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Law enforcement officers remove some of the 1,075 marijuana plants they seized at a grow site in the Carpenter Canyon area of the Spring Mountains on Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011.
By Jackie Valley (contact) 
Thursday, Sept. 15, 2011 | 1:55 a.m.
Police bust marijuana farm
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KSNV coverage of police raid in the Carpenter Canyon area of the Spring Mountains, where more than 1,000 marijuana plants were destroyed, Sept. 14, 2011.
Carpenter Canyon
Sun coverage
As a law enforcement team assembled Wednesday morning, two men guarding a marijuana farm rested at a makeshift mountainside camp.
The men had a kitchen stocked with food, a small stove and a pellet gun. And for when they could relax, two tents — filled with backpacks, shirts, jeans, high-top sneakers, sleeping bags, 9-mm ammunition and a crumpled Budweiser can — provided a retreat of sorts.
The camouflaged dwellings sheltered them from the elements and, until Wednesday morning, kept them hidden from authorities.
That’s when a multi-jurisdictional squad trekked 10 miles over the rugged terrain to the marijuana grow site on the west side of the Spring Mountains, near Mount Charleston.
It was the latest in a string of raids to dismantle outdoor marijuana grow operations, many on public land, that have popped up in Southern Nevada this year.
“They’re here to stay,” Metro Police Sgt. Erik Lloyd said of the outdoor grows. “This is just the start.”
In this case, the suspects, described as young men, fled on foot up the mountain in the Carpenter Canyon area as two raid teams approached from opposite directions.
Officers chased them on foot — at one point coming within 40 yards of one of the men — while a helicopter followed overhead. But authorities called off the chase when low-lying clouds unleashed a sudden downpour, rendering the mission unsafe.
“The suspects may have thought we were going up there to camp, so that might be why he didn’t spook until we saw him,” said Lloyd, a member of a multi-jurisdictional task force charged with eradicating outdoor marijuana grow sites.
Authorities say it’s difficult to capture those tending the grow sites because they can hear people approaching and typically have predetermined hideouts.
The suspect who lingered longer in the encampment Wednesday ran about 1.5 miles up the mountain before disappearing.
Authorities climbed an approximately 100-yard embankment to reach a clearing where 1,075 marijuana plants, estimated to be worth more than $5 million, were growing. Several hours later, nothing remained.
The team hacked off the plants as close to the ground as possible, tied them into 75-pound bundles and carted them off the mountain, destined for burial at an undisclosed location.
The operation dubbed “24D” — a common name for an herbicide — was the culmination of two months of planning. In July, a Metro search and rescue team spotted the marijuana plants while conducting an unrelated operation.
The growers’ ability to generate large marijuana crops for eventual sale isn’t the only thing that irks law enforcement officials. It’s also the environmental damage the operations cause.
Casey McEnry, a special agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration in California, said about 70 percent of outdoor grows busted in California are on public land, often involving elaborate water diversion systems from natural springs or creeks.
A kitchen area used by growers is seen during a raid of a marijuana operation in the Carpenter Canyon area of the Spring Mountains on Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011. The weapons belong to law enforcement officers.
“Not only does diversion affect the wildlife in the area, they also use pesticides and fertilizers to keep animals away from plants,” she said, adding that officials also find trash and sometimes evidence of animal poaching.
The grow site at Carpenter Canyon, 7,200 feet up the mountain, was no exception.
The growers ran irrigation tubes, spray-painted black to make them harder to spot, from a natural spring at the top of the mountain to two man-made reservoirs about four feet deep.
From there, more tubes carried the water among the marijuana plants, which require about 1.5 gallons of water a day, authorities said. They also arranged nearby brush and tree limbs to support a tarp covering a processing station to dry the marijuana buds.
Compared to indoor, hydroponic grow houses, Lloyd said, outdoor grows are cheap. The drug-trafficking organizations’ biggest expense often is paying guards, many who are armed, to protect the site.
“They are usually given a sum of money at the beginning, some food and maybe a weapon,” McEnry said. “There’s often the promise of a large sum of money at the end of grow season.”
The marijuana grow season begins as early as March and can last through October, Lloyd said.
A year ago, Southern Nevada law enforcement officials doubted outdoor grows would make their way here, mostly because of the region’s rugged terrain. But growers, who have been operating heavily in California for many years, had other ideas.
Southern Nevada’s multi-jurisdictional task force has dismantled three outdoor marijuana grows in Lincoln County this summer, in addition to the raid on a Mount Charleston site in August that yielded 4,685 plants, Lloyd said.
In comparison, authorities seized more than 7 million marijuana plants at 1,481 outdoor grow sites in California last year, according to a DEA report from its Domestic Cannabis Eradication/Suppression Program.
Southern Nevada task force members recently trained in Sacramento with the California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement’s CAMP (Campaign Against Marijuana Planting) program. Wednesday’s operation involved more people than normal because it served as additional training for members outside the U.S. Forest Service, which was the lead agency, Lloyd said.
