Dutch Salmon

Xenophon and Gemma on San Bruno Mountain

I read an article in the New Mexico Political Report this morning about the long struggle to protect the Gila, the state's last free-flowing river.  As has been the case for as long as I can recall the article started off with a reference to the involvement in the fight by Dutch Salmon.  It came as a shock to see that Salmon had died in March.  I found it hard to believe that his passing had not been sufficiently noted in the press for me to have seen it when it happened.

I read Dutch Salmon's first book, Gazehounds & Coursing, when we were living in San Francisco's Outer Mission District in the mid-70s.  His tales of chasing jackrabbits in the deserts of the Southwest inspired me to acquire a pair of salukis.  My dogs and I spent many hours together on San Bruno Mountain south of the city, and we also chased a lot of jacks in the fill land near Brisbane.  My decisions to move to Idaho and later to New Mexico were certainly influenced by Salmon's stories as well.

I put coursing and falconry aside for quite a while after we left Idaho, but I got back to the dogs when we moved back out to country living on five acres in the Chihuahuan Desert south of Hatch, New Mexico.  I got two greyhounds which were fine companions for walks in the foothills of the Sierra de Las Uvas.  Jet was a small black greyhound that came from a pack of coyote hunters belonging to some Basque sheepmen in central New Mexico.  Sky was an elegant brindle from a line of racers from the same area.  I miss those many fine days with my dogs in the high desert, and I will certainly miss Dutch Salmon's fine writing and his advocacy for the preservation of Wilderness.