Listener Neal Lenzen in the San Jacinto high country of the San Bernardino National Forest.

Sarah Miggins, the Executive Director of the San Bernardino National Forest Association, talks about hiking the high country of the San Bernardino and San Jacinto ranges (including a one-day ascent of 11,400 ft. Mt. San Gorgonio) and living the mountain life, along with the history and development of the San Bernardino National Forest Association, one of the leading park and forest conservancies in the nation.

A native of Cleveland, and like Tommy a fellow Bobcat and graduate of Ohio University, Sarah also talks about the San Bernardino National Forest Association’s role in the funding and operation of the Big Bear Discovery Center and the National Children’s Forest, re-planting burned forest areas, wildfire awareness and prevention, and preserving the historic network of fire lookouts in the San Bernardino National Forest, from the drive-up Strawberry Peak lookout to the hard-won trail to the top of Tahquitz Peak above Idyllwild.

Learn more about how to see bald eagles wintering at Lake Hemet and Big Bear Lake, where you can find the nation’s biggest Lodgepole Pine, and how you can volunteer with the San Bernardino National Forest Association in a variety of roles, from planting trees to maintaining trails.

Big Bear Lake after a winter snowfall.

More about this post at:

• San Bernardino National Forest Association
• Big Bear Discovery Center
• National Children’s Forest
• Forest Care, page at SBNFA website
• San Bernardino National Forest Fire Lookout Program
• Fire Safety Information, MAST / San Bernardino County
• San Bernardino National Forest
• San Bernardino National Forest Association, Facebook page
• Volunteers Needed for January Bald Eagle Count (KBHR-FM; 1/12/12)
• Tribe Acquires Sacred Site In Big Bear (Riverside Press-Enterprise; 12/29/11)
• Big Bear Teen Completes Summit Challenge (KNBC-TV; 12/26/11)
• San Bernardino National Forest Counts Bald Eagles for Winter (KABC; 12/19/11)
• Two Southern California Congressmen Introduce Wilderness Bills (KCET-TV; 1/7/11)
• Americorps Crew Members Sworn In (Riverside Press-Enterprise; 12/5/09)
• Morton Peak Lookout Reopens in San Bernardino Forest (Riverside Press-Enterprise; 6/24/07)

A Documentary About Energy Innovators and Climate Change Solutions

Winning a slew of praise and accolades since its release last fall, the movie Carbon Nation has been gaining attention and traction throughout 2011, and we are thrilled to have director Peter Byck on the program.

Big thanks to green energy and cleantech advocate Lee Barken for his help and assistance in making this edition of Treehuggers International possible, with additional thanks to the San Elijo campus of Mira Costa College in Encinitas, California.

Terrawatts and the Magic Number of 16

Carbon Nation takes an honest, often humorous look at global warming and the long-term effects of industrialization and fossil fuel use on our planet, and features success stories of private citizens, communities and organizations moving forward with alternative energy applications. If applied en masse, these alternative and renewable energy opportunities could meet – and surpass – the current, daily energy needs of the United States.

It wasn’t too long ago, during the heady days of 2006 following the release of Al Gore’s landmark global warming-awareness film An Inconvenient Truth, when pubic demand for government and private sector solutions to address not only our addiction to oil, but mankind’s cumulative, industrial effect on climate change was reaching a fever pitch. Political leaders from both parties began to call for remedies to global warming, as phrases like “cap and trade” and “carbon credits” began filtering into the lexicon.

By the late 2000s even GOP standard-bearers like Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman were proposing creative, free market-based ideas to encourage more responsible behavior by persistent industrial polluters. Sen. John McCain wisely stated in the early, pre-Sarah Palin stages of his 2008 candidacy:

“We have many advantages in the fight against global warming, but time is not one of them. Instead of idly debating the precise extent of global warming, or the precise timeline of global warming, we need to deal with the central facts of rising temperatures, rising waters, and all the endless troubles that global warming will bring. We stand warned by serious and credible scientists across the world that time is short and the dangers are great. The most relevant question now is whether our own government is equal to the challenge.”

Unfortunately, the intervening years have seen a complete lack of leadership on climate change issues from the White House and Congress, coupled with a bizarre, frequently anti-science backlash from entrenched energy and oil interests and their congressional and media allies. Over time, the absence of a strong voice on climate change, the recession, and the science-defying drumbeat from the political right has eroded the upswell of public support for addressing global warming and exploring renewable energy options.

While Europe and the rest of the western world have begun to plan for the consequences of climate change and taken steps to reduce their carbon footprint, the U.S. has remained notoriously idle. In the current House of Representatives, congressional minions of the Koch Brothers and other big energy industries have been actively working to gut functional environmental regulation and oversight which has made significant strides over the last 40 years in ensuring the cleanliness of U.S. air and water.

Green Energy Grassroots Efforts and Applications

While the U.S. government has so far failed to take a strong lead on the green front, and sometimes works against the best interests of the nation’s environmental health, cities and communities, citizens’ groups and green energy innovators haven’t been waiting for anyone to tell them “go.” The business of making the world a cleaner, healthier, more energy-efficient place is right at home in the U.S. with abundant innovation, complimented by some federal and state tax breaks available for green outlets.

Among the many fascinating characters we meet in Carbon Nation, one is Texas farmer Cliff Etheridge, who currently counts wind as one of his “crops.” As the owner of Peak Wind, one of the world’s largest wind farm outlets, Cliff had seen how other energy companies were leasing his neighbors’ land to develop wind farms. Instead of leasing his own land, he opted to utilize hundreds of acres of his own farmland to build a wind farm business, with dozens of giant windmills taking him off the grid and creating a functional, lucrative business for himself, his son, and others from his west Texas hometown in need of jobs.

Peter Byck also spends time with Alaska geothermal pioneer Bernie Karl in Carbon Nation, and the good news with geothermal is you no longer have to be sitting atop a geyser or volcanic field to tap into the earth’s energy. Bernie invented a way to use water heated to only 165 degrees to create geothermal power; previously water had to be at least 250 degrees, and more realistically, had to be on the way to 400 degrees to be effective. With this new geothermal innovation, it’s now possible to draw hot water from the earth’s crust nearly anywhere, even in the middle of Manhattan, and utilize the power of the planet for electricity and energy needs.

One face in Carbon Nation may be already familiar to some. Van Jones is the author of Green Collar Economy and the former Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality under President Obama. Van was also the primary advocate for the Green Jobs Act, signed into law by President Bush in 2007, and notable for being the first federal legislation to utilize the term “green jobs.” In Carbon Nation, Van takes the filmmakers to a Solar Richmond and Grid Alternatives project site in the Bay Area, as employees and trainees work to make pre-exisiting structures as energy efficient as possible, and in doing so, help create a green energy industry and workforce with real-world applications.

Peter Byck also introduces Carbon Nation viewers to retired U.S. Army Col. Dan Nolan, and former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, both are members of the growing number of “Green Hawks” in the U.S. military and national security agencies. Led by policy makers, intelligence professionals, and hardened veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the Green Hawks have become a formidable voice within the military, leading the Pentagon towards energy efficiency to make overseas operations less costly and more effective, and to make supply lines and energy independence for overseas missions less vulnerable.

