Suckling says, "It's frankly a stupid plan that ignores everything we know about conservation planning. The unique thing about these areas is that the location of the vegetation is constantly changing. When you are talking about managing a dune system, you aren't just talking about managing an ecosystem but the ecosystem processes. So you cannot just put a fence around a small area where a species occurs. Come back to that area in 15 years and it will be under 15 feet of sand. You have to manage large landscapes that are big enough to capture that ecosystem process. These plants have evolved to live in a highly dynamic landscape. Little boxed in areas don’t work…little zoos don’t work. These are not zoo animals. You need an environment that is allowed to evolve naturally. Some plants will die and some will get buried, and that’s fine…but you have to protect it enough so that you have that right balance."

When I ask him what and how he wants to accomplish at Sand Mountain, he says, "For the BLM to develop an ecosystem management plan for the entire dune system that ensures the ecological process can continue so the species are allowed to thrive. Once we establish that, only then can the areas that are not critical be used for other purposes. We want the BLM to start from the perspective of the ecosystem."

Over a year ago, the Center for Biological Diversity and other groups petitioned the Department of the Interior (the BLM's head office), to list the Sand Mountain blue as endangered or threatened. The result is today's warring factions. The BLM approached the problem the way the Department of the Interior's Gale Norton would like these things settled: Unenforced guidelines about where the duners should and shouldn't ride.

The events at Sand Mountain mimic the debate in Washington DC., because our Secretary of the Interior wants BLM policy to be freer, more multiple-use based. Endangered species questions should be resolved locally, less lawyers. Think: people-first. Think: off-roaders should be responsible for saving the species. Crowley Jr. and the off-roaders are encouraged by this, because it means the survival of the butterfly is more up to them.

But the problem is, Norton keeps losing. And Suckling keeps winning. In court, each time a Norton policy affects a wolf or a sea otter or an owl, Suckling draws his sword.

Great Basin Escalante Desert Going solo in the lonely canyons of Escalante The Loneliest Road A journey across the Nevada's Great Basin and the Loneliest Road in America. We follow the struggle between off-roaders, Great Basin Indians and conservationists over the fate of a blue butterfly. Summer Lake Part II of a conversation about travel writing, this episode continues into the southern Oregon Desert. Rachel, Nevada and Area 51 Area 51 is a dusty set of hangars at the bottom of a dry lake bed. The Owyhee River Part I of the Oregon Testament.Follow us to Leslie Gulch, where we stumble upon a yet undiscovered Native American site. The Alvord Desert Part II of the Oregon Testament. Fishing under the Steens Mountains, and wandering the alkali flats of Alvord Lake. Mono Lake They are twisted, trollish, ungodly, like a woman turned to stone East Oregon High Desert Wandering the High Desert of Eastern Oregon The White Mountains By the accidents of geologic history, this land has remained relatively unchanged. Zion Canyon Zion Canyon as a launching point for discussion on the politics of sin. Glen Canyon What Creatures will Roam Glen Canyon? It's the question I had to ask, even as I rolled into America's most lurid town.