The Roundup: Lovely, Dark and Deep
What a month...
Howdy folks,
Robert Frost once compared a dirty patch of snow in some corner of his turn-of-the-century New England to an old, weathered newspaper.
“It is speckled with grime as if
Small print overspread it,
The news of a day I’ve forgotten—
If I ever read it.”
This poem must be about late January. This is the time of year where days and nights seem to bleed into one monotonous stream of sleeping, waking, and doing, set to the orchestra of a gurgling coffee machine, a screaming tea kettle, and the occasional Crockpot ding. If you’re anything like me, you try to forgo headlines and forget what day it is. You opt for your overindulgent bookcase and empty notebook instead, content to let the world pass by while constructing an inner world of your own — one far more entertaining and far less daunting than the real one.
Call it dissociation, call it a personal renaissance, call it torpor, or call it knocking out your to-do list. This winter behavior wears many nametags.
Whatever you call it, it mirrors what we’ve been doing here at The Westrn over the last few months. You probably saw our New Year’s announcements, but on the off-chance you didn’t, we’re publishing the inaugural issue of our quarterly print newspaper this spring. Read more about what’s to come here.
We have a new addition to the website for your pleasure. You’ll find details on how to pitch us (finally!) on our Submit page. We are accepting pitches for the newspaper through February 3rd. Everything you need to know (and we mean everything) is in that pitch guide, so read it top-to-bottom and then get to work. We know what our brainiac audience is capable of. Give us the ol’ razzle dazzle, will ya?
After that, if you haven’t already, head over to Kestrel’s latest long read, “Antelope in the Bathtub at the Sundowner Motel.” Expect healthy doses each of rural pronghorn country, romance, and that singular type of hilarity that only a lost truck key can trigger.
Then, consider upgrading to an annual subscription on Substack — the only way to subscribe to the newspaper — or pre-order a few individual copies from our new store for yourself, your friends, or your coffee shop/bookstore/bar/fly shop/small business. Email nicole@thewestrn.com to talk about our low-cost advertising opportunities and bulk orders!
We are making a non-negotiable commitment to being equal parts important and impermanent to the outdoor and sporting communities we serve. That’s why we’re making a newspaper. Like all life on Earth, it’s cyclical, quick to deteriorate, and ripe for reuse. We’re all going to die someday. Why leave volumes of excess behind?
But before we can think about the inevitable death of our grassroots community rag, first we must bring it to life. We’re doing this for us, for you, and for all those old-fashioned outdoorspeople who, after watching billionaire tech [br]oligarchs get VIP seating at Monday’s presidential inauguration, are now searching for their next great ink-on-paper read.
As Frost writes, we have promises to keep, and miles to go before we sleep.
Miles to go before we sleep.
—Katie Hill, Managing Editor
Trophies and Spikes: Are We Taking Crazy Pills?
Our brief take on recent policy and conservation highs and lows
Trophy: The Supreme Court leaves federal public lands the hell alone, swiftly denying Utah governor Spencer Cox’s lawsuit calling for the transfer of 18.5 million acres of Bureau of Land Management lands to state ownership. Travis Hall dives into the nationwide implications of such a move for Field & Stream.
Spike: Custer Gallatin National Forest supervisor Matthew Jedra authorized the Inspiration Divide East Crazy Mountains Land Exchange on Jan. 17 after years of pushback from public access advocates. This is a complex issue, so consider reading Ben Ryder Howe’s piece for Intelligencer, Amanda Eggert’s extensive coverage for the Montana Free Press, and sure, I’ll plug my old work for MeatEater and Outdoor Life on the topic, too.
Spike: Representatives Celeste Maloy (R-UT) and Mark Amodei (R-NV) reportedly introduced the “Ending Presidential Overreach on Public Lands Act,” last week. This bill would nix Section 2 of the Antiquities Act, which gives the Oval Office the power to designate national monuments and historic landmarks on federal lands. Natalie Krebs reports on the issue for Outdoor Life.
Indie Work We Love: Stuart Palley’s California Wildfire Photography
Stuart Palley’s documentation of the Los Angeles fires is honest, heart-wrenching, and wildly informative. Palley possesses the training, resources, safety awareness, communication skills, and contextual clarity to do the effort justice. We note his work as another example of how independent journalism is best poised to serve the public. Find him on Instagram, and/or read his book “Into the Inferno.”
