Cattle ranchers and their supporters weighed in against both regulations that forbid cattle grazing on the Bitter Creek Wildlife Refuge south of Maricopa and the planning process for a new management plan.
Support from the ranchers included city, county, state, and federal elected officials representing the area.
The planning process has ignored the concerns raised by the ranchers, they say, creating an “anti-rancher, anti-cattle bias.”
Concerns about wildfire danger and air pollution were also raised.
All those issues were discussed for more than two and a half hours at a scoping meeting held last week in Taft.
About the only thing that was agreed upon is that the land in the refuge is a valuable resource no matter how you look at it.
“Bitter Creek is a very special place,” said United States Fish and Wildlife Service employee Mike Stockton, who manages the refuge. “I want to preserve what we can while we can.”
That meeting, conducted by the federal Fish and Wildlife Service, is part of the planning process for a comprehensive conservation plan for the Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge complex, a trio of refuges designed to preserve roosting, hunting and breeding areas for the endangered California Condor.
At more than 14,000 acres, Bitter Creek is by far the largest of the three and is located along Soda Lake Road and Cerro Noroeste Road.
Cattle grazing has been banned on the refuge since 2005, said Susie Snedden, who, with her husband Richard, has a ranch with 13 miles of common border with Bitter Creek NWS.
She said the current scoping process is a waste of time and money unless it is done correctly and with rancher input being taken into consideration.
That hasn’t happened in the past, Snedden said.
“The scoping process is a waste of time unless we can trust the (USFWS) decisions will be based on sound science and not prejudice,” Snedden said.
Since the Bitter Creek management plan was first established in 1984, Snedden said, there has been no update, and cattle grazing was arbitrarily banned in 2005 with no input from ranchers.
That decision could have serious consequences, she warned.
“It was deadly for the plants and wildlife that once thrived on grazed ground but declined on un-grazed ground,” she said. “It was also a potentially deadly decision that has created a higher wildfire risk, posing a threat to plants, wildlife and humans alike. I am concerned that the actions of the service have been driven by an anti-cattle, anti-rancher bias.”
Stockton said there have only been eight small wildfires since 1987.
Dan Caulfield said the USFWS will get farther faster with their scoping process and land management plan if they work with the cattle ranchers instead of telling them what is going to happen.
“If you come and ask me something, you are going to find a cooperative atmosphere,” he said. “You could be getting some very good help.”
Cattle have grazed in the area since it was first settled in the 1870s, the ranchers say, and it makes no sense either economically or in terms of biology to continue to ban it.
Grazing the cattle is good for the land, they said, and helps in efforts to eradicate or control nonnative species.
The FWS is proposing to use proscribed burning instead of cattle grazing as a resource management tool, but the ranchers say cattle grazing could accomplish the same thing.
Others, including Kern County Supervisor Ray Watson, Assemblymember Jean Fuller, and Congressman Kevin McCarthy, say burning is the wrong way to go and could exacerbate air quality problems in the Southern San Joaquin Valley.
Fuller sent a letter to notify the FWS “of my continued concerns and to relate the voice of my constituents.”
“The proposed proscribed burning by the FWS on the Bitter Creek National Wildlife Refuge will contribute to the San Joaquin valley’s already poor air quality and will go against decades of traditional grazing activity to control growth,” Fuller wrote.
Fuller joined McCarthy and Watson in supporting the ranchers’ stance and opposing the use of proscribed burning.
McCarthy called for a “full and transparent” planning process with public input and also resubmitted a letter first sent in July 2008.
That letter called on the FWS to take into consideration the “historic, traditional and current role that grazing has played in and around the area for more than a century.”
Watson also called for open, public discussion before the management plan is prepared and raised more concerns about proscribed burning.
He recommended a full environmental impact report if burning is to continue as a resource management tool.
Noerr talked at length with USFWS official Tiffany Parsons.
He said it was very positive.
Later, in an email, he encouraged Parsons to take the ranchers concerns into consideration.
“Please remember, you have the ability to turn that entire room full of very well connected and involved people into supporters of your program and it’s vision if you embrace their concerns and utilize their knowledge and experience to achieve a common goal. Their buy -in is essential to the timely success of this project,” Noerr wrote
The fire-versus-grazing question prompted the ranchers to point out that they, too, want to live with the wildlife on the refuge.
The range cattle have also been a benefit to endangered species, they pointed out.
Austin Snedden said cattle have provided an important food source for the condors.
“I have personally witnessed a condor feeding on a stillborn calf on my family ranch,” he said. “The loss of a calf is not economically positive, but it is encouraging to see a condor being self-sufficient.”
Before the Bitter Creek refuge was established, the condor habitat considered largely of three privately owned ranches – the Snedden, Hudson, and San Emidio ranches, Austin Snedden said.
“I have seen that productive grazing land has provided an ample food source for the California condor and other species,” he said. “Five years ago, that resource was removed from the refuge. If we can collaborate with the condor and wildlife, why can’t we collaborate with the Bitter Creek administrators?”
