Water Diversions, Hash Lab, etc. Cited in Yesterday’s Raids at Illegal Grow Sites
On July 10, 2018, deputies with the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Drug Enforcement Unit (DEU) served three search warrants to investigate the illegal cultivation of marijuana in the area of the Cedar Creek watershed in Northern Humboldt County. The following agencies assisted in the service of the warrants: California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Humboldt County Environmental Health and HAZMAT Unit, California State Water Board, Humboldt County Planning and Building Department and Cal Fire.
Three parcels were investigated during the service of the search warrants. The parcels did not possess nor were in the process of actively obtaining a commercial cannabis permit with the County of Humboldt.
Between the three parcels, deputies located multiple greenhouses with growing marijuana plants inside. Deputies eradicated a total of 6,677 growing marijuana plants. All three parcels were diverting water directly out of Cedar Creek.
At the third parcel, deputies located an unpermitted butane hash oil lab discharging an unknown hazardous sludge into Cedar Creek. At this site, deputies also located 238 pounds of processed marijuana, over 200 twenty-gallon tanks of butane and 25 pounds of pesticide.
Between the three parcels, assisting agencies found the following violations:
Nine water diversion violations (up to $8,000 fine per day, per violation)
Five water pollution violations (up to $20,000 fine per day, per violation)
Four depositing trash in or near a waterway violations (up to $20,000 fine per day, per violation)
Improper storage and removal of solid waste violation (up to $25,000 fine per day)
Multiple grading without a permit violations (up to $10,000 fine per day, per violation)
Multiple building code violations (up to $10,000 fine per day, per violation)
Failure to prevent a hazardous waste release (up to $25,000 per day fine)
Failure to report a hazardous waste release (up to $25,000 per day fine)
Mismanagement of hazardous waste (up to $25,000 per day fine)
Failure to create and file a hazmat business plan (up to $25,000 per day fine)
Discharge of waste into state waters violation (up to $5,000 per day fine or $20 per gallon of waste discharged)
Dredge or fill of wetlands violation (up to $5,000 per day fine)
No arrests were made during the service of the warrants. Additional violations with civil fines are expected to be filed by the assisting agencies.
Anyone with information about these cases or related criminal activity is encouraged to call the Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at (707) 268-2539.
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Hang em high….
the orange sludge in the creek is naturally occurring iron oxides and a byproduct of historical logging operations. its from the iron in the silt.
>”the orange sludge in the creek is naturally occurring iron oxides”
Whatever it is… it’s not bothering the plants much.
its harmless. but it does stain and odorize your skin if you handle it. large amounts like this are more associated with mining discharges, but in the northcoast, due to the Franciscan formation, it is associated with historical logging practices. a creek that flows onto my property from Green Diamond property looks no different than this one. if you google “iron oxides in creeks” you can see other examples.
i’ve never seen so much in one spot, i always thought it came from buried organic matter, or a mat of bacteria living at the point where the iron juice hits the air. I wonder where the lab stuff came from… Oh Bhogart.
fucken pigs, good they busted them!!
Enhancing hard drug business.soon a superflu will be easily imported thus.atom bombs were Inpracticle diversion of attention.law is stupid and thieving and destructive.
They use refrigerant for extraction? Is that safe for humans?
Doubt they care either way.
I think they use the refrigerant to cool the extractors
its butane in those refrigerant tanks, r600a is isobutane. just a way not to say butane in big bold letters when your ordering in bulk like these guy must have been.
Just another thug pot grower site,look at me with my jacked up new truck and my tats , what do you think of my cool sunglasses and flat bill hat. Don’t worry about the sludge or the rodicide or the stacks of butane, its all cool for the environment! , Catch up with me and my homies at the next rae-gay deal.
those five BHOGART vacuum ovens abalone are $8k each. Someone had an investment.
Mmmmmm abalone
That’s what I was thinking. Seems irresponsible to sell butane extraction equipment without a buyer being licensed. Taking these toxins up to the mountains — such a good idea.
Were are the property owners Who are they They didn’t just move in last week If I owned property out in these the way places I would be checking on it They hold some responsible If they had called police a long time ago much less danger to the land
What is the anti freeze for? and why be so slovenly? Is HCSO just looking for the grossest (sp?) grows they can find so we are all just disgusted by the pure disregard for the environment let alone personal cleanliness.
Usually when you empty a 20 gallon propane tank you take it into town to refill it. Not just throw it down and buy a new one.
BHOGart isn’t that some fancy new marijuana processing plant in Eureka?
I have been around logging operations some and never have seen the deep sludge like seen in the creek pictured here.