Carbon Nation Director Peter Byck in the editing suite.

More about this post at:

• Carbon Nation
• Mid-American Project to Include 176 New Wind Turbines (Omaha World-Herald; 1/7/12)
• Hawaii Inches Toward 100% Renewable Energy With Geothermal (Honolulu Star-Advertiser; 1/6/12)
• Solar Panels Compete With Cheap Natural Gas (NPR; 1/5/12)
• A Youngster’s Bright Idea Is Something New Under the Sun (Wall Street Journal; 1/5/12)
• Deficit Hawks Want Green Efforts to Fail (Florida Today; 12/30/11)
• Van Jones and the American Dream Movement (Politico; 11/26/11)
• Flathead Electric Co-op to Start Drilling Geothermal Well (The Missoulian; 11/14/11)
• Pentagon “Green Hawks” See Energy Security In Biofuel (Christian Science Monitor; 10/10/11)
• Carbon Nation Director Peter Byck (SoCal.com; 10/1/11)
• A Film About Climate Change Even Skeptics Can Love (Bluegrass and Beyond; 6/6/11)
• Carbon Nation (Beyond Chronicle; 3/11/11)
• Carbon Nation Lesson: A Green Economy Is A Labor Economy (The Village Voice; 2/9/11)
• Peter Byck and Carbon Nation (Filmmaker; 2/9/11)
• The Green Hawks Are Coming (The Tyee; 12/20/10)
• Peter Byck’s Carbon Nation Features Creative Energy Solutions (Bloomberg; 4/21/10)
• The New Green Land Rush (CNN Money; 2/18/10)
• New Cleantech Rule Clarifies Climate Change Disclosure Requirements (SDNN; 2/3/10)
• China Racing Ahead of the U.S. In the Drive to Go Solar (New York Times; 8/24/09)
• Gene Scientist to Create Algae Biofuel With Exxon Mobil (The Guardian; 7/14/09)
• Harnessing the Sun With Help from Cities (New York Times; 3/15/09)
• Is Algae the Biofuel of the Future? (Science Daily; 8/18/08)

Jimmy Carter installed solar panels on the White House; Ronald Reagan had them removed.

Treehuggers International welcomes Cinda Waldbuesser, the Pennsylvania Senior Program Manager with the National Parks Conservation Association, to talk about the restoration work done at Gettysburg National Military Park over the last 10 years by the National Park Service, in conjunction with the Gettysburg Foundation.

Thanks to Treehuggers International friend Perry Wheeler with the National Parks Conservation Association office in Washington DC, and Katie Lawhon at Gettysburg National Military Park for their help and assistance making this show possible.

The statue of Union Gen. G.K. Warren surveys the view from Little Round Top.

No Shortage of Carnage

Fought over the course of three days in July 1863, Gettysburg is the most famous of Civil War battles, and one of the most terrible, even for a war which had no shortage of carnage or butchery, with some 50,000 casualties on both sides, including 10,000 killed.

The battle was the culmination of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s second invasion of the north, following an inconclusive invasion of Maryland the previous September, which resulted in the savage bloodletting at the Battle of Antietam, a battle whose scope and casualties shocked both sides.

Rather than an attempt to seize territory, Lee’s invasion of Pennsylvania was prompted by supply necessities. The Army of Northern Virginia could no longer forage for food or live off the land in war-torn Virginia, so following the Confederate victory at Chancellorsville in May 1863, Lee gambled on Union confusion to launch a summer invasion of the north.

While Confederate cavalry under General J.E.B. Stuart threatened Harrisburg and briefly occupied Carlisle, the bulk of Lee’s army barely penetrated the Keystone State’s border by more than 12 miles. Federal forces under the Army of the Potomac’s new commander General George Meade positioned themselves between the Confederates and Washington DC, buying time for reserves to be drawn out of the capital to help repel the southern invasion. Federal cavalry, newly energized after an impressive stand at the Battle of Brandy Station, initiated flanking maneuvers against Stuart’s cavalry units.

Following several days of small-scale firefights, both armies jockeyed for position near the crossroads town of Gettysburg, through which the major east-west National Road and north-south Taneytown Road pass. Lee’s forces, now advancing from the north, pushed panicked federal defenders through the streets of Gettysburg after engagements at Barlow Knoll and Oak Ridge smashed the Union line on July 1st, but Meade fell back to excellent, high ground defensive positions anchored at Cemetery Hill, forming a line running some four miles south of town.

As the lines coalesced, Confederate flanking attempts were made on July 2nd on the Federal right at Culp’s Hill, and horrific, daylong close-quarter bloodbaths took place in benign-sounding locales like the Wheatfield, which changed hands several times in a matter of hours, and at the Peach Grove, which fell to Confederate advances by the end of the day on July 2nd.

At the chillingly named Devil’s Den, at the base of Little Round Top, Federal troops held off Confederate assaults during hours of macabre hand-to-hand fighting, often in narrow gaps and draws in bizarre, otherwordly rock outcroppings.

The fighting sapped southern strength on the Union left, enabling Meade’s forces to quickly claim and hold Little Round Top. By late afternoon Union artillery was raining devastating fire onto southern forces attacking out of Pitzer Woods and Warfield Ridge to the west and south.

By the end of July 2nd, the Union line held: to the north along the edge of Gettysburg at Cemetery Hill, and to the south at Little Round Top, where the 20th Maine under Colonel Joshua Chamberlin held the southern end of the line, thereby maintaining Union control of the battle, but under murderous, non-stop Confederate attack by newly-committed Alabama troops.

Union defenders paid dearly at the Wheatfield and Devil’s Den, but bought time for reinforcements, which continued to arrive from Washington even as Lee was committing his reserves with a failed assault on East Cemetery Hill.

Three Confederate divisions attempted to advance across this field to attack the Union center.

A Massed, Futile Assault

Realizing he needed to break the back of the Union line, Lee chose to do so at the center with a massive assault, which almost all of his staff, including his deputy, General James Longsteet, vehemently opposed. Union General Meade had correctly anticipated Lee’s moves throughout the battle, falling into excellent defensive positions by the end of the first day, and at a Council of War at the end of the second day predicted Lee would advance on the Union center, just over the hill beyond his headquarters near a farmhouse and several groves of trees.

After several cavalry actions on July 3rd, including a renewed assault at the northern end of the Union line near Culp’s Hill, Lee unleashed the largest artillery bombardment of the war up to that time on the Union center. Holding the high ground along Cemetery Ridge, Meade knew he held an advantage against an attack from the west, and only ordered batteries on either end of the barrage to fire on Confederate positions, leaving artillery in the center to remain largely silent during the two-hour bombardment. There was no secret as to what was coming next.

Advancing in three division-sized groups from Seminary Ridge and Spangler’s Woods along a mile-long front, Longstreet placed General George Pickett in command of the assault, which saw the bulk of nine regiments of the Army of Northern Virginia advancing uphill against fortified artillery and infantry positions.

The weather was hot and humid, in the 80s, and the objective was a grove, or copse, of trees a mile away at the center of the Federal II Corps position, but this was academic to Confederate officers. The advance was in broad daylight over a mile of open ground, with zero surprise.

