Becky Kramer

As water percolates through old mine workings in the headwaters of the Coeur d’Alene River, it picks up lead, arsenic, zinc and other heavy metals. The metals stunt fish populations in 66 miles of the river and its tributaries, with some stretches too toxic to support aquatic life. They also pose potential health risks for people who swim or float down the river, or recreate along the shore, government officials said.

A proposal to designate 215,000 acres of new wilderness areas in the Colville National Forest is drawing support from a broad coalition of forest users. The plan would expand the existing Salmo-Priest Wilderness in Northeast Washington and create new wilderness along the Kettle Crest, protecting six peaks that are each over 7,000 feet tall. The acreage represents some of the most remote, untouched land left in the lower 48 states. It’s home to grizzly bears, lynx and woodland caribou. And it’s an important wildlife migration route that connects the Rocky Mountains to the Cascades, environmentalists say.

Heyburn State Park is renting 540 goats from a Grangeville, Idaho, rancher to help control weeds along Plummer Creek. Each goat eats about 3  1/2 pounds of vegetation a day. Over the next week and a half, the herd will munch its way through dense thickets of invasive spotted knapweed, tansy and St. John’s wort along the stream, clearing the creek bottom for the return of native plants.

In 1943, Millicent Peterson Young gathered up her earnings from the wheat harvest, and ran away to learn how to fly. World War II was in full swing, and the military had begun accepting women pilots. Young, a Nebraska farm girl, never doubted that she could qualify.

At Long Lake, hundreds of dead carp are washing up on beaches, collecting under docks and creating a stink for residents living along the 24-mile reservoir. “If you’re water-skiing on the lake, you see them constantly,” said Jeff Braviroff, a Suncrest resident who started noticing the dead fish about a week ago. “There’s so many of them. … It’s going to be nasty when they really start to decay.”

At Long Lake, hundreds of dead carp are washing up on beaches, collecting under docks and creating a stink for residents living along the 24-mile reservoir.

In the early 1970s, Kellogg’s bleak backdrop reminded Ed Pommerening of Vietnam. Bare hills rising from the historic mining town bore an eerie resemblance to the napalmed jungles the young forester saw during his stint as an Army ranger.