Range teems with life Animals, plants populate area

Just east of Green Valley is an 80-square-mile island of land that’s off-limits to development, but home to bears, mountain lions, lots of rabbits, deer and cattle.

It’s the 104-year-old Santa Rita Experimental Range, now operated by the University of Arizona College of Agriculture.

It butts up against the Santa Rita Mountains on the east, lies behind the Quail Creek development on the West, is bounded on the south roughly by White House Canyon and Box Canyon roads and to the north it runs a little south of Sahuarita Road.

Through the years, a number of experiments have been tried on the range, including taking the population of certain plants, studying ways to battle termites, what are the best strategies for grazing livestock and most recently how to reign in the pest buffle grass that is sweeping over parts of the American Southwest.

Many Green Valley residents drive through the experimental range regularly. The road to popular Madera Canyon passes through the southern end of the range, which is also known as SRER.

Range Manager Mark Heitlinger operates out of the range headquarters at Florida Canyon. That’s pronounced flo-RI-da.

These days he’s spraying thick stands of buffle grass with a commercial weed killer.

Buffle grass is a hardy foreign-introduced grass that can choke out most desert vegetation and burns with a heat so intense that it can kill most other plants, including grasses, wild flowers and even trees and cacti.

Volunteer Malcolm McGreggor of Green Valley recently led a tour of the range, driving his four-wheel-drive vehicle over bumpy, rocky roads and through some muddy washes. Only once did he reverse course, when he approached a broad, muddy arroyo filled with swift-running water.

“Over there,” he said gesturing to the right, “somebody installed some hives sometime back I guess he was going to collect honey.”

But later when McGreggor drove down the road again, he found the hives smashed and all honey and beeswax gone.

“Bears probably,” he said.

And there are other vandals on the range besides bears, he said.

On the drive he paused periodically to point out where vandals had used signs or bottles for target practice. Hundreds of small bits of broken glass glinted in the morning sun.

A yellow “Open Range” sign depicting a cow was riddled.

“Look and see if there are nine holes,” he said. There were.

He said a buckshot shell contains nine pellets, favorite ammunition for some vandals.

McGreggor is the volunteer coordinator of volunteers. He said the range could use more help, patrolling roads, collecting trash and pitching in when Heitlinger could use some help.

To see about joining, call McGreggor at 625-9355 or on his cell, 403-7939.

Illegal immigrants sometimes cross the range on their trip north. Behind they leave clothes, empty water jugs, back packs, worn out shoes.

“One day I found four of those plastic containers that had held supermarket barbecued chickens,” said McGreggor.

“I guess they went down to the Safeway and got supper,” he added.

The range’s land slopes east to west, with the high side up to 5.200 feet, and the low side on the west about 2,900 feet.

There are some landmarks on the range, the old Helvetia cemetery on the northeast corner, and Huerfano butte nearby.

Huerfano means orphan in Spanish. The butte is an almost perfect upended narrow cone. McGreggor speculated that it might have been volcanic.

Huerfano Butte stands apart from other hills and mountains.

Four power lines cross the experimental range, and there are numerous roads. Route 424 to the northeast is a loop, “a good place to see desert flowers,” said McGreggor.

On Friday, about a dozen youths from Britain, Korea, France, Denmark and Belgium walked along White House Canyon Road. On their backs were tanks filled with blue dye and a liquid herbicide.

Later observers can look for the blue dye to see if the herbicide worked.

McGreggor said the young men and women were in the United States on a program sponsored by the American Conservation Experience.

Route 505 at the north end runs from Sahuarita Road to a marble mine just off the range’s east side. It’s not a quarry, but instead produces crushed marble. Route 505 is wide and well maintained.

Bill McGibbon, a former state legislator, and his family ranch the experimental range. The ranchers follow rules set out by the UA agriculture college.

There have been tests on the range about how best to graze cattle, how to preserve the range and how to grow more cows.

There are archeological sites throughout the range, like much of Southern Arizona. It’s evidence that centuries ago man found the place a great place to live.

And some of them apparently were artisans.

In 1965, “a young girl discovered a prehistoric jewelry cache while on a picnic” near Huerfano Butte, according to a 2003 Forest Service article about the the Santa Rita Experimental Range cultural resources.

jlamb@gvnews.com