This is just irresponsible and disgusting, terrible operation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron-oxidizing_bacteria
The coolant fluid was used for lab chillers, they push anti freeze as the coolant to freeze the columns of the hash extracts.
That was my question – probably the most toxic thing there – 55 gallons of ethylene glycol?? Sheesh!
Coolant for a rotor evaporator, probably.
law enforcement like to help trash the properties before taking their photos. I bet that didn’t look like that prior to the raid. Don’t get me wrong, butane oil extraction is gross, especially when not disposed of properly. But let’s be real, both sides are dirt bags.
I bet the trash was exactly like that.. I’ve seen places like this. The 25 pounds of pesticide speaks volumes.
I was kinda thinking the same thing. If you look at that one picture of all the trash strewn about there looks to be a bag for about every bag worth of trash. Not saying they shouldn’t have done a dump run long ago but kinda looks like bags were cut open and dumped out. Either that or an animal got in it very recently. What do you think?
That’s what happens when trash is left out the bears and other animals rip I to it.
If left long enough the sun degrades the bags and they fall to pieces, even if critters don’t help out.
In answer to your question–MEN.
This all should be an embarrassment to the cannabis industry. However I don’t think it bothers them. They will say it’s not me, we do the right thing. I say BS!
So much for self governing and policing themselves.
Just shameful for our communities to have to put up with environmental disregard from people who just don’t care!
The cannabis industry IS embarrassed by these types of sites. No, not all cannabis farms look like this. Yes, mamy non-cannabis farms look like this. If you dont believe it, you are unaware of what goes on around the world. This disgusting disregard for the earth is a result of the human condition, not being a pot grower. It is clear that more attention is currently given to the cannabis industry in terms of rules, regulations, and enforcement than most other forms of ag and business, but I am glad these sites are being cleaned up because it will make the cannabis industry more resposible for their actions (probably more so than any other industry affecting the environment)
I’m very concerned about something that can be fixed. The Cannabis industry can make it right. Follow good environmental practices and follow the state and county regulations.
Yes I’m very aware of the affects of communities that have horrible pollution conditions around the world.
For now my major concern is with my local community before we reach that level.
Imported workers to clean it up for minimum wage.
Or maybe the cannabis industry is just an embarrassment? Greed and money does weird things to people.
If the black market cannibis could just be priced out of the woods, environmental problems like this would go away.
Hopefully someday it will be grown by professional farmers in the Central Valley!
As of now the industry is an embarrassment to our community.
I live in a town that I am now ashamed to call home. I hesitate to tell people where I’m from when they ask.
Hopefully soon it will all change for the good.
Until someone invents seedless weed, the industry has no choice but to stay on the hill.
Professional farmers in central valley…Lol..laugh my ass off.you have not a clue amigo…sorry about your luck
Commander Cody is that you?
See? This is why we can’t have nice things!
I am personally offended by this mess, and I certainly hope someone is held accountable!
Sites like this one are the reason why we don’t want pot growers in our county.
do you want ants?
because that’s how you get ants! (and the authorities)
Ants draw toads.
And multiply the mess times 25000!
There is an outrageous cancer cluster in Humboldt. Could sites like this one be at fault? Growing marijuana should be done on farmland by professional farmers!
Don’t buy black market weed!
That’s why i keep mine as natural as posable just makes you feel better inside knowing your product is clean
For 60 years plastics have been endrocrine disrupters.poisons too.
where do you get 25,000? this site sucks, but it is not typical. there might be 4,000 parcels with grows in Humboldt. the 400-500 permitted ones don’t look like that.
Cancer? Where you here for the cabbage-poo smell that soaked Eureka until the Pulp mill shut down? What about the pressure treating of wood here? Greed and disregard of the Environment have plagued this area long before weed.
here is a perspective on conical burner use in Arcata in the 40s.
http://library.humboldt.edu/humco/holdings/collection_images/shuster/large/2001011200.jpg
Plastic imported stuff.
Plastic water lines…
Smoking a toxic product probably does not help much…
there are multiple cancer cluster areas, each with individual sources. the largest is Humboldt Hill which was downwind of the pulp mills. the conical burners were also sources, each one, but some burned treated mill ends, which is the main source of dioxins in our area and those would have been the bad ones to live near. we have one of the highest rates of down syndrome in the US and its 100% from dioxins. some of these grows and redneck properties on water wells create there own individual cancer source if they contaminate their well with surface dumping of toxins (like a chop shop or pretty much every property on the rural east side of MCK).
