Alex Boxell explains how she has experienced Northern Colorado’s natural areas and how the impacts of climate change are serious, including the tree-eating termites she has observed creating deforestation.
My name is Kaitlyn Mixon, and today I will be speaking with Alex Boxell, a student at Colorado State University. Alex is majoring in Health and Exercise Science, though in her spare time, she is an avid traveler, hiker, skier, climber, and enjoyer of all outdoor activities. She is very well-informed about environmental conservation and plans to work or volunteer in that area at some point in the future. This interview took place in person and was recorded and will be focused on how Alex views the natural areas in Northern Colorado that she has traveled to and what she finds would be the best way to respect those environments. She provides good insight from a viewpoint that is personal and experienced.
Q- “Hey Alex, so nice to have you today. Thank you for coming.”
A- “Of course, I am happy to be here.”
Q- “So I hear you travel a lot and that you’ve been to a lot of national parks, lands, or other areas in northern Colorado.”
A- “Yes”
Q- “So out of all the places that you have visited in northern Colorado, what has been one of your favorite natural areas, parks, lands, or anything of that nature? After looking at my article, “6 Incredible Natural Areas to visit in Northern Colorado that Need to be Protected and Respected,” have any of those areas stuck out to you?”
A- “I think my favorite would be the Sky Pond Hike at Rocky Mountain National Park. I think that was my favorite because it was cheap, to be honest, like Red Rocks is great, but concert tickets are expensive, so that definitely plays a factor in things. I feel like the outdoors should be enjoyed by everyone whenever they want and not necessarily, you know, have [to have] some big plan around it and wait months and pay a ton of money or whatever. But the Sky Pond Hike, it was just a long hike, but it wasn’t full summits, but they were like individual destinations along the way, so each was a destination itself before the final destination. Then the final destination was this big grand thing, but the lead-up to it was the hardest part and everything.”
Q- “That sounds absolutely incredible. Do you have a least favorite hike or national park? For any reason, it could be from like expense or area, littering, etc.”
A- “I think that my least favorite would be Horsetooth Reservoir, the hikes specifically; I think it’s great to go take pictures, I think it’s great to swim, to cliff jump at, to boat at, a lake party on the beach, anything like that, but in terms of their hikes, they’re just really really easy. Like you can’t find ones that are super challenging. The rattlesnake population is also out of control. It’s kind of boring, and also, since you’re surrounded by more of the city, all of the hikes face towards the city instead of the back of Horsetooth, where once you get behind the back of it, so the side that isn’t facing the school you can see more mountains which is really cool, but most of the hikes don’t even focus on that, they focus on the urban area. What I really don’t like about that is you can actually see the smog, you can see the pollution line, and that to me is like really upsetting and disturbing.”
Q “On the topic of pollution, what issues conservation-wise, littering-wise, disrespectful tourists-wise, or fire hazard related have you seen while camping or hiking? In these places, that are natural areas that are absolutely beautiful but genuinely make you upset.”
A- “That’s a really good question, I would say that people on hikes all over, not just one specific location, that people bring, I also see this skiing, honestly anytime I do any kind of outdoor activity, people will bring snacks and often times they come in at least single packaging, sometimes even triple packaging, you know, like something is packaged inside something else, and they’ll bring that and they’ll, even if it’s on accident, they’ll like drop something and leave it. It’s littering. That’s a big problem. I see, all in all, that people attending those sites are relatively respectful in terms of fire and those types of things, but the main issue would be littering.”
Q- “So in order to keep the area as preserved and as safe as possible, what would you suggest for people that haven’t visited a lot of natural areas other than, of course, not throwing stuff everywhere and littering, which I truly can’t comprehend why people do that. But other than that, what would you suggest about general safety?”
A- “I would say what I think, each location from the list to call you showed me of the most beautiful natural areas, each of them have websites that most people will go to prior to visiting. Most people are either going to do research on what they wanna do or what concert they want to see, or what weather they should go prepare for, and I think within the home slide, there needs to be like rules to keep our environment clean and healthy and just have a very simple bolded list to just like remind people. I also just think, like, for instance, more touristy people that are just doing this for a one-time experience, that are not going to immerse themselves in this a lot; I think they honestly don’t even realize. They don’t realize the effect of starting a little fire while camping when it’s super dry and windy, so I just think a bullet point list that’s easy to comprehend for everyone and to show that there are rules and expectations that everyone should follow would be very helpful.”
