Researchers map springs across the Mojave Desert

Study of 300 desert springs will provide 'baseline' to track impact of climate change

Hydrogeologist Andy Zdon (left) and Amargosa Conservancy Executive Director Patrick Donnelly measure the water flow and collect other data at a spring in the Mojave Desert. (Photo: Marilyn Chung/The Desert Sun)

Story by Ian James
The Desert Sun

Bouncing down a rocky road in a pickup, two researchers neared their destination: an oasis of palm trees in the desert.

When the unpaved road ended in an impassible collapsed section, they stepped out and continued on foot. Andy Zdon said the approach to this spring was relatively easy. Over five months, he has often had to trek to remote spots while carrying out an exhaustive study of the natural springs across the entire Mojave Desert — an undertaking that has never before been done on this scale.

“I have been living and breathing the desert since September,” Zdon said with a smile. “I’ve done about 300 miles of walking to these springs. We’ve had to do a lot of walking.”

At each spring, Zdon, a hydrogeologist, has collected data about how much water is flowing from the ground and has analyzed the dissolved oxygen content and other properties of the water. The results will enable scientists to monitor changes in the springs, which are critical for wildlife, and document influences such as declines in groundwater levels due to pumping, shifts in flows due to weather cycles, and the drying of springs as a result of climate change.

“If you’re going to try to understand the effects of climate on a system, you need a starting point. You need a baseline, and that’s what this is doing,” Zdon said.

“You can’t even begin to understand whether you’re seeing the effects of climate change if you don’t know what the conditions were before you started looking for it, and that’s really the crux of it,” Zdon said. “You can’t manage or identify an impact if you don’t know what your starting point is.”

His study is funded through the Transition Habitat Conservancy, a nonprofit group that obtained a $190,000 grant from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to carry out surveys of springs across the Mojave Desert.

Working alongside Zdon was Patrick Donnelly, a biologist and executive director of the Amargosa Conservancy, who was helping to take notes. He walked around the spring and rattled off a list of the plants he found: California fan palm (42 of them), honey mesquite, oleander, date palm and willows, among others.

Zdon spotted birds including a black-throated sparrow, house finches and white-crowned sparrow. They took down all of those details in their notes.

“The springs in the desert are really the beating heart of the desert,” Donnelly said.

Animals ranging from bighorn sheep to hummingbirds depend on the water holes. Zdon has also seen signs of other animals including mountain lions, bobcats, coyotes and badgers.

If some of the isolated springs and wetlands dry up as the climate heats up, the animals that depend on those water sources could disappear.

Data on desert springs has been collected sporadically over the years, but not in a systematic way.

“So this is really meant to be a baseline for the entire desert,” Donnelly said, “to understand the water in this desert and how we can protect it.”

During their outing in February, the two visited springs in California’s Amargosa Basin, an area rich in wildlife east of Death Valley National Park and a short drive from the Nevada border. Zdon was nearing the end of his study, which covers a total of 312 springs.

“This is number 296 since September,” Zdon said as he began his work at Chappo Spring.

Around the lush vegetation stood the ruins of a homestead abandoned years ago, an old chicken coop and the rusty skeletons of cars. Zdon said that decades ago, people grew crops and raised livestock at the spring.

Many of the springs he has surveyed are on federal lands, and his research will provide the Bureau of Land Management with information that can be used to make decisions about how different areas are managed.

Zdon walked into the thicket of palm trees to get closer to a pool of water. He pulled out an instrument to test the water, and he read off the pH, temperature and total dissolved solids while Donnelly took notes.

“Wow, this is the best water we’ve seen,” Donnelly said.

“Yeah, it’s pretty good water,” Zdon replied.

But Zdon said the spring’s flow has declined dramatically from 1928, when a U.S. Geological Survey report stated that it was flowing at about 80 gallons a minute. Zdon said he had measured the flow a couple of months earlier and found the spring was discharging about 8 gallons a minute.

“Now it’s essentially just a freestanding puddle and we can’t even see flow,” Zdon said. He noted his observations about the spring on a form for the BLM: “functional, at risk, with a downward trend.”

Some springs have completely dried up elsewhere in the California desert. And while it’s challenging for researchers to differentiate between the effects of climate change, groundwater pumping and natural drought cycles, all of those influences are likely affecting springs.

