Sonoran Desert National Monument is not too far West from my former home of 15+ years (Casa Grande, Maricopa, etc). The area is not part of any city, it's out in Pinal County just north of Gila Bend where gun laws are more lax than city laws. It's also not far from the Gila Bend checkpoint, where US Border Patrol check and detain a large portion of illegal immigrants and drug smugglers from Mexico. For those who aren't familiar with AZ laws, it's a crime to shoot a saguaro cactus, they're protected. In fact, you need a special permit to move it, and a licensed moving company has to do it. Anyway, morons out here get drunk and shoot at stuff all the time, and cactus are indifferent to them. SDNM has the Saguaro forest, and since it takes over 50-100 years for one to grow to normal size, I can see why they want to protect the area. Plus it's the home of numerous endangered animals. Unless it's a national park anyone can bring a firearm (concealed or otherwise) into the area, but discharging the firearm would be illegal. I'm unsure of the location's status (national park, national forest, etc). It could be interpreted as gun control, but honestly in this case and for this habitat IMHO it's necessary. This coming from someone who wears his concealed Taurus PT-140 Millenium Pro all the time (even to church). Old habits are hard to break.
