Columnist Susan Snyder: Curtain drops for rancher

Monday, July 14, 2003 | 8:09 a.m.

A woman in a dark red Pontiac stopped in front of Bob Eddy's Desert Lobster ranch and greeted the men who confronted her at the edge of the property.

She seemed oblivious to their firearms and bulletproof vests.

"Hi! Are you open for business?" she asked.

"There is no business," replied Ron Buonamici, deputy chief game warden for the Nevada Division of Wildlife.

The Desert Lobster ranch is gone. State wildlife officials on Thursday confiscated every last crustacean from Eddy's farm three miles south of Mina.

"There ain't no use to be out there. There's nothing I can do," said Eddy, who sat at his kitchen table and ignored the activity outside.

Eddy and state wildlife officials have for six years bickered over the Australian crayfish Eddy raised and sold live to travelers on U.S. 95. He was hoping to cash in on the 5,000 cars and trucks that pass his ranch each day.

The crayfish, which grow to the size of small lobsters and taste similar, lived in 10 ponds fed by hot springs on the property.

The problem wasn't raising them. It was selling them live, said Mike Sevon, a state fisheries biologist who donned waders Thursday and pulled crayfish from the drained ponds.

If someone released the crayfish into Nevada waters it would endanger native fish populations.

The confiscation was supposed to happen July 26, but wildlife officers had a conflict. They showed up in six pickup trucks early Thursday, but Eddy said he didn't know they were coming.

He stayed in a hut on a back portion of the property, forcing them to poke around sheds and outbuildings for nearly an hour before he came out.

"I've invested eight years of my life in this," Eddy said. "Eventually, somebody's going to have to pay me."

Paying jobs don't come easy in Mina. There are more people buried in the cemetery than living in town.

"I only make $380 every two weeks," said Eddy's wife, Pam, who cooks meals at Mina's tiny senior center. "This place has gone downhill in the last 35 years. They closed the school two years ago. And they closed our justice court just last week."

Mina is home to only six or seven school-aged children, locals said. The kids now ride a school bus about 30 miles each way to Hawthorne every day.

Back at Eddy's ranch, Buonamici and his officers kept visitors at bay while wildlife officers plopped crayfish into buckets by the handfuls.

"This isn't the crime of the century. It's not like some guy poaching three elk and leaving them dead," Buonamici said. "It's just something we have to deal with."

Eddy said he still is awaiting the outcome of an appeal he filed to have the case moved from the 5th District Circuit Court in Fallon to the 2nd District Court in Hawthorne.

A couple of guys have indicated they might buy his pond equipment. And he plans to open a cafe in Mina. He's restoring a 45-foot cabin cruiser to adorn the front of the building.

He's going to serve lobster.

"I've made a lot of connections in the industry," he said. "I can buy Maine lobsters cheaper than I can raise my own."