“No two springs are alike,” Zdon said. At this spring, he said, the decline in flow might be related to decades of overpumping the aquifer around the nearby town of Pahrump, Nevada, as well as years of drier conditions in the area.

Zdon has been compiling the results of his research for a report that will be released later this year.

Near another spring, Donnelly pointed out ancient grinding holes in the rock, apparently left behind centuries ago by Southern Paiute Indians who depended on the spring.

He said some of the locals in the area have said there used to be a creek flowing from the spring. Now it’s a small water hole next to a cottonwood tree and a thicket of mesquite.

“I’m going to take a water sample here,” Zdon said. He collected the water in a small glass bottle and put a label on it. The sample, he said, will be sent to a lab for isotope analysis, which can indicate whether the spring water fell as rain or snow and in which area the water seeped down into the ground.

Nearby, he pointed out a pipe sticking out of the ground: a monitoring well that was installed to keep track of water levels.

The data Zdon has collected at the springs could also help conservation groups such as the Transition Habitat Conservancy target areas to protect. The Nature Conservancy also provided funding to support the research.

As he walked around one of the springs, Zdon said excitedly: “That’s a long-eared owl!” It soared off a tree branch and disappeared. Moments later, Zdon stopped to listen to a squeaky chitter. “That’s a hummingbird!”

“This is one of my favorite places on Earth,” Donnelly said. “When I need a break from the world, I come out here and put a chair underneath that cottonwood.”

Donnelly said the huge effort involved in surveying the springs will pay off by producing valuable information about the conditions on the ground today, which will in turn help people spot the influences that will affect the springs in the years to come.

“These springs are very important because they’re very much indicators of the health of our aquifer,” he said. “Because we’re dealing with such an understudied resource, you know, we’re really developing those baselines as we speak.”

Solar Shutdown: Feinstein to Block Energy Projects

The Foundary
The Heritage Foundation

We need to transform to a new, clean energy economy but we can’t build solar panels in the Mojave Desert if California Senator Diane Feinstein has anything to say about it:

Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in Congress on Monday to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling some 13 big solar plants and wind farms planned for the region.

But before the bill to create two new Mojave national monuments has even had its first hearing, the California Democrat has largely achieved her aim. Regardless of the legislation’s fate, her opposition means that few if any power plants are likely to be built in the monument area, a complication in California’s effort to achieve its aggressive goals for renewable energy.

Developers of the projects have already postponed several proposals or abandoned them entirely. The California agency charged with planning a renewable energy transmission grid has rerouted proposed power lines to avoid the monument.”

Years of subsidies and tax credits haven’t helped wind and solar projects compete with more reliable sources of energy. Solar power supplies less than one percent of the country’s electricity demand; wind does slightly better. That’s not necessarily a red flag to stop building more, but it is indicative of how far we have to go and how costly it would be “transform to a clean energy economy” as President Obama said in his remarks to the delegation at the United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen.

If the private businesses deem it in their interest to pursue renewable energy projects (without federal help), they should be able to do so. But where these projects may be the most economically viable, such as the Mojave Desert, the government is shutting them down.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., environmentalist and a partner with a venture capital firm invested in solar, told the New York Times, “This is arguably the best solar land in the world, and Senator Feinstein shouldn’t be allowed to take this land off the table without a proper and scientific environmental review.”

This is not the first time, nor will it be the last, the renewable projects have either been thwarted or put on hold because of self-interested in politicians. Cape Wind spent millions in litigation costs, delays and regulatory hurdles in attempting to build a 130-turbine offshore project in the Nantucket Sound that Senator Ted Kennedy long opposed despite the turbines being barely visible from the horizon.

The Mojave Desert situation is slightly different because Sen. Feinstein says, “the lands were purchased with nearly $45 million in private funds and $18 million in federal funds and donated to the federal government for the purpose of conservation, and that commitment must be upheld. Period.” But if an environmental group wants to preserve these lands, they shouldn’t rely on the taxpayer to fund the purchase nor fund the conservation of the land. In fact, many environmental groups do just that. Private property rights make it possible for the Nature Conservancy and Ducks Unlimited to protect habitat by purchasing land and establishing wildlife preserves.’

