Good morning and happy Colorado Sunday to you all!
This newsletter is nothing if not nostalgic and this week I’ve been thinking about one of my first big environmental journalism assignments. It was in the late ’80s and I was assigned to take a train ride around Rocky Mountain Arsenal with elected officials. Chemical weapons were no longer being produced there and the focus had turned to cleaning up this vast Superfund site, while paying attention to the welfare of wildlife that had recolonized the property.
Though we were not allowed to leave the train during the tour, it looked perfectly safe, a piece of beautiful prairie rolling out from the edge of Commerce City’s heavy industrial zone.
But then a biologist on the train started talking about the sentinel bee hives he kept there. In summer, when the alfalfa was high and blooming, the bees behaved as they should, putting away large stores of honey and pollen that should have carried them through even the worst winters. But they did not survive to spring. The biologist wondered if the alfalfa’s roots, which can grow to 20 feet deep or more, had tapped unseen toxins in the soil that turned the nectar and pollen into poison.
I still think about that when I pass by the arsenal, now a national wildlife refuge, mostly open to the public, and see deer and antelope browsing at the fence line and big birds of prey hunting from the tops of cottonwoods. Is it safe for those animals, or for me? It’s the same question people have about Rocky Flats, also now a national wildlife refuge and mostly open to the public. Michael Booth takes on the question in this week’s cover story and, not surprisingly, the answer is complicated.
Dana Coffield
Editor
The Cover Story
Is Rocky Flats safe enough?
The Rocky Mountain Greenway Trail is an ambitious project that aims for an 80-mile path from Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge in Commerce City to Rocky Mountain National Park near Estes Park, with connections that route through Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. (Mike Sweeney, Special to The Colorado Sun)There’s a mean, only-in-Colorado trick you can pull on unsuspecting friends, when you’re out for a Sunday morning mountain bike ride at a couple of metro Denver spots that boast pretty views.
“Hey, did you know that just over that berm they shaped plutonium into warheads for 70,000 bombs?”
“Gee, would you look at that? Right where those ducks are flying they made mustard gas that would blister your skin and make your lungs bleed.”
You see, we’ve collectively tried to make the best of a very bad thing, by transforming the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant and Rocky Mountain Arsenal into placid wildlife refuges, packed with hiking and bicycling trails and ponds full of happy birds.
But transforming is not the same as erasing. And the signposts at some new entry points into Rocky Flats are literal blank slates for the Denver metro area to project its collective attitude toward history. Do we forgive and forget? Do we remember, and yet still roll through?
Is it safe?
We can’t answer those questions to the satisfaction of everyone. But we can lay out the facts, and polish the windows that look out onto Colorado’s complex history.
READ THIS WEEK’S COLORADO SUNDAY FEATURE
Michael Booth | Reporter
The Colorado Lens
There’s plenty of summer left on the seasonal calendar, but as the clock winds down toward back to school, lots of people were out living their best Colorado lives last week. Here are a few of our favorite images.
Visitors cross the world-famous Royal Gorge Bridge in Cañon City on Aug. 2. (Mike Sweeney, Special to The Colorado Sun) Riders on the Royal Rush Skycoaster swing Aug. 2 over the Royal Gorge. (Mike Sweeney, Special to The Colorado Sun) A hot air balloon captures a sunrise breeze Aug. 2 at Chatfield State Park near Denver Botanic Gardens Chatfield Farm, a frequent sight on calm summer mornings. (Michael Booth, The Colorado Sun)]* Two backpackers hike along the Mount Zirkel Loop Trail near Steamboat Springs on Aug. 2. (Olivia Prentzel, The Colorado Sun) Parker Dorst of Central City practices archery during the closing weekend of the Outdoor Belonging Project Aug. 3 at Lincoln Hills near Nederland. (Carmel Zucker, Special to The Colorado Sun)Dana Coffield | Editor
Flavor of the Week
It’s melon season. Time to get thumpin’.
Peak season Rocky Ford watermelons for sale Aug. 5 at Knapp’s Market. (Eric Lubbers, The Colorado Sun)Move over Palisade peaches. Pack a bag, Olathe sweet corn. The true champion of Colorado produce has to be the Rocky Ford melon (by volume, if nothing else).
I grew up on the Eastern Plains in a family with roots in Lamar and Pueblo, so the late-summer Rocky Ford cantaloupe was a bright spot during the dog days of August. And if you hang around melon people long enough, you learn all sorts of interesting ways to enjoy it.
While I still prefer my Grandpa Lloyd’s technique the most (cut into wedges with a little salt and plenty of black pepper), the melon haul I got at Knapp’s Farm Market just outside of Rocky Ford this weekend meant I had to get a little creative.
Before I was even able to take photos, we took down a cantaloupe with lime green flesh (one of many colors on offer) and a hybrid dove melon (somewhere between a honeydew and a cantaloupe that is icy white on the inside and perfectly sweet). Now we’ve moved on to one of Knapp’s other curiosities, the seedless watermelon that is deep orange inside (see below) and a classic cantaloupe that has since been made into agua fresca. I don’t think I’ll even have enough left to make Marcella Hazan’s cantaloupe pasta sauce (which is so much tastier than it sounds, I promise).