Union artillery began firing before the southern infantry had advanced beyond the treeline, and even long rounds did damage to Confederate troops massing along Seminary Ridge. The Confederates advanced in a skirmish line at a medium pace, and largely held discipline while under withering artillery fire from the federal left and right. The center remained silent, even though the advancing southerners could clearly see cannon pointing at them.

About halfway across the Confederates jumped into double-time, at which point federal artillery in the center at last fired, wiping out half of the advancing troops within a matter of minutes. Federal infantry opened up on the advancing survivors as they closed in on Union lines, cutting down soldiers one and two at a time, though a few Confederate troops managed to reach the Angle near the bullet-pocked Brian farmhouse before being surrounded and gunned down. One New York battery grimly summed up the point-blank use of artillery at this stage of the Confederate charge as “double canister shot at 10 yards.” It was a mass, grotesque slaughter.

The High Water Mark of the Confederacy

Today, the Angle and Copse of Trees literally mark the Confederate High Water Mark, dotted up and down the line with Union unit monuments, facing Confederate monuments a mile away along Seminary Ridge.

The High Water Mark didn’t just represent the failure of the southern effort at Gettysburg, it marked the High Water Mark of the Confederacy. Though the south would have one last major victory at Chattanooga later in 1863, the die was cast with Pickett’s Charge. The war would drag on for nearly two more years, but never again would a Confederate army manage a large-scale offensive.

By 1864, newly-installed Union commander Ulysses Grant initiated total war against the south, bringing to bear the full might of Union industry, technology and manpower against the southern states, and the U.S. at last found a way to grind out a winning formula, however hellish, to a war it had once taken far less seriously than it’s adversary, at first dismissively referring to motivated Confederate troops as rebels and mutineers.

The rocks of The Angle mark the High Water Mark of the Confederacy.

A New Cyclorama Home, and A Casino Threat

Preservation of the Gettysburg battlefield began shortly after the battle ended, with a portion of East Cemetery Hill developed by the War Department into Gettysburg National Cemetery. Many of the near 5,000 Union troops killed in the battle were buried at this new National Cemetery, where President Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address during the cemetery’s dedication four months later in November 1863. The Department of the Army managed the battlefield site for decades before transferring the property to the National Park Service in 1933.

National Battlefields and Historic sites play somewhat the same role in the eastern U.S. as National Monuments do in the west; that is, protecting resources and practicing conservation within a smaller footprint, but on a scale which still enables wildlife corridors and open space aesthetics, and acts as a bulwark to encroaching urbanization.

The Battle of Gettysburg retains a place in history as a turning point in the war, but its legacy extends beyond military history, as Gettysburg National Military Park preserves some 4,000 acres of the battlefield and adjoining areas, including streams, fields, meadows, orchards, and several good-sized hills for its area within the Pennsylvania Piedmont coastal plain and Potomac watershed.

Working in conjunction with the National Park Service in renovating the battlefield to its state on the eve of battle in 1863, the Gettysburg Foundation is representative of the kind of locally-based, quality public/private partnerships which have developed over the last decade, enabling Park Service professionals to focus on resource protection and law enforcement, while foundation volunteers and employees staff the new LEED-certified visitor center and museum.

Opened in 2008, the new Gettysburg visitor center not only features outstanding historic artifact displays and film experiences, it is also the new home of the restored Gettysburg Cyclorama, painted by French artist Paul Philippoteaux and first exhibited in a tour of the U.S. in 1883.

The National Parks Conservation Association has also worked with the National Park Service and Gettysburg Foundation to help remove the Gettysburg National Tower, built in 1974 on private property but considered a park eyesore by battlefield conservationists until its demolition in 2000. The NPCA has also helped combat the threat of a proposed casino in significant proximity to the battlefield’s borders.

Monuments along Cemetery Ridge mark where Union firepower decimated the Confederate advance.

More about this post at:

• Gettysburg National Military Park
• Gettysburg Foundation
• National Parks Conservation Association
• Casino Backers Take Gaming Control Board to Supreme Court (Harrisburg Patriot-News; 6/20/11)
• Casino Applicant Appeals (Gettysburg Times; 6/20/11)
• Tourism Funds In Jeopardy (Gettysburg Times; 4/24/11)
• Gettysburg Nixes Casino (Washington Post; 4/20/11)
• No Dice: Gaming Board Rejects Gettysburg Casino (USA Today; 4/16/11)
• Gettysburg Casino Opponents Cheer Gaming Board Decision (Harrisburg Patriot-News; 4/15/11)
• Gettysburg Battlefield Acquires 95 Historic Acres (Philadelphia Inquirer; 3/26/11)
• The Gettysburg Battlefield (CBS News; 11/7/10)
• Hundreds at Hearing Speak for, Against Proposed Gettysburg Casino (Philadelphia Inquirer; 9/2/10)
• Opponents Outnumbered In Public Battle Over Casino Proposal (Harrisburg Patriot News; 9/1/10)
• Casino Foes, Pro Testify (Gettysburg Times; 9/1/10)
• Battlelines Drawn Over Gettysburg Casino (The Telegraph; 8/29/10)
• Architecture Fans Fight to Save Gettysburg’s Cyclorama Building (USA Today; 4/5/10)
• Two Developers Have Plans for Relocated Gettysburg Cyclorama Building (York Town Square; 11/9/08)
• Cyclorama Lawsuit May Get Federal Hearing (Gettysburg Times; 6/30/08)
• Casino Considered Near Gettysburg Battlefield (ABC News; 7/3/06)

New York troops held off repeated attacks on Little Round Top using these rocks for cover.

Treehuggers International founder Tommy Hough relates how Jerry Schad and his Afoot and Afield series had a profound effect on his perception, acceptance, and eventual peace with Southern California’s varied outdoor environments and landscapes.

Springtime poppies, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.

Stranger In An Arid Land

by Tommy Hough, Treehuggers International founder and host.

When I first arrived in San Diego, I was despondent. I was enjoying a tremendous career shot in the arm and broadcasting opportunity at a dynamite new radio station bending rules and going rogue, but I was a sad and homesick guy. You could see the cloud over my head a mile away. It’s a wonder my now-wife ever put up with me on our first few dates.

The despondency came from the trauma of uprooting myself from a place I’d fallen in love with, and a place I never wanted to leave and never once took for granted. It was the trauma of moving myself far away from every outdoor adventure I loved, every reason I had for living for the weekend (and indulging in more than a few sick days), every place worthy of strapping on a pair of old, comfortable hiking boots and taking along an ice axe for a “just in case” contingency.

For five years, the Pacific Northwest had been my absolute outdoor sustenance. It still very much is, but I had just moved to a part of the country which, as far as I could see, was arid, brown, hot, and living on irrigation-fueled life support. I do not exaggerate when I say this separation was akin to heartbreak; I could not shake myself from it.

Unused as I was to dry climates and desert particulates, the week I moved to San Diego a hot wintertime Santa Ana blew in and immediately gave me a terrible cold as my eyes dried and my nose bled. The winds were strong and sustained enough to collapse a huge branch from a big, old eucalyptus tree in Old Town, which crushed an old woman to death as she was walking her dog in the middle of the day. Welcome to town.