Nantucket and the Mojave Desert aren’t unique. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Project No Project shows that the “Not in My Back Yard” crowd is everywhere. It’s not just anti-oil and anti-coal, it’s anti-energy and anti-development.

Even with subsidies, tax breaks and mandates, shifting our energy away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy will be a prohibitively costly and difficult task. Senator Feinstein is about to make it that much more difficult.

Icon in Jeopardy

Local scientists say buffelgrass may be on an unstoppable march—and the saguaro is in its way

by Leo W. Banks
Tucson Weekly



The continuing spread of buffelgrass could lead to the disappearance of our great saguaro. (Courtesy of Saguaro National Park)



Buffelgrass is forcing us to think the unthinkable: A Sonoran Desert in which the saguaro cactus is no longer the master of the landscape.

Is this really possible? Could Arizona's cherished icon vanish from a substantial portion of its range?

Actually, yes. The problem is fire.

The Nature Conservancy biologist Dale Turner says the density and distribution of buffelgrass is increasing dramatically, and in those places where it becomes the dominant plant, the number of fires will increase.

"That means every other plant that's both slow-growing and fire-sensitive will disappear," says Turner. "That's certainly the saguaro. I don't think it will go extinct, but we'll see saguaro populations either lost or seriously degraded."

Prior to buffelgrass, fire was never a major player in the Sonoran Desert. Old-fashioned fires—if we can use that term—didn't burn too hot or too long, because native grasses don't have the biomass to create big blazes.

Buffelgrass does, and it won't pause to catch its breath after a fire. It regenerates quickly and thicker than before, making subsequent blazes more intense, with plenty of fuel to run across entire valleys and up grassy slopes.

The result is greater destruction for small cacti, especially in lower desert areas, says scientist Bill Peachey, who manages saguaro study plots at Colossal Cave Mountain Park. "A buffelgrass fire kills baby saguaros and all the small cacti, and you're fooled, because you might still see large saguaros on rocky hillsides," says Peachey. "But the fire has chopped out a whole segment of the reproductive cycle."

After a blaze, saguaros might take 50 to 70 years to start reproducing again. If all the saguaros present at one time die, the area will almost certainly burn again before new plants can grow to replace the old ones.

Imagine looking at the desert floor west of Gates Pass, in the Tucson Mountains, and seeing the once-grand saguaro forest looking anemic and uninspiring. Imagine the tourism industry trying to sell Arizona as a destination without as many photos of the mighty saguaros standing tall against a blazing sunset.

But let's not move too fast. Over the decades, there have been several periods in which scientists have falsely predicted the saguaro's doom, and it hasn't happened. So not only has history taught us humility; it has proven the saguaro to be a master of survival in a harsh environment.

Still, Turner and Peachey aren't alone in sounding the alarm. The Weekly interviewed five scientists, and they all agree on one thing: The desert of the future will have much more buffelgrass and fewer saguaros.

The spread of this African perennial grass, which was introduced to the region in the 1930s and 1940s as forage for cattle, is happening with alarming speed.

At Saguaro National Park, the acreage containing buffelgrass is expanding 35 percent per year, says Meg Weesner, the park's director of science. It existed on 175 acres in 2002. Today, it grows on 2,000 acres, and one prediction has it infesting 10,000 acres in a decade. That's a significant portion of the park land on which saguaros grow.

If uncontrolled, buffelgrass could completely alter the park's habitat and eliminate saguaros from certain areas. "Our future might be a grassland of African grass instead of what we now know of as the plants and animals of the Sonora Desert," says Weesner.

Buffelgrass has gained such a foothold in Southern Arizona that stopping its spread is now impossible. Ranchers across the border in Sonora, Mexico, actually have been planting the grass for about three decades, and that has made it inevitable that buffelgrass seeds would cross the line, too—on the clothes of illegal aliens, on the tires of smuggler vehicles that cross our protected deserts, and even on the feathers of birds and on the wind.

Tucson botanist Matt Johnson, who has been studying desert environments for 30 years, says eradication efforts, such as the county's new aerial-spraying program in Tucson Mountain Park, offer some encouragement. And he's heartened by volunteers who go into the desert to remove buffelgrass stands.

