Spring Creek Basin Mustangs

This wonderful sight greeted me the other day as I drove into Spring Creek Basin and gave me a face-stretching grin right from the beginning.

I tie the look-at-me flagging to this sign every autumn right before third rifle season in an attempt to remind the hordes that off-road travel is verboten in the basin (throughout Disappointment Valley, as numerous signs warn). But the flagging is relevant year-round, also, particularly, in the spring when people emerge from winter hibernation and flock to the backcountry (for recreation as well as to hunt “sheds” – antlers shed by mule deer and elk – that can go for big bucks).

Neither the flagging nor the signs are a complete deterrent (as some folks “helpfully” remind me, people need to be able to read …), and every fall and spring (particularly), I find tracks of vehicles that have gone off the road and up and down broad arroyos.

Contaminates in the waterways, destruction of vulnerable seeps, crushing of vegetation that may take years – if ever – to recover. Those are just some of the reasons we want people to stick to the established roads and OFF the rest of the sensitive areas.

Most people are good visitors, I’m happy to say. There are always those who don’t care or believe they can go wherever they want to go because they’re in a vehicle that *can* take them there and/or are too lazy to get off/out of their buggies and walk 30 yards (or so) to look over a ridge or examine our water catchments. But the majority are respectful, and for that, I’m grateful.