This is an example of habitat destruction under the guise of brush clearance.
A resident sent the following letter and video to Mountains Recreation and Conservancy Agency and to Circling the News.
We just got home to find that the service doing work in Temescal Canyon today (trucks say Greenleaf Tree Service) has eliminated a tree where a pair of owls has been nesting for years (see attached video), as well as many other trees and bushes in the canyon just below our and our neighbors’ property lines!
It is one thing to do necessary brush clearance (and MCRA was very late with that, just starting last week while the rest of us were required to have it completed weeks ago) but completely different to destroy the homes of the animals and birds that live in the canyon.
It appears that many of the fire safe trees and bushes on the hill have been over-trimmed and even removed. See attached photo from our property taken just now.
Did MCRA or the service MCRA hired do any work to determine which trees and plants should actually be removed? What was done to ensure the safety of the nests of the owls, hawks and other birds that live in the trees here?
Has anyone attended to the role of these trees and plants for the deer, coyotes, rabbits, squirrels, etc. that also live here? There are grave environmental concerns at issue. The birds and animals keep the canyon both alive and in balance; have you acted to protect them as well as us? Surely there is no reason MCRA cannot do both.
I am cc’ing the Palisadian Post and Circling the News, as well as the Nature Conservancy, in the hopes that they may be interested in assisting with this inquiry. I am not familiar with the names of organizations that might be of help in this so hope these folks will forward this email and our concerns to those who should be involved. We are one of many neighbors surrounding the canyon who are deeply invested in its safety and care.
(Editor’s note: this letter was forwarded to California Department of Fish and Wildlife. This editor agrees with the resident that an owl nesting habitat should have never been destroyed.)
Brush clearance is way overkill. They make you cut everything down to 2 inches. A variety of plants and animals die. The fire dept should meet with environmental specialists to come up with a plan for more strategic brush clearance instead of having the same requirements for all properties.
(Love that video)
It’s hard to have it both ways. Fear of fire is causing us to kill owls. It’s as if Brush Clearance and Owl Habitat are oxymorons, complete opposites of each other. By definition Brush Clearance is Habitat Clearance. It’s hard to keep your habitat and get rid of it too. This is one of those conundrums where humans want to live near nature, but are scared to live near real nature, it might catch fire. If we could prevent fire another way we could allow habitat to grow around our homes. Until that discovery is made we’re gonna have to live further away from nature than we would like to stay safe from hellish conflagrations.
In this case specifically it looks like the clearance was too severe and a compromise should have been reached. I bet the fire department would disagree though. They like denuded hillsides, it’s assists them in their mission. Owls is a different organization.
You should report this to California Fish and Wildlife using their toll-free number