Deep-Forest Marijuana Farms Can Damage Ecosystem After Raids, Officials Say

Officials have dismantled more than 30 marijuana farms growing in the
San Bernardino National Forest this year, but scientists say the
effects on the forest's delicate ecosystem could last for years.

Scientists who study forests say it can take years for an area
formerly inhabited by a marijuana farm to return to its natural state,
if it ever will.

But agents don't have the time or money to remove all the debris
connected with marijuana farms. Helicopters often are used to haul the
marijuana and other items out of the forest because these areas are
not easily accessible by trails. Story continues below Denese D.
Stokes / U.S. Forest Service This debris-strewn scene was in the San
Bernardino National Forest last year after a marijuana-growing
operation was busted.

"We try to clean up as much as we possibly can when we do the
eradication but helicopter time is incredibly expensive," said Forest
Service special agent Denese Stokes. "There are always things that we
cannot get out."

Special agents are on track this year to bust more illegal marijuana
growing operations in California than they did last year, said U.S.
Forest Service spokesman John Heil.

He said 1.2 million marijuana plants were pulled from U.S. Forest
Service land in 2006 in California, 1.7 million in 2007 and 1.3
million so far this year.

Those plants were cleared from more than 7,400 acres in the state
since the beginning of the year.

In the San Bernardino National Forest, more than 200,000 marijuana
plants were removed from 33 sites from August to mid-September, said
John Miller, forest spokesman.

Pulling evidence, such as the marijuana, and removing rodent-killing
chemicals, fertilizers and any other dangerous chemicals is the
priority, Stokes said, but watering pipes, tents and associated
garbage often are left behind.

Growers use chemicals to kill animals because they might damage the
marijuana, Stokes said.

Officers cannot always remove all the chemicals and fertilizers, said
Patrick Foy, a warden with the state Department of Fish and Game.

Stokes said that once agents are through with all the clearing they
can do from the initial raid, the Forest Service makes no other
efforts to clean up the remaining garbage.

No Extensive Studies

Southern California is home to some of the most diverse plant and
wildlife in the world -- and many rare species that are already
battered by human encroachment and pollution, said Thomas Scott, a
University of California professor. He teaches in Riverside and
studies how humans affect natural habitats.

The San Bernardino National Forest is home to more than 150 protected
animal and plant species, according to the Forest Service's Web site.

The land might never recover if fertilizers and other chemicals are
added, Scott said.

"It's not something that will cleanse itself or heal itself
quickly."

Forest ecologist Malcolm North, a UC Davis professor who does research
for the Forest Service, said areas stripped of natural vegetation
become vulnerable to exotic plants that can take over and may not be
hospitable to other plant and wildlife.

Marijuana farms also cause damage by siphoning water from streams,
said Taylor McKinnon, public lands program director for the Center for
Biological Diversity, a nonprofit organization that studies and helps
preserve natural areas.

"The West doesn't have any water to spare, particularly in these
remote wildlands."

Scott, North and McKinnon said no one has studied extensively how
marijuana farms damage the forest.

"Only in the last five or 10 years has it become widespread enough of
a problem for it to warrant examination," North said.

McKinnon and North said the long-term effects are unknown but could be
significant.

"The cumulative impact of this happening across the West can add up,"
McKinnon said.

Volunteers Needed

U.S. Forest Service officials hope a nonprofit organization will help
clean up these sites as volunteers from the High Sierra Volunteer
Trail Crew have in Northern and Central California.

Shane Krogen, executive director of the High Sierra Volunteer Trail
Crew, and his volunteers remove tons of garbage, chemicals and
irrigation lines left behind from marijuana-farm busts, but they can
only get to a small number of sites.

Finding other volunteer crews willing and able to do the work is
difficult. Cleanup crews must be accompanied by law enforcement for
their safety and must get legal clearance. None are working in the San
Bernardino National Forest.

Krogen said it was difficult for his crew to wade through the
bureaucracy before they could start the cleanup missions.

"We had to leap tall buildings in a single bound, but we were able to
do it," Krogen said.

He said he believes it is crucial for volunteer teams to work these
sites because policing agencies aren't doing it.

"Their mission is to cut plants. They do not do restoration, period,"
Krogen said.

He estimates there are thousands of sites statewide that have not been
cleaned up.

"There is just so much out there that it is beyond belief."