Thick-billed parrots once were plentiful in Arizona, but today, the state has only six — all in captivity. This pair lives at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum in Tucson. | Bruce D. Taubert
Thick & Thin
WHAT A GLORIOUS RACKET IT MUST HAVE BEEN. What an incredible clamor filled a Chiricahua Mountains forest one August day in 1904, when a flock of as many as 1,000 thick-billed parrots (Rhynchopsitta…
Keet Seel ruins sits perched on a cliff beneath a streak-stained sheer canyon wall. By Laurence Parent
Remains to be Seen
NAVAJO NATIONAL MONUMENT By Robert Stieve For the first time in four hours, Rick was at a loss for words. I couldn’t come up with anything, either. Even the wind dwindled to a whisper, and the piñon…
On the fifth day of the trip, author Kevin Fedarko (left) and photographer Pete McBride traverse a stretch of terrain across from 29 Mile Canyon. | RICH RUDOW
A Walk in the Park
In September 2015, Flagstaff writer Kevin Fedarko and his best friend, photographer Pete McBride, set off from Lees Ferry in a quixotic quest to walk the length of the Grand Canyon — something only…
The remnants of Ruby and Sherry Bowen’s desert home are preserved in Tucson Mountain Park. | Jeff Maltzman
Out in the Desert
MORE THAN ONE TRAIL will take you to the old stone house in the hills west of Tucson. I like to begin at the Camino de Oeste Trailhead and follow the winding path of the arroyo. It’s a 2-mile hike to…
A sunlit slope in the Mount Logan Wilderness is awash with desert vegetation. The 14,650-acre wilderness area was designated in 1984. | JONATHAN BUFORD
The Outside World
Yellow wildflowers surround a prickly pear cactus in this late-afternoon scene from the Coyote Mountains Wilderness, which stretches for 5,080 acres, 40 miles southwest of Tucson.  JONATHAN BUFORD…
Writer Tyler Williams surveys a significant rainstorm from the Mogollon Rim, east of Baker Butte. There, the Rim and the Arizona Divide make a sharp turn toward the east. | John Burcham
There’s A Fine Line
THERE IS A LONE BRISTLECONE PINE that grows above timberline, on a slope of cinders. In winter, the tree emerges and hides with the passing of storm fogs, appearing like a mirage out of the white. My…
This 12-shot stitched panoramic image of the Wave in North Coyote Buttes, near the Arizona state line with Utah, was captured by Shane McDermott
This Is My Story … By Shane McDermott
This is a 12-shot stitched panoramic image of the Wave in North Coyote Buttes, near the Arizona state line with Utah. I captured the image during a photo workshop last August, during the summer…
Margaret Vail, whose husband purchased the property in 1876, works cattle in the historic upper corral. | Empire Ranch Foundation
Empire Ranch
In the grasslands near Sonoita, a windmill rises from the desert landscape, marking the entrance to the historic Empire Ranch. Beyond it, old corrals, wooden barns and single-level houses rest…