Pubdate: Sat, 21 Jul 2007 Source: Union Democrat, The (Sonora, CA) Copyright: 2007 Western Communications, Inc Contact: http://uniondemocrat.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/846 Author: Michael Kay FIFTH POT BUST YIELDS $2 MILLION IN PLANTS More than 9,000 marijuana plants worth roughly $2 million were destroyed in south Tuolumne County Thursday. Members of the Tuolumne County Sheriff's Office and its Tuolumne Narcotic Team, and CAMP -- the state Campaign Against Marijuana Planting -- mulched and then burned 9,072 plants found in the Moccasin area. The bust was the fifth in a two-month span that has yielded nearly 12,000 plants that have been found and destroyed in the Mother Lode. Sizable pot busts at remote sites are fairly common between July to October, typically the harvest season for marijuana, because officials from all law agencies are on the lookout for these illegal plantations, according to the Sheriff's Department. In 2006, the Tuolumne Narcotic Team uprooted and destroyed more than 80,000 plants in the county. Thursday, the teams also seized a loaded .22 caliber semi-automatic handgun, 9 mm ammunition and rifle ammunition, but no suspects were caught. "When they sense that we're coming into the area, they flee. They're probably still wandering," said sheriff's spokesman Lt. Dan Bressler. "They either wander and find another plot or get picked up." Like many recent busts, evidence at the scene and the style of the plot suggest the plants were a "Mexican DTO Grow" -- or Drug Trafficking Organization, Bressler said. The plants, between 6 and 30 inches tall when found, were located on U.S. Bureau of Land Management land during a flyover by detectives with the narcotic team. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek