I've been away but I'm sure you all know this:
Thought I'd post it anyway:


April 12, 2003

Federal Ruling Eases Access to Dunes
Wildlife officials reverse stand, saying off-road vehicles won't destroy Mojave habitat of Pierson's milk vetch and desert tortoise.

By Julie Cart, Times Staff Writer

Federal officials have paved the way for expanded use of off-road vehicles at the Algodones Dunes in the Mojave Desert by lifting special protection for a 50,000-acre section of the sand dunes containing rare plants and animals.The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a biological opinion this week to the Bureau of Land Management, which oversees the area, that concludes that dune buggies and other off-road vehicles will not destroy habitat of the Pierson's milk vetch plant and the California desert tortoise. The ruling allows the BLM to finalize its management plan, which calls for all but 26,000 acres of the dunes in the 150,000-acre area to be opened to off-road vehicles. That plan is expected next month and would double the amount of access for off-road vehicles.The Fish and Wildlife Service decision contradicts its earlier research that concluded that allowing vehicles in the protected area would endanger the milk vetch and destroy tortoise habitat.That prompted a letter from BLM state Director Mike Pool last year to the service asking the sister agency to not issue a "jeopardy" opinion that would close the section of the dunes to vehicles. The BLM's anticipated management plan would run counter to an existing agreement between the BLM and several environmental groups whereby only about half the dunes are open to motorized recreation. Doran Sanchez, a BLM spokesman, said that the agency intends to allow vehicle access to all the dunes outside the 26,000-acre wilderness area and that the Fish and Wildlife Service requires the BLM to educate visitors about plants and animals and keep tabs on the status of the milk vetch.According to the Fish and Wildlife Service, if the milk vetch population declines more than 50% from established levels, the BLM may have to reconsider the use of the land. Environmental groups, which have battled for years to restrict vehicle use in the 40-mile stretch of Imperial County from the Chocolate Mountains to the Mexican border, contended that the decision is a harsh blow to a fragile desert cosystem."It's a lot more than just the milk vetch. We have dozens of rare endemic species in the dunes," said Daniel Patterson, desert ecologist at the Center for Biological Diversity. "It's really about a whole diverse mosaic of wildlife and plant species, also about the recreational opportunity of everyone else who doesn't ride off-road vehicles who are displaced," Patterson said. "Non-motorized recreation and intensive motorized recreation like you have at the dunes just don't coexist. It's just not safe. This place is hammered by vehicles."The dunes draw more than 3 million visitors a year. On busy holiday weekends, as many as 250,000 off-roaders gather.Two years ago, three people were killed and hundreds injured, including a park ranger who was run over, during a Thanksgiving weekend. In January the California Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Commission refused to continue state funding for administration of the recreation area, charging that the BLM has poorly managed the area.

If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at latimes.com/archives.

What is milk vetch???

You do not want to know what I thinking...

lil research pays off.

Pagoda-like towers of creamy yellow flowers rise above the dark green leaves in midsummer, followed by scepters of bead-like seed pods in August. This striking member of the Pea family is an important food for birds, as it retains its seed late into the fall and early winter. Grows in a well drained soil, reaching two to three feet tall.

specific to US Wildlife and our plight.

http://ecos.fws.gov/servlet/SpeciesProfile...le?&spcode=Q070

This be da Milkvetch Wet...It is called the Peirsons Milkvetch, for Frank Peirsons who identified the plant (weed). And hello there Sandshark, great to hear from ya...

Thanks for learn'n me Slap...

~A

When you can snatch the pebble from my hand.........then you will be the master!

Hey Wet, what is that stuff in your pic anyways? Kinda looks like the wacky tabacky. :roll2: :spin:


LIVE FREE OR DIE!

Remember everyone.. The closed areas are STILL closed, so don't dune those areas! The closures are expected to be lifted mid-summer.

How is going Slappy. The man be gettin me down in this economy and I havent had much of a chance to visit. The board looks great, sept ever time I link on and use the board the refresh always freezes every 10 sec. Any suggestion. Oh can't wait for them dunes to open.

Sandshark: Go into your profile and scroll down till you get to turning PM's on and off. Turn them off, scroll to the bottom and apply and your problem will be solved. The screen refreshes every ten seconds or so to look for new private messages.

Quite right, and I heard this weekend that the bad guys are trying to set us up. I am home now, was supposed to be at Glamis through tomorrow but a couple things came up that can't wait. This is one of them.

If anyone has received a copy of a press release where our good buddy Dano is quoted as saying the temporary closures are open, please let me know ASAP.

Vicki

OOOHHH dat is not good SailAway, we don't need no tricks from them White Coats :x

No, it's not good but then again, it looks like we can catch their hands in the cookie jar this time... keep your fingers crossed.

Vicki

It's a good time to let all your "computer resistant" friends know about the closures still being in effect. I keep getting phone calls from people that have read press releases like the one above and they call me and tell me the dunes are open!!! AARRGGGGHHHH!!!! Then I have to be the bad guy and tell them they're not.

Thanks Ben we'll see how it works. So far so good.

:roll2:

Here's some more milk-vetch, along with another creature endemic to the dunes:

Vicki, what do you mean by catching their hands in the cookie jar???

~A

If what I've been told is true, da bad guyz publicly and blatantly set Glamis goers up for a fall.

