LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A painter in Lake County would need a palette supplied with every shade of jade, emerald and lime green as temperatures rise and we arrive closer to the spring season.

As John Muir said, “Spring work is going on with joyful enthusiasm.”

Each plant begins its renewal process, and brings with it a sense of hope and new beginnings. Responding to the lengthening days is hard work for plants.

As billions of root hairs anchor and absorb dissolved minerals, they must transport them from cell to cell within the root, then defy gravity by nourishing the bud above.

The official spring season, or vernal equinox began March 20. It can differ from March 19-21 depending on the varying length of our year and Earth's slightly elliptical orbit.

At the equinox, our star, the sun passes Earth's equator creating a night and day nearly equal in length. As the days begin to lengthen, the hemisphere warms and the annual renewal creates its show.

You know it's spring in Lake County when the first forest lilies, trillium, push themselves up through the damp earthen floor.

Of all of the spring wildflowers, trillium appears most prehistoric with its maroon or white flowering stalks protruding from three broad multi-hued green leaves and often shares the neighborhood with other prehistoric-looking plants – ferns.

Trillium's tuber-like rhizomes increase each year adding to the amount of blooms year after year, in the manner of bulbs.

Lake County Native Americans used the rhizomes in medicine, but it was so bitter that other plants were favored over trillium. The Yuki Indians crushed the root and used it as a salve for boils and other skin ailments.

Another Lake County harbinger of spring, the Western Fence Lizard appears out of hibernation during late winter or early spring to sun himself on a stone.

Also known as “blue-bellies,” Western Fence lizards can be gray, tan, brown or black in color and grow to a length of over 8 inches.

These entertaining reptiles are diurnal, or active during the daylight hours. They can be seen bobbing, or performing push-ups to attract a mate.

This activity also is used to ward off other males, along with flattening themselves to more readily display their strikingly blue sides.

Western Fence lizards breed after their second year, producing clutches of three to 17 eggs during the months of April to July, and live three to five years.

They quickly scurry away from predators like birds and snakes and can drop their tails as a decoy for a quick escape.

If attacked, the tail moves around to draw attention away from the lizard, but the lizard only drops its tail during extreme emergency, as re-growing a tail uses valuable stores of energy.

These lively lizards are beneficial in that they eat large quantities of bugs and spiders. Scientists have learned that where lizards live, Lyme disease is lower.

It has been proven that there is a protein in lizard blood that kills the Lyme disease bacterium, and renders the ticks safe from carrying Lyme disease.

Kathleen Scavone, M.A., is an educator, potter, writer and author of “Anderson Marsh State Historic Park: A Walking History, Prehistory, Flora, and Fauna Tour of a California State Park” and “Native Americans of Lake County.” She also writes for NASA and JPL as one of their “Solar System Ambassadors.” She was selected “Lake County Teacher of the Year, 1998-99” by the Lake County Office of Education, and chosen as one of 10 state finalists the same year by the California Department of Education.

It's spring, and all around the northern hemisphere gardeners are planting seeds, tilling soil and watering crops.

Imagine a gardener's surprise, however, if water from the hose, instead of hitting the soil and sinking in, floated up to the sky. Or if the soil itself rose up from the ground and fled the garden.

That's exactly the kind of dilemma astronauts onboard the ISS have faced for years. Without gravity, how do you make your garden grow?

The situation is even more confusing for plants. In a weightless environment, up and down has no meaning, so roots grow in odd, chaotic directions.

Shoots that emerge from the soil in search the sun find, instead, a cold metallic lamp that never rises or sets. And needless to say, it never rains onboard the space station.

On April 18, SpaceX-3 blasted off from Cape Canaveral with a possible solution to these problems.

“We call it 'Veggie',” said Gioia Massa of the Kennedy Space Center. “It's a plant growth chamber designed to make gardens thrive in weightlessness.”

Massa, who leads the Veggie science team, has been working on the project for years. Veggie's heritage traces back decades to experiments with plants on board the Russian space station Mir and NASA's space shuttle. In all that time, NASA astronauts have never tasted home-grown food in space – but that could soon change.

“Our first crop will be a variety of lettuce called 'Outredgeous,'” said Massa. “It is delicious.”

Veggie solves the problems of weightlessness using “plant pillows.”

“Basically, these are bags of 'space dirt' and slow-release fertilizer,” explained Trent Smith, the project manager from KSC. “Wicks inserted into the bags draw water into the soil where it cannot float away.”

In addition to guiding water, the wicks act as a kind of gardening stake.

“The wicks are where we glue the seeds,” continued Massa. “We have to be very careful to orient the seeds so that roots grow 'down' into the soil and shoots pop out of the bag.”

When the shoots emerge, they find an array of LEDs shining overhead, providing light for photosynthesis and a sense of direction to keep the shoots moving “up.” The bellows-like walls of the chamber allow it to expand to make room for the growing crop.