To me, San Diego was a catalogue of things missing and sorely lacking: wide, visceral rivers, dense rainforests, dramatic, glaciated peaks. The local mountains, to my sensibilities, were puny, brown, with zero trees or any confiers to brag about except for the highest reaches of the Lagunas, which upon close inspection were baked, bone-dry and alarmingly flammable. And what’s the point of all this sunshine if there’s no snow-capped mountains to fix one’s gaze on? No glaciers or snowfields or high alpine terrain, with a kingdom of lush forest and crashing waterfalls below?

While I could appreciate the wildness of the desert, it initially held little interest for exploration. It was vast, hot, and definitely not green. It was the inverse of the verdant outdoor environments I’d come to love as I developed my outdoor jones as a kid in the Laurel Highlands of Western Pennsylvania, at college in the Appalachian foothills of southeast Ohio, and later in the waterfall-spray soaked forests and rocky, granite massifs of the Pacific Northwest.

Summit markers atop snowy Mt. Baden-Powell, San Gabriel Mountains.

Finding Familiarity In Old Cuyamaca

Of course, an outdoorsman explores, and an explorer does so outdoors. If you love the outdoors, you don’t sit around inside thinking about it. Within days I was attempting to come to terms with my new environment, trying to find something I could latch on to and find familiar. I was certainly looking for something to soothe my outdoor jones.

With Gram Parsons and Buck Owens providing the soundtrack in the car, I made my way to the pre-Cedar Fire wonderland of Cuyamaca Rancho State Park, and found myself reminded of parts of Montana, as well as the oak-dotted hills of California’s magical Central Coast and Bay Area.

I spent days wandering around Cuyamaca Peak. There were no glaciers. There were no wildflowers. But I saw deer and even a fox in the old Jeffrey and Ponderosa pine forest, and was reminded of some of the forests of eastern Oregon, or the underrated (and soon to be closed) Castle Crags State Park near Mt. Shasta.

This was progress. At least I’d found something which felt comfortable, and a little more familiar.

The next thing I did was pick up a book I’d actually heard about in Seattle called Afoot and Afield In San Diego County. The book was written by a Mesa College astronomy professor named Jerry Schad, who’d appeared several years earlier in a TV adaptation of the book on KPBS, San Diego’s public radio and TV outlet.

Judging from the size of the book, Jerry appeared to have hiked every trail ever blazed in the county, and I mean every one. I devoured the contents of Afoot and Afield, first looking for hikes and trails which reminded me of home, then checking out coastal trails through chaparral (an ecosystem I’ve only just learned to appreciate with the help of Rick Halsey), and then, taking a few curious looks at the desert hikes detailed in the book’s Anza-Borrego sections.

Reading through the text of various trips, Jerry made the hikes tangible and interesting, and seemed to have a particular zeal for desert trails, especially some of the more sheer and brutalizing treks in the Santa Rosa range, which even piqued my admittedly low interest for badland adventure.

Before long, I was driving up fire roads on the Los Coyotes reservation near Warner Springs to the forests at the base of Hot Springs Mountain, only to be sideswiped by a view of the Salton Sea I will never forget, appearing like a giant mirage through the trees. I visited the oak groves of Oakoasis in Lakeside and was pleased to find such heavy tree wisdom so close to civilization, cared for as a county park. I walked along the headwaters of the wild Santa Margarita River on the backside of Camp Pendleton, and was calmed by the stillness and quiet of the wilderness.

I found myself in a wildflower riot bright with yellow monkeyflower, hyacinth, and morning glory on the western shoulder of Otay Mountain one March morning. I swear I nearly drowned as I walked through literal walls of water in a late winter cloudburst atop Mt. Woodson, heartened to see freshly-fallen snow through the raindrops blanketing the Santa Ysabel ridge above Ramona. I met a friend for life on a morning trek up Stonewall Peak, and laughed with gallows delight as weather turned cruel on an outing to Garnet Peak. I ascended through the changing ecosystems of the Southern California forest on the Observatory Trail at Palomar Mountain, delighted at finding genuine old-growth cedars near the top.

I returned to Cuyamaca Peak, feeling a little wiser with my newly-minted Southern California explorer’s stripes.

San Ysidro Oak Woodland Open Space Preserve, Santa Barbara County.

Gratitude and Recognition

While I made it a point to explore and hike my way through my separation trauma, I had Jerry Schad to thank for planting ideas in my head as I read pages and pages of Afoot and Afield before falling asleep at night, and guiding me to a trailhead or destination as I kept one hand on my Jeep steering wheel and another holding my rapidly-fraying copy of Afoot and Afield.

Later I picked up Jerry’s Afoot and Afield editions for Orange and Los Angeles counties, and found myself on the wander-worthy San Juan Creek trail in the wild Santa Ana range one day, and ascending 9,399 ft. Mt. Baden-Powell in the San Gabriel range on another, finding some of the freshest air I’ve ever breathed at the summit, along with one of the strangest mountaintop mysteries I’ve ever beheld.

I want to thank Jerry Schad for giving a me an outdoor compass for Southern California, and helping me find my way in a region of the country I’ve sometimes been at odds with personally, but which has always embraced me back.

Through his enthusiastic, clear writing, Jerry helped me find my bearings at a time when I needed it, and helped replace my traumatic sense of loss with a newfound appreciation for where I was, and the self-healing to embrace and be thankful for what I had, as opposed to what I was missing. For that, there are no words which say thank you well enough.

“Just Get Out There”

These days, Jerry is very sick with stage four cancer, having reached a point where treatment is no longer a viable option. He wrote about his condition in the final edition of his long-running outdoor column for the The Reader, Roam-A-Rama. I know from his wife he is resting comfortably at home.

I sincerely hope this piece goes a little of the long way of expressing to Jerry just how much of an impact he’s had on me, and how, with his help, I came to be enticed by Southern California’s remarkable outdoors through his experiences, and confirmed them with my own.

I know there are tens of thousands of outdoors fans in Southern California who eagerly lace up their boots every chance they get, and feel exactly the same rush of excitement when they make sure they have their copy of Afoot and Afield before leaving for a trailhead. I hope Jerry knows how much of an impact he has made on generations of hikers and outdoors fans. As he wrote in his final Roam-A-Rama column for The Reader, “just get out there.”

And when getting “out there,” take along your friends and family, and colleagues and neighbors. Get the novices on the trail to breathe in the fresh air and to enjoy a vista or view they can’t get from a parking lot. When people make a tangible connection to the outdoors and wilderness, the more inclined they will be to help save it, and preserve it as is.

A Canopy of Stars

In September 2008, shortly after Jerry’s first appearance on Treehuggers International, he invited me to an astronomy lecture he was giving to a new crop of Mesa College students, from a wide parking area along Sunrise Highway, a few miles above the I-8 Laguna Summit. Using his laser pointer as the sun fell away and the canopy of stars opened, Jerry diagrammed the constellations and explained their origins, compared and contrasted the remarkable similarity different civilizations had of the same constellations, and pointed his array of telescopes at heavenly bodies from the moon to the rings of Saturn to the Jovian moons. Astronomy is Jerry’s true passion, and I thank him for letting me come by and enjoy his lecture as a guest.

