Near the seashore’s misty headlands, a herd of free-roaming tule elk moved onto ranchland. -- Read and share our stories!
Photo by National Park Service |
Point Reyes National Seashore is once again ground zero for an emotional debate over the purpose of America’s national parks. Should the parks’ mission be to preserve wildlife or conserve history? Should they be set aside as wilderness or tended as a human landscape? How can land managers balance the not always reconcilable needs of wildlife and domesticated livestock? In 2012, wildness won out when the National Park Service chose not to renew the lease for an oyster farm situated in an estuary long designated as “potential wilderness.” The debate leading up to that decision tore apart the tiny Northern California communities surrounding the park, as friends and neighbors were split over whether to let the oyster farm continue doing business or to remove the aquaculture operation. Signs pleading “Save Our Drakes Bay Oyster Farm” had only recently come down when, a few years ago, another debate over the future of the seashore emerged. Near the seashore’s misty headlands, a herd of free-roaming tule elk moved onto ranchland. There, the elk have barreled through range fencing, eaten livestock feed, and, according to one rancher, gored cattle. A new battle line was drawn: elk versus cows. |
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