By Spencer Lennard
Several friends and I recently embarked on what we hoped would be a
wilderness adventure in California’s high country. What we found was
nothing like that.
When we picked up the wilderness permit for our
hike in the Emigrant Wilderness in the Stanislaus National Forest, we
envisioned the Sierra high country to be wonderful fish and wildlife
habitat lined with huge, picturesque ponderosa pines and white granite
cliffs. The otherwise helpful rangers made no mention of the ecosystem
wreckage we were about to encounter.
Instead of the pristine trout
creek we expected, the otherwise spectacular Kennedy Creek was lined
with thousands of steaming piles of cow dung, swarms of black flies,
cow-trampled banks and waterways and green algae-filled water. Instead
of what should have been lush, wildflower-strewn meadows at Kennedy
Lake, we sunk into a green quagmire of muck created by a steady stream
of cows cooling themselves in the shallows.
As we scurried to get above the algae-clogged Kennedy Lake, we
encountered several fly fishers, horse packers, photographers and hikers
– all aghast and expressing the same sense of disappointment as we
were. Why would the National Forest Service and the California
legislative delegation continue the taxpayer-subsidized damage to some
of the state’s best sub-alpine habitat, especially here, in this
increasingly popular recreational area?
As we swatted flies and
stepped over the excrement, we were struck by the notion that this
hiker’s paradise should not be a taxpayer-subsidized feedlot. We
understood that grazing allotments were grandfathered into many
wilderness bills – obviously including the Emigrant Wilderness – when
they were designated as such. We know that policy change is slower than
molasses, especially when ranching culture and environmental issues are
being discussed. But we could not understand how the U.S. Forest Service
and California’s blue congressional delegation could let such
taxpayer-subsidized harm continue to degrade one of our most preciously
beautiful places, especially when species and habitat loss are also at
stake.
Holding our noses from the stench of urine and feces, we
asked ourselves, “Why is this occurring in our diminishing wilderness,
some of the best fish and wildlife habitat left in the Sierra?”
... It is clear that the true cost of this archaic land mismanagement is
also risking harm to the human communities below. The federal grazing
program actually harms the local economy in favor of a few ranchers.
Recreationists like us will NOT return to the Kennedy Lake drainage till
the cows are removed. We’ll warn our friends and they’ll tell theirs.
The depressed foothill towns of Sonora, Twain Harte and Columbia will
receive far less revenue from hikers, horse packers and fishers if no
effort is made to reclaim our public wilderness from the cows.
For a peak into the mind of those who are influencing our agencies, read the whole diatribe published in the Sacramento Bee.
Issues of concern to people who live in the west: property rights, water rights, endangered species, livestock grazing, energy production, wilderness and western agriculture. Plus a few items on western history, western literature and the sport of rodeo... Frank DuBois served as the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003. DuBois is a former legislative assistant to a U.S. Senator, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Interior, and is the founder of the DuBois Rodeo Scholarship.
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1 comment:
I guess I'll have to take back some of my comments about the class and intelligence of people like this author. He seemed to understand that it is best not to step in anything that is soft, so he claims he stepped over at least one cow pie. Good for him.
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