Rocks being stolen from Death Valley Racetrack?

[justinblack]

I was recently in Death Valley for two weeks and made my first trip to the Racetrack Playa,

home of the "mysterious" moving rocks. Actually, the wind-powered means of the rocks'

locomotion was fairly obvious to me, though two more mundane phenomena did perplex

me.

 

The first was that there were a number of rock tracks without a rock at the terminus. Since

the rocks clearly remain on the surface when the playa is wet and presumably don't vanish

into thin air, I can only assume that some frickin' idiots have been stealing them. The

motivation for this baffles me, because once removed from context of its track, a racetrack

stone becomes a very dull and boring piece of grey rock.

 

The second issue was several sets of human footprints on the playa, made when the mud

was wet (the prohibition against walking on the playa when wet is clearly signposted). It

will most likely take decades for this damage to heal.

 

What is it with people?!?

[phyrpowr]

You can't cure "stupid"... without leaving evidence for the CSI people...though a silencer and stolen license tags help...not that I'd recommend that...BTW, silencers don't work on revolvers

[stp]

Some people believe the rocks have magical properties, and they take the rocks for

the good karma that they will impart. The ignorance and inconsideration are

incredible.

[joseph_wisniewski]

So typical.

 

An example close to home - have you ever been to Grindstone City, Michigan? Don't expect to see any grindstones, people stole them all decades ago.

[stp]

Or the old truck (1930s) at the abandoned homesite near the Ryan campground in

Joshua Tree? I've watched the truck disappear over the years as souvenir hunters

gradually reduce it to a frame.

[roy1]

guys, lets not start making a list... .<p>

finding soda/snapple bottles "hidden" along a hiking trail is more than enough to get me aggravated.

[stp]

Yes, for every person who "takes," there are many more who "give."

[rick_wong]

http://www.snopes.com/luck/pele.asp

While vacationing on the big Island I met a local who's job is to return rocks that people mail back to the postoffice in Hilo. It seems that Pele puts a curse on the rocks and sand taken from the park.

 

Later Rick

[gloria_hopkins]

It's probably the "I'm Special" complex. One person takes a stone, thinking they're the only one taking a stone, and what harm can just one missing stone do?

 

Stupidity and maliciousness play no part, I'm sure. It is probably just a healthy sense of wonder and awe, blissful ignorance and the inability to recognize that one's actions in a natural environment, however small, can have tremendous impact.

[bill_thorlin]

The situation is further proof that "tourism" corrupts unless it is very carefully regulated and in some circumstances it is very difficult to regulate it without considerable ( prohibitive ? ) expense.

 

There is also no legislating for idiots - there are those that believe powdered rhino horn is an aphrodisiac and will pay big money for it - hence an endangered species.

 

Education is I suppose the answer but it takes a long time - do we have that time ?

[steve_levine]

Let's remember that in the late 1800's, the Sante Fe RR hauled tourists to ancient native American ruins. And would loan them hammers to smash open walls, so they could find pottery!

[bill_thorlin]

Hope things have improved since :)

[christian deichert]

I am constantly disappointed by this. Worst case I have seen recently was in UR, Iraq. The compound of UR consists of a ziggurat, royal tombs, a palace, a small city, and the "reconstructed" (read: fake) House of Abram; the entire property islocated insude the outer perimeter of Tallil Air Base. Dutch and Italian coalition soldiers (though, according to our guide, few if any American soldiers) have been caught excavating for artifacts, essentially grave robbing.

 

Similar to the Pele curse above: Petrified Forest National Park has a display of "cursed" petrified wood that has been returned, as well as a sampling of letters.

[Brian]

Old stuff inevitably gets knocked down and disappears: it's no good having too much hand-wringing and general grief over it. One of the prime examples is the Colisseum in Rome, which has been reduced to its current state of ruin by the local inhabitants, who have systematically taken the stones for centuries to build or repair their own houses. This kind of thing happens wholesale, and if it didn't, we wouldn't be able to move for antiquities.

[eye-of-searle]

"An example close to home - have you ever been to Grindstone City, Michigan? Don't expect to see any grindstones, people stole them all decades ago."

 

Great Ice Cream there! And yes, no grindstones except for the few in residents yards.

[justinblack]

I thought you'd all like to see this photo of footprints on the racetrack, kindly supplied to

me courtesy of Colorado photographer Peter Holcombe who I ran into while

photographing at the Racetrack in late March.