"But it'd require half the population of Tucson turning out on a semi-regular basis to get rid of it all," says Johnson.

The most realistic hopes rest on keeping buffelgrass out of certain areas. This requires workers going into these areas multiple times to pull the plants, then returning after heavy rains to treat buffelgrass seedlings that continue to sprout.

Weesner says these efforts have worked in parts of Saguaro National Park, but it requires a lot of work, done quickly, to stay ahead of the spread.

But the spread is inevitable. And it might mean the saguaro is entering a period of significant decline that can't be altered. The hardest-hit areas will likely be in the wettest portions of the saguaro's range, in the northern and eastern Sonoran Desert. In Arizona, that means around Tucson, San Manuel and Florence, and up to Wickenburg in the north.

All of this leaves Johnson, a reluctant pessimist, thinking out loud about some yet unknown feat of bioengineering that could put buffelgrass in its place. By that, he means the creation of some pathogen or insect that could attack buffelgrass and eliminate it.

But he says that's more in the realm of science fiction, and he worries that such a creation could become uncontrollable and go after native range grasses, or perhaps migrate to the Midwest and destroy corn and wheat crops.

"Remember Jeff Goldblum's character in Jurassic Park and his line, 'Nature will find a way'?" says Johnson. "We've never had much success with that kind of bioengineering, and my concern is we're not yet able to engineer something to keep a disaster like that from happening."

Range War In the West

There is a range war in the West. Why should you care? Because wherever you live in America sooner or later it will affect you.

By Patrick Dorinson
New West


There is a range war out West. And unless you live in Idaho or Nevada or any other Western state you probably have no idea what is happening or why you should care. But wherever you live in America you should care because sooner or later it will affect you.

This range war is between ranchers who have worked the land raising cattle and sheep for over a century and environmental outlaws whose stated goal is driving them off the very land they need to survive and prosper. Today’s weapon of choice is not a Colt .45 or a Winchester rifle, but something much more deadly—the lawsuit.

So what’s the issue?

There are more than a quarter of a billion acres of public lands in the West. For over century a system has been in place to allow livestock ranchers and resource entities controlled access to portions of public land.

Over the years there have been bitter disputes between ranchers and environmentalists over whether this practice should continue. For the ranchers this is about their very survival and the survival of the livestock industries that contribute so much to the economies of many Western states—1 ranch job creates 7 jobs to support the industry.

Recently, reasonable mainstream environmental and conservation groups like the Nature Conservancy have worked closely with the public lands stakeholders to find common ground that can address both the needs of the land while preserving a way of life essential to the West. Working together, ranchers and conservationists listened to each other and came up with plans to ensure the survival of both.

But some fringe environmentalists like the Western Watersheds Project (WWP) have no interest in compromise and consistently use and abuse our legal system to deny ranchers and other interests their rights to use public lands, especially for grazing.

WWP and its leader Jon Marvel, a transplanted Easterner that has designed huge homes for the rich and famous in Hailey, Idaho, continue to wage war against the ranching industry by pushing to let the land return to a pristine state with no cattle. I have news for Mr. Marvel, before the cattle came to the West, huge herds of elk and buffalo roamed the plains and valleys for centuries and I’ll bet they ate grass and tramped through streams.

WWP regularly sues the federal government, challenging rancher’s permits on technicalities and burying officials in a flood of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. It is estimated that just to fill the current requests it would take one person 6 years, working full time. This means that trained range managers and scientists who should be out working with the ranchers and other users of public lands are instead filling out paperwork. If you are a taxpayer you should be outraged.

I said earlier that even if you didn’t live in the West this would affect you in some way. Eventually the price of beef will rise as there will be fewer cattle merging into the food supply. And these activities might also put a severe crimp in the Obama administration’s desire to upgrade the electricity grid, build new pipelines to carry the West’s abundant natural gas to the rest of the nation, take advantage of the wind corridors that dot the West and build solar farms in the region’s deserts.

It’s already happening. Interior Secretary Salazar recently came to California to talk up building solar farms on public land near the Mojave Desert. But California Senator Dianne Feinstein is dead set against it, as are radical environmentalists. They’ve been complaining about lack of renewable energy for years and now that it might happen they suddenly develop a bad case of NIMBYism.