Humboldt hill had the power plant as well; the old plywood mill burned its spent glue mixed with shavings, etc for power and steam after they got caught discharging it in the bay. “Treated” wood, most likely “penta” that is a fungicide was used a lot; Emerson mill did for years and they were right on the bay, a number of others as well. Blue Lake Forest used it and got away with capping contaminated areas, now the plume is heading to mad river and our water supply.
Wish Trinity County would step up their enforcement against illegal grows as well.
“Cedar Creek watershed in Northern Humboldt County” is vague. Can you tell me what town it is near?
Google says it is west of Willow Creek not far from 299.
Thanks! When I googled it I had Cedar Creeks all over the US.
Where were they yesterday? All of the pictures state they are from the day before.
Cedar Creek is a major tributary of Horse Linto Creek, which is itself a major trib on the lower Trinity, entering the river south of Hoopa, and an important spawning creek for chinook and steelhead.
“Those ruining the earth,will be brought to ruin”
Hope you are right.
“Those ruining the earth,will be brought to ruin”
That’s why, not only would I never dream of firing up a hash lab, I also choose to bypass meat and dairy .
Industrial meat/dairy is a karmic train wreck for this earth!! It is implicated in 50% of global warming!!! It generates nasty effluent, water waste and contamination by the trillions of gallons, causes untold suffering to fellow sentient beings, and exposes everyone who consumes it to a horrifying concoction of drugs, pus and e coli. We don’t need meat to survive. Our obvious epidemic of fat sick weak blobs of citizens is a joke! 50% are OBESE! Heart disease kills 50% of us! Everyone is aware those problems are directly linked to consumption of meat, dairy, and processed garbage . But oh no, everyone is a busy body peace loving Eco Freak , until they eat.. then no fucks are given. Put that on the BBQ.
Why doesn’t the Sheriff’s department ever say who the land owners are? Ultimately the clean up bill should fall to the property owner as a lien. When the property owner does not pay on the lien and then the property should be auctioned off by the County.
Fukn ugly all around. U guys should truly be ashamed of your actions. Pick up you trash you lazy pigs! Jeeezzz. This is what gives “cannibis “ “farmers” a bad name is doo doos like this.
Cedar Creek is a tributary to Willow Creek, which runs into the Trinity and into the Hoopa Water Treatment Plant.
Many Hoopa have cancer, and they blame the water supply…
Just pour deisal on the whole place light it up get the hell out of the way let it burn bring in cat hule it all out put bad people in jail very simple thats what all these places need a make over
BHOGART has destroyed more lives than it has helped…
#justsaybhNO!
By the looks of all that trash lying all over I would say that they are deffently gross polutors.
Fuck em that’s horrible to do that to our beautiful water sheds of course no arrests.
Thank you Kym and thank you law enforcement agencies. Nearby resident I am.
Truly disgusting. Considering the amount of money obviously invested in this operation, you wouldn’t think going to the dump once in a while would break their budget.
I said it here years ago….BHOgart is the problem. Shut them down or track their equipment for big busts to be had. Yet there they are proudly selling their BHO equipment in Eureka, flaunting it in our faces. Then later we are shocked that their equipment is all over ugly backwoods factories?!!
They have a distribution / retail location in Grants Pass also.
There are a few of these abated grows in our neighborhood. The property owners forfeited the land to avoid paying huge fines. If the property is now owned by Humboldt county or the state I don’t know but the outdoor gardens on a couple have been planted again this season. Maybe hcso will cut them maybe not with no one left to fine or arrest. When the cats away the mice will play
Ever since the white man arrived in Humboldt, andwherever they go, it has been environmental devastation.
Before the white man arrived on the north coast, environmental damage was limited only because the technology wasn’t there to do more. The natives then did what damage they were capable of from gill netting to firing to keep prairies clear. Changing the environment to suit is a human speciality.
All the money these growers make and they can’t even take a load of trash to the dump every now and then. They divert and pollute the land and waterways and then argue they should be left alone because they are making medicine.
Sorry but race does not cause environmental devastation. There are plenty of yards in Hoopa that have piles of household garbage in them just like the piles at this grow, only they’re not grows, they’re residences. I realize crying race this and race that is the “in” thing to do these days but it’s getting old. There are bad people and good people in every race that exist so get over it.
almost every property on the rural eastside of MCK looks like this and many in Fieldbrook, Glendale, Blue lake. its called low income.
Never was a snitch but now is the time if you know someone like this!!!!
DON’T BUY OR DEAL IN BLACK MARKET WEED! SMOKING POISONED WEED MAY NOT KILL YOU TODAY, BUT CLEARLY, IT MAY KILL YOU LATER…
“Legal” poisoned plants are better?