Pictures of Veggie often show the chamber flooded with a mixture of red and blue light. That's the color of light plants use most for photosynthesis. “We're just giving them what they want,” said Smith.

Under a purplish light, plants appear gray and unappetizing. “Who wants to look at that?” asked Massa. Astronaut gardeners can switch on green LEDs as well. Adding that color to the red-blue mix produces white light and displays the garden to better effect.

The appearance of the garden is important because, as Massa points out, gardening has psychological as well as nutritional benefits. Compared to Earth, spaceships are a relatively lifeless environment, cold, metallic and sterile.

“Plants allow astronauts to form a connection to living things,” she said. “There could be a huge psychological benefit.”

Chalking up another success for commercial space flight, SpaceX's Dragon capsule delivered Veggie to the ISS on Sunday, April 20. Massa said the first crop of Outredgeous should be ready for harvesting in late May, but astronauts won't be allowed to taste-test.

“First, we have to bring the lettuce home for analysis,” she explained. Is it safe to eat? Are there any bacteria growing on the leaves? “These are some of the questions we'll be looking at. If everything checks out, future crops may be eaten.”

Salad anyone?

Dr. Tony Phillips works for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) and Spitzer Space Telescope have discovered what appears to be the coldest “brown dwarf” known – a dim, star-like body that surprisingly is as frosty as Earth's North Pole.

Named “WISE J085510.83-071442.5,” the brown dwarf appears to be 7.2 light-years away, earning it the title for fourth closest system to our sun.

“It's very exciting to discover a new neighbor of our solar system that is so close,” said Kevin Luhman, an astronomer at Pennsylvania State University's Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds, University Park.

Brown dwarfs start their lives like stars, as collapsing balls of gas, but they lack the mass to burn nuclear fuel and radiate starlight. The newfound coldest brown dwarf is a chilly temperature between minus 54 and 9 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 48 to minus 13 degrees Celsius).

Previous record holders for coldest brown dwarfs, also found by WISE and Spitzer, were about room temperature.

“It is remarkable that even after many decades of studying the sky, we still do not have a complete inventory of the sun's nearest neighbors,” added Michael Werner, the project scientist for Spitzer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “This exciting new result demonstrates the power of exploring the universe using new tools, such as the infrared eyes of WISE and Spitzer.”

WISE was able to spot the rare object because it surveyed the entire sky twice in infrared light, observing some areas up to three times.

Cool objects like brown dwarfs can be invisible when viewed by visible-light telescopes, but their thermal glow – even if feeble – stands out in infrared light.

In addition, the closer a body, the more it appears to move in images taken months apart. Airplanes are a good example of this effect: a closer, low-flying plane will appear to fly overhead more rapidly than a high-flying one.

“This object appeared to move really fast in the WISE data,” said Luhman. “That told us it was something special.”

After noticing the fast motion of WISE J085510.83-071442.5, Luhman spent time analyzing additional images taken with Spitzer and the Gemini South telescope on Cerro Pachon in Chile.

Spitzer's infrared observations helped determine the frosty temperature of the brown dwarf. Combined detections from WISE and Spitzer, taken from different positions around the sun, revealed the object's parallax, and thus its distance.

The closest system to Earth, a trio of stars, is Alpha Centauri, at about 4 light-years away. WISE J085510.83-071442.5 is only a few light years farther than that.

WISE J085510.83-071442.5 appears to be three to 10 times the mass of Jupiter. With such a low mass, it could be a gas giant similar to Jupiter that was ejected from its star system. But scientists estimate it is probably a brown dwarf rather than a planet since brown dwarfs are known to be fairly common. If so, it is one of the least massive brown dwarfs known.

In March of 2013, Luhman's analysis of the images from WISE uncovered a pair of much warmer brown dwarfs at a distance of 6.5 light years, making that system the third closest to the sun.

His search for rapidly moving bodies also demonstrated that the outer solar system probably does not contain a large, undiscovered planet, which has been referred to as “Planet X” or “Nemesis.”

Dr. Tony Phillips works for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – You see them often in wild areas, especially after a light rain: strikingly brilliant colors against the browns of the forest.

They are often mistaken for some kind of fungi, but they’re not; nor are they really plants or any kind of animals.

They are the Myxomycetes: slime molds.

Starting off as nearly invisible single-celled formations born from spores, they can live out their lifespan in a single day.

The single cells find one another through a kind of chemical communication system, and congeal into thin amoeba-like globs called plasmodium.

This plasmodium creeps rhythmically along the ground at a speed of about a quarter of an inch per hour over dead leaves, onto stumps or wherever else the motion takes it, pretty much unseen, hunting down bacteria and digestible spores.