Even though nothing compares to a true roadside melon at the peak of the season, nearly every grocery chain in the state sells Rocky Fords. So keep your eyes peeled and your melon baller at the ready so you can enjoy one (or more) before this sweet, juicy window closes for the year.
A peek inside one of Knapp’s orange watermelon varietal (with a classic Rocky Ford cantaloupe for comparison). (Eric Lubbers, The Colorado Sun)Eric Lubbers | CTO & Newsletter Wrangler
SunLit: Sneak Peek
“There Are Reasons for This”: Lie of omission, infatuation converge
“Helen went out, Helen came in. There she was, standing on one leg in the hall, scraping something from her shoe. Lucy squinted with one eye pressed to the hole in the door, the same flush she always felt, a quickening.”
— From “There Are Reasons for This”
EXCERPT: Lucy has come to Denver in the hope of connecting with a woman her brother loved so she might learn more about his death. But when Lucy moves in across the hall from Helen, failing to divulge her identity, her curiosity soon morphs into infatuation. Author Nini Berndt’s debut novel “There Are Reasons for This” is a tale of longing and loss and the search for connection.
READ THE SUNLIT EXCERPT
THE SUNLIT INTERVIEW: Berndt explains that she’s grown bored with New York-centric stories and resolved to write about the city she’s from. That also meant chronicling its changes — warts and all. Here’s a portion of her SunLit Q&A:
SunLit: Did you intend to write about Denver? What about setting a book in Denver was important to you?
Berndt: We don’t get a ton of Denver literature. I’m so bored of New York books. So I did want to write something set in the city I’m from. The Denver I grew up in in the early 2000s and the Denver I came back to after grad school in 2016 were such different places. 2016 Denver was this glittering, shining place, everyone was young and healthy and happy, there was money, prosperity, everyone was having a good time, people were moving here in droves. I can’t imagine a better place to live during those years. And then during COVID it changed again. … So I was writing from that place, a place of seeing this city shift and shift, fall apart, this bursting bubble.
READ THE INTERVIEW WITH NINI BERNDT
LISTEN TO A DAILY SUN-UP PODCAST WITH THE AUTHOR
Kevin Simpson | Writer
Sunday Reading List
A curated list of what you may have missed from The Colorado Sun this week.
Flowers and vegetables growing in Virginia Loop’s greenhouse seem undaunted by a stop-work order issued by Teller County in May. (Mike Sweeney, Special to The Colorado Sun)? People good at gardening can take a slice out of their food budget by growing their own vegetables, though the task gets more difficult the higher in elevation you are. Virginia Loop, who lives at 9,200 feet in Teller County, thought a new state law made it OK for her to build a large greenhouse on her property. Now she’s in a fight to save her home after the county ordered her to tear the structure down. Jennifer Brown went to Woodland Park to check out the situation. And the garden.
? International vacationers, who typically stay longer and spend more during their visits, are sitting out of summer travel to Colorado for the first time since 2014 (not including the pandemic). Jason Blevins looked at the numbers and talked to tourism marketers who are worriedly watching as Colorado’s tourism market share drops.
? This week in wolf news, Colorado Parks and Wildlife still is looking to kill a member of the Copper Creek pack near Carbondale; a wolf moved from Oregon to Colorado in 2024 was killed in Wyoming; and an uncollared wolf, perhaps from Wyoming, killed enough sheep in Rio Blanco County to qualify as chronic depredation, but wildfire in the area is keeping CPW from tracking it down. Tracy Ross spent time with biologist Doug Smith, who worked with wolves for 30 years at Yellowstone National Park, and he said all this chaos is kind of par for the course early in a restoration program.
? Think you’ll have to work beyond the traditional retirement age of 65? You’re not alone. In the most recent story in our Aging in Colorado series, Tamara Chung talked to older folks who are happy to keep working, but having a hard time finding workplaces that can see past their ages to assess their skills.
? Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser has always been ready to jump in with other AGs to sue for things like settlements against opioid manufacturers and vape companies. He’s gotten a bit more of a workout the past half year, suing the Trump administration 33 times. Taylor Dolven started a tracker so we can keep up with his win/loss stats.
? Gov. Jared Polis finally set the date for the special session. Jesse Paul reports that lawmakers must return to the statehouse Aug. 21 to carve as much as $783 million from the current spending plan. This is because Colorado’s income tax code is linked to the federal tax code and the changes made in the federal spending bill last month have an immediate impact on state revenue.
? Are we getting a small nuclear reactor to help power Denver International Airport’s massive growth aspirations? That’s a $1.25 million question, Michael Booth reports.
Dana Coffield | Editor
Thanks for spending time with us this week. As we sign off for the day, please know that we are watching the wildfire situation in northwestern Colorado closely and holding only good thoughts for the people and places that are threatened, and for the folks working tirelessly to protect them.
— Dana & the whole staff of The Sun
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