Bodie Hills Region Pinyon Juniper Report – 4/28/24

 Bodie Hills Region

Our heart breaks for the beautiful Pinyon-Juniper forests in the Bodie region of the California-Nevada border, an area home to the Threatened Bi-state Sage-grouse. Pinyon Jay habitat here where we’ve observed flocks filtering into pinyon pine overlooking Mono Lake, and across the region, is being decimated in the name of “saving” Sage-grouse – while abusive cattle and domestic sheep grazing disturbance continues, and mining threats grow. Primary land “management” is the Humboldt-Toiyabe Forest and Bishop BLM. The local sage-grouse plan has long been primarily based on PJ eradication and rounding up wild horses. 

Severe cattle grazing devoured aspen ramets.

Cut trees on the ground, bark beetle killed trees in the background.

This is a landscape which suffered immense 1800s mining era deforestation for wood for processing ore – and was one of the wild west mining places chronicled by Samuel Clemens. 

BLM and the Humboldt-Toiyabe Bridgeport Ranger District ignore the fact that in many areas, trees are re-occupying sites where a forest naturally occurs as the late successional plant community. They’re not “invading”. 

Both BLM and the Humboldt-Toiyabe Forest turn a blind eye to cattle and sheep grazing impacts in this landscape, while going to great lengths to scapegoat trees for the Sage-grouse problems.

A typical Bishop BLM deforestation project describes the project purpose “maintain and improve the ecological condition of the most ecologically departed and at risk upland vegetation …”. What does BLM-speak calling a plant community “ecologically departed” mean? Are the trees levitating, or packing up and moving away? It means that the beautiful trees – or if BLM wants to attack sagebrush – the beautiful dense sagebrush essential for Pygmy Rabbits and nesting sagebrush songbirds – doesn’t fit the models of ideal plant communities conjured up by BLM/USFS/TNC very frequent fire return intervals used on the Landfire website and in its veg models. The darned trees or sage have “departed” from the agency “desired condition” conjured up through use of bogus models. So then its open season on the forest. Mature sagebrush at times is also mowed or rollerbeaten – similarly based agency models of “ideal” vegetation. Trees or dense sage are scapegoated for Sage-grouse declines, while cattle and sheep grazing impacts to Sage-grouse habitat are ignored.

This sap is the result of insects caused by agency tree killing project damage to pinyon pines.

Older clearcut area in sagebrush in the foreground. Injury to cut trees attracted insects that killed old Pinyon pines surrounding landscape. BLM and Forest service projects often claim they’ll leave old growth trees while cutting or “thinning” younger ones. That is a false reassurance, because: 1) Contractor crews hired for these deforestation projects are prone to errors; 2) The insects haven’t read the EA, and ravage any old growth that remains uncut.

PJ deforestation on the east side of the Bodie Hills. Note red-brown color of trees visible in background – the result of bark beetles lured in by Bodie Hills clearcutting.