Today we hiked for three hours along an immigrant trail off the Carr Road trailhead. This trail goes off a picnic area, up a shaded hillshide of oaks and alligator junipers before it turns westward into Ramsey Canyon, home of the Ramsey Canyon Preserve owned by The Nature Conservancy. This well-trodded trail is not on my Huachuca Mountain Hiking Trails map. It's not even an official hiking trail.
This nameless immigrant trail is on national forest land and heavily trashed with backpacks, clothes, hygiene products and plastic bottles. It's an eye sore that has always irritated me. I hike this trail just to pick up trash and give the dogs some exercise. We never see hikers on this trail.
I told Kevin I would be picking up trash on the return route. He wanted to hike this trail to explore the rock ledges. We once hiked this trail three years ago and came out high on a ridge that was badly trashed with the leftovers of illegals. The trail we were on that time was higher, shadier and hugged the rocky cliffs.
There are so many immigrant trails that branch off the main immigrant trail and it's easy to get lost on this trail. We stayed on the main trail...and somehow it didn't look like the same wooded trail I remember from last time. The last time I remember seeing "Nature Conservancy" boundary signs which we did not trespass.
Today we stayed on National Forest property as we saw the fence line and the private property behind it. But we never saw Nature Conservancy signs. So on we trekked and landed on Ramsey Canyon property; we could see a house down the hill. A Coronado National Forest Sign faced us, with "The Nature Conservancy" below that. This was the start of the Hamburg Trail which goes uphill for 2.4 miles to the Pat Scott Trail and meadow. But we wanted to know: are dogs allowed on Nature Conservancy property?
We tied the dogs up on leashes and proceeded, but I didn't feel comfortable walking on Nature Conservancy property with the dogs. There was no "No dogs allowed" on the National Forest Sign, either. There was only a mention of "Keep dogs indoor or on a leash" in the Safety Tips at the top of the sign.
The Brown Canyon trail, I learned later on, which is NOT on Nature Conservancy property, was a mile further up the Hamburg trail. That was too far to hike in disputed terrain.
We got off the main hiking trail and went straight uphill, away from hikers. We figured if we go straight up (south) we would find the continuation of the immigrant trail off Carr Peak/Comfort Springs trail. We rested for water and ended up going back down along a side trail that paralled the main hiking trail, and before we knew it, a Conservancy volunteer, Jennfier, was yelling at us to come down off the mountain immediately. "You are not even on a trail!" she said to us. "Dogs are not allowed here!"
Oh shit, I thought, we are screwed now. We explained that we were looking for the trail back from where we came (no lie) and weren't sure if dogs were allowed on Conservancy property. (They are not, and it's posted on the organization's website, too, something I didn't check since we weren't planning on entering the Conservancy property when we started the hike).
Jennifer was very polite to us and explained to us why we had to leave immediately. Dogs would mess up the natural habitat of the wildlife protected in the canyon. The dogs would upset other vistors. "I even repimanded a man the other day for throwing away an apple core!" she added. "I had to tell the man that the apple core had his scent which would scare off the wildlife."
And that is true, but what about all that trash that the illegals leave behind every day when they trespass into Ramsey Canyon from Carr Peak? There is so much trash around Ramsey Canyon. When I asked Jennifer about this, she replied "We try our best to clean up that trash" but I'm sure the volunteers have enough to do monitoring the visitor center. The trash pick-up alone would be overwhelming. And once again it's the trash all over our forests that the illegals leave behind that chaps my hide every time I come across it on a trail.
She escorted us past the entrance building, pass a large group of visitors who glared at us. "I thought dogs weren't allowed in here!" said one old man. I felt like a prisoner-of-war getting escorted passed the enemy.
"I didn't know that either!" I replied back. Jennifer added that "They just got lost." Boy did I feel stupid walking past all those gawking on-lookers. Jennifer was right about one thing: the Nature Conservancy has its reputation to uphold. Even if we were to hike off the trail and up the mountain, if something bad had happened to us it would make the Conservancy look bad, she said.
I wanted to know where the Conservancy's property ended since I know the National Forest property was up the hill nearby. We had seen the signs. But Jennifer was more vague and pointed to the moutain and said "We claim all that!" I need to know for sure so that next time I find myself lost in Ramsey Canyon I will know where I can hike with my dogs.
I didn't feel satisfied with that response and an internet search later at home couldn't show me the map of the Nature Conservancy's 300 acres of Ramsey Canyon. I want to know where I can't go next time I find myself lost off the trail. No map shows the property line.