When runs out of stuff to eat – or when some other trigger like rain or sunlight excites the mass – the plasmodium finds a prime spot (preferably one that’s dry with a little breeze nearby) to reproduce.

It forms fruiting bodies calls sporangia – which can come in a variety of shapes and colors including red, yellow, gray and bright blue – that go on to produce spores.

These spores are then carried off by the breeze and the whole process starts over again.

One of the most common forms of slime mold in this region – and you may even have spotted it in your own backyard – is Fuligo septica. In its excited fruiting-body-stage this stuff looks like bright yellow froth or thin scrambled eggs.

Within a day, though, this mass of froth forms a crust over itself that starts out pearly white and eventually turns brown.

Underneath the crust, the spores are forming. When the crust is brittle enough it will break at the slightest provocation, releasing the spores. This is a kind of slime mold you might even find in your backyard.

Don’t worry, though. It’s a bacteria-eater and won’t affect your grass or plants. Some folks try to get rid of it by spraying it with a hose, but all that does is spread the mold further over your lawn and plants. So, it’s best just to let it be and run its course.

Two other forms of slime mold prefer weather that’s slightly chilly, and I’ve been able to find them often in riparian (river-side) habitat throughout the region. They are wolf’s milk slime mold and white-finger slime mold.

The wolf’s milk variety appears as bright pink “buttons” or cushions in its early stages, and then turns a shiny brown as it matures and goes to spore. Touching one of the young buttons will make pink-colored tooth-paste-like “milk” ooze from it.

The white-finger variety of slime mold, on the other hand, starts out looking like strings of tiny white upright fingerlings.

Look more closely, and you’ll see that each tiny finger is actually sitting on top of a thread-like stalk. As the fingerlings age, they turn brown and then shiny black.

Once in the spore-bearing stage the molds go brittle, and interestingly enough, even though the wind, critters and people can promote the spread of the spores, some slime molds actually depend on beetles to help spread the spores.

The beetle’s hard feet and legs pierce through the “crust” that surrounds the spores, and the bristles on their legs carry the spores to new destinations.

The best time to find active slime molds is right after a rain – so in drought years like this one finding them might be difficult, but keep an eye out for them anyway.  

When you encounter them, remember that the time between “fruiting” (when they’re most visible) and going to spore can sometimes take less than a day.

They won’t be around for long, so take as many photos of them as you can whenever the opportunity presents itself.

Tuleyome Tales is a monthly publication of Tuleyome, a nonprofit conservation organization based in Woodland, Calif. For more information about Tuleyome go to www.tuleyome.org . Mary K. Hanson is an amateur naturalist and photographer and author of The Chubby Woman’s Walkabout blog.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A young man who grew up in Lake County and faced a deportation battle last year celebrated becoming a United States citizen on Friday.

Carlos Solorzano took the oath of citizenship in US District Court in Anchorage, Alaska.

Solorzano's immigration attorney, Margaret Stock, described his mood as “ecstatic.”

That important milestone, Solorzano told Lake County News on Friday afternoon, came “after a long and pretty tough fight.”

Aiding him in that fight was Stock. A retired lieutenant colonel in the Military Police, US Army Reserve, and a former West Point law professor – Stock isn't just tough and talented, she's considered a national expert in the highly complex world of immigration law. Last September, she was named a 2013 MacArthur Foundation Fellow, receiving one of the foundation's coveted “genius grants.”

Solorzano, 28, was born in Mexico and came to the United States with his family when he was 1 year old, growing up in Lake County and attending Lower Lake High School. In that time, he became a permanent US resident through a green card.

He went on to serve three years in the US Marines. During his service, he was involved in a bar fight in Virginia Beach, Va., on New Year's Eve 2006. He said he was defending himself, however he found himself being charged and convicted of misdemeanor assault and battery.

In that case, Solorzano didn't have a lawyer; Virginia state law doesn't require that defendants be provided with criminal defense.

He spent two days in custody, was sentenced to 365 days in jail and had all but two days of that sentence suspended, with the case settled with time served.

What he didn't know at the time was that the way the case was handled set the stage for a potential deportation threat later.

That's exactly what happened in late 2012.

Solorzano – who now lives in Alaska – was returning to the United States in December 2012 from a trip to Mexico when border agents flagged him. He was allowed to reenter the United States, but only on probationary status.

The problem, said Stock, was that while Solorzano's conviction was a misdemeanor, immigration law allows for such convictions to be interpreted as “aggravated felonies,” which are deportable offenses.

Stock said that there also has been an increased push in the US government's pursuit of deportation cases, which she told Lake County News in a previous interview resulted from a combination of more stringent interpretations of immigration law and redefined criminal law terminology.

For Solorzano, that led to the scheduling of a February 2013 hearing in Anchorage in which he faced the potential to be deported from the United States, the country he considers his home.

