In the rugged high country of the Rocky Mountains — from the snow-crusted drainages to wind-scoured alpine basins — a lean, ghostly predator roams. The coyote (Canis latrans) is at home here, from subalpine forests to alpine meadows and ridgelines above 7,000 feet. Though smaller than wolves, coyotes’ adaptability makes them one of the most successful carnivores in North America.

In the rugged high country of the Rocky Mountains — from the snow-crusted drainages to wind-scoured alpine basins — a lean, ghostly predator roams. The coyote (Canis latrans) is at home here, from subalpine forests to alpine meadows and ridgelines above 7,000 feet. Though smaller than wolves, coyotes’ adaptability makes them one of the most successful carnivores in North America.

Sandhill cranes are as old as the story of migration itself. Tall, gray-bodied, crimson-capped, they move with a purpose that has outlasted ice, drought, and the rise of cities...

The Lindenmeier Site in northern Colorado is one of North America’s most important Paleoindian archaeology discoveries. Here, Ice Age hunters of the Folsom culture crafted fluted spear points, sewed hides with bone needles, and hunted Bison antiquus on the windswept plains long before history was written. The site’s dramatic evidence — a Folsom point embedded in bone — challenged early Smithsonian archaeology skepticism and helped prove humans lived in prehistoric Colorado during the Pleistocene. Today, visitors to Soapstone Prairie Natural Area north of Fort Collins can walk the same open shortgrass prairie where these early people once camped and hunted.