We hiked back the same way we came in, only we picked up the trail directly off Ramsey Canyon Road next to the Ramsey Canyon Inn. This old forest trail skirts private property. We each carried back a full bag of trash off this trail which we again dumped into the trailhead trash bins. (And with my bad luck lately, I hope dumping the trash there is legal!)
It's no big deal. Next time we do a trail clean-up we just won't go as far as we did today. There's enough trash off the first two miles of the immigrant trail to keep us busy for several months if we continue to pick up trash every Saturday. We will not pick up trash from private property and we will not pick up trash from the Nature Conservancy. Our main goal is the help clean up our national forest.
Naturally I began thinking again about The Nature Conservancy. I used to pay the organization $40 or more a year as I truly believe in preserving "the plants, animals and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the land and waters they need to survive" (as per their own website: http://www.nature.org/aboutus/ ) but I stopped the donations when The Washington Post in 2002 revealed in a special report that the Nature Conservancy is not a non-profit organization but rather, as its website claims now, "an international conservation organization." It makes a good profit off of real estate investments, and partners with environmental polluters such as 3M, BP, GM, Northwest Airlines and Proctor and Gamble.
The Nature Conservancy makes beautiful greeting cards, some of the best I've seen. And it takes great care of its tracts of land it owns across the planet. Ramsey Canyon itself is a beautiful canyon and home to 14 species of hummingbirds and other wildlife. Volunteers like Jennifer are dedicated people working for a good cause.
Just don't tell the public The Nature Conservancy is a non-profit organization. It is not.
BP in Northwest Indiana alone is being lambasted by environmentalists for its expansion to its refinery modernization, which they say will increase air pollutant particles by 21 percent. Union members and BP contractors argue that the change in air standards "will increase the supply of gasoline from a secure source while reducing overall emissions by 7 percent...the jobs are necessary in an economy heading into a recession." Northwest Indiana (Lake and Porter counties especially) are working-class counties that once held steel mills and oil refineries busy, and provided great-paying jobs for factory workers in the 1970s. Lake and Porter counties are also two of Indiana's worst counties for particle pollutants in the air, as recently revealed by the EPA.
http://www.desertusa.com/mag00/oct/stories/ramsey.html
http://www.nature.org/wherewework/northamerica/states/arizona/preserves/art1973.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/specials/natureconservancy/
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/tnc_fs_fy07.pdf
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/annualreport2007.pdf
http://www.post-trib.com/844105,bpair.article
http://www.post-trib.com/news/823934,bpparticle.article
This nameless immigrant trail is on national forest land and heavily trashed with backpacks, clothes, hygiene products and plastic bottles. It's an eye sore that has always irritated me. I hike this trail just to pick up trash and give the dogs some exercise. We never see hikers on this trail.
I told Kevin I would be picking up trash on the return route. He wanted to hike this trail to explore the rock ledges. We once hiked this trail three years ago and came out high on a ridge that was badly trashed with the leftovers of illegals. The trail we were on that time was higher, shadier and hugged the rocky cliffs.
There are so many immigrant trails that branch off the main immigrant trail and it's easy to get lost on this trail. We stayed on the main trail...and somehow it didn't look like the same wooded trail I remember from last time. The last time I remember seeing "Nature Conservancy" boundary signs which we did not trespass.
Today we stayed on National Forest property as we saw the fence line and the private property behind it. But we never saw Nature Conservancy signs. So on we trekked and landed on Ramsey Canyon property; we could see a house down the hill. A Coronado National Forest Sign faced us, with "The Nature Conservancy" below that. This was the start of the Hamburg Trail which goes uphill for 2.4 miles to the Pat Scott Trail and meadow. But we wanted to know: are dogs allowed on Nature Conservancy property?
We tied the dogs up on leashes and proceeded, but I didn't feel comfortable walking on Nature Conservancy property with the dogs. There was no "No dogs allowed" on the National Forest Sign, either. There was only a mention of "Keep dogs indoor or on a leash" in the Safety Tips at the top of the sign.
The Brown Canyon trail, I learned later on, which is NOT on Nature Conservancy property, was a mile further up the Hamburg trail. That was too far to hike in disputed terrain.
We got off the main hiking trail and went straight uphill, away from hikers. We figured if we go straight up (south) we would find the continuation of the immigrant trail off Carr Peak/Comfort Springs trail. We rested for water and ended up going back down along a side trail that paralled the main hiking trail, and before we knew it, a Conservancy volunteer, Jennfier, was yelling at us to come down off the mountain immediately. "You are not even on a trail!" she said to us. "Dogs are not allowed here!"