Why? Because these hypocrites don’t want any of that on public land either and you cannot achieve the president’s energy goals unless you use the West’s vast public lands.

Finally you should care because this type of bullying and intimidation is just plain wrong. And it’s hard to deal with folks whose goal is to drive ranchers out of business and destroy a way of life that has survived for over a hundred years despite the hardships inflicted by man and Mother Nature.

Patrick Dorinson is a communications strategist specializing in media relations, public affairs, political communications, crisis communications and government relations. During the Clinton Administration, he received Presidential appointments in communications to the General Services Administration, NASA and the Department of Energy. During California’s historic recall election of 2003, Dorinson served on press staff for Arnold Schwarzenegger’s campaign and transition teams. After the election he was tapped by Governor Schwarzenegger to be Deputy Secretary for Communications for the Business, Transportation and Housing Agency. Mr. Dorinson graduated from the University of Oregon, receiving a Bachelor of Science degree in History.

Initiative on state trust land lacks enough signatures to make ballot

By Howard Fischer
Arizona Daily Star

PHOENIX — An initiative to put about a half-million acres of state trust land off-limits to development, the largest share of it in Pima County, does not have enough valid signatures to make the ballot, Secretary of State Jan Brewer concluded Friday.

Brewer said backers turned in nearly 370,000 signatures. But she said petitions with more than 33,000 of those were rejected by her office. And, a random check by county recorders of the remaining signatures ultimately concluded that another 125,580 of those should be removed either because they did not belong to registered voters or for other reasons.

The result is that the measure came up about 19,000 signatures short of the 230,047 required to put the measure before voters in November, Brewer said.

Patrick Graham, executive director of The Nature Conservancy, which wrote the measure, said his organization will take the matter to court. Graham said he believes that there are sufficient valid signatures.

That argument was reiterated by Charles Blanchard, the attorney hired by the group.

Blanchard said county recorders disqualified a large number of the names for technical reasons, like having an incorrect or missing date next to the signature. But he said courts are permitted to declare those names valid if there is "substantial compliance" with legal requirements.

Arizona got about 10 million acres from the federal government when it became a state in 1912. The state constitution requires it be either leased or sold for the highest value, with most of the funds earmarked for public education.

About 9.3 million acres remain. Proposition 103 would amend the constitution to exempt specific parcels scattered throughout the state from that requirement.

The Arizona School Boards Association voted earlier this year to oppose Prop. 103. That group's key concern is whether taking what could be highly desired parcels off the market would hurt classroom funding. The Arizona Education Association, which represents teachers, has backed the measure, saying there will be no loss.

Acreage, by county, Prop. 103 would have preserved:

• Apache 17,540
• Cochis 82,715
• Coconino 36,423
• Graham 635
• Maricopa 62,661
• Navajo 3,142
• Pima 181,391
• Santa Cruz 30,242
• Yavapai 71,563

Source: The Nature Conservancy

Ranchers, environmentalists show support for initiative

By Jaime Richardson
Green Valley News






George Monzingo, left, who runs a cattle ranch between Tombstone and St. David, talks to Sonoita rancher Mac Donaldson. Donaldson organized a meeting at Empire Ranch Tuesday to discuss a proposed State Trust land initiative that will affect those leasing in Pima and Santa Cruz counties. At right are Dennis and Deb Moroney, who raise cattle in McNeil, Ariz. (Jaime Richardson Green Valley News)

Area ranchers met with environmentalists in Sonoita on Tuesday to discuss a proposed measure that would set aside 570,000 acres of State Trust land for conservation.

About 30 supporters of Proposition 103: the Our Lands, Our Schools Initiative, gathered on a cloudy day at the sprawling Empire Ranch in Sonoita, a rural community about 40 miles southeast of Green Valley.

The historic ranch sits at the heart of the 42,000-acre Las Cienegas National Conservation Area, on public lands acquired and administered since 1988 by the Bureau of Land Management. Ranching there continues under a grazing permit held by John Donaldson and his son Mac, of Sonoita.

“In 150 years, what will our great-grandchildren have here in Arizona?” said Mac Donaldson, who helped organize Tuesday's gathering. “Will they have more Phoenix, more Mesa? Or will they be able to have something like this?”

