"The tribe has survived for more than a thousand years in the arid mesas. The megadrought gripping the Southwest is testing that resilience."

"MOENKOPI, Ariz. — On the bone-dry plateau where the Hopi people have lived for well over a thousand years, Robinson Honani pulled his truck to the side of a dirt road and pointed to a carcass.

“This is where the cows come to die,” Mr. Honani, manager of the Hopi Office of Range Management, said one morning in September as he spotted the remains nearby of another bovine decaying under the sun. It was at least the 10th dead cow Hopi range officials had found in recent weeks.

Alarmed by the two-decade drought that has dried up springs, withered crops and killed cattle, the Hopi Tribal Council ordered ranchers in August to slash their herds in a bid to preserve water supplies and avoid the cruelty of an even larger death toll."

Simon Romero reports for the New York Times October 2, 2021. [2]