To: FOREST SUPERVISOR KLAMATH NATIONAL FOREST

CLOSE A FOREST SERVICE ROAD & SAVE THE WILD!

We insist that the Forest Service close and revegetate, with native plants, Forest Service Road 47N80, otherwise known as the Bee Camp Road. This road serves no functional use, but remains an eyesore and invasion of otherwise Forest Service designated backcountry. It is in conflict with the Pacific Crest Trail, it allows the access of poachers, illegal off-roaders, noxious exotic invasive weeds, serves as a future obstacle to wilderness designation and is an abomination in such a critical biodiversity “hotspot.” Bee Camp Road must be closed permanently to safeguard the future health of this area of national importance.

Why is this important?

The Klamath National Forest is in charge of a critical biodiversity “hotspot” in Northern California that extends well into Southern Oregon: the SISKIYOU CREST. This petition asks the Forest Service to close and revegetate with native plants Forest Service Road 47N80, otherwise known as the Bee Camp Road. The Bee Camp Road is long defunct, boulder strewn and barely drivable, mostly by ATVs. Built to access the chromium mines in Hello Canyon in the 1940's, it is now a useless invasion of wild country.

The Bee Camp Road begins at Cook and Green Pass and heads west paralleling the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT), and surrounded by roadless wildland on all sides. The road is adjacent to the Cook and Green Pass Botanical Area and the Seiad Baker Cypress Botanical Area. The area is designated "back country" by the Klamath National Forest, and all Forest Service management direction in the area emphasizes backcountry and botanical values, wildlife, late successional reserves, and non-motorized recreation.

The Bee Camp Road represents an obstacle for wilderness designation; it is a seed source for noxious and non-native weeds; it disrupts the feeling of solitude and isolation in the Red Buttes Wilderness, the Kangaroo Roadless Area, and on the PCT. It also disturbs the abundant wildlife in the area because the road allows access for motorized vehicles, poachers, and others who seek to do harm. The Red Buttes region is the wild central core of the Siskiyou Crest, with the Condrey Mountain Roadless Area to the east and the Siskiyou Wilderness to the west. The Bee Camp Road is the only road still open to vehicular use from Cook and Green Pass to Sundown Gap, a distance of approximately 20 miles.

More info and opportunity for added comments can be found as follows. See ttp://thesiskiyoucrest.blogspot.com/2013/05/close-bee-camp-road.html
Comments may be submitted in a variety of ways. You may leave a message with your comment on the Travel Management Information Line at 530-841-4597. Hard copy comment forms are available at all Klamath National Forest offices and also on the web at http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5423782.pdf. You may also submit your comments directly into the travel management comment database by going to https://cara.ecosystem-management.org/Public/CommentInput?project=42227. Individual letters or emails are also welcome and may be submitted to the Klamath National Forest, 1711 S. Main Street, Yreka, CA 96097 Attn: Motorized Travel Management Update, or to [email protected]
.