A pastoral zone was created decades ago to allow cattle to graze within Point Reyes National Seashore/Photo via Sarah Rolph
Ranching in Point Reyes National Seashore is a valuable heritage that is being falsely maligned.
Anti-ranch activists contend agriculture was never meant to stay in the Seashore, citing one clause or another from enabling legislation or House hearings. But the first thing you learn when you try to go to the source is that there is no one source. Ranching was a purpose of the park from the beginning; as then-Secretary Ken Salazar said in his 2012 memo directing the Seashore to provide 20-year agreements, “Long-term preservation of ranching was a central concern of local interests and members of Congress as they considered legislation to establish the Point Reyes National Seashore in the 1950s and early 1960s.”
The enabling legislation was signed in 1962, and has been amended several times; none of those changes altered the original intent of retaining ranching as part of the Seashore. This history has been carefully detailed by environmental historian Laura Watt in her book, The Paradox of Preservation: Wilderness and Working Landscapes at Point Reyes National Seashore, a history of the Seashore that sheds light on every aspect of its foundation, evolution, and management, including lots of detail about the re-introduction of the Tule elk.
The importance of these ranchlands was recognized last year with national historic certifications. The new Point Reyes Peninsula Dairy Ranches Historic District and Olema Valley Diary Ranches Historic District are now on the National Register of Historic Places. Speaking of this designation, Seashore Superintendent Cicely Muldoon told the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, “National parks are so much more than sweeping landscapes. They are keepers of our national heritage, both natural and cultural.”
The facts show that ranching on Point Reyes is a net positive. Grasslands benefit from grazing. The iconic landscapes we love at the Seashore are the result of hundreds of years of grassland management, first by the Coast Miwok peoples, then by the Spanish and Mexican rancheros, then by the Anglo-American settlers and new immigrants, who called the place “cow heaven” for its incredibly lush grasses fed by the foggy climate. Today’s well-managed grazing practices provide not only aesthetic benefits—those gorgeous green hills and fields, emerald vistas extending to the sea—but also environmental benefits.
These benefits are buried in the Seashore’s current Draft Environmental Impact Statemen, but you can find them if you look. While Alternative F, the elimination of ranching, is described largely in glowing terms, the truth is that, as the DEIS says on page 139: “Over the long-term, however, the cessation of ranching may not result in overall beneficial impacts, especially in grasslands, which constitute 48 percent of the planning area. Rates of shrub encroachment into grasslands, invasive perennial grasses, vegetative fuels (both herbaceous and woody), and the consequent risk of large, intense wildfires are all likely to increase...”
I find it astonishing that the Park Service would underplay the risk of large, intense wildfires. But, sadly, officials at Point Reyes National Seashore do not have a good track record of telling the truth.
Nor do they have a good track record of following their own planning processes. In 1998, when the Seashore decided to create a free-ranging elk herd, a formal planning process was required. The 1998 Elk Management Plan and Environmental Assessment promised that the elk would be kept off the ranches, that the carrying capacity of the new herd would be studied and optimized, and that the population of the new herd would be kept in check. None of these promises has been kept.
A final environmental assessment or environmental impact statement has the status of law. If the Seashore can ignore the elk-management EA, why should we expect them to abide by this new EIS, or any other?
The DEIS uses the current range of the roaming elk as its baseline. But the elk were never supposed to be allowed into the pastoral zone. The baseline should be the conditions described under the 1998 elk management plan and environmental assessment.
Bull elk at Point Reyes National Seashore/NPS, Tim Bernot
The DEIS also plays into the hands of anti-ranch activists by discussing lethal control of the elk. Every news headline I have seen about the DEIS has used this angle. And yet, the DEIS makes it clear that when it comes to protecting livestock and property from elk depredations, lethal control is off the table; the plan is to continue to use hazing, which does not work and is cruel to the animals.
Lethal control is being proposed only for controlling the population of the Drakes Beach herd, and the Seashore says it might kill around 10 elk. The Seashore tells us that hundreds of its re-introduced Tule elk have died, from thirst, starvation, mineral deficiencies, and illness. Why isn’t population control being taken seriously for all of the elk on Point Reyes? Is this DEIS really focused on responsible natural resource management, or is it meant to increase pressure on the ranchers?