A similar initiative, Proposition 105, the State Trust Lands Act, failed to make the ballot in 2006.

The main purpose of Our Lands, Our Schools, would be to set aside 570,000 of the state's 9.3 million acres of State Trust land for conservation, explained Patrick Graham, state director of the Nature Conservancy and chair of the initiative committee. This would ensure that those acres could never be sold for development, he said.

Existing leases and rights-of-way would not be affected, and would continue to generate revenue for the trust.

The more than half-a-million acres were selected based on their ecological significance and proximity to state and federal parks and wildlife management areas. This would include 50,135 acres in the Santa Rita Experimental Range, 2,073 acres in the West Desert Preserve, 30,172 acres in the Sahuarita Mountains, 8,768 acres in the Santa Cruz Wildlife Corridor, and 3,072 acres adjacent to Patagonia Lake State Park.

About 85 percent of State Trust lands are leased for grazing, but there is an increasing pressure to sell that land to developers, said Graham.

“These lands are increasingly being converted into subdivisions,” he said. “This initiative is a unique opportunity for landowners, conservationists, the business community and educators to form a coalition and try to do something for Arizona that will benefit us for the next century.”

Some of the money from the sale of State Trust lands goes to public schools in Arizona.

The Arizona Education Association supports the initiative, but much of the education community is split, says Patrick Bray, deputy director of government affairs for the Phoenix-based Arizona Cattlemen's Association, who voted to take an official stance against the initiative. One reason for their decision is their belief that the initiative will hurt funding for public schools.

“We're in favor of the mission of the trust, which is the highest and best possible use of the land,” said Bray. He said that State Trust land is not public land, and should not be treated as such. “There’s no reason that 570,000 acres should be set aside and not paid for. If so, the trust should be compensated somehow.”

The Cattlemen's Association is run by a 25-member board made up of representatives from every county in Arizona. Bray said it took members around 60 days to come up with their decision, which they didn’t take lightly.

“When a trust owns those lands, and you have to answer to 12 beneficiaries (one of which is the Arizona public school system), you should pay for those lands,” said Bray.

But Graham says the schools will still get revenue from the conservation lands.

“Those people in the education community that have taken the time to understand that the trust is not harmed by this measure are very supportive of it,” he said.

A representative from the office of Gov. Janet Napolitano who attended the meeting said the governor is in support of the initiative. U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords sent a spokesperson to collect information, though Democrat Giffords has yet to reveal her positions on any of the initiatives up for ballot.

Joining those representing the Nature Conservancy, Cienega Watershed Partnership and Sonoran Institute were ranchers from throughout Santa Cruz and Pima counties, from as far north as Aravaipa Canyon, about 50 miles northeast of Tucson. Many of the ranchers have lands that would be included in the 570,000 acres. Others came just to bring back information to share with their neighbors and fellow cattlemen.

“Many ranchers and environmentalists have the same goals, so why not work together, instead of against one another?” said Mac Donaldson.

“I have a long-term concern for the health of our state — that's why I’m supporting this. And I’m attempting to show that there are grazers here who support it, and have some sense of what the future can bring both for us and for Arizona.”

Groups battle over land proposition

Opponents:
Measure would detract from
sales benefiting state schools


by Lesley Wright
The Arizona Republic



Arizona state trust lands map.
[Click image for detail.]

A coalition of educators and conservationists submitted petitions Wednesday, calling for an initiative on the Nov. 4 ballot that would preserve more than 570,000 acres of the Arizona's most ecologically sensitive lands.

The "Our Land Our Schools" proposition would ask voters to change the Arizona Constitution, making it easier to protect Arizona's 9.2 million acres of state trust land.

Sale and lease of the trust land helps fund education and state agencies.

Phoenix, Scottsdale, Flagstaff and 57 other communities across Arizona would immediately expand their desert and mountain preserves, and the initiative would allow communities to buy thousands more acres without competing with developers.

"We need to get this done," said Pat Graham, state director of the Nature Conservancy. "It's too important to the state of Arizona."

The coalition gave the Secretary of State petitions with more than 350,000 signatures, well over the 230,047 certified signatures needed to make the ballot.

Defeated two years ago

A similar measure was put to voters in 2006, but narrowly lost.

