National Park Service Law Enforcement car in Yosemite. Photo by Rennett Stowe.
Yosemite rangers have been aiding other National Park Service personnel at the Whiskeytown National Recreation Area in Shasta county to combat the ever increasing cultivation of marijuana on public lands by Mexican drug cartels.
Law enforcement rangers at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area have been assisting Shasta County deputies discovering and eradicating marijuana in and around the park. In June, law enforcement personnel removed over 90,000 plants and apprehended two undocumented Mexican nationals.
In August, rangers from Whiskeytown, Redwoods and Yosemite joined deputies and CAMP task force officers remove over 6,000 plants in the Crystal Creek drainage in Whiskeytown and another 1,700 plus plants on lands immediately adjacent to the park. During cleanup operations rangers found more plants in a complex not previously discovered and later returned to the area to remove more than 1,500 plants and 50 pounds of processed marijuana. All of the areas showed evidence of cultivation by highly organized Mexican drug cartels.
Whiskeytown National Recreation Area is located approxiately 8 miles from the city of Redding in Northern California and, as with most National Recreation Areas, encompasses a large lake. The unit was originally created by John F. Kennedy and dedicated in 1963. (NPS Morning Report)