I was told that a spokesperson for a major anti-access group put out a press release stating that the temporary closures had been lifted and then later that same anti-access group hired a camera crew to film the resultant incursions.

The BLM has been flooded with calls and e-mails about the closures being lifted. It's a real problem for us because proof of the incursions is heading into court in the very near future.

Now, I know that many press releases and news stories have appeared about how the Fish & Wildlife opinion means the closures will be lifted, but I haven't personally seen a press release put out by this particular anti-access group stating that the closures are lifted right here and now. I have found traces that one existed and has been pulled, but I need it in my hand in order to act on it. I do know the rumor about the film crew is true.

We all know that we've been set up in the past, in a back door shadow kind of way. This is different and this is something we can actually do something about.

Vicki

Thanks for the tip off Vicki, I'll be on the look out! :spin:

I find it amazing the lengths that the anti access groups will go to in order to put us in a bad light. I wouldn't be surprised if they have pretenders right here among us to do that very thing.

To borrow a phrase, effen tree huggers! :x

Hey i was wondering what is the fine if you are caught in a closed area if you somehow go into a closed area that you didnt know was closed?

Here is the kind of answers you get from these wako's. It sure sounds like a stadged Vidio set up to demonstrate just how far these wako's will go to LIE and set stuff up to help their cause. I have on three times sent this to the BLM and FWS so they can see. The photo of the tortise that was smashed was taken on the side of the highway 58 in the Mojavie Desert. Just one example.


Thanks for your questions, Rooster.

The video was shot over the Thanksgiving weekend last year. All of the
footage, except for the dead tortoise, was filmed on location, and nothing
was staged. The tortoise shot was an old piece of footage we had on file,
and we used it to demonstrate the very real danger a lack of monitoring can
present to the animals.

Let me try to answer your questions:


1. Who killed the lizard that was shown?
We found dead lizard in the dunes over the Thanksgiving weekend. It wasn't
hard to find--100,000 off-road vehicles in one area lead to a lot of dead
wildlife.

2. Who killed the desert tortis that had fresh blood all over it , not dried
blood?
As I mentioned, that was old file footage we had on hand.

3. How did the camera crew get around in the sand dunes to shoot this
footage?
We used a pick-up along the periphery of the dunes and hiked our cameras in
to shoot.

4. Is the rider shown on the four wheeler in the closed area a member of
Peer?
No--it was easy to find people riding in closed areas, so we set up our
camera in front of a sign. We waited less than 2 minutes to get that shot.

5. If you can't answer my questions then who can?
N/A


6. Was the events in question or any part of the video STAGED?
No. All of the riders were real, and all of the wildlife damage was real.
For a couple of up close rider shots, we asked riders' permission to film.
One four-second shot of riders in vegetation was filmed with the cooperation
American Sand Association members who support our efforts toobtain
additional support for law enforcement.

Feel free to call if you have any more questions.

Sincerely,


Eric Wingerter
National Field Director
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility
2001 S Street, Suite 570
Washington, DC 20009
(202) 265-7337
ericw@peer.org
www.peer.org

Rooster, that's really disturbing. When did this e-mail exchange take place?

Vicki

I e-mailed my questions when I seen the Peer vidio when it came out
I think it was last year or the year before. I also heard from a good
soruce from a BLM official that the perp in the video
of the quad comming out of the closed area next to the marker was Daniel Patterson him self. There was a lot of the video that was stadged to their point of riding and the footage taken out of context as you can see. It is a shame there is no law that can be inforeced about these kind of actions. We just have to stay on top of them and expose them for what they are.

Most of that reply is also outright lies and fabrications. Jim (Sandduners) group was appraoched about helping to film and were asked to ride in closed areas among other things.

I guess that dosen't count as "staged" for some reason in Erik's mind >:<

Closures to save the Environment? I don't think so.

["It's ... the recreational opportunity of everyone else who doesn't ride off-road vehicles who are displaced,"Patterson said...motorized recreation and intensive motorized recreation like you have at the dunes just don't coexist. ]

Dunetamer, fed up with the eco-extremists.

Of the three groups that sued to close Glamis, only one has any kind of track record for actual conservation work. But even they lost their way a long time ago. I believe that one group was exploited because their name was more recognizable than the other two, not for their "good work."

The other two are absolutely not environmental organizations, even though their names would lead you to believe otherwise and certainly that's what they like to push with their rhetoric.

Their agenda is and always has been very clear; closing public lands from the public. Mechanized access was targeted first because it's always been so easy (until we bit back that is), but it hasn't stopped there.

Ask a horeseman about what kind of feed he has to purchase before he can take his horse on some public land trails. Ask the mountain bikers how it happened that suddenly they are banned too from many non-mechanized areas.

One environmental representative on the Desert Advisory Council told a lovely story one time about a bunch of them "leap-frogging" through the desert, moving from one water jug cache to the next. Ask him how he's going to get those hundreds of gallons of water out there after the dirt road they used is listed as a closed trail.

Anti-access is what we are fighting, even as they duck behind the skirts of the true environmentalists.

Thanks for letting me rant :rant:

Vicki

[quote]Thanks for letting me rant [/quote]

you'd make more sense if you'd identify the groups by name.

[quote]you'd make more sense if you'd identify the groups by name.[/quote]

I think **** sky and Baghdad Bob are related! :roll: :eww: :|

You'd make more sense if you'd quit smoking crack.