Latest news with #Sonoran
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Arizona national park named a top US travel destination — and it's not the Grand Canyon
Saguaro National Park near Tucson was named a hidden gem of the U.S. National Parks, according to a recent report. Vacation rentals marketplace HomeToGo analyzed which national parks across the country offer smaller crowds, stunning scenery and affordable stays for those looking to escape to lesser-known destinations to experience the beauty of the U.S. wilderness. 'According to our 2025 Travel Survey, almost half of U.S. travelers have their eyes set on the great outdoors, with 49% planning to visit national parks or wilderness areas this year,' Eleanor Moody, HomeToGo's travel expert, said in an news release. 'As many vacationers continue to show particular interest in off-the-beaten-path destinations, whether this is to escape the crowds or find more affordable options, we hope this guide helps travelers pinpoint their perfect park escape." Here's why Saguaro National Park is one of the top national parks to enjoy nature without crowds, as well as a roundup of the top 10 national parks from HomeToGo's ranking. Saguaro National Park showcases the Sonoran Desert in all its prickly, sunlit beauty with its more than 94,000 acres of land on the western and eastern edges of Tucson. The park helps protect the biodiversity of the Sonoran desert landscape, including unique desert species like roadrunners, Gila monsters, desert tortoises and the iconic saguaro cactus. The park offers scenic drives, short trails and breathtaking views of towering cactuses, arid valleys and rugged mountains. During certain times of the year, the desert blooms with vibrant colors, bringing the trails to life. On the road? An Arizona city was named among the most underrated US travel destinations Additionally, the park was recently certified as an Urban Night Sky Place by Dark-Sky International, making it the first National Park Service location in Arizona to achieve this certification. Urban Night Sky Place recognition is awarded to sites near or surrounded by large urban areas that actively promote an authentic nighttime experience amid artificial light. One of the best parts? This stunning destination can also be budget-friendly. According to HomeToGo, the median nightly price per person for a vacation cabin near the park is about $53. To help preserve this unique landscape, visitors are encouraged to follow park guidelines closely. "As outdoor enthusiasts hit the trails, we encourage park visitors to embrace the Leave No Trace principles - preserving these natural spaces and leaving the parks as they found them,' Moody said. The desert environment: this tiny mouse lives in Arizona and eats cactus. See what it looks like Here's a list of the 10 most beautiful — and affordable — national parks for a vacation this summer 2025 and the median price per night per person for a vacation rental stay in the area, according to HomeToGo. Kenai Fjords National Park, Alaska: $59 Congaree National Park, South Carolina: $62 Saguaro National Park, Arizona: $53 Crater Lake National Park, Oregon: $75 Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota: $56 Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, Colorado: $56 Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado: $112 Arches National Park, Utah: $77 Lassen Volcanic National Park, California: $120 Capitol Reef National Park, Utah: $76 To figure out the top national parks for travel, HomeToGo looked at vacation rental data and travel interest from January 1 to March 15, 2025. They focused on trips planned between April 1 and Sept. 21, 2025. The data was taken from the site's own exclusive pricing and search demand data, in addition to 2024 visitor statistics from the National Parks Service´s Integrated Resource Management Applications portal. Only parks with reliable vacation rental price data were included. Each park was scored using three factors: Affordability: the average nightly cost per person for a vacation rental near the park. Crowd size: how many people visited the park in 2024. Popularity: how many people searched for that park on HomeToGo during the travel dates. Each factor was given a score between 5 and 10, with 10 being the best (for example, the cheapest park or the least visited one). The highest possible total score a park could earn was 30. This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Looking for a beautiful summer escape? Try this Arizona national park
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Oscar Mayer Wienermobiles race ahead of the Indy 500
All 6 Oscar Mayer Wienermobiles, representing different regional hot dog styles, will race on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Friday, May 23, 2025. View more Video Transcript This weekend, the Indy 500 becomes the Weenie 500. Advertisement On Friday, all 6 Oscar Mayer Wienermobiles, each representing a different regional hot dog style, will race on the legendary Indianapolis Motor Speedway ahead of Sunday's Indy 500. This is the first meetup of all 6 Wienermobiles in over a decade. Look, you can see them converging on the live Wienermobile tracker. So who do you think will be crowned top dog? We have the Chicago style dog representing the Midwest. New York style repping the east, the chili dog out of the South, slaw dog from the Southeast, Sonoran dog from the Southwest, and finally representing the Northwest, we have the Seattle style dog, kind of gross looking if you ask me. Advertisement Cream cheese on a hot dog. Anyways, the fastest wienermobile will receive a special trophy in the wiener circle. The lucky driver will get a condiment spray down instead of the traditional champagne shower.