Field Notes
Slices of out-of-office life from our editors
Nicole recently attended the Traditional Bowhunters of Montana Winter Banquet and was reminded that there are dedicated groups of people that cherish doing things that are difficult, ancient, and communal. It was a LOT of fun. Mostly, she’s been head-down, figuring out the minutiae of starting a small business, and enjoying being productive at the desk after a long fall in the field. Keep an eye out for her upcoming interview with Ed Roberson of Mountain and Prairie, about her strange past and all things Westrn.
Kestrel went on their first ever goose hunt in mid-January, led by an enthusiastic waterfowler friend with good cornfield access. While shivering in their ground blind for hours, which is kind of like a camo vampire coffin that you decorate with corn stalks, they realized that Western big game hunting has made them too weak to pursue the Canada Goose. No one took a bird as there was a much more popular real goose party across the creek. Kestrel vowed to be prepared for next season with warmer pants and about 10 dozen or so decoys. They’ve also concluded that former theatre kids should try goose hunting, since it involves arts and crafts (blind concealment with natural vegetation) and puppetry (windsock decoys).
Katie participated in a butchering seminar at the San Antonio Food Bank with rockstar butcher Kriss Abigail of Meet Your Meat back before the holidays. She talked about chronic wasting disease and finally learned how to skin a deer properly. She also welcomed her first-ever pieces in Modern Huntsman (buy volume 13 here) and Field & Stream and appeared on Jeff Lund’s podcast, On Step Alaska. Stream the episode here.
Community Corner: “Skim” by Matt Cunningham
We aren’t the only ones making cool stuff.
writes poetry from Kilmarnock, Virginia. He sent us this one back in November after reading Lou Tamposi’s “Bird Language.”“Yes, it's a fishing piece submitted at the peak of hunting season, finished as the dog noses at me to go chase woodcock, but I'm hopeful you'll find it a good fit as we head into the next few months.” - Matt
Skim
Ice pops and clinks underfoot,
a tipped stack of plates
jarring against the steady
hiss of the river.
Night-blue sky.
The dam a pale wall.
Frost and bare limbs on the bank,
grey on darker grey.
Sunrise skims a riffle,
pink in the black water.
A visual anchor, steady
in a river more sound than sight.
A black streamer cast
by a black graphite rod.
Shadow sending shadow
across and downstream.
Current and line tension intersect just so.
Fur and feathers twitch,
that desperate motion.
Pray it summons a fish.
Cast, drift, strip, lift.
Repeat. Hope.
A strike, then pink-blue shimmer
of scales and splashing leap.
So quick it only snaps to focus
as a memory
as I net the fish.
Holdover stocked rainbow,
monochrome silver.
The faintest salmon
glows on its flank.
As the day melts into color,
yellow, gold, muddy brown, the water like gin,
One humble fish is permission
to play.
Cast up and across, just to watch
a white streamer flitter
like desperate life
through microcurrents.
No more taps, no more takes,
but no worry:
it’s ok to go home
satisfied
and wonder how one fish,
silver-salmon, melting blue
from net to dark water
can bring such color to a day.
-Matt Cunningham
We want to publish short work from our community! If you have:
a letter to the editor
a piece of published writing you love
a book that everyone should read
an important bit of news
a great photo or snapshot of artwork
a short story, a poem, or something else creative under 300 words
Send any of the above to editor@thewestrn.com and we’d love to share it in The Roundup. We are jonesing for some ol’ school lit mag vibes around here!
ICYMI: Our Latest
It’s hard to stay on top of emails, so we want to make sure you get what you signed up for.
Antelope in the Bathtub at the Sundowner Motel, in which Kestrel wrestles with relationships old and new in the perfect place to lose a truck key — pronghorn country.
The Westrn’s First Newspaper Ships on April 1st, in which the crew geeks out.
The Backcountry of Outdoor Media, in which Katie envisions a future for outdoor writers informed by the past.
Dear Reader: A Call to Community, in which Nicole geeks out some more.
Our That’s the Breaks series, in which Katie, Kestrel, and Nicole dissect one TW Montana deer hunt three ways.
Coming up: Nicole eats animals. Katie suggests a feminine cure for the public-land-grab blues. The crew trades guns, camo, and tags for skis, snowboards, and Indy passes.
We’re Offering 20% Off the Annual Subscription Until March 20th
We bury these codes at the bottom of our newsletters for our friends who love the fine print as much as we do. We’ll send you the first four print issues of our community paper as part of an annual subscription, which is what differentiates it from monthly and free subscriptions.
If paying for our annual subscription isn’t in the cards right now, we totally get it. Get 20% off your pre-order of the first issue with this link. We want to make sure it’s accessible, affordable, and available. We want to connect like-minded badasses in our budding community, after all.
It’s a feel-good investment in an editorial team like no other in the outdoor industry.