Landmark Agreement Boosts Native Ecosystems on Point Reyes National Seashore
A historic agreement has just been struck to settle a decades-long land-use conflict over the future of cattle and wildlife on Point Reyes National Seashore. Under the deal, most of the beef and dairy ranches on Point Reyes National Seashore will depart, and former ranch lands will be managed as a Scenic Landscape Zone according to a new General Management Plan approved by the National Park Service. Tule elk will have the freedom to roam unmolested throughout Point Reyes National Seashore, opportunities for public recreation will improve, and the land will have the opportunity to return to native coastal grassland.
The settlement was struck between three environmental groups (Resource Renewal Institute, Center for Biological Diversity, and Western Watersheds Project), represented by Advocates for the West, and the National Park Service, and a subset of ranchers who had intervened in our lawsuit that had challenged the prior General Management Plan at Point Reyes. In addition (and importantly), the Nature Conservancy provided the private funding for the voluntary ranch buyouts after being invited to join negotiations when mediation was underway.
Before the settlement, ranchers had faced constant challenges and uncertainty surrounding their leases, impacting the viability of their operations. Environmentalists pointed to the impacts of agricultural leasing on wildlife management and the protection of the park’s natural resources. The situation had become untenable for everyone. The settlement and new General Management Plan usher in a new era of healing on Point Reyes National Seashore.
On the National Seashore, 12 of the 14 ranches have accepted voluntary buyouts from the Nature Conservancy, brokered with private funds, and will depart these public lands. On Golden Gate National Recreation Area, all seven ranches will remain, with a 16% reduction in the number of cattle in this part of the Park. Remaining ranchers will be authorized to operate under longer 20-year leases.
The most controversial aspect of the package is that the new General Management Plan allows targeted grazing by domestic livestock on the Scenic Landscape Zone vacated by the departing ranchers. A plan will be drawn up in the future for targeted grazing in the Scenic Landscape Zone to assist in maintain desired conditions, enhancing native vegetation and controlling invasive plants, which will be conducted by the Park Service, the Nature Conservancy, and/or another conservation nonprofit. Numbers of livestock for targeted grazing are capped at 1,200 cow-calf pairs in the wettest years, 600 cow-calf pairs in an average year, and near zero during drought. The maximum limit represents a 75% reduction in livestock for this zone compared to previous numbers of cattle that grazed here, and for an average-rainfall year the published number of livestock represents an 87% decrease from previous authorizations. The Park Service’s plan gives the agency flexibility to manage livestock numbers to achieve ecological objectives outlined in the plan. We expect the actual cattle numbers to be much, much lower than the figures published in the new General Management Plan.
For the rare tule elk, the new plan means that they will have the opportunity to roam freely throughout all of Point Reyes National Seashore. Elk will no longer be allowed to be hazed away from ranch pastures as they were in the past. Elk populations will be allowed to expand and reach self-regulated levels. But disappointingly, tule elk will not be allowed to expand into Golden Gate National Recreation Area, or to disperse outside the Park, even though they are a wildlife species native to the region.
Other rare native species should also have a better opportunity to thrive at the Seashore under the new plan. The new plan contains helpful language to fence off streamside areas that will enhance the ability to protect spawning habitats for embattled runs of coho and chinook salmon and steelhead. Water quality should also improve, and it will be required to meet Clean Water Act standards.
As fences come down in the Scenic Landscape Zone, expanded trail systems will be developed, increasing recreation opportunities and public access. The recreational experience will be enhanced by an increase in wildlife, expanding wildlife viewing opportunities.
The Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria will continue to have a say in the management of livestock management and tule elk conservation under the new plan, which commits the Park Service to incorporating traditional ecological knowledge into land management. Traditional burning could be a part of the mix to help return the land to natural conditions.
A plan is being developed to assist the transition of ranch workers, with cooperation from the conservation groups, and some of the necessary funding has already been secured to help workers find employment and housing outside the National Seashore.
Under the settlement, the departing ranchers will have about 15 months to wind down their operations and move off the land, and when that happens, the environmental groups will drop our legal challenge.
From the beginning, WWP and our allies have focused on restoring healthy native coastal grasslands and allowing the rare tule elk to recover on Point Reyes National Seashore. This package offers opportunities to achieve both of our goals. It has been a long and complex negotiation, and nobody walked away from this process with everything they wanted. But in the end, this agreement starts a new era for Point Reyes National Seashore, and we look forward to better days ahead for lands and wildlife as a result of the deal.
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