Christopher Ketcham has been a freelance writer for more than 20 years. His articles have been published in Harper’s, CounterPunch, National Geographic, Hustler, Penthouse, the New York Times, Pacific Standard, Sierra, Earth Island Journal, Vanity Fair, The New Republic, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, Salon, and many other websites and newspapers large and small. He was a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT in 2015-16, and he is currently a MacDowell Colony writing fellow in New Hampshire, whence he spoke to us. THIS LAND: HOW COWBOYS, CAPITALISM, AND CORRUPTION ARE RUINING THE AMERICAN WEST, published by Viking, is his first book.

THIS LAND: HOW COWBOYS, CAPITALISM, AND CORRUPTION ARE RUINING THE AMERICAN WEST is a hard hitting look at the battle now raging over the fate of the public lands in the American West.

An area of ancient pinyon and juniper forests larger than the state of Vermont, adapted over eons to the arid lands of the west, is being destroyed by machines such as these – turned into mulch for the planting of seeds of invasive species for forage for the most destructive invasive specie, Bos taurus, cows.

Articles referenced in this interview include:

Public Land Workers Faced Hundreds Of Threats, Assaults Over The Past 5 Years  https://www.huffpost.com/entry/federal-public-land-workers-assaulted_n_5dae870fe4b0f34e3a7b3048

Federal employees on public lands see anti-government threats as ‘part of the job’   https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/federal-employees-public-lands-anti-government-threats-part/story?id=66417963

Trump Admin Moves To Greenlight Logging In America’s Largest National Forest    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tongass-national-forest-alaska-logging_n_5da61884e4b062bdcb19dd04

William Perry Pendley, opponent of nation’s public lands, is picked to oversee them as acting head of BLM      https://www.sltrib.com/news/nation-world/2019/07/30/william-perry-pendley/

William Perry Pendley: ‘The arsonist in charge of the fire department’    https://missoulacurrent.com/opinion/2019/08/william-perry-pendley/

BLM boss Pendley recused from Grand Staircase planning, but he remains listed as Utah counties’ attorney in suit     https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2019/09/26/blm-boss-pendley-recused/

Interior to shift 44 jobs to Utah, move BLM headquarters to Colorado   https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2019/07/16/blm-headqurters-heads/

‘National tragedy’: Trump begins border wall construction in Unesco reserve   https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/12/border-wall-organ-pipe-cactus-arizona

Yellow cedar rejected for threatened species listing     https://apnews.com/8e511ffc18754ac8933f0b565ff4dcb5