SHERIFFS LEVEL HUGE POT FARM NEAR ALAMEDA COUNTY LINE

Operation Worth About $84 Million

The Santa Clara County Sheriff's Department announced Friday it has
eradicated the largest marijuana-growing operation in county history, worth
an estimated $84 million on the street.

More than a dozen law enforcement officers worked for two days chopping
down and confiscating more than 21,000 pot plants growing in a canyon near
the border of Alameda and Santa Clara counties.

``It's a literal jungle that the officers were in,'' Sheriff Chuck
Gillingham said. ``The remote parts of the county make it easy for these
people to set up.''

That marijuana plantation was the second in Santa Clara County spotted from
the air and destroyed this week, said Sgt. Jim Arata, a sheriff's spokesman.

Both sites were abandoned, and they are believed to be unrelated.

No one was taken into custody in either case, and Arata said he did not
think any arrests were imminent.

The larger of the two operations would have yielded enough pot for 19
million joints, said Mike Van Winkle, a spokesman for the state Department
of Justice.

The biggest outdoor marijuana operation that California authorities have
shut down consisted of 60,000 plants in Glenn County, Van Winkle said. But
a typical operation has fewer than 4,000, he said.

The larger of the two operations hit this week was on San Francisco Water
Department property about 2 1/2 miles east of Calaveras Reservoir, between
Poverty Ridge and Black Mountain.

A helicopter spotted the plants about 6 a.m. Wednesday, Arata said.

Authorities found the farm in an area of barren hills, heavily forested
gullies and small creeks southeast of the reservoir, secluded even from the
numerous cattle ranges and ranch houses that pepper that part of the
county. Most of the roads in the area are unpaved and gated.

Because the hillsides are starting to change to brown, it is becoming
easier to spot the distinctive, green marijuana plants from the air,
Gillingham said.

Officials cut the plants down and destroyed them by grinding them with
garbage and other foliage, Arata said.

About 15 sheriff's deputies and state law enforcement agents were flown by
helicopter to the site, where they discovered three base camps, a Tech-9
machine pistol, a 9mm automatic pistol and large amounts of ammunition for
various firearms.

Arata said the marijuana farm was irrigated by a system that used gravity
to draw water from creeks and springs.

Authorities believe someone brought immature plants in the spring, Arata
said, and planned to cultivate them until harvest, which would have be
within two weeks.

Deputies said the plants were configured in clusters similar to those found
on Mexican pot farms.

Authorities also discovered stoves made of dirt, mud and water, he said.

The record seizure followed a similar one Monday by Santa Clara County
sheriff's deputies that destroyed 1,590 plants. Another helicopter spotted
that marijuana farm at the base of Mount Umunhum, on an out-of-the-way
patch of land owned by the Mid-Peninsula Open Space District, Arata said.

He said that growing operation was discovered by a National Guard
helicopter crew and had an estimated street value of $7.8 million. Those
were cut down and burned at a Santa Cruz facility, the spokesman said.

``With the helicopters going over, we'll continue to find patches and we'll
continue to aggressively take them out,'' Gillingham said.

In a typical year, county officials might destroy 3,000 to 4,000 plants,
Arata said.

He and Gillingham said the pot farms are especially troublesome because
joggers and hikers might stumble onto them and unwittingly put themselves
in danger. Both said growers might booby-trap their farms and attack
possible witnesses.

Sheriff's officials asked that anyone with a tip on a marijuana farm call 911.

Mercury News Staff Writer Gil Jose Duran contributed to this report.