New York Times
03-05-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Weed Manager of the Year: One Man's Quest to Save the Sonoran Desert
When Don Pike takes his daily walk, he laces up his brown hiking boots, grabs his walking stick and bucket hat and heads outside. Ten feet later, he carefully slips past barbed wire and enters the Tonto National Forest. Unlike other parts of the Tonto, where the ground between native plants and trees is covered with dry grasses, the earth is pale, crusty and barren, like it's meant to be. That's because Mr. Pike has been pulling weeds. 'You won't find any of them in this area here because I've removed them,' said Mr. Pike, 84, a retiree from Maine who installed floor-to-ceiling windows in his living room to better see his beloved desert. Mr. Pike is at war with buffel grass and fountain grass, two invasive species that are spreading in the Sonoran desert, choking native plants, increasing the risk and intensity of wildfires and threatening a vibrant ecosystem. He began hunting the thick grasses, which were introduced to the area by landscapers, almost 15 years ago. Since then, he estimates that he and his team of volunteers have cleared 550 of the roughly 14,000 acres they oversee. In 2024, that earned him the title of Arizona's Weed Manager of the Year. Work by volunteers like Mr. Pike has always been an important supplement to managing federal lands, according to government workers who say their programs have been underfunded for years. But since the Trump administration and the so-called Department of Government Efficiency began mass firings of federal workers, volunteers like Mr. Pike have become more vital than ever. 'It's going to be important for the federal agencies, the Forest Service in particular, to find ways to engage people,' Mr. Pike said on his back porch in March. 'There's a lot of people that want to get involved. Particularly retirees who have a lot of skills.' Ine February, at least 2,000 employees had been eliminated from the U.S. Forest Service, which is responsible for lands across the country that, together, rival the size of Texas. Forests like the Tonto are at risk as climate change increases the chances of wildfires and as invasive species spread. But citizen scientists like Mr. Pike are working to reduce fire and heat risks, clear hundreds of acres of invasives and capture data on threatened cactuses, helping to save what otherwise might be lost. Bringing in Reinforcements Patti Fenner was an invasive weeds specialist for the United States Forest Service in 2011 when she gave a presentation to a retirees group that included Mr. Pike. After the talk, Ms. Fenner and Mr. Pike took a hike and she pointed out how invasive grasses had begun overtaking native plants. That first outing led to a decades-long obsession, and when Ms. Fenner retired three years later and founded Friends of the Tonto, a volunteer group with about 70 members that assists the national forest, Mr. Pike became one of the first members. Ms. Fenner had worked in the forest since college, doing a variety of jobs. She liked the Forest Service-style of land management because it demanded compromise from all parties. Unlike national parks, Forest Service land is used by multiple interests, including logging, mining and ranching in addition to recreation. But maintaining an ecological balance is also key, and when Ms. Fenner became the forest's first noxious weed manager in 2003, it felt like a Sisyphean task to clear three million acres of rapidly multiplying invasive species. Mr. Pike decided to concentrate on a smaller scale, homing in on what's known as the wildland urban interface, or the space where developments like his neighborhood creep up on wilderness areas like the Tonto. A former engineer, he created a map to track the progress he made with his team of volunteers, pinning a green flag where invasives were cleared. The flag turns yellow after two years as a reminder to clear the area again. While his system is effective in his relatively small section, it's an unlikely fix for an entire forest. 'In the direction that we're headed, the desert will become a grassland,' Mr. Pike said. Lightning-strike fires have always been possible in the desert, but excess vegetation like red brome, a grass that dries into short hay-like tufts, has contributed to bigger and more frequent wildfires in the Tonto. One of the first huge wildfires came in 2005, when the Cave Creek Complex fire burned 243,000 acres. Then, in the summer of 2020, Mr. Pike watched the sky turn orange as the Bush fire burned 193,000 acres, killing roughly 80,000 saguaros, the distinctive cactuses with cartoonish curved arms. Invasive plants grew back quickly, outcompeting the native saguaros and palo verde, the state tree with flowers like tiny yellow bells. So, Friends of the Tonto started a second monitoring program for the saguaros. In late 2023, Mr. Pike created another map with more than 9,900 tiny saguaros. On this one, green signals good health and black means the cactus is dead. He's trained about 40 people to find additional saguaros and monitor the ones already in the database. Staff at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix and the Saguaro National Park near Tucson are also monitoring the plants. But Mr. Pike's group is a citizen science program done exclusively by volunteers using simple tools. They measure, somewhat based on guesswork, the height and number of arms, and share visual observations of the cactus's health, along with a photo. The Future of the Forest The main office at Tonto has been closed for years because the Forest Service had trouble staffing it, even before the recent hiring freeze and terminations, largely because the pay was low, Ms. Fenner said. Other offices within the forest used to stay open on weekends during the busy season, but that also ended years ago because of a lack of employees. 'If you're trying to get ahold of somebody there's no one to talk to,' Ms. Fenner said of the forest staff. 'It's like nobody's home.' Ongoing budget and staffing issues at the Tonto have limited the scope of volunteer work, which is based on an agreement with the Forest Service that spells out the terms of the relationship. The Forest Service did not respond to a request for comment. Mr. Pike has been struggling to contact federal employees who can help him apply for grants. In 2024, he helped win a $105,000 grant from the state's Department of Forestry and Fire Management to hire a contractor to apply herbicide and organize a youth group to cull invasive plants in the forest. 'It's not going to get better, it's going to get worse,' Mr. Pike said of communication with forest managers. He's wants to secure more grants to better manage the invasive plants but without support from forest officials, he said, 'I can't logically expand the area that I'm covering.' Still, they are tackling the impossible, weed by weed. At the top of a hill overlooking the Tonto called Sears-Kay, which features ruins almost 1,000 years old, Ms. Fenner spotted buffel grass in late March. She tried to pull it with her bare hands but it was rooted too firmly. So she called Mr. Pike, and he encouraged her to go back with a shovel. She went on a walk and pulled the plant the next day.