Buy Black Market Only! Only fools equate “legal” with “clean”. Anyone who believes that the government regulators have our best interests (our health) in mind when they create these laws has either been duped by government propaganda or are just too blind to see reality. Some examples to prove my point are: the food we all consume (read the ingredients), pharmaceuticals (where do I begin?), tobacco (do you honestly believe that Marlboro you smoke is simply a rolling paper with organic tobacco inside? You probably do.), pesticides and herbicides (Roundup!), meat(isn’t it amazing how the meat we buy is always so perfectly red and pretty?), and the list goes on to include every single product we consume in this country. All regulated and all very unhealthy for us because of those regulations. Weed is sadly on the verge of being taken over by those same regulators but there is still one little shimmer of fading light. Buy Black Market Only!
This is disgusting but there are plenty of non-marijuana properties that are just as trashy with evironmental damages who are not held accountable. The news rarely shows positive marijuana news, cannabis industry businesses & farms who are doing things correctly. This contributes to miseducation & derogatory stigma.
I agree100%
Why, you see it at every site, why can’t the inhabitants or workers or whatever they call themselves, put their trash in a trash bag? Is it too hard to reach over a foot or so and use the black plastic bags that are all over the place to keep the trash in one place? Or do they have “homeless-it is”, observable in Eureka and environs, a disorder which prevents someone from using trash receptacles…
Idk but the news does not showoff the many proper farms & seems to mostly highlight disasters. Non-cannabis property’s are not blasted in the news or by law enforcement for being trashy & environmental damage. If the County truly cares about waste management, they’d have more trash pickup routes… I’m sure this would solve a lot of trash prblms.
I think we should thank the pretend representatives labeled Supes. The most devastation has happened in the last 24 months from when they unlawfully taxed uninformed farmers and pushed anti-nature indoor grows with threats and coercion. If you, in the private, don’t sign-up for “legal” Public idiocy, we’ll come and attack you and call planting nature in nature by nature, a crime.
Look at the front of the courthouse. It looks like ground zero.
Why would anyone trust those who have proved to be so untrustworthy?
Nothing impactful. The sludge is natural occurring with healthy native plant s growing in the middle . Because it’s from iron in the soil. Iron makes plants greener as you can tell by what’s growing the middle of the so called sludge. A bunch of garbage bags that a bear a got into is worst I see in these pictures . A normal humboldt property grower or not . A nice greenhouse that’s cleaner than the legal ones I’ve seen and a nice clean bholab same as the legal ones . The only different is they didn’t pay the tax permit money takers fees . If they did they would have the image of legal good people that are permitted angel growers that just want to keep humboldt brand alive .
Sliding hillside doesn’t bother you?
If it is not natural occurring . I’ve seen many . Then I see the old stumps that shows signs of logging . But dirt erosion being the big issue. They should have cut the hill at 40 degree angle like the professionals to prevent but it’s makes its own 40 degree angle . And after our huge raining season the year before erosion is expected . So if they would have cut the hillside better they wouldn’t be criminals . If that’s the case . I am against damaging the environment but I thinks it’s being exaggerated in the name of tax and permit money . I understand what your saying and how you feel . I appreciate your work as a journalist . I love this site .
You would think the smart biologists would know that it’s iron seepage and not take pictures and pretend it’s bho. But Remember police can lie to you there trained too but you can’t lie to them it’s illegal. Google it if you don’t believe me that it’s iron. There dramatizing there efforts as any smart person can see . The environmental issues are always exaggerated because that’s all they can come up with to justify there efforts .
There are a thousand grows just like this in Trinity Pines and no one gives two shits, not TCSO or F&W.
Yeah it is pretty crazy if you go on google maps and look at trinity pines it is so blown up and basically right in the middle of it is a US forest ranger station and they apparently don’t care either.
Exactly trinity pines is insane you can just drive in the pines and see everything that’s happening from the road. Nobody has fences just a bunch of blown over weed matting but its safety in numbers I think. Because theres so many and all out in the open they are just overwhelmed by it. Maybe they have sympathy for the Hmong people?
I want to see them in the national forest busting the big cartel grows soon .
“Don’t you look at me so smug
And say I’m going bad.
Who are you to judge me
And the life that I live?
I know that I’m not perfect
And that I don’t claim to be.
So before you point your fingers,
Be sure your hands are clean.
Judge not
Before you judge yourself.
Judge not
If you’re not ready for judgement.
The road of life is rocking
And you may stumble too.
So while you talk about me,
someone else is judging you.”