Privatized Crown Grassland ploughed up

Love the Southwest, and if native prairie were a scenic seashore or a old-growth forest people would protect it more readily.

Not many people live in the Southwest.  A lot of it smells of sage and wildflowers, and the skies are wonderfully dark.  The antelope and coyotes are the stuff of many old west novel.  One local told me that Leon Trotsky nearly moved to the area to join up with a friend.

Cattle have to walk miles to find a blade of grass in this country, but this doesn't stop people from trying.  Developers and speculators from other places seem to be covering it with oil wells and windfarms.  While I understand that huge region can't be a nature preserve, we exploit so much land and conserve so little.  Some of the best dinosaur finds in the world come from this area, and they might be getting further out of reach.

Thankfully, Grasslands National Park was set aside before this recent land boom.