Unlike two years ago, the Legislature did not put a competing referendum on the Nov. 4 ballot. And unlike two years ago, the state's largest homebuilding organization has pledged not to oppose it.

Still, the initiative continues to draw strong opposition. Critics say that the Arizona State Land Department should continue to sell or lease trust land - granted to Arizona at statehood in 1912 - only to the highest bidder.

Supporters argue that education funding would not suffer under the changes, since the price of developable land next to preserves skyrockets, and the state should profit as much or more.

Voter education urged

"This is not an issue understood by a lot of people," Graham said. "It requires more outreach."

Still, he and other advocates said that this measure has the best chance ever. It is less complex than the 2006 proposition, and has attracted supporters that range from Gov. Janet Napolitano to the Sierra Club.

More important is one group not opposing the proposition - the Home Builders Association of Central Arizona.

The homebuilders helped defeat prior efforts to preserve trust lands.

But the lobby agreed to remain neutral this time in exchange for some key changes to a major transportation initiative that also appears headed to the Nov. 4 ballot.

Opposition to changes

The Arizona School Boards Association, which represents school-district governing boards, voted this weekend to oppose the initiative, as it did the 2006 ballot question. Members are worried about losing education funds, said Tracey Benson, the association's spokesman.

"They didn't want to take any risks with this funding stream when funding is tight and getting tighter," Benson said.

The Arizona Cattlemen's Association, another foe of the 2006 initiative, also could campaign against this one.

But the Arizona Education Association, which represents the state's teachers, is a leading supporter of the initiative.

Besides increasing the value of land surrounding conservation areas, the proposal would give the Land Department more flexibility for planning and managing development and allow for greater income, said John Wright, the teacher group's president.

"Every aspect of this initiative benefits the classroom," Wright said.

Conservancy buys 1,000 acres to expand state park

Desert property is near Jacumba

By Anne Krueger STAFF WRITER
San Diego Union Tribune

The Nature Conservancy has bought more than 1,000 acres of desert in the southeastern corner of San Diego County, with plans to use the property to expand Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.

The national conservancy organization purchased the $2.3 million property near Jacumba with donations. David Van Cleve, the conservancy's senior project director, said the property was owned by five investors who bought the land intending to develop or sell it. The conservancy intends to sell the land to the state park.

Van Cleve said the property is a critical link between the state park, federal Bureau of Land Management property and land in Baja California. It will provide a habitat for endangered species including bighorn sheep and the Quino checkerspot butterfly, he said.

Van Cleve said the region on both sides of the border is one of five places in the world with the climate and geography to create diverse habitats of chaparral, grasslands and oak and coastal forests.

Van Cleve said the conservancy is meeting with state park officials to discuss selling the land. One person already has donated $900,000 toward the sale, he said.

Mark Jorgensen, superintendent of Anza-Borrego, said that park officials are interested in the property but that its purchase will depend on resolution of the state budget crisis. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed closing 48 state parks to save $14.3 million.

“We're going into hard budget times, so we'll have to find funds dedicated to” buying the land, he said.

Jorgensen said the purchase allows the land to be preserved until the state can buy it. Developers are already eyeing other parts of Jacumba. On 1,250 acres near the town center, a developer is proposing a project with 2,125 homes.

Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, with more than 600,000 acres, is the largest state park in the contiguous United States. Jorgensen said the addition of the property to the park would help ensure that wildlife can move freely between the United States and Mexico.

“It would be a pretty sad day to think we were cutting off that movement with triple fences and continued development,” he said.

Eradication of Santa Cruz Island pigs deemed a success

Park Service and Nature Conservancy say endangered native species now have a chance to rebound.

Prohunt species eradication team on Santa Cruz Island.
By Gregory W. Griggs, Staff Writer
Los Angeles Times

Efforts to restore the ecosystem on Santa Cruz Island to its native state reached a milestone this week as scientists said that a two-year program to eliminate feral pigs had been a success.

Although the last confirmed pig death was last year, the National Park Service and the Nature Conservancy, which owns 75% of the island, have been monitoring the results of the $5-million eradication effort since then to gauge the program's effects.

They say the island's endangered species are rebounding.

A total of 5,036 feral pigs were killed on the island 18 miles off the Ventura County coast. They were considered a threat to the endangered island fox and nine rare plants.

