Don Amador on Beach on Humboldt Bay
BLM Samoa Dunes Recreation Area
OPINION
By Don Amador
July 8, 2019
Oceano “Dust” is Fragrant Elixir
As somebody who grew up on the North Coast of California,
I remember visiting many non-motorized state and county parks to enjoy walking
on the beach and having a picnic with family and friends. Enjoying the fresh ocean breeze and dealing
with blowing sand aka “dust” into the food was just part of the experience and
something that I treasure.
8.5M Dollar Beach Front Home for Sale
Malibu, CA
Up and down the CA coast, movie stars and business
tycoons often spend a lot of money purchasing homes that are near or on the
beach where they too can enjoy those same coastal dust experiences.
As many of us in the OHV community prepare to attend the
July 11 California Coastal Commission (CCC) hearing in San Luis Obispo, I ask
why the CCC staff’s “dust control” mitigation proposals are largely focused on installation
of barriers, planting of vegetation to cover dunes, and severe restriction and
eventual elimination of OHV recreation at the Oceano Dunes State Vehicular
Recreation Area (SVRA)?
Burn Piles from ODNRA Restoration Project
As we have seen at the Oregon Dunes National Recreation
Area (ODNRA), all of those aforementioned treatments have resulted in
conversion of a prehistoric 40,000 acre open dune structure to an artificially manipulated
area that is 90% overgrown with a dense vegetative dune mat that extends to the
waveslope.
LINK TO COLLABORATIVE EFFORT AT ODNRA TO RESTORE OPEN
DUNE STRUCTURE
While the Forest Service and the ODNRA collaborative try
and restore the open dune structure via vegetation removal projects including
use of prescribed fire to reduce vegetation behind the foredunes and bulldozing
of high foredunes to encourage Western snowy plover habitat, it appears the CCC
is poised to make the same dune mismanagement decisions their Oregon
counterparts made in the 1970s.
LINK TO ODNRA DUNE RESTORATION PROJECT
# # #
Don Amador was born and raised in Eureka, CA. Don currently lives in Oakley, CA where he
works on various land-use, recreation, and resource management issues. He may be reached via email at: Damador@cwo.com
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