Monday, April 25, 2011

The REAL Humboldt County

Humboldt County is a located on the coast, north of San Fransisco in northern California. According to 2010 Census Data, the county’s population was 134,623.Euerka is  the county seat and Arcata contains Humboldt State Univeristy. It also is home to Humboldt Bay, California's second largest natural bay.  200 miles north of Its primary population 
Humboldt is a densely forested, mountainous, and rural county situated along the Pacific Callifornia's rugged Coast mountain Ranges. With nearly 1,500,000 acres (6,100 km2) of combined public and private forest in production, Humboldt County accounts for twenty percent of the total forest production for all of California. The county contains over forty percent of all remaining old growth coast redwood forests, the vast majority of which is protected or strictly conserved within dozens of national, state, and local forests and parks, totaling approximately 680,000 acres (over 1,000 square miles). 

Humboldt County is also widely known for its cultural attributes associated with the cultivation and proliferation of marijuana. Proposition 215 allows patients and caregivers who are given a doctor's recommendation to legally (State level only) grow up to 99 plants in Humboldt County.The New Yorker, describes the county as "the heartland of high-grade marijuana farming in California." However, in the years before Prop 215 (early 70's-late 80's), Humboldt County saw a large migration of the Bay Area counter-culture to its region. Many came looking to purchase cheap land, and ended up growing marijuana to pay for their land payments to eventually became owners of the land. Especially around Garberville and Redway, the rural culture and hippie scene eventually collaborated to create a "hippy-billy" community in which marijuana became the center of the economy. Many people prospered by exporting their marijuana down the California coast and to Midwestern states because of its reputation for quality. Conflicts between local growers and state and federal officials have also become a part of Humboldt's reputation. Every harvest season since 1983, CAMP (Campaign Against Marijuana Planting, a drug task force) land helicopters on private property and perform mostly unwarranted searches and seizures. Austin Steve Bowser, a well known local in the 1980s recalls state police officers telling him it was time to bring Humboldt County back to the United States. A Garberville radio station, KMUD, in the past has issued warnings and alerts to the region with information on whereabouts of law enforcement on their way to raid marijuana gardens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYPtadEG2Hg&feature=related

LIVING HERE CAN BE TOUGH ECONOMICALLY .....
this living wage calculator helps to understand what it takes to live in rural Humboldt county







  1. Kerr, J.M. - The Codes of California. - 1905. - p.1043.
  2. http://2010.census.gov/2010census/data/
  3. Discover Humboldt Bay. - Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District. - Retrieved: 2008-07-13
  4. Forestry, Forest Industry, and Forest Products Consumption in California. UC Davis:  Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources. - (Adobe Acrobat *.PDF document). - Retrieved: 2008-03-30
  5. Area of Old Growth Forest in California, Oregon, and Washington- US Forest Servive USDA  (Adobe Acrobat *.PDF document). - Retrieved: 2007-11-18
  6. .Humboldt County Public Lands- Humboldt County Community Development Services. - (Adobe Acrobat *.PDF document). - Retrieved: 2007-11-19
  7. California Let Voters Decide on Marijauna Legislation. , PBS News Hour, aired 13 Oct 2010.
  8. http://www.safeaccessnow.net/humboldt.htm 
  9.  Samuels, David. - A Reporter at Large: "Dr. Kush: How medical marijuana is transforming the weed industry. The New Yorker  July 28, 2008.
  10. http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20100425/ARTICLES/100429643?tc=ar