Another important benefit of ranching is its potential for helping to solve the climate crisis. Rangeland managers around the world are excited about the positive climate impacts of carbon farming. The Marin Carbon Project and the Carbon Cycle Institute are doing cutting-edge research and working closely with Marin ranchers to create carbon farming plans that are improving soils by increasing soil organic matter, and reducing atmospheric carbon in the process. Forward-thinking Point Reyes ranchers are interested in joining this project, but so far the Seashore has not allowed it.
The DEIS mentions carbon farming only in the appendices, and doesn’t include this important issue in its analysis, even though it was raised during scoping; this should be corrected in the final draft.
The DEIS claims that ranching has adverse impacts on native plants, but the documents they cite for these claims don’t say any such thing. The Natural Resource Condition Assessment cited in the DEIS says, “Information was insufficient to determine the trend for invasive plant and rare plant populations,” “the PORE range data set provides information about only one small part of the overall Point Reyes landscape,” and, further, that “none of the indicator rankings were considered to have a high degree of certainty.”
In fact, grazing is so important to the ecological health of these grasslands that if ranching were eliminated, the Seashore’s plan is to bring in its own livestock, under contract, and/or do lots of mechanical mowing. (Page 125: “The use of limited prescribed grazing is considered under alternatives with no or reduced livestock grazing because this would mitigate some undesirable impacts of grazing reduction or removal.”)
The DEIS is filled with deceptions like this. The preferred alternative is presented in a way that sounds like it gives ranchers everything they want; the appendices make it clear that, in practice, it won’t. Row crops are supposedly allowed—but they can’t be irrigated, must be sown by hand, can’t be more than two-and-a-half acres, and no control of, say, gophers, is allowed. So much for row crops. The same with goats and sheep—supposedly they are allowed, but the new zoning requirements would keep them out of the places they are needed to control brush.
Perhaps the most shocking deception in the DEIS is in the description of its purpose and need for action. The DEIS says on page 4: “In 2013, at the direction of the Secretary of the Interior, the NPS Director issued a Delegation of Authority authorizing lease/permit terms for up to 20 years and directing NPS to initiate a National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process to evaluate the issuance of long-term leases.” That is not true. There is no mention of NEPA in either then-Secretary Salazar’s Nov. 29, 2012, decision memo or then-National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis’s Jan. 13, 2013, delegation of authority. Instead of following these directives, the Seashore is using them as an excuse to validate the proliferation of elk on ranchlands and to further restrict ranching.
The Seashore is rewriting history to suit its current preferences, and using NEPA as a weapon to try to get what it wants—the elimination of ranching or its micro-management to the death. There are no apparent legal restraints on the power of the park service, but, morally, it is wrong to deceive the public in this way.
Ranching on Point Reyes is a valuable cultural heritage that is beneficial to the land. The multi-generation ranching families of Point Reyes are an asset to the Seashore, aesthetically, economically, culturally, and environmentally. Secretary Salazar had it right when he said, “These working ranches are a vibrant and compatible part of Point Reyes National Seashore, and both now and in the future represent an important contribution to the Point Reyes' superlative natural and cultural resources."
Sarah Rolph is a longtime business writer and research analyst who now writes narrative non-fiction. She grew up in California and is based in Carlisle, Massachusetts. In 2006 she published a history of a venerable Maine diner. Her work-in-progress documents the shutdown of Drakes Bay Oyster Farm.
Comments
Where to start? Have you read 16USCSS459c-5? Yes it's an amendment, but as I noted in another set of comments, the First Amendment isn't any less valid because it's an amendment. It carries the full force of law and supercedes anything that said anything different. It's leased back through the parameters of the law as it currently stands.
Also - your timeline is way off on the acquisition of land. It was done piecemeal. My research indicates that the federal government didn't own what's now the G Ranch until 1978, and in that case that ranching family were tenants since the 1950s. I linked to the history of the ranches and found this history:
A Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1971 with a 20 year reservation of use and then regular leases entered from 1991.
B Banch - purchased by NPS in 1971 with a 20 year reservation of use and then regular leases entered from 1991.
C Ranch - purchased by the federal government in 1964.
D Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1971.
E Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1971 with a 20 year reservation of use and then regular leases entered from 1991.
F Ranch - not clear when but the history indicates it was purchased.
G Ranch (Lunny Ranch) - purchased in 1978 from RCA by the Trust for Public Land, which then sold it to NPS.
H Ranch - purchased in 1971.
I Ranch (McClure Dairy) - not specified.
