Survival Training : Marines, Babbitt OK Pact of Coexistence With Wildlife at Camp Pendleton

On a windblown promontory at Camp Pendleton, a Marine Corps general on Monday surveyed a seemingly incongruous example of peaceful coexistence: a firing range and a nesting area for endangered birds.

And he was as proud of it as he might have been of a nicely executed amphibious assault or a guns-blazing helicopter attack on an enemy stronghold.

Maj. Gen. Claude Reinke, commanding general of this sprawling 125,000-acre base, was showing U.S. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt how the busiest firing range in the Marine Corps is located not all that far from the world’s most populous nesting area for a tiny endangered bird called the least Bell’s vireo.

The vireo is in deep trouble elsewhere in Southern California, but at Camp Pendleton the little brown bird is flourishing nicely, increasing its numbers tenfold in recent years thanks to steps taken by the Marine Corps to enhance the bird’s habitat and control predators.

“We’ve made the birds happy, and we’re happy too,” Reinke said.

Babbitt had come to Pendleton to congratulate the Marine Corps on work done saving the base’s native fauna and to sign a pact between the corps and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to redouble efforts at species conservation.

Babbitt said the agreement, a product of the spirit of compromise, is the first such agreement involving a West Coast military base and should serve as a model for other pacts.

The agreement, called a “biological opinion,” covers the beachfront and riverfront portions of the base and six important species that live there: the least Bell’s vireo, the Southwestern willow flycatcher, the California least tern, the arroyo toad, the tidewater goby and the snowy plover.

Under the agreement, the Marine Corps and the Fish and Wildlife Service will work to find a suitable middle ground between the need of the corps to train troops for war and the service’s desire to protect as many species as possible.

Certain parts of the base’s 17.1 miles of shoreline are off-limits during nesting season and military dependents in certain housing areas are not allowed to keep cats and dogs, lest the pets gobble up endangered birds.

“Our first mission is to train Marines,” Reinke said. “When they’re on the battlefield and bullets are flying, Marines are kind of an endangered species, too, that we think we can keep alive through training. But we don’t think that is incompatible with other missions like saving birds and animals.”

Babbitt said the agreement, which was 10 months in the making, began with both sides “learning to understand the culture of the other side.” The cultural differences were readily apparent at the signing ceremony, where many Fish and Wildlife employees were wearing beards, long hair, jewelry and casual shoes and the Marines were in camouflage, jungle boots and “sidewall” haircuts.

“You’re never going to turn a military base into a wilderness area, but we can live together,” said Babbitt, who presented Reinke with a ceramic statue of an eagle.

Camp Pendleton, home base for 40,000 active-duty Marines and sailors and 22,000 reservists, contains 250 species of birds, 60 of mammals and 45 of reptiles. Possibly the best known are the California gnatcatcher, golden eagles and buffalo, of which there are 66.

The Santa Margarita River, one of the last unchanneled rivers in Southern California, flows through the base to the sea, providing habitat for birds and small reptiles. The river estuary is a stopping point for birds on their annual migration.

“It looks kind of barren right now,” Reinke told Babbitt as they inspected the river mouth, “but it’s the lifeblood of a bunch of birds.”

The agreement may mean the Marines will not be able to build facilities or train troops in certain areas. On the other hand, Fish and Wildlife understands that sometimes, such as in the placement of a helicopter landing spot, there will be no choice but to disturb some creatures.

The Marines have agreed to declare war on a fast-growing kind of bamboo that looks attractive and makes good training grounds but is choking out willow trees, which are good for nesting birds. The bamboo is also tough on toads.

Babbitt noted that without Camp Pendleton, coastal Southern California could be one long suburb, with animals and birds fighting to survive.

“I think of Los Angeles and San Diego as these great growing cities, like great magnets put end-to-end, and right in the middle is Camp Pendleton and the Marine Corps,” Babbitt said. “I think it is really great for our nation, for California and for our natural resource heritage that the Marine Corps has been here, is here, and will be here for generations to come.”