FS, LANL impeding Park Service plans at VCNP

Indigenous history in the Valles Caldera goes back at least 8,000 years and obsidian quarried there for knives and projectile points is found throughout the region. The ancestors of Jemez Pueblo or Walatowa migrated into the area in the late 13th Century after Mesa Verde was laid bare. Pre-European Indigenous cultures in the Jemez Mountains and around the caldera raised turkeys, beans, squash and maize. 

Today, cattle trespasses are creating problems on the Valles Caldera National Preserve as the National Park Service makes plans to bring more visitors to the Jemez Mountains. And, if tourists are heading to the Preserve from Los Alamos drivers must go through a series of guardhouses at the boundaries of the National Laboratory, present identification and promise not to take any pictures for a four and a half mile stretch. 

VCNP enjoys a multi-year funding agreement with the Pueblo of Santa Clara for road maintenance on 54 miles of roads within the park and the Park Service intends to add food vendors at the visitors center.

This National Park attracted more than 76,000 people in 2023 and the Valles Caldera team have numerous plans to help bring more attention to the park while also preserving and maintaining it for the future. The long-range management plan includes the possibility of rerouting the main entrance road away from the wetlands as well as paving it. Big plans are also in the works for Sulphur Springs, the park’s geothermal site. The gurgling of mud pots and an acid green pond with its own pockets of bubbling water make it prime to be a popular spot for visitors. Fire mitigation is another major focus. The problem is more and more trees are getting packed tightly together, totaling between 1,000-2,000 trees per acre. A cattle wrangler has also been hired and corrals are erected to collect wayward cows. [Valles Caldera National Preserve Shares Big Plans]

Cattle manure contaminated with bovine growth hormones and antibiotics introduced into critical watersheds is epidemic even on public lands.

“I feel a deep sense of betrayal,” said Madeleine Carey, Southwest Conservation Manager for WildEarth Guardians. “We were promised this persistent issue would be dealt with and, if anything, things have gotten worse.” [Heinrich presses forest service chief on fencing to keep cattle from entering the Valles Caldera National Preserve]