Q- “So I made a list of seven simple basic principles to follow when traveling on my article. I figured these seven out from researching websites of national parks, such as the Rocky Mountain National Park website. The rules are to plan ahead and prepare, travel and camp on durable surfaces, dispose of waste properly, leave what you find, minimize campfire impacts, respect wildlife, and be considerate of other visitors. Do you have anything to add to that, or do you think it’s a pretty cohesive list?”
A- “I think, yeah, that’s a really cohesive list. The only thing is like for “plan ahead and prepare,” which it’s kind of like the same thing, but just do your research and not even just planning ahead of like time but do your research and yeah [research] what their rules are. For instance, in Rocky Mountain National Park, depending on the season, there are different restricted areas, like at the start of hunting season, one of the roads is completely blocked off unless you have a hunter’s license. It’s just things like that.”
Q- “This is on a slightly different topic, though relating to rules, have you, and your lifetime, observed any climate-related or environmental changes in the areas that you have either visited or lived in? Is there anything in particular that you’ve noticed, such as climate change, where we have all noticed it’s hotter in the warmer months and colder in the colder months, seemingly, anything like that that you have specifically noticed from traveling and visiting all these places?”
A- “I think the height that I can get on my hikes, not just at Horsetooth, but I do a lot of other places, highlighted the impact of dryness, which comes along and comes along with, and triggers a lot of wildfires. I’ve hiked and seen, from a distance, a lot of wildfire damage. Also, a lot of things I’ve seen, and most people assume it is wildfire damage, but it’s not. It’s the, I believe it’s actually called termites, but they are termites or beetles or something of that nature that eat the trees commonly grown in Colorado, and a lot of people assume the damage is from wildfires and all the devastation is all wildfire damage, but it is actually that if there’s not enough snow, and it’s not cold for long enough, these insects can survive for longer than they should. Therefore, it causes them to eat away at these trees and causes mass devastation of forestry.”
Q- “Wow, that is definitely not something people talk about. I had no idea.”
A- “No, definitely, most people don’t even realize that, and I think that, like, the biggest thing with climate change is that Colorado is getting less snow and less snowpack, and it’s warmer, and it’s warmer for longer periods which impacts that and also with the less snowpack the impact of that causes a much greater degree and likelihood of avalanches, and avalanche risk which inhibits people from skiing, that country or ice, pick hiking, and all that.”
Q- “And also, the smog you mentioned near Horsetooth over the urban areas is definitely something that I have noticed in different times of the year to become worse, and sometimes I’m like wow, it truly is bad, and it is aggressive, and that’s really upsetting. Have you ever worked in the field environmentally, and I know you are a Health and Exercise Science major, but have you ever volunteered for any environmental organizations, or have you done anything in that general area in order to try and help or minimize the effects? If not, there are a lot of if you would like more information there are a lot of things or organizations that are not as widespread, though they could be in order to be more helpful. Such as, there is this Northern Colorado Wildlife Center that I was reading about, and it literally holds these educational seminars and has volunteers health to educate people and inform people about wildlife and environmental conservation while keeping the environment safe and healthy. It is just not nearly as widespread as it needs to be. I feel like you would really enjoy something such as this. Have you done anything with that or in that area?”
A- “The most, the most that I have ever done in regards to being involved in an environmental business or a park or whatever, is simply cleaning up trash on the beach. That’s the most that I have personally done. I have not volunteered for any environmental organization or anything like that.”
Q- “I have also spent a lot of time cleaning up the beach, being from Galveston, Texas. And you were from Chicago, yes? But you chose to come to Colorado. Was it because of, or partly because of, the natural areas and preserved land here?”
A- “Yeah, it was totally the lifestyle of waking up and hiking when it’s warm out and when it’s cold out, waking up and skiing all day.”
Q- “That is truly one of the reasons I also came to Colorado. I really appreciate you talking to me about this, and I really enjoyed getting to know your insights on the topic; the beetle information really opened my eyes. Have an incredible day, and thank you so much!”
A- “Thank you so much!”