Thanks for everything Jerry. We’re thinking about you.

Jerry Schad has made two appearances on Treehuggers International: July 13, 2008 and July 19, 2009.

Zuma Canyon wildflowers, Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

More about this post at:

• Skyphoto, Jerry Schad’s homepage and astronomical photographs
• Wilderness Press Bio
• San Diego Reader Staff Page
• Roam-A-Rama
• KPBS Videos Page
• The Life of Jerry Schad (San Diego Union-Tribune; 8/1/11)
• End of the Trail (San Diego Reader; 7/6/11)
• A Bad Day In Hiking (San Diego Hiker; 7/6/11)
• Jerry Schad: Wish Him Well (100 Peaks; 6/6/11)
• Friends of Lake Murray (Mission Valley Courier; 6/3/11)
• Find Coast Redwoods In Balboa Park (San Diego Reader; 4/13/11)
• Los Angeles County Trails With Jerry Schad (Treehuggers International; 7/19/09)
• Afoot and Afield With Jerry Schad (Treehuggers International; 7/13/08)
• Afoot and Afield Author Talks About Hiking Areas After Wildfires (San Diego.com; 1/28/08)

The setting sun on the restored lighthouse, Cabrillo National Monument.

Treehuggers International is pleased to welcome Ranger Lou Sian to talk about the magnificence of the coastal Redwood forest ecosystem, and the effort a century ago to save a surviving old-growth grove minutes away from the growing metropolis of San Francisco, resulting in Muir Woods National Monument.

Thanks to Lindsay Bartsh at the National Parks Conservation Association, and Muir Woods Sight Supervisor Mia Monroe for their help with this program. A very special thanks to Paul Lancour for his technical assistance with this edition of Treehuggers International.

The older a Redwood gets, the more rot and fire-resistant it becomes.

“My Dear Mr. Kent: By George! You are right!”

Sprouting from a seed no bigger than a tomato, Redwoods have a special place in western conservation culture. Along with being the tallest trees in the world, California’s Redwoods are also some of the world’s most rot-resistant trees, and by virtue of their bark, size, and typical surrounding ecosystem, Redwoods are amazingly fire-resistant. Other than man, or the occasional well-placed windstorm, Redwoods have no natural enemies, and can thrive for hundreds if not thousands of years.

Growing in groves of five or six in a small, thin coastal band from Big Sur to the Oregon border, Redwoods once covered some two million acres of the Northern California coast. But due to over-logging, and a lack of understanding about the Redwood forest ecosystem, those once great stands were denuded to the few stands which survive today. While most surviving old-growth Redwood groves have since been preserved in various California state and National Parks, some old-growth Redwood groves do survive today on private timberland, and calls for their preservation occasionally percolate to the surface.

One of the few surviving stands of old-growth Redwoods in the San Francisco Bay Area, Muir Woods lies in a canyon along the Pacific coast in southwestern Marin County, and was one of the first National Park Service units of what is now collectively referred to as the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

Like classic old-growth Redwood forests, it relies upon fog for regular moisture, and this abundance of fog results in a locally wet environment which ensures abundant plant growth similar to that seen in the Pacific Northwest.

Named for the great naturalist, savior of Yosemite, and Sierra Club founder John Muir, Muir Woods was set aside as a National Monument in Muir’s honor by his friend and fellow conservationist, President Theodore Roosevelt in 1908, at the urging of area businessman and future congressman William Kent, after a Sausalito water company announced plans to dam the canyon.

Muir Woods became the first National Monument to be created from land donated by a private individual, rather than land already in federal government inventory.

Salmon-spawning Redwood Creek on it's way to the Pacific Ocean.

More about this post at:

• Muir Woods National Monument
• Golden Gate National Recreation Area
• National Parks Conservation Association
• Save the Redwoods League
• Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy
• Mount Tamalpais State Park
• California’s Giant Carbon Sponge (KQED Climate Watch; 2/26/11)
• Shhh, and Not Because the Fauna Are Sleeping (New York Times; 2/21/11)
• Global Warming Seen As Threat to State’s Parks (San Francisco Chronicle; 10/27/10)
• Report Predicts Hot Future for California National Parks (Scientific American; 10/27/10)
• Vanishing Fog Threatens Redwoods (Santa Cruz Weekly; 2/18/10)
• Less Fog Puts Redwoods At Risk (San Francisco Chronicle; 2/16/10)
• Fog Decrease Harming California Redwoods (USA Today; 2/15/10)
• Fog Decline Threatens Redwoods (BBC; 2/15/10)
• Muir Woods Celebrates A Century of Conservation (USA Today; 4/9/08)
• Muir Woods Anniversary (Bay Nature; 4/1/08)
• Muir Woods Celebrates First 100 Years (San Francisco Chronicle; 12/17/07)

For once, Tommy remembered to take a photo with his guest, Ranger Lou Sian.

Mr. Gonzalez and his team have also been active in pointing out the willingness of elected officials, and even the pubic, to turn a blind eye to blatant violations of state and federal clean water and clean air laws.

Smoke from the 2011 La Jolla fireworks drifts lazily in the thick air.

With June marking Leave No Child Inside Month and spring fever giving way summer plans, Dr. Anne Fege, Janice Swaisgood and David MacDonald join Tommy for a discussion on the need to reconnect kids with nature and enjoying unstructured time spent in the outdoors.

Get kids outside, and their natural tendencies to run, explore and play kick in.

Nature Misunderstood, Feared

A strange thing began happening about 20 years ago. Kids stopped going outside. With competition from electronic media and parents’ schedules growing increasingly busy with longer work hours, the volume of kids making time to go outdoors and play is now far smaller than it used to be.

Over time, a misplaced culture of fear about the outdoors also began to take hold, the result of irresponsible media and, in some cases, hyperactive parenting. The outdoors began to be seen not as a place of wonder and experience and fun, but as a place of danger and threat; a place to be avoided, where snakes and bears lurk beneath rocks and behind trees.

Like anything else, there are dangers inherent in the outdoors, but scouting and related outdoor organizations continue to offer safe, fun, constructive ways for kids to learn about the outdoors with hikes and overnight backpacks into the wild, and map and compass training which tangibly bolster kids’ sense of accomplishment, ability and self-worth, and tap into kids’ desires for exploration and adventure.

Unfortunately, many kids never quite reach this pro-active level of outdoor exposure and confidence building because they are first introduced to the outdoors by way of the culture of “extreme sports,” emphasizing activity in which the outdoors aren’t something to be enjoyed or a place to find peace or solace, but a place to be conquered, to be vanquished, with little opportunity for reflection beyond boasting.

Richard Louv and the “Leave No Child Inside” Phenomena

As the nation’s youth have grown more disinterested or ambivalent about nature and outdoor play in favor of free time spent indoors or in structured activity, skyrocketing rates of childhood obesity have resulted, while more subtle effects on children’s psychological well-being have been detected.

In his best-selling 2005 book, Last Child in the Woods, author Richard Louv lamented what he called the “nature-deficit disorder,” and inspired a grass-roots movement, sometimes called “Leave No Child Inside,” in order to bring a natural balance back to children’s lives.

