Crow's Range: An Environmental History Of The Sierra Nevada

Notes

266 Crow’s Range ern politicians and landowners to adjust boundaries instead. In October of , a federal district court dismissed a lawsuit filed by Tulare County politicians , timber interests, and off-road-vehicle users who had sought to challenge Clinton’s designation of the Sequoia Monument in the hope of reducing its size by removing non-sequoia buffer zones from around the big tree groves. A combination of environmental-group challenges and public outrage over some of the new administration’s early proclamations in environmental matters made President Bush more cautious.166 As with other Bushadministration environmental initiatives, bold reversals of policy were not attempted. Instead, regulation changes and actions taken at lower levels were used to accomplish resource-extraction goals. Public expectations that the big trees and the surrounding ecosystem would truly be treated as a national monument (with a deemphasis on commercial activities) were quickly dashed. The key problem was that the monument was to be administered by the Forest Service and not the National Park Service. The same people who had been supporting policies to cut heavily in the surrounding forest and cut smaller sequoia were the ones preparing the Draft Environmental Impact Statement. Most of the work on the deis was conducted before the Scientific Advisory Board that was required by the presidential order creating the monument had met. That board later played only a limited role in the formulation of the six alternatives produced by the Sequoia National Forest personnel. Five of the six alternatives stressed continued logging, with the preferred alternative allowing the greatest amount of cutting. Only one of the alternatives suggested using fire management, similar to practices in the adjoining Sequoia National Park, and limited cutting for protection of structures or forest health. It was as if the eras of environmental influence and ecosystem management had never occurred. This book went to press before the final Record of Decision was announced.167 Epilogue: Perspective from Martis Valley June , —I am sitting inside the mouth of a prehistoric rock shelter looking out onto Martis Valley, just south of the sprawling community of Truckee, California. The rock shelter is located off the valley floor in a volcanic outcropping. I am talking with some members of the Nevada County Land Trust, explaining how the area has changed since its first occupants used it for refuge. This is not John Muir’s shining “Range of Light” country. It’s the lower northern and eastern edge of the Sierra, where volcanic rock still covers much of the granite heart of the range. Above me, the smokeblackened roof attests to campfires that burned thousands of years ago. From The Sierra in Peril and Ecosystem Politics 267 this vantage point at the rock shelter’s lip, I can look out and reflect upon the changes that have made this portion of the Sierra Nevada what it is today. And in its way, this Martis Valley site speaks to the future of the Sierra as well. It is part of a range heavily used by admirers and commercial interests alike. Ancient people from what archeologists have called the Tahoe Reach, Martis, and Kings Beach archeological complexes used this area seasonally from about  b.c. to around a.d.  The valley and adjoining areas were then used until early historic times by the Washoe people. That means that this valley has been in continuous use for all of the Sierra’s human history . The valley, creek tributaries, and creekside environment of the prehistoric days provided seeds and other vegetal resources, fish in spawning season , and waterfowl. The hillsides, ridges, and valley floor provided habitat for deer and rabbits. Basalt formations nearby provided raw material for tools used in hunting and other activities. The long occupation by a relatively small number of native people left little in the way of large-scale transformation of the environment. Smoke-blackened rock and the scattering of basalt flakes and projectile points do not represent big impacts on the surrounding landscape. Even the use of fire as a tool for altering the landscape was not as important on this eastern, lee side of the range, with its moreopen and less-dense forests.168 To the north and south are historic pathways created by explorers and emigrants from the United States during the early opening phase of the Sierra’s history. The greatest early impact in this area came between the s and the s from loggers, grazers, and sheepherders. The Washoe were driven away. The...