J Ranch (Kehoe Dairy) - not specified
K Ranch - not specified but apparently NPS leased it to an artist for some time.
L Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1971.
M Ranch (Grossi Ranch) - purchased by NPS in 1971 with a 20 year reservation of use and then regular leases entered from 1992.
N Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1963 as the first rancher to sell. Apparently most didn't wish to sell.
U Ranch - unclear how NPS acquired it.
W Ranch (Bear Valley Ranch) - purchased in 1963 and buildings immediately were used by NPS as park headquarters.
Y Ranch - purchase date not specified.
Z Ranch - purchase date not specified.
Lake Ranch - acquired via eminent domain in 1971. Work has started on housing but were removed when NPS took control.
South End Ranch (Palomarin) - purchased by NPS in two transactions in 1963/1964 and most of the buildings were intentionally burned down by NPS.
Home Ranch - purchased by NPS in 1968.
There have been several previous articles on this website covering this same topic and I have commented several times. Earlier this evening, I posted a comment about some earlier statements that I vaguely remembered having been made by Ms Rolph. I was very harshly critical of those statements at the time and I reiterated some of that criticism in my posting earlier this evening. My posting was up for a time; however, Mr. Repanshek soon came back and removed it, advising me that he considered my comments to be abusive and personal and had deleted them. There was, admittedly, an impatient and impolite tone to my criticism, which I regret.
There are many issues at play at Point Reyes, including native plants, range condition, visitor experience, scenic values, and a host of others. For me, however, two issues come to the forefront, protection of Tule Elk as a species and the public health and safety concerns related to the spread of Johne's Disease and its potential association with Crohn's Disease. In that context, please allow me to now more patiently and politely express my concerns relative to these two issues to ensure that important information on these topics is clearly and fully conveyed and understood.
First, with regard to my concerns about the protection of Tule Elk as a species, out of at least six, probably at least eight, original elk species or subspecies in North America, all but four are now extinct, the others lost forever. Among the surviving species, Tule Elk are the smallest, have relatively complex antlers, are adapted to warmer coastal environments, are generally considered the most unique, and, unfortunately, are also the rarest. Out of a population estimated from between half and three quarters of a million prior to European colonization, no more than a few dozen survived by the end of the nineteenth century. In notional terms, that represents an evolutionarily recent reduction in their gene pool of up to twenty thousand to one. Although current estimates suggest as many as five thousand Tule Elk exist today, today's five thousand elk are the recent descendants of a gene pool of no more than a few dozen. This means that the remaining Tule Elk constitutes all that's left of a gene pool that has already been decimated and what remains is absolutely priceless from a conservation biology standpoint. Does that mean that every single individual Tule Elk is vital to the survival of the species? Not necessarily; however, given that the state of the science for predicting if, when, and where inbreeding effects are going to appear is nowhere near mature or reliable, it means that, when a species has suffered this kind of major gene pool loss, there's no reliable way to fully know what traits are lost, passed down, or left hiding in which remnant individuals. There is no way to tell what path "genetic drift" has taken or will take; no way to tell what traits will be needed, wanted, or unwanted under unpredictable future conditions; and no way to even fully define what might turn out to be "desirable" or "undesirable" in this context. It means that, until we have the science to know what we've lost and how much more we can afford to lose, every significant further taking, through either an acute mechanism or an imposed chronic burden, runs the risk, not necessarily the certainty but the risk, of unacceptable additional damage to the species.
As an earlier article pointed out, most of the elk at Point Reyes are fenced onto Tomales Point, effectively trapped there so they can't eat grass "leased" to ranchers. More than two hundred of these rare elk recently died because they were trapped there, without water and forage. That situation is so ridiculously immoral that even any ethical ranchers involved should have been moved to remedy the situation. Unfortunately, there were apparently none involved. As if that situation was not bad enough already, the National Park Service is now proposing to enshrine, in Alternatives A through D, administrative mechanisms to continue the removal, lethally in all probability, of more of these rare elk from the "parklands" because "ranchers complain" that these remnant specimens of Tule Elk are competing with their cattle for grass when "cattle at the seashore outnumber Tule elk by nearly 10 to 1" already.