Oh shit, I thought, we are screwed now. We explained that we were looking for the trail back from where we came (no lie) and weren't sure if dogs were allowed on Conservancy property. (They are not, and it's posted on the organization's website, too, something I didn't check since we weren't planning on entering the Conservancy property when we started the hike).
Jennifer was very polite to us and explained to us why we had to leave immediately. Dogs would mess up the natural habitat of the wildlife protected in the canyon. The dogs would upset other vistors. "I even repimanded a man the other day for throwing away an apple core!" she added. "I had to tell the man that the apple core had his scent which would scare off the wildlife."
And that is true, but what about all that trash that the illegals leave behind every day when they trespass into Ramsey Canyon from Carr Peak? There is so much trash around Ramsey Canyon. When I asked Jennifer about this, she replied "We try our best to clean up that trash" but I'm sure the volunteers have enough to do monitoring the visitor center. The trash pick-up alone would be overwhelming. And once again it's the trash all over our forests that the illegals leave behind that chaps my hide every time I come across it on a trail.
She escorted us past the entrance building, pass a large group of visitors who glared at us. "I thought dogs weren't allowed in here!" said one old man. I felt like a prisoner-of-war getting escorted passed the enemy.
"I didn't know that either!" I replied back. Jennifer added that "They just got lost." Boy did I feel stupid walking past all those gawking on-lookers. Jennifer was right about one thing: the Nature Conservancy has its reputation to uphold. Even if we were to hike off the trail and up the mountain, if something bad had happened to us it would make the Conservancy look bad, she said.
I wanted to know where the Conservancy's property ended since I know the National Forest property was up the hill nearby. We had seen the signs. But Jennifer was more vague and pointed to the moutain and said "We claim all that!" I need to know for sure so that next time I find myself lost in Ramsey Canyon I will know where I can hike with my dogs.
I didn't feel satisfied with that response and an internet search later at home couldn't show me the map of the Nature Conservancy's 300 acres of Ramsey Canyon. I want to know where I can't go next time I find myself lost off the trail. No map shows the property line.
We hiked back the same way we came in, only we picked up the trail directly off Ramsey Canyon Road next to the Ramsey Canyon Inn. This old forest trail skirts private property. We each carried back a full bag of trash off this trail which we again dumped into the trailhead trash bins. (And with my bad luck lately, I hope dumping the trash there is legal!)
It's no big deal. Next time we do a trail clean-up we just won't go as far as we did today. There's enough trash off the first two miles of the immigrant trail to keep us busy for several months if we continue to pick up trash every Saturday. We will not pick up trash from private property and we will not pick up trash from the Nature Conservancy. Our main goal is the help clean up our national forest.
Naturally I began thinking again about The Nature Conservancy. I used to pay the organization $40 or more a year as I truly believe in preserving "the plants, animals and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the land and waters they need to survive" (as per their own website: http://www.nature.org/aboutus/ ) but I stopped the donations when The Washington Post in 2002 revealed in a special report that the Nature Conservancy is not a non-profit organization but rather, as its website claims now, "an international conservation organization." It makes a good profit off of real estate investments, and partners with environmental polluters such as 3M, BP, GM, Northwest Airlines and Proctor and Gamble.
The Nature Conservancy makes beautiful greeting cards, some of the best I've seen. And it takes great care of its tracts of land it owns across the planet. Ramsey Canyon itself is a beautiful canyon and home to 14 species of hummingbirds and other wildlife. Volunteers like Jennifer are dedicated people working for a good cause.
Just don't tell the public The Nature Conservancy is a non-profit organization. It is not.
BP in Northwest Indiana alone is being lambasted by environmentalists for its expansion to its refinery modernization, which they say will increase air pollutant particles by 21 percent. Union members and BP contractors argue that the change in air standards "will increase the supply of gasoline from a secure source while reducing overall emissions by 7 percent...the jobs are necessary in an economy heading into a recession." Northwest Indiana (Lake and Porter counties especially) are working-class counties that once held steel mills and oil refineries busy, and provided great-paying jobs for factory workers in the 1970s. Lake and Porter counties are also two of Indiana's worst counties for particle pollutants in the air, as recently revealed by the EPA.
http://www.desertusa.com/mag00/oct/stories/ramsey.html
http://www.nature.org/wherewework/northamerica/states/arizona/preserves/art1973.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/specials/natureconservancy/
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/tnc_fs_fy07.pdf
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/annualreport2007.pdf
http://www.post-trib.com/844105,bpair.article
http://www.post-trib.com/news/823934,bpparticle.article
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