Other participating agencies included Metro, the North Las Vegas Police Department, the DEA, Nye County Sheriff’s Office and the Nevada Department of Wildlife.
Authorities believe they’ll find more outdoor grow sites through their own investigations and tips from members of the public, such as hikers, Lloyd said.
“It’s something totally different that we haven’t had much experience on until now,” he said.
Good job by LE.. the pro-pot head comments should be entertaining.
4 farms, what a trend and what a waste of taxpayer money. Looks like California is cutting funds for creepy pot raids by bozos in camo.
http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/sep/07/w...
We could increase tourism with legal pot. (Looks like that guy in the picture got into posion oak.)
I find it amusing that these LEOs found the need to throw on fatigues, boonie hats, and cover their faces to mimic themselves as some Special Forces or Navy SEALs conducting a covert operation in South America. They didn't have to dress up all pretty and live in fantasy land in order to snip some plants with some clippers. Some people just want to pretend they are something more than what they are not.
"Wednesday's operation involved more people than normal because it served as additional training for members outside the U.S. Forest Service, which was the lead agency, Lloyd said. Other participating agencies included Metro, the North Las Vegas Police Department, the DEA, Nye County Sheriff's Office and the Nevada Department of Wildlife."
All proof their budgets need to be severely chopped.
Additionally, we see our own law enforcement present themselves as being military, a dangerous trend showing everywhere in our republic.
"Tobacco, hemp, flax and cotton, are staple commodities." -- from Thomas Jefferson "The Works," vol. 3 (Notes on Virginia I, Correspondence 1780-1782), "A Notice Of The Mines And Other Subterraneous Riches; Its Trees, Plants, Fruits, &C."
Our country is spiraling down the toilet due to corporate greed, crooked politicians and outsourcing our wealth to Chinese communists.
Yet fed.gov sees fit to spend our limited resources to run around the country side like wannabe law dogs to cut down some plants.
Time to legalize it, tax it, and let the profits roll in like smarter countries do.
"The growers' ability to generate large marijuana crops for eventual sale isn't the only thing that irks law enforcement officials. It's also the environmental damage the operations cause."
You only have yourselves to blame. Regulate it and all this stops.
What a waste of tax-payer dollars. NV used to be the place that would simply legalize behaviors outside of puritanical morality (see prize-fighting, gambling, quickie divorce/marriage, prostitution). Now, because conservatives who don't want to pay taxes, and who also bring their "moral savior" mentality, move here in great numbers, we can't reclaim our heritage of making money by legalizing non-conformist behaviors. Legalize it, regulate it, and tax it. Same goes with gay marriage. Our economy would thrive.
The problem with the idea of "legalize it and tax it for the kids" would be that the users would still be DOPERS , at least until the PC gang can come up with a new less honest name for the users.
We would also lose an opportunity to become educated on the subject by the king of quotes.
But in the meantime "book em Danno" Steve McGarret Hawaii five o!
"You only have yourselves to blame. Regulate it and all this stops."
goingbust -- actually the reverse would be best, stop regulating it, decriminalize everything having to do with marijuana, and leave people alone unless they're actually hurting someone else! You know, like the original laws said before government tweaked it all to create this police state our republic has become.
"The problem with the idea of "legalize it and tax it for the kids" would be that the users would still be DOPERS..."
pmmart -- right. Then "the kids" can just get doped up on the usual "legal" drugs -- prescriptions and alcohol.
The real question the anti posters here should be asking is how did a staple commodity for the colonies get turned into this.
"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." -- Thomas Jefferson, letter to Isaac H Tiffany (1819)
This is another unforeseen consequence of the federal marijuana prohibition. It doesn't appear that President Nixon thought about this when he started it.
Parents have to decide if they want drug dealers selling marijuana to kids or supermarkets selling marijuana to adults. Forty years of federal marijuana prohibition has taught us that "nobody selling marijuana to nobody" is NEVER going to happen!
Interesting how the Anti-Cannabis people can't get through a message without using derogatory slurs against the Pro-Cannabis people, terms like "pot-heads,Dopers"
"the users would still be DOPERS , at least until the PC gang can come up with a new less honest name for the users.""
Why can't you just leave it at "User"
--------------------
I always am amazed that the feds try to convince U.S. that growing a garden is a danger to the wilderness. Like urban sprawl doesn't damage the environment, like they don't use chemicals at you local Golf course, like they don't spray toxic herbicides on the side of the roads all over this Country???? I read that the feds figure for every one acre of growing the Cannabis plant 10 acres are "damaged" and they charge something like $11,000 per acre to clean it up ????HUH?
"It doesn't appear that President Nixon thought about this when he started it."
jway -- Nixon is a long way from being the guy who started this. America passed its major federal law on marijuana and hemp 74 years ago -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana#L...
