Operation Trident destroys more than 432,000 marijuana plants in three counties
Federal, state and local agencies announced on 11 August 2010 that Operation Trident in Fresno, Madera and Tulare counties had eradicated 432,271 marijuana plants, arrested 97 people, and removed tons of trash and irrigation line from public-land grows; officials put the plants’ street value at more than $1.7 billion.
🇺🇸 Fresno, Madera and Tulare counties, California · California, United States
About 450 officers from 21 agencies spent the 2010 season targeting large marijuana grows on public
land in Fresno, Madera and Tulare counties under Operation Trident.[1]On 11 August 2010 the
White House drug-policy director Gil Kerlikowske joined the three county sheriffs and U.S. Attorney
Benjamin Wagner to report that the work had seized 432,271 live plants, 499 pounds of processed
marijuana, 97 arrests, 33 weapons and miles of irrigation tubing removed from grow sites.[1]
Public land and reclamation
Wagner said traffickers operating in the Sierra foothills damaged watersheds and endangered hikers
and campers.[1]Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims said the targets were armed smugglers tied to
organized crime, not only summer growers.[1]Teams also hauled away 15.5 tons of trash and 4,580
pounds of fertilizer from about 270 acres disturbed by cultivation, work the release priced at up to
$11,000 per acre to restore.[1]
The California National Guard Counterdrug Task Force, working with the same partner list in July
2010, described short-haul removals from forest grows and youth prevention outreach in nearby
communities.[2]Its summary pointed to more than 100 arrests and nearly half a million plants
with the same roughly $1.7 billion street-value estimate federal speakers used.[2]
Case data
Every number and detail the sources state, with the sources that state it.
The 226.356 kg figure converts the 499 pounds of processed marijuana the DEA listed; the release does not weigh uprooted plants separately from cut live material.
Investigations began in January 2010 and the DEA called the effort ongoing on 11 August; later indictments under the same name are separate court steps not folded in here.
A July 2010 National Guard summary described “nearly half a million” plants and more than 100 arrests, slightly higher than the 11 August DEA totals cited here.
California's Unified Cannabis Enforcement Task Force seized or destroyed 55,308 pounds of illicit cannabis and eradicated 108,226 plants between July and September 2026, Governor Gavin Newsom's office said. The quarter's operations across nine counties led to 14 arrests, nine firearms and $29,215 in cash, and brought the state's nine-month total to more than $230 million in cannabis.
Arrested 14Plants destroyed 108,226Cannabis 25.0873 t
Humboldt County sheriff's deputies eradicated about 3,102 cannabis plants and destroyed about 36 pounds of processed cannabis at two unlicensed grows near Alderpoint and Garberville on 5 and 6 October 2026. No arrests were made and the cases were sent to the District Attorney for review.
On 25 September 2026 New Mexico's Regulation and Licensing Department Enforcement Bureau and the Organized Crime Commission raided 102 Howell Road in Estancia, Torrance County, seizing and destroying about 6,300 mature cannabis plants in 21 greenhouses weighing an estimated 21,000 pounds. The case remains open for prosecution.
On 16 September 2026 U.S. Forest Service officers, Glenn County’s Major Crimes Task Force and a Forest Service helicopter team eradicated about 700 cannabis plants from an illegal grow in remote Mendocino National Forest. No arrests were reported.
