Wardens with the California Department of Fish and Game prepare under a full moon for a raid on an illegal marijuana growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills near Kernville on Aug. 2. The raid targeted an operation that is growing large quantities of pot on public land administered by the U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Los Angeles — A California Department of Fish and Game warden wades through a marijuana patch during an early morning raid on an illegal growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills on Aug. 2. Set in a deep ravine fed by a small stream, 431 pot plants were nearing maturation and harvest as a group of about a dozen wardens swept in.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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A warden with the California Department of Fish and Game hacks down marijuana plants found growing in a deep ravine in the Sierra Nevada foothills near Kernville. A raid that included a dozen armed wardens netted 431 pot plants that officials believed was being grown by foreign nationals for foreign drug cartels. Marijuana cultivation on public lands has exploded in California and every year law enforcement seizes millions of plants grown illegally in the wilderness.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Votive candles and religious icons form a makeshift shrine erected in an encampment occupied by marijuana growers near Kernville, just one of many such plantations sprinkled throughout public lands across the state.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Buckets containing fertilizer, pesticides and rat poison sit in an encampment used by marijuana growers in an illegal operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Marijuana cultivation is a major industry in California and chemicals used to cultivate marijuana on public lands have caused widespread environmental damage as the compounds leach into nearby streams that are used for irrigation.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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A warden with the California Department of Fish and Game hacks down marijuana plants near an encampment used by growers to illegally cultivate the drug on public land in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Agents with the Bureau of Land Management search two men who were taken into custody during a raid on an illegal marijuana growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills on Aug. 2. The two men were apprehended near a patch of more than 400 marijuana plants growing in the wilderness near Lake Isabella. Officials believe that foreign suppliers have moved north of the U.S.-Mexico border to grow marijuana in an effort to avoid border checks and gain closer proximity to U.S. drug markets.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Wardens with the California Department of Fish and Game detain two men during a raid on an illegal marijuana growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills on Aug. 2.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Game wardens stack marijuana plants in a clearing in the forest so they can be airlifted away as part of a law enforcement sting operation on illegal growers in the Sierra Nevada.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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Dozens of marijuana plants and hundreds of feet of irrigation lines are piled up for removal from an illegal marijuana growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Extensive irrigation for marijuana plants, with each consuming four to five gallons of water daily, impedes water flows in the wild, damaging sensitive riparian zones that are critical habitat for native wildlife and vegetation.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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California game wardens roll up hundreds of feet of irrigation line used to deliver water to an illegal marijuana growing operation in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Extensive irrigation for marijuana plants, with each consuming four to five gallons of water daily, impedes water flows in the wild, damaging sensitive riparian zones that are critical habitat for native wildlife and vegetation.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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A helicopter airlfits dozens of marijuana plants out of a wooded ravine in the Sierra Nevada where they were being grown illegally.
PHOTOGRAPH BY: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times
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