I have some basis for being critical of the ranchers involved; I ranched for decades; I know what ranching is about; and it seems obvious, to me, that the situation at Point Reyes is a case of pretentious ignorance, rampant greed, and spoiled selfishness run amok. At this point, we need the remaining Tule Elk more than we need ranchers who are so unethical as to want to continue, much less escalate and further institutionalize, this situation and I would not disagree with a threatened listing for the species.
I speak with knowledge of and from experience with these topics, knowledge and experience that I was motivated to share in initial comments on an article entitled "Point Reyes National Seashore Expected To Release Draft Ranching Plan Next Month" that appeared on this website, dated July 23, 2019. I was motivated by comments Ms Rolph made on that same article, comments in which she opined that the Tule Elk at Point Reyes "don't just graze there, they also damage fences and other property, gore the livestock, and impregnate cows -- when that happens the cow must be destroyed." This comment surprised me. Elk do get tangled in fences; it happens all across the American West. It's just a normal fall thing when the bulls fight during the rut. Once, in decades of ranching, I also heard of a bull elk putting some minor cuts on an overly aggressive and overly ambitious angus bull at a nearby ranch; but, that was a far, far, far larger elk than any Tule Elk that ever lived; the cuts were minor; and none of us ranchers liked that particular angus bull anyway. The encounter actually improved his attitude. But, it was the last part of Ms Rolph's comment, that part about elk impregnating bovine cows and causing them to need to be destroyed, that got my attention.
Several people responded to Ms Rolph's comment; I responded with an unflattering post. Ms Rolph then countered that it was "true" that she didn't "know much about elk. It sounds like I'm wrong about the impregnation detail..." and that the "detail about elk impregnating cows was told to me first-hand by a rancher I interviewed." For me, her admission merely rubbed salt in the wound. In my mind, the Tule Elk issue is both central and critical to the Point Reyes discussion. Ms Rolph has been emphatically and aggressively opining on the situation at Point Reyes, yet admits knowing little about this key issue, and the ranchers at Point Reyes with which Ms Rolph was speaking seem to be knowingly spreading disinformation.
The second issue at Point Reyes that alarms me most is the public health and safety concern related to the spread of Johne's Disease and its potential association with Crohn's Disease. Quoting numerous notes and sources from my own ranching years, Johne's Disease is a "contagious, chronic, and usually fatal infection" caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis (MAP). This bacterium is spread by exposure to the colostrum, milk, or manure of an infected animal, attaches to the intestinal wall of the next victim, and causes an inflammatory immune response that deteriorates the victim's ability to digest and absorb nutrients. The symptoms mimic a fatal form of a chronic wasting disease. Although pasteurization should prevent its spread into the milk supply used for human consumption, studies have shown that it is present in nearly seventy percent of dairy operations in America and half of the dairy herds at Point Reyes tested positive in the available studies. Some studies have also shown abnormally high levels of the MAP bacterium in humans suffering from Crohn's Disease. Johne's Disease has already spread into the Tule Elk at Tomales Point, Drake Beach, and other areas at Point Reyes and the health effects of the infection may be involved in recent elk die-offs. The high rate of infection in the dairy herds at Point Reyes, coupled with the ease of contagion through exposure to the manure of poorly contained dairy cattle, raises the probability that the dairy operations at Point Reyes were involved in the introduction and spread of this disease to the Tule Elk population and perhaps beyond.
I know people whose lives have been damaged by Crohn's Disease. My family has friends struggling with it. The disease has a long incubation period; it can take years for it to emerge, making it difficult to correlate the disease in a particular patient to a source of exposure with which the individual may have been in contact years earlier. So, I worry about the safety of hikers, birdwatchers, and other visitors who may be exposed to dairy manure today, perhaps blowing in the dust at Point Reyes, and begin to show symptoms far in the future. I don't know what Ms Rolph knows about this issue; but, she does not appear to have acknowledged it as a concern at all.
I find numerous reasons to be concerned by and opposed to the continuation of any and all commercial livestock operations at Point Reyes. I find no compelling reason to continue any of these operations at all and I urge everyone to vigorously support Alternative F. Let's get this mess cleaned up once and for all.
Oh, right, gee, I forgot.
There are multiple publicly-subsidized private business/commercial/industrial ranchers we have rightfully negotiated and compensated for their properties who have been on our Seashore national park land for many years LESS than the earlier ones.....and who have propogated land, water, and air destruction faster in overall time since our national park's creation.
