Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Filching Trees in Forest Is Taboo : Crime: Stepped-up ranger patrols aim to reduce seasonal cutting of pines in Angeles National Forest. Cold weather, stiff fines are other deterrents.

Grinches planning on poaching Christmas trees from the national forests could be in for a surprise this year with stepped-up patrols and roadways closed due to icy conditions, U. S. Forest Service officials said Wednesday.

Unusually cold weather has forced the closure of most dirt roads above the 5,000-foot elevation where the most desirable pine trees thrive, said Steve Bear, Forest Service resource officer for the Tujunga District.

“Our forests are very fragile areas,” he said. “Only 25% of the Angeles Forest is covered with trees and we can’t afford to lose any. Each tree to us is an investment.”

Signs warning against the cutting of trees have been posted throughout the area and patrols have been increased. About 10 citations have been issued to impromptu woodsmen--about average for this time of year, said Roger Richcreek, an investigator for the Forest Service.

However, he estimates that at least 10 times that number of trees are chopped down every year in forests adjoining the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys without the culprits being caught. Those who are caught typically pay a fine of $75--”which is still a pretty expensive Christmas tree,” Richcreek said. The law allows fines of up to $5,000 and six months in jail.

The trees most often cut down by poachers are those planted on fill areas next to roadways. Usually only the top portion of the tree is taken, officials said.

Cutting trees in Southern California’s national forests has been prohibited for about 20 years because of conservation efforts, officials said. However, one exception is granted in the Mt. Pinos area of Frazier Park, where about 400 trees on a Forest Service plantation are cut down each December by families who pay a $2 fee.

Forest officials jokingly call the Jeffrey pines “Charlie Brown Christmas trees” because they are considered ugly and misshapen.

“You would have to do a lot of cutting off branches and drilling holes to fill in the empty spaces to make them look anything like a Christmas tree,” said John Kelly, a resources officer for the Mt. Pinos Ranger District. “But it makes a nice outing for a family.”

The Jeffrey pines are grown on a 50-acre plantation at the 7,000-foot elevation on Mt. Pinos, about 50 miles north of Santa Clarita. Each year, rangers tag the weakest and scrawniest trees for cutting, which helps keep healthy trees from being crowded out, Kelly said. Families travel from as far away as Bakersfield and the San Fernando Valley for the daylong excursion into the woods.

Forests aren’t the only targets of grinches. At a private tree farm in Valencia, owners reported “a few trees have disappeared over the back fence.”

Nancy Roatcap, whose family has operated Windmill Christmas Tree Farm at West Rye Canyon Road and Magic Mountain Parkway for 14 years, said they lose several specimens every year from the 55-acre farm where about 18,000 of the 80,000 trees are harvested annually.

How do they know when a tree has been swiped? “We can follow the path of pine needles to the fence,” Roatcap said.