Bad day for dune buggies
Feds rule to maintain protected status for embattled sand plant

By Benjamin Spillman
The Desert Sun
June 9th, 2004


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IMPERIAL SAND DUNES -- A plant that roots only in the shifting sands of some Imperial County dunes will continue clinging to protection by the government -- much to the chagrin of off-roaders who ride around its habitat.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ruled that the plant, Peirson’s milk vetch, deserves to maintain its status as a threatened species.

The decision won’t prevent dune buggy riders from playing in the massive, shifting sand system, but it could complicate efforts by off-highway vehicle trade groups to open more of the dunes in the future.

The news buoyed environmentalists who are fighting a plan by the Bureau of Land Management that would lift conservation closures on 49,000 acres of the Imperial Sand Dunes.

"It will probably be the difference between extinction and recovery," said Daniel Patterson, desert ecologist for the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the environmental groups fighting the government over dune management strategies.

"The off-road industry knows that and they don’t like it," he said.

The dune system spans approximately 40 miles along the eastern fringe of the Imperial Valley.

It is home to the Peirson’s milk vetch, a threatened species, and other sand plants and animals.

It is also a magnet for dune buggy and all terrain vehicle riders from throughout Arizona and Southern California, including the Coachella Valley.

It has attracted more than 160,000 visitors during holidays and drew approximately 1.2 million people during the 2002-03 riding season, according to the BLM.

The Fish and Wildlife decision to endorse continued protection for the milk vetch was a response to off-roaders who sought to de-list the species.

They cited a study commissioned by the American Sand Association, an off-road organization, that concluded the plant population in the dunes was robust.

De-listing the plant, said Greg Gorman, spokesman for the ASA, would aid off-roaders opposed to limiting the number of riders who can use the middle of the dunes.

"You have to think about the dunes as a lake, you don’t ride around the edge, you ride in the middle," Gorman said. "(The center has) some of the greatest dunes and the best bowls."

Patterson said environmentalists would like to maintain the status quo at the dunes, a management strategy that closes about 79,000 acres for protection and opens about 80,000 acres to traffic.

The proposed BLM management plan would open all but about 15 percent of the dunes to off-roaders, leaving just about 30,000 acres for conservation.

"There is plenty of room out there for everybody," Patterson said.

Gorman, however, disputed Patterson’s "50/50," characterization.

He said riders have already been driven from 90 percent of a popular dune system at Pismo beach and completely from the Kelso Dunes in the Mojave National Preserve.

"Pretty soon, everything is closed," Gorman said.

The dispute over the dunes has grown unwieldy for government agencies over the years.

Lawsuits from both sides have complicated efforts to manage wildlife in the area and elsewhere in Southern California, said Jane Hendron, a spokeswoman for the Carlsbad branch of the Fish and Wildlife Service.

"That is using up our budget," said Hendron.

She said the lawsuits result in the courts, not scientists, dictating the priorities of the Fish and Wildlife Service and the BLM.

"Both of our agencies are, in a way, caught in the middle," she said.

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