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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 27, 2012 - 02:24pm PT
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Oh I also get a sense that the rich, respectable folks in Saratoga and Los Gatos don't like to see what they regard as "white trash" climbers invading their territory and depressing their property values. They don't really distinguish between rock climbers, party-ers, taggers and gang-bangers. They regard all of them as equally disreputable and potentially criminal. Of course, who exactly is responsible for the yawning gulf between the rich and poor in the USA? What you're seeing in practice up on the Skyline is not Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal in action, but rather Richard Nixon's and Milton Friedman's Republican Neo-Liberal version of America, the one in which rich and poor are pitted against one another and a once solid middle class is evaporating as each subsequent speculative bubble collapses. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the rangers get meaner and meaner.
But here's an idea, Fatty: Why don't you dig into your deep pockets and buy Summit Rock? Make it into into a private climbing park and charge $3 bucks per day admission? Since County Parks obviously hasn't got a budget to patrol the place, why not hire a private security patrol of underemployed climbers to drive the partyers out? Is there a "stand your ground" law in California?
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Rick A
climber
Boulder, Colorado
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Apr 27, 2012 - 02:25pm PT
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Email sent. Keep up the great work, Bruce and Paul. I worked with Paul in the early days of the Access Fund and he is a very effective advocate, as illustrated by his letter.
Rick
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 27, 2012 - 03:06pm PT
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Even for us unreconstructed New Dealers, the Republican dream of privatized climbing parks does have its allure. However, when Handley Rock in Redwood City became a public climbing park (except for one Sunday per month), it was donated by the owner, who cut a deal with the County Sheriff about patrolling it and providing security. IOWs: Handley Rock already was a piece of private property. Luckily, the landowner was also a climber. When I went down to the Franchised Tax Board at San Jose City Hall and looked up the history of the property that Summit sits on, I found that it had been transferred to the County some time in the mid-70s.
The irony does not escape me that if Summit was on private property, it would probably be a lot easier to cut a deal with the landowner about climbing access. Probably, but maybe not. However, because Summit sits on public land, the user group that recreates there has been driven off by County Parks backed by the environmental zealots on the Parks and Recreation Commission. IOWs: Because Summit has been set aside for public use, climbers are unable to use it even though Summit Rock has been a common rock climbing venue for nearly 70 years! You'll notice too that there is never a word about climbers or climbing in print in any official publication of Santa Clara County Parks. Even the No Climbing signs refer to "Park Users". The brochure for Sanborn County Parks never mentions climbing or bouldering at Indian Rock or Summit Rock. It's really something that they would rather just disappear.
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Seamstress
Trad climber
Yacolt, WA
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Apr 27, 2012 - 03:40pm PT
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I think most foks can enthusiastically or grudgingly sign on to regulations that reflect science. Darn frustrating to know that:
Seasonal restrictions to protect peregrine and other nesting raptors have been implemented since the 1970s. As the American peregrine falcon (F. p. anatum) population continued its recovery through the 1990s, the period between 1994 and 1997 saw a 40% increase in the number of new seasonal climbing restrictions, with 58 restrictions implemented in 1997 alone. At the time such restrictions were unusual as a management tool. Guidelines for managing peregrine were published in 1996 by the Peregrine Fund World Center for Birds or Prey and the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group. The following year, in collaboration with the authors of the 1996 guide, The Access Fund published guidelines for managing Peregrine in rock climbing areas.
On August 25, 1999, the American peregrine falcon was removed from the List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants (64 FR 46541). The plan for delisting called for monitoring peregrine falcons five times at 3-year intervals beginning in 2003 and ending in 2015. 2003 monitoring results were made public by the USF&W Service in 2006. During the 2003 monitoring period the USF&W Service determined there were 3,005 nesting pairs of American peregrine falcons in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, compared to approximately 1,750 pairs at the time of delisting. In 2003, their estimates of the nesting parameters and the additional data from across the United States indicated that the peregrine falcon population is “secure and vital .” The 2006 monitoring results are not yet available. from a memo by Orton discussing various Oregon access issues.
How do we pry the evidence that supports sensible restrictions out of the bureaucrats hands? And how do we ensure that real data is used for regulation? What causes these birds to die before reproducing and what prevents them from reproducing? The decline was due to DDT-related shell thinning, and shooting birds. There is significant evidence that suggests climber/raptor interaction does not lead to reproductive failure.
