Environment reporter
Elise Schmelzer
Elise Schmelzer is the environment reporter at The Denver Post and covers water, climate change, public lands and wildlife. She previously covered public safety for the Post. Before moving to Denver, she wrote for the Casper Star-Tribune in Wyoming, the Washington Post and the Colorado Springs Gazette. She studied journalism and Spanish literature at the University of Missouri. When she's not writing, she disappears into the mountains to hike and fish.
Featured Stories

The wolves are coming to Colorado, and the state has stockpiled explosives and deterrents. How are ranchers preparing?
Colorado's ranching community, bracing for the reintroduction of wolves to the state as soon as this month, is weighing methods to protect livelihoods from the carnivore while facing new stresses.

How should we manage the drying Colorado River? Here’s what’s at stake in negotiations for its long-term future
An announcement last week of a short-term Colorado River management plan gives those working on the next batch of long-term plans for the river a breather, experts said. Now, those...

Nearly 40 years later, one of Colorado’s longest-running Superfund sites still has no radioactive waste cleanup plan
Nearly 40 years after federal regulators designated a former uranium mill near Cañon City as a Superfund site and mandated its cleanup, there is still no plan for how to...
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Federal officials pursue own Colorado River management plans as states try to overcome impasse
"I don't think anything in here was new to (states' negotiators), so this doesn't necessarily change the calculus. ... This highlights the need for the states to reach an agreement...

Nearly every corn seed planted in Colorado is covered in insecticide. Lawmakers may restrict the chemical.
“The choices ... put in front of farmers are not real choices,” an environmental advocate said. “Itap essential that we take legislative action to create market conditions to create that...

Can beavers help heal burn scars after wildfires? Colorado researchers built their own dams to find out.
The team installed beaver-like dams across the Cache la Poudre and Willow Creek watersheds — both burned in the 2020 wildfires — to slow water flow and instead spread the...

Where Colorado’s gray wolves traveled in December, including the mountains west of metro Denver
At least one wolf tromped through watersheds west of the Denver metro in December, a new map released Tuesday by state wildlife officials shows.

Pine beetles are poised to decimate Front Range forests: ‘Our ability to stop the spread is very limited’
“Right now, because the trees are all the same age and are in close proximity, itap sort of a ready-made buffet for the mountain pine beetle," Colorado's state forester says.

Trump moves to shut down Boulder climate research lab NCAR, drawing rebukes from Colorado officials
Federal lawmakers called the planned NCAR closure "deeply dangerous" and "blatantly retaliatory." Gov. Jared Polis said: "If true, public safety is at risk and science is being attacked."

Colorado’s snow season is having an abnormally warm and dry start — boding poorly for snowpack
Colorado's statewide snowpack, as of Friday, sat at 70% of the median between 1991 and 2020, according to data collected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Water and Climate...

CPW director who oversaw wolf reintroduction resigned to avoid being fired, documents show
The director of Colorado Parks and Wildlife resigned his position late last month to avoid being fired and was given another job with the state, documents show.

Trump administration renames Colorado’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Federal officials on Monday renamed the National Renewable Energy Laboratory -- which is headquartered in Golden -- and removed any mention of renewable energy.

5 killed — including 3 children — in Douglas County crash involving stolen car
A two-vehicle crash about 9 miles south of Franktown on Monday killed five people, including three children, and seriously injured two others.