Meanwhile, aliens including fathead minnows, channel catfish and common carp, which would have been hard put to survive in the savage waters of the undammed canyon, have moved in.

ECONOMIST: Flooding the Grand Canyon

To his mind he was no more a thief of Nature than when, a country boy during the Depression, he had hooked 20-pound channel catfish, now long gone, out of the Chattahoochee River.

ECONOMIST: Ray Anderson