BLM closes mesa land to shooters

Increasing number of recreationists using parcel

Staci Matlock | The New Mexican

7/2/2008 - 7/3/08

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management closed a 530-acre parcel of land in the Caja del Rio west of Santa Fe to target practicing Tuesday in an effort to protect petroglyphs and the safety of nearby residents.

Caja del Rio is popular with target shooters and garbage dumpers. The BLM is trying to bring both under control as an increasing number of off-roaders, mountain bikers and horseback riders recreate on the mesa.

The parcel the agency has closed is within a BLM-designated Area of Critical Environmental Concern, bordered on one side by Old Route 66 west of Santa Fe and peppered with archaeological sites. The other 8,000 acres the BLM manages on Caja del Rio will remain open for use by target shooters and recreationists. "These legal areas will remain open to the public for target shooting as long as glass bottles and jars are not shot. All shotgun shells, clay pigeons, brass casings and paper targets are to be picked up and disposed of properly," said Sam DesGeorges, Taos field manager.

The closure order encompasses lands south of the Old Route 66 (County Road 56C) down to Paseo Real (County Road 56) along the Santa Fe River near La Cieneguilla Land Grant west of Santa Fe Municipal Airport. The order will remain in place until the a resource management plan is finished sometime in 2011.

Since BLM law enforcement ranger Jon Sering started in February, he has issued 10 citations on the Caja del Rio to people for littering (including shooting glass bottles) and endangering public safety (shooting across the mesa in the direction of La Cieneguilla homes).

Just as often, Sering hasn't issued citations to someone shooting at glass bottles, but instead hands them a shovel and a plastic bag to clean up the mess. Part of his job is educating people about the proper place and way to target practice, he said.

Steve Blotter, a sportsman who works at Tina's Range Gear, a Santa Fe gun shop, said the areas where people are target shooting at Caja del Rio with little oversight are "absolute pig pens."

He said he thinks it's a good idea the BLM is trying to control target shooting in the Caja del Rio area. Even better would be for the agency or some other entity to re-establish a public range. He said there used to be a nice one where the state Department of Game and Fish offices now sit off Caja del Rio Road. When it closed, nothing took its place but free-for-all target practicing on public lands. "I know the sportsmen would be tickled to death if they would reopen a public target range," Blotter said.

Petroglyphs and cows have been the targets of shooters in the Caja del Rio in the last few years. BLM archaeologist Paul Williams and staff photographed and documented 4,000 petroglyphs on the Caja del Rio's black volcanic escarpment. Over the years, periodic bullet holes have marred the ancient drawings.

In 2005, two cows in the area were shot and left to die near the petroglyphs.

Sering said about 30 volunteers, most of them target shooters, helped clean up both legal and illegal shooting areas on the Caja del Rio in May. "We were planning on hauling off 10 tons. We ended up hauling out 55 tons of stuff, everything from old state signs, shotgun shells, trash and dumped sofas," Sering said.

Sering, who lives in La Cienega, spent five years with BLM law enforcement in Moab, Utah. "I had not one trash-dumping incident in that time," Sering said. But he regularly has to tell people not to dump on the mesa west of Santa Fe.

Sering also developed a list of good target practice habits he hands out to people he meets on the mesa. He said ideally sportsmen will bring their own paper targets and take the targets with them when they go. Shooting at glass bottles even in open areas is a no-no. Shooting at metal runs the risk of a ricochet, he said.

The Caja del Rio is not the only BLM area with errant shooters and dumpers. Sering is meeting with Las Campanas homeowners this month because of problems in the Buckman area near the Rio Grande.

Contact Staci Matlock at 470-9843 or smatlock@sfnewmexican.com.