"Santa Cruz Island had 150 years of nonnative animals and plants, so it's not something we can solve overnight, but at this point we think things are looking very favorable," said Kate Faulkner, the Park Service's chief of natural resources management. "This allows us to move our resources to look at other plants and animals on the island."

Faulkner said her agency, which owns a quarter of the 96-square-mile island, and the conservancy expect to spend $3 million over the next three years to study and improve conditions for native plants.

"We're trying to look ahead to anticipate what the problems might be for plants and animals that are unique to the island," Faulkner said. Removing the pigs, and tens of thousands of sheep before them, "will do a lot to move the ecosystem forward," she added.

With the last confirmed pig death on July 5, 2006, native plants, such as oak trees, could begin to rebound, biologists said.

Lotus Vermeer, director of the conservancy's Santa Cruz Island Preserve, said acorns -- a primary source of the pigs' diet -- can again be spotted, and oak seedlings have begun to sprout

"Because all the pigs are removed from the island, we think we have a fighting chance," she said. "It's a unique time for the foxes and for plant recovery."

The pigs were targeted for extermination to save the Santa Cruz Island fox, a cat-sized creature found only on the island. The fox was being preyed upon by golden eagles, which Park Service officials say came to the Channel Islands in the 1990s to feed on these nonnative pigs.

Sheep ranchers began using Santa Cruz in the 1850s and introduced pigs as farm animals. Before long, pigs escaped into the wild and over the decades disrupted native plants, spread seeds of nonnative plants and uncovered archaeological sites of Chumash Indian settlements.

In April 2005, the Park Service hired Prohunt Inc., a New Zealand-based company, to track down the pigs using helicopters with snipers, traps, dogs and electronic collars. Officials said the methods were "following euthanasia guidelines set forth by the American Medical Veterinary Assn."

"We deny that vehemently," said Richard M. Feldman, a Santa Barbara businessman who sued the park's owners, saying the killings were inhumane and that the Park Service violated its own rules and procedures when it approved the environmental data to support the eradication.

Feldman's suit was dismissed and is currently under submission to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Elliot M. Katz, a Northern California veterinarian who is founder and president of In Defense of Animals, joined in the lawsuit and a second one filed to stop the killing of more than 100 wild turkeys that proliferated once the pigs were gone.

"Obviously, we'd like to stop the government's killing machine, but it's a difficult thing to do. It's a shame," Katz said. "They tend to be very aggressive when it comes to killing other species. As compassion and concern grows in our country, we hope they'll be forced to become responsive."

LAWS OF THE LAND; Mining for trouble

Editorials, Op-Ed
Los Angeles Times

A PAIR OF DAMAGING environmental proposals have been stripped out of the budget bill before Congress. Thanks to bipartisan opposition, no new oil drilling will be allowed off the nation's coasts or in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Yet an equally troubling provision remains in the bill, placed there by Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Tracy), who as head of the House Resources Committee has pushed an extraordinary number of wilderness-trashing ideas this year. This one would allow the government to sell off millions of acres of public land for mining, for as little as $1,000 an acre. The deal comes complete with mineral rights, which are generally worth far more than the land.

Buyers would not need to prove there are minerals in the ground, and the owners have no obligation to try to find them if there are. They could decide to develop the land into a housing development or an office complex, or they could just keep the land for themselves, no public trespassers allowed. The deal includes land in national forests; it also would open up old claims in national parks to mining. These are lands now used for hiking, camping and off-roading — and held by the public for its future. Prospective buyers would need to invest only $7,500 in land surveying or other "mineral development work" to turn these into private lands. Where do we all sign up for a deal this rich, at our own expense?

There's little in this for the budget — or the public. The budget would gain a minimal, one-time boost with each sale, and would suffer the permanent loss of public resources sold at rock-bottom prices.

The budget bill squeaked by the House late Thursday, with this measure attached. It will be up to the Senate-House conference committee to halt the attempted giveaway of public treasures. If that fails, the best recourse would probably be to contribute to groups such as the Nature Conservancy, in the hopes that they will buy up large blocks of land to hold in the public interest. Should that day come, it will sadly mean that public land is safer in the hands of a private organization than in the possession of the government.