Outdoors

CRYSTAL MOUNTAIN RESORT – “Are you ready to work?” ski patroller Alisha Bator whispers into the ear of Kio, a mountain rescue dog, at the edge of a meadow near the Forest Queen chairlift at Crystal Mountain Resort. Fresh snow blankets the ground, and somewhere underneath, Bator has buried an article of clothing. But the surface is crisscrossed with ski tracks and shovel prints, so it’s not obvious to the naked eye where the hidden garment is tucked.

Fly fishing

Sometime around mid-November, Mother Nature uses a giant, invisible turkey baster of sorts to siphon all the color out of the world. The fields become a washed out swath of bland. The tree line is defined primarily by contrast. The sky only changes in its proximity and threat of suffocation. Even our wardrobes, in unspoken solidarity, turn a mournful black with the occasional rebellious flair of a holiday red.

A trumpeter swan takes off from Middle Pine Lake at the Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge in this Nov. 21 photo by Jerry Rolwes.

A bald eagle takes off at Higgens Point on Lake Coeur d’Alene in this mid-November photo by Mark Hendrickson.

For the first time in years, summer visitors in 2026 will be able to drive personal vehicles into the Glacier National Park at any time of day without a reservation.

A forecast calling for warm temperatures and rain has forced managers of Spokane’s backyard ski hill to cancel plans for opening this weekend.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is taking a deeper look at the Blue Mountain elk herd and what may be causing it to fall short of population objectives.

Austin Visintainer was 5 years old when the kids from his block let him have a whirl on their snowboard, the thought never crossing his mind that maybe one day he’d be riding a board with his own name on it.

Bragging on social media was the downfall of six men who faced 34 charges in July for a variety of Musselshell County hunting violations documented by Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks.

Fisheries managers on the Hells Canyon section of the Snake River are contemplating a future in which they may routinely move sturgeon and possibly boost their numbers through a hatchery program.

Fly fishing

I read a thing this week that suggested our obsession with optimal may be distracting us from the pleasantly effective approach of beneficial. This is probably how water aerobics was born.

It is officially eagle season at Lake Coeur d’Alene.

State officials are taking a hard look at buying waterfront property on Downs Lake, southeast of Sprague.

Environmentalists are renewing their fight to get the federal government to write a nationwide gray wolf recovery plan.

An app that allows Washington hunters and anglers to keep and display digital licenses is now live.

More chairlifts will start spinning in North Idaho this weekend.