In 2000, a deer hunter and his 8-year-old son were shot by growers trying to protect their
crops in El Dorado
County. Both the man and his son were critically injured—the 8-year-old having buckshot in his head—but they survived.
Kicking off their annual campaign against Northern California's marijuana crop..., about 40 heavily armed police officers raided two large El Dorado County marijuana fields early Monday (2005), using helicopters to find and seize 6,000 drug plants. The marijuana plants were being grown on public land near Salmon Falls Road, within sight of million-dollar homes near El Dorado Hills, police said.
By Nicholas
Grube/Bryant Anderson The Daily Triplicate A father and daughter were hiking through Del Norte County's wilderness recently and stumbled upon black hoses, fertilizer bags and other gardening equipment.
Tourists four-wheeling through remote parts of the Smith River National Recreation Area encountered some people walking around in the middle of nowhere. Riding through the same area a few days later they saw the same people, but again didn't see any indications of how they got there.
These are the types of signs local law enforcement officials say might indicate the presence of large-scale outdoor
marijuana growing operations in Del Norte County's public lands.
"The outdoor season basically started July 1st," said sheriff's Detective Sgt. Steve Morris, who heads the county's outdoor marijuana garden suppression efforts. "In this day and age you need to be aware of your environment, and not just in the city."
Morris wants to warn people who take advantage of Del Norte's many outdoor recreation opportunities of the danger of outdoor marijuana growing operations, and give them tools to identify what these gardens look like so they can avoid them.
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"We really want them to enjoy their public land," Morris said.
In 2007, Del Norte saw a 626 percent increase in the amount of marijuana seized in outdoor gardens, a figure that ranked the county fifth in the state for the largest increase in a year. One of these gardens that contributed to the spike had more than 17,000 plants in it.
With the amount of money at stake in these types of operations, Morris said it can become dangerous for those who unsuspectingly stumble upon such an operation.
"The value of those gardens is tremendous and they're going to protect those crops," he said. "All they want to do is grow that weed, and they want to protect it. They gotta get out of there with that weed to get that money."
Sometimes, encounters with outdoor growers can become violent.
In 2000, a deer hunter and his 8-year-old son were shot by growers trying to protect their crops in El Dorado County. Both the man and his son were critically injured—the 8-year-old having buckshot in his head—but they survived.
Just last week Santa Clara sheriff's deputies shot and killed an armed man who was guarding a pot farm along with two other armed men who escaped.
"They're protecting a garden that's worth a lot of money for themselves and their families," Morris said. "They're worried about people wandering into their gardens and calling the cops."
There are some red flags that might indicate a person is in a marijuana garden, Morris said. These things include bags of fertilizer, gardening equipment, black rubber hoses for irrigation and freshly cut trails where there likely shouldn't be any.
This is in addition to actually encountering people in the middle of the forest who don't look like they are recreating.
"If something doesn't look right, it might not be right," Morris said.
If people think they have found an outdoor growing operation, Morris said they should immediately leave the area and call law enforcement to tell them where they saw it.
"Sometimes it's important, sometimes it's just nothing," Morris said.
Del Norte is expected to see an increase in the amount of marijuana plants eradicated this year, Morris said, because it received more money from the federal government to do so and law enforcement only covered a small portion of the county's public lands in 2007.
Del Norte County is more than 70 percent publicly owned, and much of this land is secluded. This characteristic is combined with natural water sources, such as streams and creeks, and many abandoned mining and logging roads for easy access to isolated areas.
"That makes Del Norte County perfect for it," Morris said of marijuana growers. "They recognize Del Norte County as being one of the hot spots."
Reach Nicholas Grube at ngrube@triplicate.com.
When you find an outdoor marijuana garden
•Turn around and leave the area.
•Remember what you saw and where you saw it. If you have a GPS locator mark the spot.
•Call local law enforcement. The El Dorado County Sheriff's Office Felony Investigation
Phone # 530-626-4911.
