Stuff by Elizabeth Key

• Locations: News By Elizabeth Key Published Jul. 6, 2022

  It’s elemental: fire, lightening, wind and water

  Cloud formation above Glenwood Springs, photo by Jon Lopez

  Fire and water are opposites, but when it comes to weather, they are interconnected. Large wildfires can generate their own weather systems. Weather travels through vertical columns in a convective process, but fire and weather are almost cyclical in nature as they create and destroy one another.… read more →

• Locations: News By Elizabeth Key Published Jun. 22, 2022

  Sun showers in the sunflowers

  Elle Mullen frolics among the sunflowers at the Basalt Community Garden. Photo by Elizabeth Key

  The Basalt Community Garden is blooming in Southside, just west of Basalt High School. In its 10th year of operation, the half-acre garden has reached capacity. Currently, almost 100 garden plots are traversed by bark mulch paths supporting a whole new crop of gardeners. Gayle Shugars, one of the garden’s… read more →

• Locations: Columns, Opinion By Elizabeth Key Published Jun. 15, 2022

  My personal burn scar: An appeal for volunteer firefighters

  Elizabeth Key

  It was July 3, 2018, when we fled our Hillcrest home and the hotshots were called in. We watched from Willits as the choreographed fire dance began; flames popped up and the chopper released rains of red retardant. The hillside was studded with brush fires crowning our home.… read more →

• Locations: News By Elizabeth Key Published Jun. 15, 2022

  PitCo Landfill gets creative to curve capacity constraints

  Jade Bath holds down the new Motherlode Mercantile. Photo by Elizabeth Key

  The Pitkin County Solid Waste Center (PCSWC) was originally established, in its current location, as the Aspen Free Dump in 1965. For years since, the community has received public service announcements about the landfill nearing peak capacity. 

  The landfill has been pushing recycling and innovation to stymie… read more →

• Locations: News By Elizabeth Key Published Jun. 8, 2022

  Picking fresh figs on Basalt Mountain

  Jerome Osentowki grafts varieties of apple trees together by slicing and taping them, then nourishing them with mist. Once the energy transfers to heal the graft, a multi-branch tree emerges, proffering different types of apples from around the world. Photo by Elizabeth Key

  The slice of the Roaring Fork Valley population that inhabits a small portion of Eagle County often finds its boundaries baffling, inefficient and frustrating. The State Legislature evidently didn’t consider the watershed or topography when they drew Eagle County’s borders back in 1883. Jerome Osentowski, in turn, probably… read more →