Yahoo
02-05-2025
- Yahoo
Radio-collared Pronghorn shot, left to rot in Oklahoma
BOISE CITY, Okla. (KSNW) — Authorities in Oklahoma are looking for whoever shot and killed a Pronghorn in the Oklahoma Panhandle. Oklahoma Game Wardens say a Pronghorn was shot with a high-powered rifle around 11 a.m. Monday. It happened in a field near the intersection of N0250 Road and E0150 Road, northwest of Boise City. Game wardens say the animal, sometimes referred to as the American Antelope, was shot, killed, and left to rot. Her dead twin fawns were found with her. Still no new judge for suspect in murdered moms case The doe was wearing a radio collar and was being monitored by the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation and Oklahoma State University. A cash reward is being offered to anyone who comes forward with information about who killed the doe. Callers can choose to remain anonymous. Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to contact Lt. Mike Baker, Game Warden, at 580-651-9135. The fastest land mammal in North America and the second fastest animal in the world, next to the cheetah, pronghorns are not related to deer or antelopes, but they are in the same family as giraffes. Although not directly considered endangered, their numbers have declined from historic levels. Two subspecies of pronghorn are listed as endangered: the Peninsular and Sonoran. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Saguaro National Park will grow by 47 acres. How a private trust is making it happen
Saguaro National Park West will add 47 acres to its protected park lands in the foothills of the Tucson Mountains after an acquisition of two properties by the Trust for Public Land. The addition will strengthen wildlife corridors, preserve Sonoran desert habitat and expand recreational access. The Trust for Public Land, an organization with a mission to create quality parks and protect green spaces, announced the addition to the park on April 25. The new acreage adds to the organization's work protecting over 2,300 acres in and around Saguaro National Park since 1993. The land was purchased with a federal funding source called the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which comes from a portion of the federal government's offshore oil and natural gas revenues that are reinvested into protecting American natural resources. The Trust for Public Land also received financial assistance for project costs from Pima County and the Southern Arizona Hiking Club, a nonprofit volunteer group that promotes outdoor recreation. Saguaro National Park, encompassing about 92,000 acres across two locations, protects ecologically valuable and biodiverse Sonoran desert landscape, including a number of unique desert species like roadrunners, Gila monsters, desert tortoises and the iconic saguaro cactus. The new park land will also bolster the linkage between Saguaro National Park and Pima County's Sweetwater Preserve, an 880-acre park that includes 13 miles of interconnected trails used for hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding. The preserve was created in 2004 through a partnership among Trust for Public Land, Tucson Mountain Association and Pima County. 'I'm beyond pleased to see Saguaro National Park West growing with this new addition of beautiful natural land,' said Pima County Supervisor Jennifer Allen in a news release. 'Being good stewards of our public lands is one of the core principles of Pima County, as laid out in the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan,' said Allen. 'It's an honor to see our conservation partner, Trust for Public Land, continue and expand that stewardship within our community.' As the park expands, outdoor recreationists may soon be able to explore the new acreage after a public planning process is completed. 'Preserving the wildlife linkages is job one. Any new trail linkages have to go through a public planning process,' said Michael Patrick, senior project manager at Trust for Public Land, 'so everyone will get a chance to say what they want to see out here before the park actually puts it in the trails and opens it up.' John Leos covers environmental issues for The Arizona Republic and azcentral. Send tips or questions to Environmental coverage on and in The Arizona Republic is supported by a grant from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust. Follow The Republic environmental reporting team at and @azcenvironment on Facebook and Instagram. This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Land trust acquires 47 acres to help Saguaro National Park grow