Dr. Anne Fege served as Forest Supervisor of the Cleveland National Forest from 1991 to 2004, and is a co-founder of the San Diego Fire Recovery Network and San Diego Partners for Biodiversity, an adjunct professor in the biology department at San Diego State University, and a partner in Business and Ecology Consulting. A Botany Research Associate at the San Diego Natural History Museum, Dr. Fege also helped create the San Diego Audubon Society’s Outdoor Explore program, which provides nature walks for after-school programs, and is the co-founder and Chair of the San Diego Children and Nature Collaborative.

Janice Swaisgood is the co-founder of Family Adventures in Nature, serves on the national advisory board for the Natural Families Network for the Children and Nature Network, is on the Let’s G.O. “Get Outside” Oversight Committee, and is the co-chair of the San Diego Children and Nature Collaborative. Interestingly, her husband Ron appeared on a previous edition of Treehuggers International to talk about his work with the San Diego Zoo’s Desert Tortoise Recovery Project.

David MacDonald is the founder and president of the Donate-A-Pack Foundation, and previously appeared on Treehuggers International with Adventure 16 president John D. Mead to talk about the organization. A New England native and longtime western outdoorsman, David served as the Regional Coordinator for the American Hiking Society prior to creating the Donate-A-Pack Foundation in 1997, and helped bring the first National Trails Day to San Diego.

Teens enjoying the view from atop Garnet Peak, Laguna Mountains.

More about this post at:

• Children and Nature Network
• San Diego Children and Nature Collaborative
• Family Adventures In Nature
• Donate-A-Pack Foundation
• Richard Louv
• Last Child In the Woods
• California Children’s Outdoor Bill of Rights, California State Parks page
• Earth, Wind and Wildfire, San Diego Natural History Museum exhibit co-curated by Dr. Fege
• Between Wildfires Ask Questions, East County Magazine wildfire series written by Dr. Fege
• A Connection With Nature Enhances Well-Being (Harrisburg News-Patriot; 6/7/11)
• Getting Kids to Love and Respect the Great Outdoors (Imperial Valley News; 5/28/11)
• Outdoor Nature Youth Movement to Gather In Denver (Summit County Citizens Voice; 5/22/11)
• Can Nature Really Improve Health? (Chicago Tribune; 5/18/11)
• Get Over Nature Deficit Disorder (Minneapolis Star-Tribune; 5/17/11)
• Book Promotes the Unplugged Life (San Diego Union-Tribune; 5/8/11)
• The Great Outdoors Are Just That for Kids (USA Today; 4/14/11)
• South Dakota’s Nature Backpack Program Targets Kids (Outdoor News Daily; 4/12/11)
• Springfield Nature Center Presents Film On Children and Nature (Outdoor Central News Network; 4/1/11)
• New Hampshire Children In Nature Conference (Outdoor News Daily; 9/10/10)
• BLM Teaches Kids Nature, Outdoor Safety (Billings Gazette; 6/5/10)
• Healing the Broken Bond Between Children and Nature (Voice of San Diego; 2/23/09)
• Leave No Child Inside (Orion Magazine; 3/1/07)
• Nature Programs’ Goal: No Child Left Inside (USA Today; 11/22/06)
• Children With ADHD Benefit from Time Outdoors Enjoying Nature (Illinois News Bureau; 8/27/04)

Grandmother and grandson on the slopes of Mt. Diablo, near Walnut Creek.

As the bad news from the new Congress continues to pile up, an extraordinary volume of anti-environmental legislation has managed to pass the House of Representatives, and is in the early stages of debate in the Senate.

Sadly, not all of this environmental ugliness has been fully explored or reported by major media outlets. Part of the reason for this is sheer volume; there’s just too much to sift through, part and parcel of a new and very dangerous assault on long-standing, functional environmental regulations. It is clear we are in the midst of a new era of anti-environmentalism which, so far, has yet to crest, and may only grow more aggravated should the Senate and White House pass hands in 2012.

We’ve included information at the end of this piece on what you can do to help.

Utah ORV users ignore a barrier intended to prevent non-motorized use.

An Executive Order

Several years ago, Dan Schroeder, the chair of the Ogden, Utah chapter of the Sierra Club, wrote

In 1972, President Richard Nixon signed an executive order directing the nation’s public lands be managed to “minimize damage” from motorized off-road vehicles. The President noted these machines were growing in popularity, and their use was “in frequent conflict with wise land and resource management practices, environmental values, and other types of recreational activity.”

The order stated federal agencies must manage off-road vehicle use so as to protect natural resources, promote the safety of all land users, and minimize conflicts among various uses. Open routes must be clearly signed and publicized; closures must be enforced; and effects of off-road vehicle must be monitored.

Unfortunately, all these years later, the implementation of Nixon’s wise executive order remains spotty at best, and if one California Congressman has his way, restrictions on off-road vehicle use in our National Forests will become a thing of the past.

The Great Unraveling Underway

We at Treehuggers International encourage, and expect, bi-partisan support and cooperation in our mission to preserve parks, wilderness, and special places, and have seen in recent weeks the ability of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to introduce and support wilderness legislation, like Rep. David Dreier’s current San Gabriel Mountains Wilderness Bill.

But the new GOP majority in the House has shown itself not only ready to do the bidding of the Koch Brothers by declawing the EPA, Clean Water Act, and Clean Air Act to levels the Bush administration only dreamed of (which looks almost responsible by comparison), but are prepared to roll back long-standing environmental regulations across the board, even if it means limiting the ability of citizens or government scientists and professionals to voice their concerns about Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management policies. Even the most benign conservation issues have been turned into ideological battlegrounds.

Herger Amendment

While the dust-up over the end of the Bureau of Land Management’s “No New Wilderness” policy has garnered some attention in the form of a potential new “sagebrush rebellion” in the west, the particular case we’re focusing on is the late-night passage of the Herger Amendment on February 18th, as part of the Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2011. It has received almost no media or press attention at all.

Named for Representative Wally Herger, who has been been representing California’s 2nd District for nearly a quarter-century, this seemingly benign piece of legislative-speak attached to an otherwise crucial piece of defense legislation would “prohibit the use of funds for the Secretary of Agriculture to implement or enforce Subpart B of the Travel Management Rule, relating to the designation of roads, trails, and areas for motor vehicle use, in any administrative unit of the National Forest System.”

Subpart B is the important component here. According to David Smith of the Siskiyou Daily News

Subpart B of the federal Travel Management Rule declares that motor vehicle travel outside of designated areas is prohibited, the enforcement of which would be subject to the defunding under Herger’s amendment.

In other words, the measure is intended to force the Forest Service to lift restrictions on off-road vehicle use in our National Forests. While the Herger Amendment may not be broad enough to undo the 1964 Wilderness Act’s exclusion of machine and motorized use in designated Wilderness areas, according to Alan Rowsome, the Conservation Funding Director at the Wilderness Society, the Herger Amendment

limits the Forest Service from regulating its road system, [thereby] opening up more of our pristene lands to off road vehicle use. Importantly though, 18 Republicans voted against this harmful amendment, showing that many members understand the need to protect our forests.

