Near dark iron gates that cover cave openings in the Flatirons, a sign explains that the caves have been closed because white-nose syndrome has already killed more than 5 million bats. Local author and cave expert Richard Rhinehart informed the City of Boulder’s Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) office of an inaccuracy on the signs.]]> It’s that time of year. The resolutions fly back and forth, the company incentive packages and community weight loss programs are rolling out. Your gym is about to become a lot more crowded with people looking to burn off the holiday pounds and jump into the new year leaner and meaner and healthier, ideally.]]> After suffering more than 15 years of a mountain pine beetle outbreak, Colorado’s forests are now facing another bark beetle epidemic. Last year, 183,000 acres of Colorado’s forests were infested with the spruce beetle, bringing the total acreage affected by spruce beetles to just under 1 million since the initial outbreak in 1996.]]> A nonprofit fund called Soil Trust, which will be officially launched at Slow Money’s upcoming National Gathering in Boulder on April 29 and 30, aims to enable local citizens to up the food sustainability ante and put their money where their meal is — or, rather, where it comes from.]]> Shortly after Ben Barres, a professor of neurobiology at Stanford University, gave a speech about his discoveries regarding nerve cells at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1998, an MIT faculty member was overheard saying, “Ben Barres gave a great seminar today, but then again, his work is much better than his sister’s.”]]> Earthships aiming to land in Colorado pour on a slew of questions about rights to the rain. Permaculture-minded and rather postmodern, the gridfree homes are designed to catch rainwater for consumptive, gray water and black water use. But in most parts of the state, catching rainwater is illegal.]]> Natural,” “organic,” “whole grain,” “hormone free”: the labels in grocery store aisles are endless, all designed to tell consumers more about the products available for purchase.]]> Deforestation is at the top of the CIA’s list of environmental issues facing Indonesia, and much of it can be attributed to the creation of palm oil plantations, built to satisfy demands of the American market, which has increased the import of palm oil by 485 percent over the last decade.]]> Step away from the shrimp cocktail and the smoked salmon spread. Even fisheries that sell products stamped with the seal of approval from the Marine Stewardship Council, an international nonprofit that promotes solutions to overfishing and certifies fisheries and seafood products as sustainable or environmentally friendly, have been the source of some oceanic nightmares. ]]> A long with Boulder landmarks like McGuckin Hardware and the Boulder Book Store, Alfalfa’s grocery remained a local standby for 13 years. Locals were crushed when the store, which pioneered the model for natural foods supermarkets, was bought by Wild Oats in 1996.]]> Twenty years of wishful thinking by lottery ticket buyers all over the state has made all the rest of us winners when it comes to living in Colorado. For the last two decades, revenue from the Colorado Lottery has been used to build parks and trails, create open space and protect wildlife habitat.]]> No need for the herald: It’s a well-known fact that American society is a consumerist culture.]]> Boulder’s bicycle culture is thriving and lively, and we habitually capture and celebrate it in visual form and as a group. Compare the single man polishing the chrome bumper of his car to the workshop of Community Cycles, which has now graduated 1,000 Earn-a- Bikers from its community workshop.]]> Volunteers Sarah Reed, Chelsea Hodge and 1Sky Colorado regional organizer Micah Parkin are the main organizers of what will be a day-long series of events, including workshops, a march, a rally, a raffle and an expo of green products and services, finishing off with a party at the St.]]> Pesticides are made to kill something somewhere — it says it in the name and there is always a trade-off, says Pierre Mineau, Ph.D., co-author of a new study that found that pesticides are the leading cause of grassland bird deaths.]]> Journalist and ocean organizer David Helvarg is attending this month’s Colorado Ocean Coalition Blue Drinks to talk about his new book, The Golden Shore. On its surface, Helvarg’s latest book offers a lengthy history of California and Californians’ relationship to the ocean and their 11,000 miles of coastline.]]> Women exposed before birth to the banned pesticide DDT may have a greater risk of developing high blood pressure later in life, according to a study published March 12.]]> Forest Service researchers have used the emerald ash borer, a beetle that has killed more than 100 million trees in the eastern and midwestern U.S., to study the correlation between human health and forest health. They conclude that counties severely impacted by the emerald ash borer also had higher human mortality rates.]]>