So two teams coming off separate points on the ridge, press out with it
Okay, right where we're at right now is what would be considered the lion's den of marijuana cultivation in California or North America?
This is also a prime area for a lot of threatened endangered species
There's a marijuana garden about a half mile away and hopefully we can apprehend them
That risk of coming into a grow that has people that are defending their crop to the end with guns
There's always a risk there. Go ahead and get your team ready to make entry start heading your way
My name is dr. Murad Gabriel
I'm the co-director of a nonprofit organization called integral ecology Research Center
Our specific mission is to generate and disseminate scientific information for wildlife
managers
politicians and other individuals involved in the conservation realm
we've been in this work since about
2013
Looking at Fisher ecology Fisher is a mid-sized carnivore that relies on mature forests
They're kind of the honey badger of North America. You're pretty ferocious little guys
We started finding out the Pacific fishers were dying from rodenticide toxicosis
so rodenticides this type of pesticide and so what was causing this
Only thing that was coming up was there was something around these forests that was placing these rodenticide out there
And it wasn't until a for service special agent stated that your answer is marijuana cultivation on their public lands
Emerald triangle has been coined by marijuana cultivators as the central hub of where
domestic marijuana cultivation kind of
Sprouted and so that would be humbled Mendocino in Trinity County
If you get rid of wildlife you have no conflict with it, it doesn't destroy your plants it doesn't eat your food
That's what these suspects constantly reiterate. I get rid of wildlife by poisoning them
multi-year contamination of soil
poisoning terrestrial wildlife poisoning avian wildlife I
Would ask any conservationist if that was occurring in an impacting threatened endangered or sensitive species?
Is that a significant conservation threat I would bet you 10 out of 10 conservation should be like yes, that is
Yes, that is
So from the time that we detect the site
What we'll do at that point is we'll begin investigating and starting to try identifying who's doing it through surveillance
Get as much Intel as we can on them before we actually come in and do the raid
Yeah, they're turning left here. And then the drop points right underneath the powerlines. Yeah those reference
In these cases these really large growths are probably being run by a drug trafficking organization
And so they'll get whatever pesticides or fertilizers they need brought to them
They're gonna go down raw, so extremely important. We stay behind these trees
Waiting for the suspects to show up in the vehicle once they show up. Hopefully we can apprehend them
Sounds like we're gonna go in and get him the camp coming up
Stop it, I
Can explain what happened real quick, oh they were waiting
They saw the guys who are attending the plants and then when the suspects were apprehended
By canine unit with this officer and another suspect
evaded
Horseman until they can actually catch up to him. Can't you chain them?
Loose uh-oh throws people stay in sick to see those malathion
Mercado nada nada, no guy
Says he doesn't use insecticides
Pretty surprised to find out all right, he said no car for urine, but what we're finding is a spray bottle up there
It's got paint on the inside of the spray. There's no insecticides or pesticides that we know of that are pink
other than the car bro fear
This is highly plausible that these are meth amid Depot's or cover fearing that is it probably dying that house
carbo Furion, it takes literally a quarter of a teaspoon to kill a male African lion a
600 pound male African lion quarter teaspoon
So, you know don't offend us on that Iran, yes, uh,
don't it's very important to be there on that day if that raid happened, and I was not there and
Then I come out a week later Bears have destroyed the whole area
I'm gonna lose local growers are actually doing so, you know nothing than that data
How does the site compared to other ones you've seen before this cookie cutter ran?
Poison kill plant poison kill plant repeat I mean, it's I mean hate to be so blunt
And simplistic about it, but that's pretty much it poison kill plan
They were talking about bringing some a Murad's group in from ier C to help document the site process
You know some samples, but because it's getting late in the evening. We'll we'll do that environmental survey stuff more tomorrow
The raid happens we go out there document it and then we go in there and clean it up
I'm gonna go ahead and start marking this guys. So if you guys want to follow me
Okay, whoa, what is this I don't like that you can see that it almost looks like
Calamine lotion that's been diluted. That is a big
big big red flag for us I am
going to
Take samples
Murad's group helped us so much as far as assessing the sites. They analyzed the soil
They analyzed the plants they help us identify. How much damage there is to the resource into the National Forest?
I see there's a bear puncture in this
I mean that is a bear getting, you know several ounces in its mouth if it's Karbo fear, and that bear is done
It has federally been designated as critical habitat
And now we have what I call a death ring a death pit if that bears raising young now
You didn't kill that cell you killed her and maybe her two or three cubs that she's raising
That's the ramifications that people need to grasp
So, how do you see the way forward after this you think the pesticides are just gonna continue to be this bad
Well, you guys try to make a dent in it. Oh, we're making a dent in it. Our organization is completely optimistic
There's no way we're quitting on this. So another twenty four fourteen fourteen fifty pounds
You got to be relentless and show know pretty much what I say no reclamation. Mercy, you clean it all up
You don't give them this quarter where they can come up and set up shop any time and we contaminate the environment
to go in investigate
See the chemicals that are there see how much trash is there and to finally see it come out of that site
I'm sort of reversing. The damage is a really really great feeling
What we do is document environmental degradation because what we're doing is gathering data in order to demonstrate that
Contamination is occurring. I
care about conservation
Rectifying something that us as humans are contributing towards in
Creating the scientific evidence so that policymakers and agency folks can make the best sound decisions. That's my main mission
It doesn't matter what species it is. It doesn't matter the topic. It's conservation
I do this work because it's a conservation issue. That's my mission