Customer Reviews

Otero Mesa: Preserving America's Wildest Grassland

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Grasslands continue to disappear throughout the U.S. to the determine of the ecosystems and habitats where they are an essential part of a healthy and self-sustaining environment. "Otero Mesa: Preserving America's Widest Grassland" focuses upon one specific grassland with an impressively informative text by Gregory McNamee, an enlightening foreword by Governor Bill Richardson, and impressive photographs by Stephen Strom and Stephen Capra. This seminal work of meticulous scholarship brings to light the vast beauty of Otero Mesa and its alarming present day reality. Otero Mesa is in danger of becoming a drilling haven to one hundred new oil wells which will pollute the environment, decimate and contaminate groundwater and endanger the wildlife. Presented in four compelling chapters: The View from an Aplomado; The View from a Missile; Oil and Otero Mesa; and the Fate of the Land, "Otero Mesa" is certain to enlighten the non-specialist general reader and environmental activist who recognizes the value of wide open spaces and the habitat that occupies it, and clean water so necessary to plant, animal, and human life. The fate of Otero Mesa is still unknown as the case fighting to preserve it rests in the federal courts awaiting a decision. A clarion call, "Otero Mesa" is urgently recommended for all personal, community, and academic library Environmental Studies reference collections and supplemental reading lists.

I had high hopes for Otero Mesa but found the author essay quickly digressed into childish rhetoric. The type of language found in the following passage discredits the entire premise of the essay, which is unfortunate because there are important points to be made and conclusions to be drawn.

"..Powerful interest are arrayed against Otero Mesa and the rest of the earth, aided and abetted by an administration founded on oil and a millenarian vision that promises heaven for those who destroy the ground beneath them. Let us call these people for what they are. They are devourers who talk benignly of consumption as they use up much, much more than their share. They are gluttons, if gluttons who work out daily at the gym to disguise the evidence of their appetites. They are men and women who deny themselves absolutely nothing, no matter what the expense, an expense that is always borne by other people and by the earth itself. They are killers of places and landscapes and the people and animals and plants that inhabit them, whose existence is a nuisance. They talk of patriotism while destroying the ground on which America was built. They are thieves who rob the future, for which they have no regard for in any event, in order to nurse the past."

Important environmental issues need mature, educated, and thoughtful spokespeople if the cause it to be taken seriously. The author has exhibited none of these qualities in this work.

Charlie Gell
charlie_gell@hotmail.com

Well written book with beautiful photos about saving and protecting the areas of New Mexico that we love. Great read!