Beginning October 3 and extending for up to several weeks, a private company with mineral rights will be conducting a mining survey in the Grade Creek/Camp Creek area of Cecil D. Andrus WMA.
The geophysical survey involves laying a wire along the ground across an extended area with small probes placed into the ground. The work on the WMA will take place in an area of about 1.5 sq. mi. or 960 acres, roughly 4 percent of the total acreage of the WMA.
While the survey should not substantially disrupt users of the WMA, and access to the survey area will remain open to hunters, they should be aware that survey crews and equipment will likely to be in the area for portions of upland game and big game hunting seasons.
While Fish and Game owns the surface rights to much of the property associated with Andrus WMA in the Grade Creek/Camp Creek area, the subsurface rights are either owned by the federal government (administered by the Bureau of Land Management) or owned by a private company. The previous owners of the property provided subsurface rights for mineral extraction to a private mining company in the late 1960s.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s several exploratory drilling operations have occurred on the property. The mineral rights and the neighboring private property were recently purchased by a new company that has an interest in exploring the potential for commercial mineral extraction.