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More than half of Yellowstone National Park's bison herd has died since last fall, forcing the government to suspend its annual slaughter program.More than 700 of the iconic animals starved or otherwise died on the mountainsides during an unusually harsh winter, and more than 1,600 were shot by hunters or sent to slaughterhouses in a disease-control effort, according to National Park Service figures.As a result, the park estimates its bison herd has dropped from 4,700 in November to about 2,300 today, prompting the government to halt the culling program early.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park can be the engine to propel new eco-friendly tourism for gateway communities in Tennessee and North Carolina, according to participants at a regional conference on "sustainable tourism." That's both an opportunity and a challenge for such communities as Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and Cherokee, N.C., and for the country's most-visited national park itself.

The view across the Potomac from George Washington's Mount Vernon estate will remain pristine, as it was more than 200 years ago, thanks in part to a purchase of 63 acres by the National Park Service on the banks of the river. The purchase, announced Monday, conserves the last major block of shoreline on the Maryland side of the river that can be seen from Mount Vernon, which sits in Virginia just a few miles south of the nation's capital.

Steve Lautenbach had company recently, and after more than six months of solitude, it was downright exciting. "I saw a grizzly bear and cub today, right in front of my cabin," the winter caretaker of Many Glacier Hotel said on April 14. "I was shoveling out my car. It's the first year the bears have been out so early." There aren't many signs of life around Many Glacier Hotel in the winter, so when Lautenbach came 12 feet from being face to face with mama and baby bear, it was an adrenaline rush, and maybe a little bit unsettling.

U.S. Senator Benjamin L. Cardin (D-MD) and U.S. Congressman Steny Hoyer (MD-5th) joined the Trust for Public Land, the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association and the National Park Service today in announcing the acquisition of an additional 73 acres of land at Piscataway Park. The new park land builds on the effort to preserve the historic viewshed along the Potomac River across from Mount Vernon.

NPS Morning Report for April 28, 2008

The Ancient Redwood Forest and Watershed Restoration Project is coming to Redwood National and State Parks in the first year of a 10-year program to reinvigorate America’s national parks. This $3 million project will foster the recovery of some of this nation’s last remaining ancient redwood forests, protect critical salmon habitat and work to inspire future generations toward being better stewards of the land.

Big Island residents take pride in their ability to tolerate and adapt to the elements. It isn't unusual in a single year for residents to put up with drought, long days of rain that can cause flooding, or threats from wildfires.Even so, the recent days of heavy volcanic emissions and light kona winds have been obnoxious and in some cases damaging, and have some residents worrying about the future.

Wawona tunnel is a passageway from civilization to natural splendor. The tunnel, dug through a hill on the south side of Yosemite National Park in the 1930s, hides the coming view like a mile-long blindfold.

The public has been given the opportunity to speak out on plans for Morris Island, and its message has been to overwhelmingly urge that access to the island not be encouraged. The owner of the island's Cummings Point tract should acknowledge public opinion and complete the sale of the property to the Charleston Park and Recreation Commission without requirements for docks and other facilities.

The red-legged frog sat motionless amid tangled vegetation in a wetland area below the spectacular cliffs of Mori Point, just a short walk from a beach in Pacifica where bootlegging and a notorious gunbattle once raged. The federally threatened frog has survived on this sweeping promontory of cliffs, bluffs and wetlands despite almost constant human disruption over the years, including dredging, development and off-road vehicles, not to mention booze and gunfire.

It's no wonder that Dinosaur National Monument, on the Utah-Colorado border, now has the worst visitor satisfaction ratings in the entire National Park Service — disappointing news disclosed during the current National Parks Week.For two years, its world-famous visitor center — enclosing a cliff where 1,500 dinosaur bones in the rock were carefully exposed — has been closed as unsafe. It slowly split apart over years atop unstable soils. When and if money for renovation or reconstruction may be available is unclear. The center was the park's main attraction.

Disabilities-rights activist Marilynn Phillips is prepared to file a complaint with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission regarding the newly opened Gettysburg National Military Park Museum and Visitor Center - which she alleges does not "reasonably" accommodate disabled patrons. Phillips' main gripes are with the center's 500-foot sloped sidewalk from the parking lot to the entrance, the low number of handicap parking spaces, a lack of automatic and power-assist doors and the absence of Braille signage for blind persons and audio tapes for the hearing-disabled.

This year has been a wet Spring at Yellowstone National Park, with the most snow in a dozen years hitting the ground. The conditions are pretty similar to how it was at the park 20 years ago, just before the biggest fires in its history. That's not to suggest we're due for a repeat of the fires of 1988, but it does show just how fast we can go from wet to tinder dry. "The pattern of wetting and drying is what drives fires" explains ASU Fire Researcher Steve Payne. "So we go through an annual cycle inv the West, then we have droughts on top of that."

Every April, hundreds of volunteers take to the streets and roads of Mount Desert Island, sacrificing a few precious Saturday hours to preserve the beauty around Maine’s only national park. About 400 volunteers split into small teams spent several hours canvassing nearly 150 miles on MDI and the Schoodic Point section of Acadia National Park, cleaning up several tons of trash from the roadsides.