Las Vegas Sun

November 8, 2009

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Letter: Snowmobiles bad for Yellowstone

Tuesday, March 2, 2004 | 9:26 a.m.

In reply to Nicholas Kristof's Feb. 19 column on the Sun's Editorial Page headlined, "Preserve way to enjoy Yellowstone:"

His statement, "I think humans trump the bison and moose," brings to mind the early days in American history when you could board a train for the plains and shoot bison to your heart's content. This act nearly drove the bison to near extinction.

In backpacking the High Sierras with our Boy Scout troop, you used a foxhole and shovel when nature called, so the waste could break down in the ground. Now, will the people on snowmobiles do the same in the back country? True, when you drive your car into Yellowstone there are facilities to remove human waste. In other words, to control contamination.

Where man goes he leaves behind some debris, whether on Earth or in space.

Other than that, I'm sure Kristof stopped his snowmobile, and, with his son, listened to the wind blowing through the pine trees giving up its music, or the snow falling through the branches of a tree.

All this can be done on shank's mare (on foot).

FRANK NAGY

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