I'm all for funding and using scientific research that provides intelligent ways to live together. I remain convinced that most of the regulations to protect raptors is a thinnly disguised shield to keep climbers off the land. Tourists in cars and at picnic tables are less threatening to the officials.
I would think it would be less expensive to process and release the darn data about the helath of the population than to enforce regulations to close climbing.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 27, 2012 - 04:16pm PT
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I'm all for funding and using scientific research that provides intelligent ways to live together. I remain convinced that most of the regulations to protect raptors is a thinnly [sic] disguised shield to keep climbers off the land. Tourists in cars and at picnic tables are less threatening to the officials.
Exactly, Seamstress! Climbers are one group who uses the land that Santa Clara County Parks cannot directly get their hands on and control and, hence, represent another power that threatens their authority. Remember the old maxim: "One power cannot tolerate another power"? That's why adjacent armies "demonstrate" toward each other until a certain flash point is reached (i.e. there's an 'incident') and a shooting war breaks out.
But for the life of me I cannot understand why climbers and County Parks cannot partner together to manage Summit Rock in a mutually beneficial way that helps keep the bottle throwers out while improving the environment for the nesting peregrines. It sounds more like cock-eyed ideology than real science. Afterall, we brought in one of the leading raptor biologists in the world, Dr. Clayton White, and he told them their rationale was unscientific and they're still trying to find ways of wiggling off the hook with bogus arguments that have no basis.
I can still remember back in the early 1990s when there was a dedicated County Parks Ranger for Sanborn-Summit County Park and a guy who drove up there each evening in a truck and emptied the garbage can in back of the rock. Now, there are only No Climbing signs and a locked gate at the trail junction leading to the rock. All the party-ers, gang bangers and taggers just walk on in and do their dirty work without any authority whatsoever out there to stop them. Closing Summit Rock has in effect turned the area into a completely lawless zone. I for one believe that the name change from Sanborn-Skyline County Park to simply Sanborn County Park is indicative of a cost-saving administrative shift.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 27, 2012 - 05:44pm PT
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No. As the Seamstress points out, it's a 'No People' issue, but the liability stuff probably scares County Parks too. The attitude I've noticed is one of complete contempt for climbers as a recreational user group. Sort of like a bunch of snobs "Kicking the bums out of our little town". Really, it's a whole bunch of things all operating together: budgetary constraints, upstairs-downstairs class suburban elitism, reactionary environmentalism, factional bureaucratic power politics. There's an element of the powerful beating up on the powerless too. What the authorities didn't count on was that today climbers are now more organized and have an organization that will come to bat to protect their interests. Incidentally, they do monitor SuperTopo so know that the Summit Rock access issue is familiar to a lot of people across the whole country. Sure, Summit Rock isn't the greatest crag in the world, but it's one of the best in whole Bay Area, and the principles involved in its closure have far-reaching implications for the sport of rock climbing everywhere else.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 27, 2012 - 06:48pm PT
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Seamstress: I remain convinced that most of the regulations to protect raptors is a thinnly disguised shield to keep climbers off the land.
Complete and utter rubbish - I don't have time for complete response until later or tomorrow, but that's just ain't remotely the case.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 27, 2012 - 07:05pm PT
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That may be so for rational regulations to protect nesting raptors. However, I detect an irrational post-romantic nature myth operating here along with a political subtext that is harder to read. Obviously, County Parks has chosen to lump climbers in with the bottle-breakers as part of a destructive lawless group that must be edited out of the Summit Rock eco-landscape. I know it's really counterproductive because it excludes climbers, which are the one group that has done the most for keeping Summit Rock clean and free of vandalism. I think they're cutting their own throats because of their near-sighted bias.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 27, 2012 - 07:12pm PT
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Don't conflate what's happening at Summit with what's happening nationwide. Summit is a unique situation and while it may not be the only one of its kind it is clear we the few are being punished for the sins of the many. The idea that raptor regulations are designed to deny us the land is patently ridiculous and borders on both arrogant self-aggrandizing and paranoia.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 28, 2012 - 02:54am PT
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Yes, the situation at Summit Rock is exceptional, in so many ways.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 28, 2012 - 05:19am PT
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Let's be clear upfront - first, Peregrines are bad ass - they snatch their food out of thin air at 200mph, lay their eggs on bare rock ledges, and hunker down on them unprotected and out in the open during cold spring storms (not in a cushy portaledges w/ flys like us pussy humans). Second, we're talking about EXTINCT east of the Mississippi in 1970 with a handful of breeding pairs west of it. Third, Peregrines have nested on cliffs in North America for somewhere between 8-2.4 million years until we virtually wiped them out in a blink of an eye. Fourth, cliffs are their favored and most commonly productive reproductive sites.
