Pubdate: Mon, 31 Oct 2005
Source: Lake County Record-Bee (CA)
Copyright: 2005 Record-Bee
Contact:  http://www.record-bee.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3384
Author: Terre Logsdon, Record-Bee staff

BATTLING ILLEGAL MARIJUANA

LAKE COUNTY -- In September, California Attorney General Bill Lockyer 
announced that the Campaign Against Marijuana Planting program broke 
the one million plant barrier for the 2005 season, and as of Oct. 26, 
Lake County alone had eradicated 145,732 plants with 80,000 of those 
plants coming out of the National Forest.

Last year Lake County had a record year by eradicating 85,000 pot 
plants, but they have far surpassed that this year, said Deputy Steve 
Brooks of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.

Brooks is working full-time to ensure that illicit pot growing comes 
to an end, because not only is it illegal, it's harming the 
environment and putting the public at risk.

"You can throw a dart at a map of the U.S. Forest Service, and you'll 
probably hit a grow spot," said Matt Knudson, a law enforcement 
officer with the Mendocino National Forest, who works with Brooks.

Lake County is 1,261 square miles, with several thousand acres of 
public land including Mendocino National Forest, Cow Mountain and 
Knoxville Recreation Areas, Boggs Mountain State Forest and Clear 
Lake State Park. While beautiful and open to all, these lands have 
become magnets for illegal pot growing, especially the national forests.

This trespass cultivation, the season for which runs April through 
October, also impacts the ecosystem.

"I've seen camps with almost 20 people living around the clock in the 
forest," Brooks said.

These pot work crews also generate a lot of garbage, said Brooks, as 
the work crews rotate and bring new supplies in each week by 
strapping large boxes to backpack frames and hiking it in to the grow plot.

Not only has he seen "tons and tons of garbage," but Brooks said he's 
seen the toxic remainders of the tools of agriculture and the 
destruction of wildlife.

Drip line irrigation is placed in streams and routed to the grow 
plots which may be a considerable distance away and "they'll dam up 
the creek and add fertilizer to the water and pipe it to the plants," 
Brooks added.

"There are miles and miles of this irrigation tubing up in the forest 
and in the streams," he said, "and it will still be there when my 
children have grandchildren."

All undergrowth is cleared away, leaving a canopy of trees to cover 
the growing crop, but this clearing of undergrowth causes run-off and erosion.

In some grow areas, Brooks has found 400 to 500 pounds of unused 
fertilizer, left to be washed away in the winter rains, which will 
kill everything around it and leach into the watershed.

The crews show total disregard for the land as they leave everything 
empty propane canisters, garbage, fertilizer and poison.

The poison is to kill all animals within the grow area, which 
includes mice, squirrels and deer that may eat the plants; but, said 
Brooks, it has the added effect of poisoning other animals in the 
food chain. Raptors, owls and mountain lions who eat the poisoned 
animals also die, as well as scavenging animals such as vultures.

Poaching is a problem, and at one site this year there were animal 
carcasses strung on wires surrounding the plot and deer hides on the 
ground, reported Brooks.

Bears, who are attracted to the large amounts of garbage, are killed, 
as are any animals that might harm the crops. Also in danger, said 
Brooks, are hunters who stumble into an illegal operation.

"We advise hunters, hikers and bikers not to confront anyone," Brooks 
said. "If they have a GPS and can give us the coordinates, great 
we'll take care of it."

The pot grow workers in the forest many of whom are illegal 
immigrants are probably armed, said Brooks; this year, authorities 
seized 19 firearms.

The majority of the marijuana growing operations in the National 
Forest are run by crime families out of Mexico, some of whom are well 
known in the area, Brooks said. These families, he explained, found 
it was hard to get the marijuana out of Mexico, so they moved to 
rural counties in the U.S. to grow the crops.

As a result, they bring people across the border, give them supplies 
and bring them up to live in the grow area, where these workers can 
earn between $10,000 and $30,000 per year, Brooks said. But the real 
profit is for the growers, as a single plant can be worth $7,000 and 
many grow plots, he said, have thousands of plants.

"We go after the profiteers," Brooks said.

It's these illegal operations that the sheriff's office looks for, 
not legal medicinal marijuana growers, Brooks said.

He gets three to five calls per week from residents asking if they 
are in compliance. Brooks stresses that he doesn't want people who 
are ill to be afraid to contact him.

"We don't target medicinal growers," Brooks said. "The marijuana we 
eradicate is not going to the seriously ill. It's making some very 
few people wealthy and financing other drug operations, such as 
manufacturing methamphetamine."

CAMP agents consist of members of the U.S. Drug Enforcement 
Administration, the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Forest Service, 
California National Guard, California National Guard, California 
Department of Fish and Game and dozens of local police and sheriff 
departments. There are five teams to cover Northern, Southern and the 
Central California regions.
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MAP posted-by: Beth