 

Photo: ﾩ 2006 www.HolcombePhotography.com<div></div>

[peter_lawrence]

To me, the biggest pet peeve I have about bad tourist behavior at National Parks is the

feeding of animals. I seen people feed squirrels, marmots and other small animals right in

front of "Do not feed the animals" signs! I've also seen people try to feed larger animals

like foxes and deer. Some people just don't have a clue.

[kathywilson]

I'd like to attribute such appalling behavior to an overwhelming sense of awe, and wanting to be part of it. But considering the damage it does, I just can't find it in myself to do so. When I saw a guy throw a cigarette butt on the ground at Canyonlands NP I nearly came unglued. "Take a look around you for God's sake! Pick your butt up and throw it in your car if you want to burn soemthing!" Even if it didn't start a fire - a small bird or mammal could eat it and the nicotine could kill it, to say nothing of the ugliness of another piece of trash. Ignorance, stupidity, carelessness... or just sheer dumb human nature... whatever it is, it's epidemic and incurable.

[bill_thorlin]

Perhaps if we were more outspoken it might have an effect on the "rotten apples" who spoil things for so many - perhaps.

[daniel_smith6]

And I have photos of rocks and tracks in the 1980's as well. It is not a new phenomena this stealing of rocks, leaving new rocks and walking on the wet mud. It has been going on since the place was discovered as friends who have photographed there since the 1940's have shown me old diary entries with the same complaints then.

[gloria_hopkins]

Kathy: The cigarette butt thing is my biggest pet peeve of all time. I once got out of my car, picked up the butt and gave it back to the person. I really, really hate that.

 

If I may wander off topic a little, relevant to tossing trash out the window, I'd like to mention something else. Some think it's OK to throw things like empty sunflower seeds or peanuts out the window. They're natural, biodegradable, came from the ground, etc.

 

What they don't know is that small animals are attracted to this roadside natural trash, thinking its food. They get hit by cars. Raptors are attracted to the small animals and they are also hit by cars. Something as unlikely as a spent sunflower seed, can kill.

[joseph_wisniewski]

Daniel - do you think people would be influenced by a sign that said:

 

These are not 'magical' rocks!

 

Inconsiderate people keep taking the rocks as souvenirs, and kind hearted volunteers constantly place new rocks here to make up for the ones that are stolen. This has been going on for over 100 years, and there is not a single original rock left in this place. Every rock here came from someone's rock garden.

 

It is the magic of this place that makes any old rock move. Relax, and enjoy this, but don't take the rocks, they're really not special.

[oliver_tan1]

I was just at the Racetrack Playa April 16th and noticed that some of the rocks were missing and there were lots of footprints. To think that 2-3 hours of driving in a washboard dirt road would deter people! On the other hand, maybe some people use it to anchor themselves when the wind gusts reach 30mph.

[ruschhaupt]

I was raised in Yosemite National Park, and I have to say that once I read through all of your comments... YOU'RE ALL RIGHT! And in Yosemite, I learned (no, I didn't create it) a term the sums-up all of our pent-up emotions about the less-thoughtful and more malicious of our species: "tourons." I was surprised to not see this curse word listed in a prior post, however, I thought I would share this with the group so you could have something meaningful that you can shout out to the tourist-moron du jour. Trust me- you'll feel so much better, though it does turn an enchanting day into a New York moment.

 

Daniel Smith and Brian Southward are especially right, this sort of thing has been happening forever, and will continue. Do what you can when you see it happen, and especially report the offenders to an authority. When you see new damage, reporting this will also arm the management agency from that area with better data to demand more funding for monitoring and enforcement.

 

When I was younger, I would say before 10 years old, the park rangers in Yosemite were park rangers. After that I began to notice serious upgrades in training and enforcement from the massive amount of law-breakers (btw- any law broken in a National Park is a Federal offense). Now the rangers are fully-armed and tactically trained police officers. No naturalist component, other than the visitor's center.

 

To tie this back into photography; you have a camera- use it! Evidence goes so much further than he said/she said.

[david_senesac]

Just another sad story of selfish morons mutilating famous places in the natural world the rest of us so value. Of course there are many stories of this kind of behavior from the past. I'm all for dishing out harsh painful punishment on anyone caught. One that stands out is the jeffrey pine atop Sentinel Dome in Yosemite. Cretins would break off branches as souveniers or climb up into the little branches for photos. And then some fruitcake they caught lit it on fire. Any place people can drive a vehicle to without hiking presents an opportunity for the selfish morons to carry off material. So I'd be all for the DV park service truncating road access out there in order to make people walk a mile or three. That way no one would be too inclined to lug out those sizeable rocks.

 

...David