As for your "Parents have to decide if they want drug dealers selling marijuana to kids or supermarkets selling marijuana to adults" -- why exactly should it be any different than parents deciding everything else about their kids? Why exactly should government be making those choices for them? Worse, why exactly should government be making those choices for adults? THC in its many forms has been part of the medical pharmacopeia for centuries, if not thousands of years. That hemp itself is also illegal spotlights the utter stupidity of these criminal laws.
"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others." -- Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 1781-82
Damaged the environment... what a crock
the growers also had several rented video cassettes that were not rewound.
The growers did not appear to be recycling.
The growers did not have any toothpaste or Q-tips so they were probably unhygienic too.
By all means, it is time to turn this into a legal cash crop. If nothing else, decriminalize it and let people grow at home.
Hypocrites!! But it is ok for the feds to "allow" on line gambling??? Gambling does as much if not more damage to the community. And when legal on line how many people are going to gamble everything if not more because they don't even have to leave their house....B.S. and I don't mean our gov...
The laws are in place and have been for 10 years but the legislature did not even take the time to look at the 3 bills in front of it this past session to give safe access to patients. And so all the "illegal" growing will continue. Creating problems where there should not be any.
For the rational impaired....
It hammers the water table.
They are HazMat sites (fertilizers and bs chemicals)
They are generally armed.
Stop watching TV and get with the real world.
KillerB, you can throw down quotes all you want, but the law is the law. Marijuana is illegal and will hopefully stay that way. If folks don't like it, pleaes move to a place to accomodate your potsmoking needs.
"...pleaes [sic] move to a place to accomodate [more sic] your potsmoking needs."
LotusLV -- exactly why did you post I have "potsmoking needs"?
And you obviously missed my second Jefferson quote -- as in Thomas, as in the guy who wrote the Declaration of Independence, etc.? One of the key architects of why we have a republic based on securing our unalienable rights?
Found a quote just for you --
"The Fuhrer is always right." -- Joachim von Ribbentrop, the 1939 Konigsberg address
Ah the fallacy of quoting out of context, expertly done Sir.
lol, call it like it really is; illegal immigrants working for the Mexican cartel are growing crops. Cash goes south, drugs go north or goes east on the interstate. Wait until the cartel starts shooting people who are sightseeing or nature walking and come across their crops, many life's are lost these days that the liberal media doesn't talk about. Nevada is becoming just like the Northern California region where the cartel is growing thousands of acres of marijuana along with poppy plants where people are killed weekly for just passing through or being too close to the crops.
We are all just pawns in this 300,000 yr. old war between plants. The plant that makes the humans happiest wins. Go ahead and destroy the cannabis I will send you more overpriced Columbian coffee. Just don't criminalize my beans please. I make alot of money keeping the cops high.
JV
"Just don't criminalize my beans please."
JuanValdez -- Colombia Supremo from CoffeeFool.com rules
"After the coffee things ain't so bad." -- Henry Herbert Knibbs, cowboy poet, d. 1945
Coffee leads men to trifle away their time, scald their chops, and spend their money, all for a little base, black, thick, nasty, bitter, stinking nauseous puddle water. ~The Women's Petition Against Coffee, 1674
Question - If Marijuana is served at a Chamber of Commerce meeting , does it then become Chamber Pot ?
I really can't believe those who are pro-marijuana actually seem to be siding with these criminals!!! The reason this story hits a nerve with me is that I routinely hike in areas all around Mt. Charleston and the Spring Mountains. The story mentioned that, among other things, 9mm ammunition was found in the criminal's camp! I honestly think if I ever happened across one of these camps, I'd probably be toast since I am not armed while hiking and really don't know how to defend myself. Its pretty disheartening to think I could be a casualty for just wanting to get away from the city to enjoy nature!
So I guess if you're interested in having a dialogue about being pro or anti marijuana, discussion about this specific situation and article is the wrong place for it! I would NOT want to come across these criminals during any of my treks and I applaud the law enforcement officials who are trying to bring these guys down!
Wasn't Betty Ford, of the Betty Ford Clinic a Republican. Was the film team from "Cops" or some other reality show there? The camo gear is needed because these rough tough law men need protection from mosquitoes. Guess they will go celebrate at the LOCAL COP Bar (free and half price food and drink for LE.) I hope we don't have any more cop car crashes due to too much alcohol.
"destined for burial at an undisclosed location."
Sounds like job security to me!
The DEA know what happens when they bury 1,000,000 seads and it rains.
How much did operation "24D" cost taxpayers?
How much does sending task force members to CAMP cost taxpayers?
How much (each and in total) did the U.S. Forest Service, Metro, North Las Vegas P.D., the DEA, Nye County sheriff's office and the Nevada Wildlife Department recieve in compensation for their participation?
The article states that "Wednesday's operation involved more people than normal...". It would follow that said operation cost more than normal.
All this for a politically motivated, disingenuous (specious?) and ultimately futile, campaign against marijuana?
WTF?
If people stopped doing drugs to begin with there would be no cost! I'm glad my tax money is going to fight these drug runners as for all of you that support drugs, shame on you.