Tin Mines Hike Tomorrow

At entrance to Franklin Mountain Tin Mines

There are some really cool hikes coming up.  As always, I suggest that you visit and bookmark El Paso Hiking Meet-up and the Las Cruces Hiking Meet-up as well as the Ocotillo Hikers of Las Cruces for schedules of great hikes. Join the El Paso and Las Cruces meet-up groups so that you receive email about hikes as soon as they are scheduled.

Tomorrow, Saturday, January 7^th plan to hike to the only Tin Mines ever in the United States. They are located in the northeast Franklins. The hike begins at 8 a.m. Get details here including where to meet. The El Paso Tin Mining and Smelting Company operated in the northeast Franklins from 1909 until 1915 when it was shut down for lack of productive ore. 

Also tomorrow is a hike in Fillmore Canyon at Dripping Springs in the Organ Mountains. Go to the El Paso Hiking Meet-up description for the details.

The El Paso/Trans Pecos Audubon Society is planning the annual trip to Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge to see ducks, cranes, geese and other birds and wildlife. (Map) Mark and Janet Perkins will be at the Refuge on Friday, January 13^th,  for those who want to join them that day.  Those who arrive on Saturday will meet at 1:00 p.m. at the Refuge Visitor's Center.  There are also plans for a trip to the Sandia Mountains for the Rosy Finch banding (weather permitting).  Beginners and nonmembers are welcome.  Please RSVP as soon as possible.  Reservations are required for this trip.  There is a detailed Itinerary available upon request.  Contact Mark at 637-3521 or mperkins4@elp.rr.com.

Every Sunday is Scenic Sunday at Scenic Drive from 7 a.m. to Noon. Walk, run or bicycle this 4.1 mile round trip of panoramic views and 500 million-year-old fossils. Also, get to know the El Paso Zoo. If you visit all of the exhibits on this fabulous 35 acres, you will walk a mile. Keep track of Zoo Events.

Excelsior!

El Paso Is Losing Out on $18 Million

Here's a follow-up to yesterday's post about the Rio Bosque's precarious situation.

The nonprofit, independent research group, Headwaters Economics, published a fact sheet, Quick Facts: The Economic Benefits of Southern New Mexico's Natural Assets, Fall 2010. Item #3 states:

"Bird watching alone is significant for New Mexico, and the state ranks fifth nationally with 46 percent of its birders coming from outside its borders. The Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, for example, brings in $13.7 million annually from non-residents to the three counties of Socorro, Bernalillo, and Sierra; along with $4.3 million in regional tax revenue."

That's $18 million!

As a matter of fact, I know birders and Master Naturalists and hikers and friends and neighbors from El Paso who frequently go to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. El Paso's Rio Bosque Wetlands Park could be a similar attraction not just for wildlife but for eco-tourist and tax dollars.

So how do we as a City invest in the Rio Bosque? The City contributes $10,000. EPWU lets John Sproul and volunteers truck water from the Bustamante Plant so that they can laboriously hand-water suffering and dying trees. The El Paso County Water Improvement District #1 prevents 7,800 acre-feet per year of water from the Bustamante from being piped directly to the Bosque past their canal and their drain. The El Paso County Water Improvement District #1 sucks groundwater from the Bosque when one of its wells (CW-4) is operating.

We just bought Sea Biscuit and we have put him out to pasture to die.

The City of El Paso will also provide a sculpture and signage for the Park. The City will spend $170,000 on that art project but not a dime extra for needed equipment in the Park. Moreover, the interest in the Park by the City's Parks and Recreation Department is nil - just an item on their inventory like several other neglected natural areas.

With all due apologies to my friends at MCAD and the Public Art Program, the sculptor who they hired to do the Rio Bosque sculpture and signage is Heath Satow, whose studio is in Los Angeles. He's good at what he does; but he will take the $170,000 and spend and/or invest it in . . . Los Angeles not El Paso.

$18 million!

That's the kind of change that could come El Paso's way if it just got smart about eco-tourisism and places such as the Rio Bosque. I bet a few changes at City Hall and a Green Chamber of Commerce for El Paso would help matters.