Once my second cup of coffee kicks in I'll be writing a response to this current load of crap
http://www.thedesertsun.com/news/stories/l...046056903.shtml
Biologists: Milk vetch, Imperial dunes need more study
Pair urge BLM access decisions be based on science
By Benjamin Spillman
The Desert Sun
February 24th, 2003
More scientific data on just how off-road vehicles affect the unique ecology of the Imperial Sand Dunes would help the government make better decisions about how to manage access to the area, according to scientists familiar with the dunes.
One of the scientists, botanist Arthur Phillips, recently authored a study off-roaders cite as evidence they should have more range on the giant dunes.
The other, former Bureau of Land Management biologist Debbie Sebesta, said she has long favored conducting experiments to study what happens to the Peirson’s milk vetch when it is run over by off-highway vehicles.
Their views represent the disparate opinions among scientists and the dune community as to the role of science in making decisions on how to manage public land at the dunes.
Both said the emotional standoff between environmentalists who want the dunes closed and off-roaders who want total access complicates land management decisions that ought to be based on sound science.
"Everything has gotten so political lately," Sebesta said. "I just don’t know they pay that much attention to the science."
But Phillips, Sebesta and many colleagues disagree over how much more study is warranted at the dunes, a legal and political battleground between off-roaders who flock to the area by the tens of thousands and environmentalists who say the dune buggies destroy species uniquely adapted to the giant waves of sand.
Phillips said the balance between protecting the threatened milk vetch and other native species from harm and preserving the dunes as a popular off-highway-vehicle destination requires compromise.
"Unfortunately, that is kind of a middle road. I don’t think either group is going to be happy with it," said Phillips, a member of the California Native Plant Society who said he usually supports preservation efforts. "It is real easy to get caught up in the emotion of things and forget about the science."
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will consider removing the "threatened" tag from the milk vetch. The designation in 1998 led to a 2001 legal settlement in which the BLM agreed to close nearly 50,000 acres of land to off-highway vehicle use. Currently, roughly half of the 134,000-acre region is open to off-highway vehicles.
The Phillips study, commissioned by the American Sand Association, an off-highway vehicle group, concluded the milk vetch population at the dunes is robust.
The ASA cited Phillips’ findings Wednesday after filing a lawsuit to force Fish and Wildlife to make a decision about the "threatened" tag.
Other scientists who support continued closure of the dunes, while not doubting Phillips’ findings, said the ASA study did not ask the right questions.
The study found more than 71,000 plants in spring of 2001.
"Just because there are a lot of plants doesn’t mean they aren’t threatened," said Sebesta, who left the BLM’s El Centro office in 2001 for a job in the Forest Service. "What they need to show is how much actual impact the plants can take from OHVs."
Sebesta said during her time at the dunes, she pushed for more specific studies, to no avail.
But even testing the milk vetch by running it over with vehicles in a controlled setting won’t give government land managers the data they need to control access to the dunes, said biologist Bruce Pavlik, who has conducted similar experiments at Eureka Dunes near Death Valley.
The sporadic distribution of rider visits and the plant’s life cycle make it hard to determine the off-road capacity of the dunes.
"It is difficult to demonstrate just what is going on out there because of the complicated nature of both activities," he said.
Pavlik said combining data about plant population and off-road visitation to build a flexible plan that balances closures with plant population and rider distribution would be difficult.
"I think the science that has been done so far is great. I just don’t think it is enough to really develop a new plan that will be convincing to all sides," he said.
Ileene Anderson, another member of the California Native Plant Society, said it’s clear to her that off-highway vehicles threaten the milk vetch. She points to changes in the vegetation pattern between closed and open areas of the dunes.
"All you have to do is drive down Highway 78," she said of the road that separates open and closed areas in the dunes. "There is a substantial difference in the amount of plant cover."
Anderson said the off-road group behind the Phillips study should have alerted environmentalists to their work. That way, she said, the two groups could have crafted a more thorough report.
The BLM is awaiting the Fish and Wildlife decision on the status of the milk vetch while it considers opening more of the dunes.
BLM spokesman Stephen Razo said the agencies multiple-use mandate means the dune plan will be based on more than the plant’s needs.
Lorey Cachora, a member of the Quechan Indian tribe that has long occupied land near the dunes, said he accepts humans have changed the dunes, but he doesn’t want any more of the land opened to off-highway vehicles.
"There is no sense going out and destroying the rest of the area," Cachora said.
Benjamin Spillman can be reached at 778-4643 or by e-mail at Benjamin.Spillman@thedesertsun.com
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. No matter the outcome, blame will be placed on the OHVers. And isn’t it true that Milkvetch seeds lay dormant for long periods of time till they can be germinated by rainfall?
