BLM begins dunes study

12:01 AM PST on Friday, February 27, 2004



The Press-EnterPrIse

A federal agency has launched a four-month program to monitor a threatened plant that has led to closures in the California desert's most popular off-roading area.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management said Thursday that 33 interns will scour the Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area until June looking for Pierson's milk-vetch and other imperiled wildlife to establish populations counts.

"This is the largest monitoring program we have conducted in the dunes," Christopher Knauf, program coordinator for the BLM's El Centro office, said in a statement. "It encompasses a wide variety of monitoring that contributes to an ecosystem level of understanding."

The study is required as part of a plan to reopen large portions of the dunes that stretch 30 miles north of the Mexican border and rise up to 300 feet high.

The BLM closed those portions in 2000 under a settlement agreement with environmental groups seeking protections for the plant under the nation's Endangered Species Act. The BLM, in a new plan, has called for reopening those sections with the possibility of closing them again if it is determined that off-roading harms the plant's ability to survive.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/desertpa...s27.5799a.html

 

Sounds like the Bush organization is at work undoing the extreme liberals work. If Al Gore was president we would have too sell our atv's because there would be no place too ride.
NOW, if we only had some people thats on our side conducting the investigation..[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-sad.gif[/img]. Some of these "investigations" in the past have been tainted by extremists.