We’re concerned about the Herger Amendment not only because it is a gratuitous kiss to the growing off-road vehicle lobby, but because of the ability it will give off-road users to use and abuse National Forest trails and open space, while limiting the ability of Forest Service managers to limit their use to current levels. Even a tenderfoot as notorious as George Will was able to discern

Pristine wilderness is an acquired taste and is incompatible with the enjoyment of some popular tastes such as dirt bikes, snowmobiles and other off-road vehicles. But surely there is no shortage of space in America for persons whose play must involve internal-combustion engines.

The Herger Amendment is, in part, a power play by off-road vehicle enthusiasts to snatch up even more public land, however inappropriate or wild it may be, to indulge in their “sport,” a sport which has obvious and detrimental environmental consequences. It is also, in part, a reaction to the Interior Department bringing to an end the aforementioned Bureau of Land Management’s “No New Wilderness” policy, which reverses a 2003 Bush-era rule which called a halt to the BLM identifying and preserving wilderness-worthy locales and sites until they could be appropriately reported to Congress and acted upon in wilderness legislation.

In the center-right Frum Forum, columnist David Jenkins of Republicans for Environmental Protection noted

This type of Western Republican rant against wilderness has become all too predictable in recent years. These libertarian-minded lawmakers are heavily influenced by a radical property rights group, the American Land Rights Association (ALRA), which made national news in 2007 for its boycott of the Minneapolis airport in protest of then-Senator Larry Craig’s (R-ID) arrest for sex solicitation, and the Blue Ribbon Coalition (BRC), an off-road motorized recreation group.

A former field ranger with the Forest Service in Oregon, Hillery Johnson Scott remembered “I would come across user-made trails, mostly made out of laziness to get to a campsite or hunting blind. There would be multiple trails going to the same spot, all user-made. We would take entire crews out and try to cover them with brush and tree debris to discourage their use, but a week later they were all cleared away with fresh four-wheeler tracks. Even within the agency there were issues on how to deal with it, trails and multiple use folks vs. conservation folks. I’ve been known to ride a dirt bike or two, but user-made trails have become a pariah on vast recreational areas. This amendment would do so much more damage to an ongoing problem.”

Granted, it’s hard to deny someone the permission to use a dirtbike or off-road vehicle on an appropriately-graded road in a National Forest or BLM area. In remote areas like Alaska, off-road vehicles are often used for the utilitarian purposes they were originally designed for, to transport food and supplies or cover great distances on poor or primitive access routes, as opposed to being used as thrillcraft which can literally climb to the tops of mountains.

Destructive Recreation

While the 1964 Wilderness Act excludes motorized use in any designated Wilderness area, and the Forest Service and BLM often exclude off-road use from certain areas recommended or under consideration as wilderness or on popular hiking and equestrian trails in order to avoid conflicting uses, the use of these thrillcraft machines to “rock crawl” up sheer faces of granite or “tear up” muddy or damp areas means greater management of off-road vehicles and the areas in which they’re allowed to operate is desperately needed.

What’s not needed, and what will lead many pristine National Forest areas to unregulated ruin, is a blanket dismissal of all restrictions for ORVs. Only someone who has never spent any time in the outdoors (or is so connected to the off-road lobby) could fail to see the immediate harm to Forest Service and BLM resources in passing such an amendment.

We at Treehuggers International concede off-road vehicle and thrillcraft use has become a part of the outdoor experience for some; it is appropriate to have some land set aside for this type of activity on public lands. But we also stand by our belief the explosion of off-road vehicle use is the single-biggest environmental threat our special places face. If not properly regulated, and corralled into areas designated for use, the consequences will be regrettable and far-reaching.

Beyond the inherent noise and air pollution resulting from internal combustion engines ruining reasonable levels of natural tranquility or outdoor solace, by definition “off-roading” puts automobile-like vehicles and internal combustion engine-driven machines in areas not designed or ever intended for such activity.

In terms of engine noise, habitat destruction, exhaust pollution and physical contact and harm, the impact of ORVs in terrifying wildlife, seen and unseen, and interfering with hibernation and mating schedules and regular activity, is considerable. Even a passive observer can tell off-road vehicle use churns up soil and creates ruts, damages root systems, compacts soil, and accelerates erosion, all of which can lead to more frequent dust storms and increased sedimentation in waterways. Despite this, the thrillseeking component of “tearing up” the landscape continues to be popularized and encouraged in the advertising for sport utility vehicles, even in commercials from major auto manufacturers.

In addition to damaging plants by driving over them and chewing them apart, off-road vehicles also spread seeds as they churn up soil and vegetation, aiding in the spread of weeds which can damage native plant life. As a natural habitat is churned up, eroded or invaded by noxious weeds, the wildlife which depends on it suffers. The idea of lifting reasonable restrictions placed by forest managers on off-road vehicles would permanently alter the balance of outdoor recreation, and rapidly damage the health of plants, water and wildlife in our National Forests.

We ask, is it that much of a chore to get off your machine and walk? Or even ride a mountain bike? Simply because you can access almost anywhere in the wild with such advanced off-road vehicles, it doesn’t necessarily mean one should, particularly if the goal is to find a new place to wreak destructive recreation. Far from “locking up” landscapes, wilderness designations are intended to preserve landscapes and ecosystems as is, for the health of the nation and for all to enjoy in the spirit of preservation. You can walk right in.

We hear enough engine noise and breathe in enough internal combustion engine exhaust in our daily lives as it is. Why would we want these same stresses and unpleasantries in the wild?

Political Expediency

With President Obama about to get in a political jam on the debt ceiling, along with other thorny national issues, we at Treehuggers International worry about what amendments he will use in order to draw GOP support in an eventual compromise, or for a compromise for some unseen concern down the road.

While much of the anti-environmental legislation passed over the last month in the House may appear ridiculous, in this highly-charged political climate where the nation appears to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown, it could also pass in the name of political expediency.

In 2009 President Obama gave a gift to the gun lobby in the form of allowing loaded firearms on the trail in National Parks in order to pass the credit card reform bill. Obama’s kneejerk pragmatism and moderate extremism may lead to more of these kinds of political giveaways at the cost of environmental and regulatory integrity.

Sadly, another regrettable component of the Herger Amendment may be akin to bombing a building a peace treaty is being negotiated in. The Herger Amendment undermines a great deal of community work and common ground the conservation community and off-road vehicle enthusiasts have found over the last 10 years, and with its broad scope of eliminating local forest management by strangling the budget for regulation and enforcement, it reboots the conversation and eliminates what progress has been made.

Contact Your Senators

We urge you to reach out to your U.S. Senators, preferably by letter, but by phone as well, and tell them:

Herger Amendment 177, included by the House in its recently-passed Fiscal Year 2011 budget bill, prevents National Forests from managing off-road vehicles by prohibiting implementation and enforcement of the off-road vehicle travel plans that the public and forests spent the last six years developing.

These off-road vehicle travel plans have a history of bi-partisan support. In fact, they were initiated by the Bush administration which itself pointed to uncontrolled ORV use as one of the top threats to our National Forests. In addition to the obvious safety and resource damage concerns, this amendment takes away the voice of thousands of Americans who have, in good faith, worked with the Forest Service to develop these plans over the past six years. A vast array of citizens have spent their time and energy to see this process through, and Congress should not simply walk in and render years of the public’s hard work moot.

