I've lurked during some of your arguments, and noticed a few things, and I'd like to share them with you. Please pardon me if I've misunderstood you, as I've skimmed much of what you posted, but I'm getting the impression that you're talking about there being an ecosystem on the Playa that is somehow being damaged by Burning Man. The presence of surface water on the Playa during the wintertime is mentioned on your site, I believe. Check. The state of Nevada, on one of its sites, I forget which, confirms this, warning people to not drive out on the Playa during the winter, because they're likely to get stuck in the mud.
Fine. There's water. I'll give you that.
But is there an ecosystem? I've been to the Playa, and taken a good careful look at the unfamiliar looking ground, because that's the kind of geek I am. You know what I didn't see? Seeds. Nor did I see any dried out grass stalks, something that one would expect to see were this a waterfowl feeding area, with the vegetation drying up and blowing away during the dry season, as in parts of India. All I saw, even as I shook the dust off of a lot of items, was some of the purest looking dust I've ever seen, a seemingly uniformly fine powder.
As anybody who has ever dried a plant knows, dried vegetable material is amazing durable, at least in regard to decay. So, where's the debris? I have seen photos of the Playa in winter, and all I saw was bare ground, some nasty looking water, and a thin crust of ice. Nothing that would attract migratory waterfowl; there's no food.
You do make reference to Frog Pond, but my understanding, and please correct me if I'm mistaken, is that this "wetland" is nothing more than a pit that somebody dug to get to the water table. And, again, sorry if I've heard wrong, but I understand that you've been told this, and still wanted to pursue a complaint about the use of Frog Pond, anyway. This, to me, seems to be something akin to a nuisance suit, something where the spirit and purpose of the law are ignored, while one tries to trump up a complaint based on the letter of the law. BMORG is apparently restoring this pretty little area, and good for them, but it sounds to me like what you guys are saying is that if one digs for water in Pershing or Washoe county, or maybe even anywhere else, that one had better cover the hole over, or the government will come and make you stop pumping water out of the hole that you dug.
And you guys wanted to puirsue a complaint on an interpretation of the law that would read like that? Like I said, I only skimmed, maybe I misunderstood you, and my apologies if I did. But this sounds kind of messed up to me, so if I did get this wrong, please explain to be how I did, and maybe, if you could, offer some evidence in support of the hypothesis that there is an off-season ecosystem being damaged. Because somehow, hearing about piles of playa dust building up, just isn't striking horror into my heart, especially when I know that the next heavy rain will turn it all into mud anyway, ruling out the possibility that an accumulation of "playa serpents" is going to represent a lasting change in the physical character of the Playa. Right? Does a compacting mass of mud remember what it looked like before it got wet?
Allanon? Kids? Any comments?
