wilderness proposal

[azpackhorse]

I was down in 36b yesterday attempting to call a lion in when I ran across one of the G & F officers that I have met and spoke with a few times, real nice guy. After shoot'n the breeze for awhile he got to talking about the proposed widerness area that will all but take up 36b, he asked what my thoughts were about it and showed me a map of what areas/road closures it would incompass.

At first I thought great, maybe it would keep some of the "road hunters" out of the area but then the more I thought about it the more I became concerned with the whole ordeal.

He urged me to keep my ears open for any progress in the matter and to pass it along to fellow sportsmen/women.

It sounds to me like the government is trying to sneak this one right under the radar. This would greatly impact the entire 36b area and make access a real issue.

I am all for wilderness areas but I personally think that this is not a good place to have it. Things to think about other than hunting access is Border Patrol access and even G & F access. This would give border crossers and "bad people" a place to cross our nations border virtually undetected.

 

 

Any thoughts on this matter?

[Guest Ernesto C]

I might be wrong but I dont see how it will afect hunting in any way is the oher way around the area will be a better place to hunt. Like I said earlier a may be wrong but if the area is declare wilderness area there will still be vehicle acces but only on designated roads,there will be no off road driving of any kind which mean ATV's will have to stay in the road,camping must be within 100 feet from roads etc etc.

When you said that "is not a good place to have it" well that's another story,they (the govermente) or who ever is behind this must consider the pros and cons of this area.

 

My two cents??.....Take care.

 

Ernesto C.

[bacula]

Good post.

 

I think it is a good idea. If you take a look at the proposed map at www.skyislandalliance.org/tumacacori/maps.htm, none of the numbered FS roads would be closed. I could be wrong on this, but I've studied the proposed map and compared it to the Coronado NF map and all of the FS access roads remain open. There is a huge chunk of roadless country in this area that I feel needs to be protected. Especially from mining. You would see very little change in regards to access in my opinion. Nothing upsets me more than backpacking in somewhere and then find someone carving a new trail into the back country with a quad. Keep it wild.

[Diamondbackaz]

I posted on this issue awhile back when it was first proposed. Yes there are roads that would be closed with this proposal. As I stated awhile back, many of the main roads on the map are cherry stemed into the wilderness (cherry stemming is a process of putting the wilderness boundary on each side of the road too allow the road to remain open going into a wilderness area). My problem with this proposal it makes it a lot easier in the future to close off those roads by doing away with the cherry stems. A classic example of this is the the closing off Powers Garden in the Galiuros in 1984. This was done by closing the cherry stem into the 1964 wilderness area. In 1982, a group of us drove our Blazers and jeeps all the way back to the Powers Cabin and mine in the center of the Galiuros. The road is now closed off at Powers hill. Some might say this is a good thing, but existing roads, buildings, and mines are not wilderness compatable.

[bowsniper]

More wilderness means more and better wildlife habitat. As hunters, wildlife habitiat should be our number one concern. The road hunters may squeal about this, but I think it's a good thing.

 

Bowsniper

[.270]

normally, i'm all for wilderness areas. especially real wilderness. seems like lately most of these things they want to call wilderness areas are small enough you can shoot a rifle across em and there always seems to be some hidden agenda that doesn't come out until after the deal is done. just about anyplace that is true is wilderness, is already a wilderness area. places with an abundance of roads, fences, manmade water tanks and other non-natural things just ain't a wilderness. they still allow grazing in the wilderness areas and this causes contention between folks that make a living in the wilderness area and folks that hunt or fish or hike or whatever in the same area. a good friend ranches in the gila wilderness in new mex. the forest circus was in a big tizzy because some hikers complained that there were cowpies in the trail and they got some on their shoes. the farce-estry officials didn't know what they were gonna do about it. they had 2 choices, do something real expensive or tell the hikers to watch where they step around saddles with salt in em. after my friend reminded em that part of his charter with em was to maintain the trails to a certain level, they decided that maybe they would just tell the hikers to be careful. but it took em several years and a buncha study to come up with that solution. i think that instead of making a buncha little cookie cutter wilderness areas, which seems to be the fad nowadays, they oughta take those areas and designate em to where no new roads or improvements can be made there. no new mines can be opened and no prospecting or anything like that can take place. maybe restrict em to no motorized vehicles too and make folks either walk in or take horses, or goats, can't forget about them things. but these dinky wilderness areas don't seem to make a buncha sense and it seems like they always have an alterior motive for it. just my nickel. Lark.

[Red Rabbit]

Hidden agendas? Is this the same wilderness proposal that incorporates power companies, transmission lines and $$$$ ?

[Diamondbackaz]

Bowsniper, you most likely use forest roads to get back to where you want to start hiking. There already currently exists large wilderness areas where wildlife rarely sees a human. Road hunters have never really bothered me simply because they are hunting the roads while I am on foot hunting the back country. Thats just less hunters to deal with in the back country.