And it is at the Interior's Secretary's discretion to lease or NOT lease lease "federally owned land (or any interest therein) which has been acquired by the Secretary under sections 459c to 459c-7 of this title, and which was agricultural land prior to its acquisition. Such lease shall be subject to such restrictive covenants as may be necessary to carry out the purposes of sections 459c to 459c-7 of this title." So, there poor little commercial/industrial private rancher businesses - who took payment from the American people, bought other private ranchlands in Marin and Sonoma counties to which they could move their gimongous operations, yet fight shoe-and-nails to con and swindle us in tandem with their ag biz and land development lobbyists to exhaust coastal prairie, riparian habitats, mixed woodlands, beaches, and ocean for profit. And their allies say current/Alternative Plan B doesn't go FAR enough to convert public lands into taxpayer-subsidized private commercial/industrial rancher businesses. 24 rancher operations get to call the shots instead of millions of Americans and world visitors.
Nice try.
Let's repeat some reality clarification:
Plan B, to cow-tow to rancher businesses for their profit losses, will do the following across our Point Reyes National Seashore and GGNRA publicy-owned national park lands and waters: increase acreage and head-count for dairy and beef cattle for up to 6,000 methane-generators; open up new small livestock operations (sheep, goats, chickens, turkeys, ducks, etc.); allow private vacation accommodations, retail shops and stands, and tourist excursions; and lethal culling or removal of native Tule Elk (the only national park to have these icons) and other wildlife; and threaten the very laws, regulations, and policies of the NPS and the PRNS/GGNRA enabling legislation - setting extremely dangerous precedents and standard practices for every national park, monument, and recreation area in the nation.
Walk along the lands and waterways of what was to be the Yellowstone of California national park through its 1962 enabling legislation. Watch your step, though. Bring a scrub brush and putty knife to get the urine-soaked cattle manure off your boots - that is, if you actually get out of your SUV or big-wheels truck. See the ranchers chase off wildlife with their ATVs and dogs. Lounge near the beach cliffs by the excrement-infused runoff from overgrazed pastures above, watch it drain into the surf. Stroll by fetid algae-bloom-matted ponds and creeks.Take in deep breaths of ohhh geezzz noxious smells. Gaze upon ravaged coastal prairie overgrazed as the current so-called Pastoral Zone soon to be the more militant Ranch Zone. Wrestle shoulder-to-shoulder avoiding hooves and horns through cattle as you try to hike on along your lands and waters. Share the unhealthy and unsafe conditions with your friends, family, kids. Now, THAT's wilderness (for ag biz and land development interests)!
Support Alternative/Plan F.
Oppose Alternative/Plan B.
And for those not living close to the Seashore, please join us.
The next National Park in gunsight for obliteration could be your own.
The Public Comment period ends Monday September 23, 2019 at 4:59pm PDT.
Comment at https://parkplanning.nps.go..., or by mailing or hand-delivering comments by September 23, 2019 to:
GMP Amendment c/o
Superintendent
Point Reyes National Seashore
1 Bear Valley Road
Point Reyes Station, CA 94956
I agree with an earlier comment that this publication should be embarrassed to run it. There are 2 surveys we know of where people were asked why they visited PRNS, and the responses are overwhelmingly about wildlife and not about ranching. People visit National Parks to see a little bit of what is left of nature, not to smell manure and watch mowers tear up fields and decimate habitat and wildlife. This article belongs in a big-ag rag, not any publication posing to care about national parks and nature.
Actually, comments close at 11 p.m. PDT. I'm writing this at 7:38 p.m.
From the website: A comment period for this project closes Sep 23, 2019: 0 Days, 3 Hours, 22 Min.
Submit comments here: https://parkplanning.nps.gov/commentForm.cfm?documentID=97154
So being tenants means they have even less expectation of being able to continue their ranching. When a lease is up, the owner/lanlord can choose not to renew it, absent any provision in the law. There is no requirement in either the original legislation or the subsequent bill that leases be extended.
Cattle are an invasive species. They do not belong in that park or on any public lands anywhere. The author of this article seems to believe, or wants to pretend, that culture and history only begin with the induction of this rancid animal.
I'm pretty sure that's not the way that the federal government works. If it were, then each Superintendent could rule via fiat and wouldn't be subject to the public comment period and other rules as required by the Administrative Procedure Act.
However, I brought that up the 1978 amendment because there seem to be a lot of responses insisting that the "establishing legislation" doesn't allow for indefinite renewals.