Please contact your U.S. Senators and pass along this message. If you want, e-mail us and let us know who you spoke with or who you sent a letter to. While e-mails are handy, nothing beats a hand-written letter from a frequent voter. Believe us, a letter gets passed around the office. We hope the above information isn’t too much to transcribe by hand, though a well-presented, hand-signed word processor-created letter works too.

Thanks to Anne Merwin from The Wilderness Society for her help with this piece.

Washington off-road vehicle driver being cited for driving around a forest gate.

More about this post at:

• The Wilderness Society, House Votes to Slash Conservation
• The Wilderness Society, Budget Amendment Opens Forests to Off-Road Vehicle Use
• The Sierra Club, off-road vehicle page from Ogden, Utah chapter’s website
• The Sierra Club, off-road vehicle page from Juniper Group of Oregon Sierra Club
• Congressman Wally Herger, January 2010 statement on off-road vehicle use
• Center for Biological Diversity, Off-Road Vehicle Plan Halted Near Grand Canyon
• Washington Trails Association, 2010 Endangered Trails Guide
• Pinelands Preservation Alliance, off-road vehicle page
• National Forests: A Battle Over Mapping Forests and Trails (Los Angeles Times; 3/4/11)
• Obama Threatens to Shatter Political Peace In the Forest (Eugene Register-Guard; 3/2/11)
• Herger Amendment Prohibits Travel Management Funding (Siskiyou Daily News; 2/23/11)
• Obama’s New Forest Rules: Read the Fine Print (The Oregonian; 2/19/11)
• Judge Rules Forest Service Motorized-Vehicle Plan Unlawful (Magic Valley Times-News; 2/9/11)
• Lawsuit Accuses Forest Service of Ducking Own Rules On ORV Use (Colorado Independent; 2/1/11)
• Judge Upholds Forest Service Off-Road Vehicle Ban In Wild Montana (ENS; 1/24/11)
• New Wilderness Regs Are No Land Grab (Frum Forum; 1/7/11)
• Wallowa-Whitman Forest Becoming Battleground for ORV Limits (The Oregonian; 10/8/10)
• Destruction of New Jersey Natural Areas By ORV Users Mounting (Atlantic City Press; 9/2/10)
• Mt. Hood National Forest Restricts Off-Road Vehicles to Four Areas (The Oregonian; 8/27/10)
• Off-Roaders In Search of Trails (USA Today; 4/6/10)
• Rally Opposes Closing Ouachita Forest Trails (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette; 3/14/10)
• Off-Road Vehicles: A Threat to Our National Forests (Epic; 3/4/10)
• Lawsuit Targets Off-Road Vehicle Trail Plan In Oregon Dunes (KCBY-TV; 12/9/09)
• ATV Riders Damage Land At Earth Conservancy Site (Wilkes-Barres Citizens Voice; 9/1/09)
• Forest Service Developing Off-Road Vehicle Plans (Seattle Times; 4/8/09)
• OHV Riders Cause Real, Long-Lasting Damage (Redding Record-Searchlight; 11/9/08)
• Off-Road Vehicle Bans Seem to Please No One (Christian Science Monitor; 7/9/08)
• Congressional Hearings Address Off-Road Vehicle Damage (Wildlands CPR; 6/19/08)
• Off-Roading Turned Meadow Into Mudhole (Seattle Times; 4/3/08)
• Off-Road Enthusiasts Air Concerns to Rep. Hunter (San Diego Union-Tribune; 3/22/08)
• Forest Service May Ban Off-Road Vehicles from Trails (Gainesville Times; 1/18/08)
• Park Destruction Blamed On ATVs (East Brunswick Sentinel; 1/25/07)

New Jersey swamplands damaged by off-road vehicle use.

Treehuggers International welcomes Sara Feldman, the Vice President for Programs at the California State Parks Foundation, back to the program to talk about potential state park closures, as well as the California State Park Foundation’s upcoming Earth Day Restoration and Clean-Up on April 16th.

Also on this edition of Treehuggers International is special guest Laura Davick, the President and Founder of the Crystal Cove Alliance in Orange County, a model for successful public/private partnerships with the mission of preserving California’s state parks.

A pelican enjoys the sunset from the Crystal Cove tidepools.

Familiar Ground

Since the beginning of Treehuggers International in 2007, founder and host Tommy Hough has often referred to California State Parks as the “envy of the nation.” While National Parks and National Monuments located in California typically defy superlatives and stand as some of the grandest in the nation, California’s state parks also hold a bounty of National Park-worthy sites, vistas, and resources, from Anza-Borrego to Montaña de Oro and Henry Coe, to the network of Redwood state parks along the North Coast.

California State Parks also go a long way towards preserving the history of the Golden State, from a park celebrating Southern California’s long-gone citrus empire in Riverside, to the one of the first African-American communities in the Central Valley, to the beginning of California’s gold rush at Sutter’s Mill along the American River.

With the failure of Proposition 21 in last November’s election, California’s remarkable state park system remains faced with the same threats of closure they’ve faced in previous years. As returning Governor Jerry Brown has made clear from the moment he took office, he intends to spread the pain of budget cuts across the board, including California State Parks. So far, the governor’s proposed 2011 budget calls for $11 million dollars in cuts to state parks, with an additional $11 million to be cut in 2012, making state park closures a certainty.

With park advocates’ backs to the wall and the impending release of a new state parks closure list, California State Parks, in conjunction with the California State Parks Foundation and various conservancies and associations around the state, is once again considering alternate sources of funding in order to keep parks open to the public and able to operate.

Earth Day Restoration and Clean-Up

Sara and Laura also take a few moments to talk about this year’s California State Parks Foundation annual Earth Day Restoration and Clean-Up, happening at state parks sites around California on Saturday, April 16th. You can join volunteers to plant trees, restore trails, and clean waterways at California’s magnificent state parks.

For individuals, groups or businesses interested in volunteering on Earth Day or to find an Earth Day Restoration and Clean-Up site a site near you, go to the California State Parks Foundation website, or call 1-888-98-PARKS.

For more information on Laura and the Crystal Cove Alliance, call (949) 376-0900.

With hopes for an omnibus public lands bill in mind, Treehuggers International presents an encore presentation of our 2008 conversation with George Wuerthner. The author of a two-volume guide to California’s Wilderness areas, George has spent an extraordinary amount of time on the trail in our nation’s National Parks, National Forests, BLM lands and Wilderness areas, and is a prolific writer with 34 books and hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles to his credit.

An articulate advocate for the responsible management of America’s public lands, George Wuerthner is also the author of a book about the damage caused by reckless off-road vehicle use called Thrillcraft: The Environmental Consequences of Motorized Recreation (2007), as well as The Wildfire Reader: A Century of Failed Forest Policy (2006), and Welfare Ranching: The Subsidized Destruction of the American West (2002). He is currently completing work on a book about the destructive practice of mountaintop removal coal mining in the Appalachians.

Big Sky: Continental Divide Trail, Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest.