves sand about.

In both of these cases, there are solutions in sight. The question is whether they'll succeed. 

While spring is slowly giving way to summer in many parts of the country, with visitors gaining more and more access to the National Park System, a stand-off in Washington over the country's debt ceiling very likely would greatly disrupt operations in the parks. It was just a decade ago that a federal budget sequestration, that is a forced cut across all federal agencies budgets as part of the Budget Control Act, led to closed campgrounds, Sunday closures of National Park System units, and 900 permanent positions that went unfilled. For the National Park Service, the sequestration led to a 5% budget cut that also led to a reduction in invasive plant control at the parks, a reduction in maintenance of fences and building repairs, science and research activities, and natural resource monitoring.

In Washington today, House Republicans want to see some pretty stiff budget cuts in return for agreeing to raise the debt ceiling. According to the New York Times, one outcome, if the funding cap's proposal put forth by the Republicans is approved, would be a 51% reduction in the Interior Department's budget. How devastating might that be to the National Park Service and the National Park System? We're going to explore that question with Mike Murray, chair of the Coalition to Protect America's National Parks, and John Garder, senior director of Budget and Appropriations at the National Parks Conservation Association. 

National parks are not alone in grappling with crowds. Many gateway communities surrounding our national parks are notable for their own amazing offerings -- natural beauty with tranquil spots for solitude and reflection…and nice venues for dining, listening to live music and pursuing year-round outdoor recreational and leisure activities.  But when the management of visitation in these areas is unchecked, and the very resources that make these places highly desirable destinations are strained, can anything really be done?
 
The community of Jackson, Wyoming, hopes so.  Recognizing that residents, business owners and visitors all share in the responsibility of preserving the area's unique character and allure, stakeholders throughout Teton County have put together a comprehensive sustainable destination management plan. The goal is to protect the beauty of the area, preserve a healthy environment and, at the same time, enhance visitor experience, business growth and quality of life for residents.
 
This week the Traveler's Lynn Riddick talks with Crista Valentino of the Jackson Hole Travel and Tourism Board to find out what's in the plan and how it will help.

It's easy to take the status of national parks for granted. We read wonderful beckoning stories about them in magazines and newspapers. And we watch gorgeous travelogue pieces about them on television. But how much do we know about the operational status of the national parks? How much do we know about the health of the natural resources, the condition of historic structures, the state of the workforce that operates and manages the national parks?

In short, we know really very little about those things. But at Yellowstone National Park, staff has been preparing "State of the Park" reports for some years. These reports provide some insights into the overall health of the park, if you will. Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly sat down with Traveler Editor Kurt Repanshek to discuss this year's report.

Across the National Park System, there are incredible sights that explore American history. There's a robust mix of cultures reflected in the parks, and breathtaking vistas that, well, will take your breath away.

But there also are seemingly countless needs, from backlogs of maintenance projects, interpretation for history, wildlife and science that needs to be crafted, and unique issues that can range from climate change impacts to helping inner city youth visit a park.

Helping the National Park Service tackle these myriad issues and challenges is the National Park Foundation, which Congress created back in 1967 to be the official charitable organization for the parks. Through the years, this organization has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for the parks. Today, with National Parks Week underway, we're joined by Will Shafroth, the Foundation's CEO to discuss not only the needs of the park system, but the successes the Foundation is recognizing in tackling some of them. 

El Camino Real de Los Tejas is a network of trails that connected Spanish missions, settlements, and military outposts from Mexico through Texas and into Louisiana. Now a national historic trail, this road played a crucial role in the Spanish colonization of the region in the late 1600s. It served as a vital route for communication, trade, and military movement. 

Over time, that trail facilitated cultural exchange and interaction between Spanish settlers, indigenous peoples, and later, Anglo-American pioneers. The 2500 mile route is marked by numerous historical sites, including mission ruins, forts, and early settlements. It provides a tangible link to the colonial past and the diverse communities that shaped Texas and the broader Southwest. 

The Traveler's Lynn Riddick takes a stroll along the trail with expert Steven Gonzales, who shares his knowledge about the significance of the trail and the American historical narrative. 

Travel extensively through the National Park System, and you'll quickly come to realize that the park's restaurants try to reflect the local culinary trends, or at least use local ingredients in crafting their menus. For instance, visit national parks in Alaska and you can pretty much count on salmon in the dinner offerings. Travel through the parks in the Rocky Mountains, and elk (and sometimes bison) will appear on the menus. Explore parks in the southwest, and you can almost predict that cacti will show up in some form.
You can be amazed at the menus that chefs in the National Park System roll out. Even more amazing is how they feed hundreds of people at meal time, and largely maintain consistency with what they put in front of you. This week we're going to explain how you can mimic some of these chefs in your own kitchen. Our guest is Linda Ly, author of "The National Parks Cookbook." We'll see if we can inspire you with new home menus, from beverages and appetizers, to entrees and desserts.

Over the years there have been more than a few units of the National Park System that have been head-scratchers. Why were they added? What redeeming value did they bring to the park system? 

James Ridenour who was director of the National Park Service from 1989 through 1993, was well familiar with these units. As he once put it, "I'm in complete agreement that the National Park Service has units that are unworthy of National Park Service status. That was my motive for coining the term 'thinning of the blood'."

Members of Congress trade votes to get their local favorite on the NPS teat, usually to attract tourists. Then they don't add money to the budget to run these units. So you have two things - you thin the quality of the system, and you thin the ability of the National Park Service to run the system.

We're going to explore some of these units, at least some of the ones that were pushed out of the National Park System, with none-other than Traveler Professor Emeritus Dr. Robert Janiskee. Bob was the one who quite some years ago started the "Pruning the Parks" series on the Traveler, and we've momentarily  pried him out of his retirement to discuss some of these parks with us. 

When warm weather spreads across the National Park System, many parks offer nightly gatherings around the campfire. The tradition of gathering around a flickering fire goes back thousands of years. Fire, after all, was the giver of light in the darkest of night, and seen as offering safety from what might lurk about in the dark.

For the park visitor, nightly campfire gatherings are not about feeling safe from the darkness, but rather an opportunity to learn about the surrounding park landscape from a well informed park ranger. Back in 1968, a National Park Service training brochure explained that the national park campfire provides an opportunity to weld the visitor's random experiences and impressions into an understanding and appreciation for the park's real values. Of course, there are a number of definitions and expectations for what constitutes a campfire story. 

Today we're going to explore "Campfire Stories: Tales from America's National Parks and Trails" with editors of the book Dave and Ilyssa Kyu. 

Coastal grey wolves in Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve in Alaska seem to be feasting well these days on an unlikely food source - sea otters. In fact, the shorelines of Glacier Bay offer wolves a cornucopia of otters and other marine menu items, providing this carnivorous predator safe and dependable locations for food and raising offspring.

This week the Traveler's Lynn Riddick speaks with park wildlife biologist Tania Lewis, whose research team is evaluation coastal wolf diets. Their goals are to identify different wolf packs and the shoreline areas important to them for feeding and reproduction. With annual visitation to Glacier Bay approaching 550,000, the team's work will be instrumental in determining whether those areas should be protected from unnecessary human disturbance.

How did America get hooked on skiing? In 1939, Hannes Schneider moved from Austria to North Conway, New Hampshire, to teach skiing. But before the sport really took off, World War II broke out. After the war, a gritty band of soldiers who fought in the US Army's 10th Mountain Division, returned home into the mountains they loved. 

Last week, Christian Beckwith, an alpinist and climbing historian, introduced us to the 10th Mountain Division and how it was jump-started by climbers who had honed their skills in the craggy mountains of Grand Teton National Park.  

Beckwith, who rolls out this history in his podcast "Ninety-Pound Rucksack", is back with us today to explain how those soldiers kick-started the ski industry in America, started organizations such as the National Outdoor Leadership School, and played a role in fields of avalanche science and wilderness rescue.

How much do you know about World War II history, Grand Teton National Park, and the evolution of outdoor recreation in the United States? Believe it or not, they're all intertwined. 

Ninety-Pound Rucksack is a podcast about the U.S. Army's legendary 10th Division, and the dawn of outdoor recreation in America. Hosted by veteran alpinist and climbing historian Christian Beckwith, Ninety-Pound Rucksack examines the stories that made the unit legendary, as well as those that history has forgotten. 

The tale of the 10th Mountain Division, a gritty unit of World War II climbers and skiers who trained for more than two years high in the Colorado Rockies to fight the Axis powers in extreme cold and mountainous terrain, is famous for good reason. Not only did its insertion into the war help end Germany's occupation of Italy, but post-war its surviving members helped found and develop ski areas across America, started organizations such as the National Outdoor Leadership School, and played a role in the fields of avalanche science and wilderness rescue. 

Equal parts real-time research, intimate conversation, and revelatory journalism, Ninety-Pound Rucksack explores not only the conventional wisdom about the 10th, but the transformative power of the mountains to forge a collective identity among the mountain troops. And to ignite a passion for the outdoors that reshaped American society in the process.

Big Bend National Park is not simply a park that you pass along the way. Located in West Texas along the US/Mexico border, this 1,252-square-mile park is five hours from the closest commercial airport. In other words, you must make Big Bend your final destination if you're going to visit. You're not going to just happen upon it as you drive down the road. But once here, you're likely to be astounded by the ruggedness, the beauty of the Chisos Mountain Range that falls entirely within the park's borders, and the rich cultural history preserved here.

Aside from the natural beauty of Big Bend, there's a lot going on here that's going to affect most visitors. There's work to design a new lodge, a question of whether the official wilderness designation should be applied to some of the park's landscape, and there are staffing issues and even wildlife issues. The Traveler's Lynn Riddick traveled to Big Bend to discuss these issues and more with Superintendent Bob Krumenaker.

Bears tend to scare us when we're outdoors and they're not behind steel bars. Particularly grizzly bears. They're big, with sharp claws and powerful jaws, and seem to be in a bad mood whenever we spot them. We hear about people being mauled to death by bears, and even of black bears attacking campers in their sleeping bags. 

Are bears really as terrifying as they appear? Or is our fear driven by a lack of understanding of their behavior? Derek Stonorov knows a little bit about bears and their behavior, after all the wildlife biologist has spent the past 50 years observing coastal brown bears in Alaska, in a bid to better understand their social structures and behaviors. He details he findings in his forthcoming book "Watch the Bear."

For more than a decade, Colorado College has sponsored a poll to gauge conservation sentiments of residents in Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and Nevada. Over the years, the questions have ranged from whether the members of the public view themselves as conservationists, whether land conservation and protection can be paired with a strong economy, and even whether federal lands should be turned over to the states. 

The 2023 State of the Rockies poll just came out, and it points to public support for strong conservation policies that protect wildlife and wild lands, and what some might call surprisingly strong support from a largely conservative corner of the country, for a conservation goal of protecting 30 percent of the nation's lands and waters by 2030. We're going to get into the poll results with Brian Kurzel, the National Wildlife Federation's regional executive director for the Rocky Mountain region.

The US Geological Survey operates five different volcano observatories around the country. These observatories monitor real-time volcanic, hydrothermal, and earthquake activity in Alaska, the Cascade Mountains, California's Long Valley Caldera, Yellowstone National Park, and the State of Hawaii. 
 

There are virtual partnerships between federal and state agencies, university-based researchers, and scientists. Their work involves monitoring, measuring, and analyzing data, all helping to increase our understanding of these powerful and fascinating geologic forces.

This week Lynn Riddick catches up with Matt Patrick, a research geologist at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. He and his colleagues have seen quite a bit of awe-inspiring volcanic action recently, with eruptions from Mauna Loa and Kīlauea within Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

The National Parks Conservation Association is almost as old as the National Park Service. The Service, as you probably know, was established in 1916, and NPCA came along three years later.

Through the 106-year history of NPCA, there has been only one woman who held the title of president and Chief Executive Officer. That woman is Theresa Pierno, who has worked for the park advocacy group for more than two decades, and as NPCA's CEO and president for the past ten years.

At the end of this year Theresa will step down from the organization, but she won't stop advocating for the parks. Theresa is our guest today, and will both look back on her tenure with NPCA and the current political climate that is threatening the National Park Service and the national parks.

It is one of the longest units of the National Park System in the country. "It," of course, is the Oregon National Historic Trail, which stretches more than 2,100 miles from Missouri to Oregon. It's been estimated that between 1840 and 1860 some 300,000-400,000 men, women, and children embarked on the four-month-long trip to head to the West Coast. 

A new book, "Exploring The Oregon Trail, America's Historic Road Trip," can help you explore sections of the trail, or the entire trail if you have the time. It was written by Kay and David Scott, longtime national park travelers and park lodging experts.

It's a problem that's been coming for quite some time, and one that really comes as no surprise. The large landscape national parks that are home to many species of wildlife have been turning into biological islands as development hems them in. You can look back to 1993 when the Yellowstone to Yukon Initiative launched to begin to see the discussion around opening up these parks through migratory corridors. That initiative, which continues today, envisioned a corridor stretching from Yellowstone National Park to Canada's Yukon Territory to serve wildlife by protecting core wildlife habitat. 

There have been other somewhat similar initiatives. There's the Wildlands Network, which since 1991 has been, as that organization puts it, striving to reconnect, restore, and re-wild North America. There have been efforts in Congress to pass legislation that would provide funding for such corridors. The Pew Charitable Trust this past October released a report on the need for creating migratory corridors and the challenges standing in their way. 

Today we're going to zoom in on some national parks, their wildlife, and the need to establish habitat connectivity between those parks to prevent animals from being stranded on biological islands. Joining us is Dr. William Newmark, a research curator and conservation biologist in the Natural History Museum of Utah. 

There is a wide acceptance that we have drifted too far away from nature, and that we need to pull closer. Many have called for 30 by 30 - conserving 30% of nature by 2030. The 2022 State of the Birds Report pointed out that more than half of bird species normally found in habitats as diverse as forests, deserts and oceans in the United States are in decline. Climate change is a major factor in those declines, but human development also plays a key role by chewing into wildlife habitat and creating biological islands. 

How do we reverse declines in wildlife and in wildlife habitat? Can we prevent Yellowstone, Yosemite, Kings Canyon, Rocky Mountain National Parks, and other large Western landscape parks from turning into biological islands? Today we're going to explore the problems, and possible solutions, with Elaine Leslie, who was the National Park Service's Chief for Biological Resources before retiring, and Bart Melton, who leads the National Parks Conservation Association's Wildlife Program.