POT BUST NETS 6,400 PLANTS NEAR SR

Property owner discovers five large, terraced plots, complete with
irrigation, off Porter Creek Road northeast of city

Drug agents hit a home run on opening day of marijuana season, seizing more
than 6,400 pot plants with an estimated street value of $2.8 million from a
wooded area near Santa Rosa.

The haul by the Sonoma County Narcotics Task Force ranks as one of the
largest ever in the county.

"That's a good, large garden. It's pretty close to the largest," task force
Sgt. Chris Bertoli said Wednesday. "A good, solid garden could be several
hundred or a thousand plants really spread out and camouflaged well. This
was concentrated."

No arrests have been made.

The discovery, made Tuesday by a property owner walking on his land off
Porter Creek Road northeast of Santa Rosa, was an early start to the annual
crackdown on outdoor marijuana gardens, Bertoli said.

He said authorities will be looking for more outdoor gardens from the air
and on the ground as the growing season continues through October.

The North Coast is a prime target in the state's Campaign Against Marijuana
Planting program.

State, federal, and local law enforcement agencies under the direction of
the state Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement seized a record 354,164 marijuana
plants worth more than $1.4 billion last year, according to the state
Justice Department.

Mendocino County topped the state with more than 103,000 plants seized,
followed by Sonoma County with nearly 40,000 plants seized. Lake County was
eighth with more than 18,000 plants seized, the state said.

To protect the property owner from possible reprisals from the growers,
authorities wouldn't disclose the location of the garden northeast of Santa
Rosa.

The plants were growing in crop rows on five large, terraced plots watered
by irrigation lines tapped into two natural springs. Some surrounding brush
and tree cover was removed to improve growing conditions, with enough left
to camouflage the site.

Rat poison, slug bait and fertilizer were found in numerous containers and
draining into nearby springs.

Agents didn't find anyone at the site. Two campsites with sleeping and
eating areas were found, and agents also turned up shotgun ammunition and a
scabbard for a rifle or shotgun.

Both the growing techniques and campsites fit the profile of large gardens
usually tended by recruits who live for weeks on end near the illegal crops,
Bertoli said.

"We haven't seen the terraced, hilly tactic for a while. But every once in a
while, we will spot them," he said.

For every garden authorities find, there likely is another one or two
somewhere else, Bertoli said, because growers anticipate losing some to
poachers, known as "patch pirates," or law enforcement.

Beginning later this month and continuing through October, authorities will
fly over the county in helicopters and airplanes several days a week to
search for marijuana growing operations.

Agents take in between 25,000 and 40,000 plants a year, Bertoli said. "We
keep it in check," he said.