So, given that quick background, the probable historic number of breeding pairs of North American Peregrines was likely between 4-5,000. So 3,000 breeding pairs in 2003 is a great comeback from just this side of zero (that's roughly one North American Peregrine breeding pair for about every 20,000 U.S. human breading pairs in 2003). But that number includes urban boxed pairs with a high mortality rate, lots of hacked and released birds, and doesn't necessarily reflect a true, self-sustaining rate across their natural range in historic nest sites. I would guess a sustaining natural rate in 2003 was more like 2,500 breeding pairs. But let's not split hairs, they're no longer on the verge of extinction and were properly delisted as such in 1999.
That, however, doesn't address the issue of restoring and maintaining both their historic range and numbers, which is the ultimate goal of the long term recovery efforts and why they are, and will remain, a protected species under state and federal law. I personally believe about all that can be accomplished in that regard will have been accomplished in the 2017-2020 timeframe - a job well done by a crew of people who dedicated their entire lives to accomplishing this remarkable feat and for whom every new, successful nest is just like an FA to us. And remember, climbers - including a bunch here on ST - played an essential role in those recovery efforts which is likely how Dr. Pagel got involved in the first place.
And given both Peregrines and climbers use cliffs as an essential resource the question becomes how do we share that resource over the long haul? And hey, it's not all a one-sided deal either - it's not just all about the reanimation of the Peregrines since 1970 and them now 'taking over our cliffs!' Check out this google map search:
If we're going to be honest we also have to factor in what our own climbing demographic has done since 1970. And what would that google map look like today versus 1970 if you could search on "rock climbing bolt" and see every bolt on the map (and wouldn't bolt placements from 1970-2012 make a fabulous map animation). The reality is our climbing demographic has utterly exploded over the same timeframe it has taken to bring the Peregrines back to within striking distance of their historic range and numbers; so not much of surprise some raptor biologists might view our own demographic growth with a raised eyebrow or two. But again, the question remains - they're back - and how are we going to co-exist on rock with them over the long haul?
One thing that definitely isn't going to 'fly', is the locals at every crag in America saying, "hey they're like rats now and don't need my xyz crag!!!" Hey, forgetaboutit! It flat out ain't gonna happen. The bottom line is there is always going to be protection for nests determined to be steady, successful reproductive sites - i.e. nesting closures - and there is no other way for our populations to co-exist over the long haul without them. Oh, and our small crag outside of PDX is one of those which has long been identified as a steadily producing nest site which, as a climber, sucks on one hand but on the other I'll take the closure over not seeing Peregrines out there when I climb.
The real question going forward is when are closures appropriate in any give stretch of Peregrine range relative to highly successful nest sites and what is an appropriate closure size and duration given the crag particulars and available monitoring resources. From my perspective the most important things climbers can do is not click email links (though that helps), but rather learn something about the Peregrines and establish trusted working relationships with the raptor biologists associated with your area and crag. Learn to monitor them and establish cooperative monitoring sessions (oh, and monitoring and learning to understand exactly what you are seeing isn't necessarily easy and can take 1-3 years to really dial in on it all reliably).
And this is where Summit comes back into the picture - is the closure duration and size appropriate for its role and potential in the overall area's (NorCal) Peregrine reproductive numbers. I think it likely Summit is a marginal nest site in terms of reproductive success and have doubts that a year round closure changes that outcome all that much over a seasonal closure (but I could be wrong on that given I don't know the numbers). It could be that the biologists are taking it county-by-county and seek to protect traditional nests sites in counties with low or even no current count and that may or may not be a reasonable (as opposed to wishful) long-term management strategy.
Based on the cumulative effects of all user groups, Dr. Pagel obviously thinks the year-round closure is necessary. But I personally suspect the even with a year-round closure the site isn't likely to be steadily successful enough to warrant it's imposition (again, just my suspicion). At that point it becomes a matter of perceptions around the overall importance to the Summit contribution to the [long-term Coastal NorCal] reproductive success of the species.
Again, this all boils down to a forty-two plus year effort to restore the Peregrine's historic range and numbers - it's not in any way an effort to "keep climbers off the land" which is utter nonsense. What it is all about is a plain and simple collision of demographics and resource use.
And last:
There is significant evidence that suggests climber/raptor interaction does not lead to reproductive failure.
