Let us mourn the loss of dense and wonderful piñon-juniper forest that existed until a week ago and is now decimated beyond recognition.
I began living on this north end of La Mesa de Poleo in 1973. I was surrounded by the Santa Fe National Forest that protected thousands of acres of natural environment. I enjoyed the surrounding wildlands of rich diversity while closing off my own land to human exploitation. Deadwood at the time was plentiful and gathered before the widespread use of the chainsaw. Native Americans came to gather the piñon nuts as they had for centuries. Hunting fed families. Ancient native game sites were marked by fire pits and obsidian flakes.
The pristine landsacpe began to change with the advent of firewood permits and the increased use of the chainsaw. People would create roads into the forest, dump truckloads of garbage and carry away tree trunks.
I spent years picking up the garbage and heated by own home by cleaning the dead branches left behind. The forest became littered with garbage, dead cars, sets of decaying furniture and plastics. Though criss-crossed with dirt roads and dead tress, it still maintained a sense of integrity with rich and diverse habitats for wildlife, a herd of elk, a large flock of wild turkeys.
A couple of years ago a community meeting was called to discuss the thinning of all the surrounding forest to prevent forest fires. Only eight people attended, mostly ranchers interested in reducing elk population and opening new pastures for their sacred cows. Of course in their narrow minds, man held dominion over nature and his arrogance, greed and appetite came first.
At first the ponderosa forests were thinned by hand and it was beautifully done, no habitats destroyed, firewood gathered, jobs created. But when it came to the piñon juniper forest, machinery was brought in to bulldoze the ground cover to eat up the trees and spit them out shredded. Eighty percent of thee forest has disappeared.
All the dens, burrows and nests have been destroyed. I am experiencing an exodus of refugees. First came the birds and then rodents. Who knows where the larger animals have fled. Great flocks of crows and buzzards are cleaning up all the dead left behind.
Man’s dominion over nature reigns supreme as environmental degradation and climate change slowly causes the extinction of man himself. But first he must satisfy his arrogance and gluttonous needs. The native people who lived here for centuries are out migrating to new paradises like Rio Ranch and Española trailer pars happy with astro-turf and plastic flowers, junk food and pharmaceuticals.
Weapons of mass destruction eat up and spit out the natural environment. This is only a moment in geologic time. The forest will return and man himself will only be a fossil in ancient cliffs.
Douglas Johnson
Coyote