More nonsense - there is no such "significant evidence". Quite the contrary, the biologists have forty-two years of records of pillaged, trampled, and abandoned nests along with at least limited behavioral research and can trot out 'significant evidence' to the contrary that trumps our amassed anecdotal evidence every single time. And honestly, how many of you have been bombed or harassed by an angry raptor parent? Over the years I know I've had both experiences - Peregrines remaining completely calm nearby and not freaking out, but far more often than not, they've clearly been moderately to highly agitated by my proximity to their nest.
Add it all up, and as someone with some biology, journalism, and political background I personally try to stay objective, honest and realistic when my avocations and environmental interests clash - I love doing FAs and want every possible day I can get on rock, but not at expense of a thing as cool, stout and burly as Peregrines which have lived on bare stone ledges a few million years longer than our species has existed. In PDX we're lucky in that we have a few other options during the closure (when it isn't dumping rain on us which makes for short seasons and is another contributing pain point up this way); others my not, and YMMV with local resources.
My two cents anyway, and I urge folks to remain calm, keep the conspiracy and talk radio rhetoric to a minimum, and just work the issue as Bruce and co. have been doing.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 28, 2012 - 02:18pm PT
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All of what you are saying is true, healyje (Joe). But local climbers and the Access Fund obviously want to contribute to the success of the peregrine nesting site at Summit Rock by entering into a co-operative relationship with County Parks and whatever organization is going to monitor the breeding pair. The big problem is that County Parks and other stakeholders don't want to allow us to help monitor and protect the site. The real problem for the peregrines at Summit are the hoards of party-ers and graffiti 'artists' who, largely thanks to the blanket closure, are wandering over the site completely unchecked. It's been easier for County Parks to print a few signs and interdict climbers going out there from the Summit Rock Parking Lot on a weekend basis than to get to the real root of the problem and keep the lawless element out of there after dark. It's a typically cosmetic bureaucratic solution to a problem that is largely unsolved. Okay, County Parks can say that they've kept the climbers off the rock and away from the nesting site, only now there are even more people out there painting the rocks and getting drunk and high than there were before the ban. We want to convince County Parks of our good intentions and work with them for a solution that benefits the peregrines and the natural environment out at Summit. And climbing isn't a new form of recreation at Summit at all; it's been going on up there since the 1930s. There have been more people enjoying the recreation rock resources up there since 1990 or so, but I would say that usage has remained about the same since then. Climbers have shown good faith and been doing cleanups at Summit under the auspices of the Access Fund, REI, BayAreaClimbers.com, SheClimbs.com, and Santa Clara County Parks for many years, which seems to show that all concerned can work together to achieve mutually beneficial environmentally-sound goals. This current imbroglio reminds me of a union-management negotiation session where at first mutual suspicion and distrust are so great that there's no hope of a compromise. Now, at least, we do seem to be moving toward a more typical seasonal closure that allows climbing in the non-nesting season in September, October and November. Those are the best months out at Summit anyway when it's not too hot with too many mosquitoes. In fact, that's the best time of the year to be out there climbing.
I notice that Dr. Pagel was told (presumably by Ranger Rocha) that chick productivity at the Summit site between 2008-2011 was something like "2, 2, at least 1, and 2, respectively, with delayed nesting chronology for 2008". Dr. White implied that the delayed chronology had to do with the fact that the Summit eyrie is not a very good site. In other words, the peregrines were still breeding again in September because owls, racoons, rats and other predators were probably eating the chicks hatched earlier since it's a fairly simply matter for them them to crawl up into the crevice where they're nesting. Still, this has to be confirmed by a real study of the site and no one seems to have been doing that. That's in fact where climbers and the Access Fund could really help out.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 28, 2012 - 07:06pm PT
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Bruce, I think we are in complete agreement on Summit. As I said, I don't really see where a year-round closure is going to significantly enhance the breeding success at Summit over a seasonal closure and believe it's being employed as a proxy for managing difficult youth issues at the site. Getting organized to do annual monitoring at the site is definitely the way to go or there'll be no way to really know what's going on...
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 30, 2012 - 12:23am PT
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I think one idea being considered is to have Glenn Stewart and his Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group at UCSC do the monitoring of the peregrines and their eyrie. Certainly, climbers could help out if County Parks gives them the okay. As you can see from the pics I posted, the peregrines are nesting back in a cleft that is actually between two routes, neither of which run through it. But the eyrie is way back under a roof where the only way for humans to enter is from above on rappel.
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