When he arrived for that hearing, however, the federal officials backed off, and he was formally readmitted to the United States. He then began the process, aided by Stock, of pursuing full US citizenship.

That process wasn't free of more obstacles. Solorzano said he was rejected for citizenship once during the ensuing naturalization process, with the interpretation of his misdemeanor conviction again coming up as an aggravated felony.

He said that rejection was a matter of federal immigration officials failing to gather and consider all of the information in his case.

More recently, there was still some excitement, as Stock termed it, when the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services Field Office director told her that they believed Solorzano was an aggravated felon and didn't want to approve his application.

“But after some legal wrangling, they agreed with me that he was not an 'aggravated felon' and naturalized him,” she said in a Friday email.

Solorzano credited Stock with helping him receive his US citizenship, acknowledging that had it not been for her he didn't know where he would be now.

Stock said she was very pleased with the outcome to Solorzano's case. “But it was a lot of hard work.”

She continued, “That’s one of the biggest problems with our immigration system right now – the laws are so complicated that often the immigration agencies do not understand them, and they wrongly try to deport people (and deny them US citizenship) when they should not. And often the immigrants do not have lawyers.”

Last September, during the midst of his immigration process, Solorzano returned to Lake County to celebrate another milestone – his marriage.

He and fiancée Danielle White were married in a Sept. 14 ceremony on Cobb Mountain. In his wedding pictures, Solorzano looks rather like a steampunk Abe Lincoln with his top hat, tails, tattoos and a big beard.

Solorzano continues to live in Anchorage with wife Danielle, working as a tattoo artist.

“We stay pretty busy here,” he said.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – The Wednesday service of a search warrant led to the arrest of a Clearlake Oaks woman, the eradication of more than 1,800 marijuana plants and seizure of two firearms.

Narcotics detectives arrested 52-year-old Jane Cook, according to Lt. Steve Brooks of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.

Brooks said that detectives secured a search warrant for a residence located in the 12000 block of Cerrito Drive in Clearlake Oaks on Tuesday, serving it the following day at 11:15 a.m. He said they were unable to locate anyone at the residence during the search warrant service.

During the search detectives located three hoop-style greenhouses on the property that contained a total of 283 marijuana plants, Brooks said.

Brooks said the detectives located a grow inside the garage, which contained 1,599 cloned marijuana plants. A total of 1,882 marijuana plants were located on the property and eradicated.

During a search of the residence detectives located and seized a 9 millimeter semiautomatic pistol with three loaded magazines in a bedroom, Brooks said.

In the same bedroom detectives located $3,130 in U.S. currency, which Brooks said was seized pending asset forfeiture proceedings. They also located and seized a loaded .22-caliber revolver inside a liquor cabinet in the kitchen.

The person responsible for the property was identified as Cook, Brooks said.

At 2:25 p.m. Wednesday, detectives located Cook and arrested her for the cultivation of marijuana, possession of marijuana for sale and being armed while in the commission of a felony. Brooks said she was transported to the Lake County Hill Road Correctional Facility and booked.

Cook's bail was set at $25,000. Jail records indicated she posted the required percentage of bail and was released.

The Sheriff’s Narcotics Task Force can be reached through its anonymous tip line at 707-263-3663.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – This week Lake County Animal Care and Control has another group of lovely canines that need forever homes.

Mixes of Chihuahuas, chow chows, corgis, beagles and terriers are waiting to meet you.

Homes are needed soon, as many of the dogs have been waiting a long time for the right family to come along.

The shelter is short of space and prospective owners are urged to come in as soon as possible and give the dogs chances for forever homes this spring season.

Dogs that are adopted from Lake County Animal Care and Control are either neutered or spayed, microchipped and, if old enough, given a rabies shot and county license before being released to their new owner. License fees do not apply to residents of the cities of Lakeport or Clearlake.

If you're looking for a new companion, visit the shelter. There are many great pets hoping you'll choose them.

In addition to the animals featured here, all adoptable animals in Lake County can be seen here: http://bit.ly/Z6xHMb .

The following dogs at the Lake County Animal Care and Control shelter have been cleared for adoption (additional dogs on the animal control Web site not listed are still “on hold”).

Male chow chow mix

This male chow chow mix is 6 years old, and continues to wait for a good home.

He has a medium-length black coat and weighs 68 pounds, and has been neutered.

He's a mellow and sweet dog. Shelter staff said he was on his own, traveling the streets for some time. He may have been abandoned.

He is good with other dogs, and is very sweet, not shy or skittish.

Find him in kennel No. 17, ID No. 39308.

Pit bull terrier mix

This female pit bull terrier mix is 15 weeks old.

She has cropped ears, a short brown and white coat, and weighs 22 pounds. Shelter staff did not report if she has been spayed.

Find her in kennel No. 13, ID No. 39400.

'Buster'

“Buster” is a 2-year-old corgi-retriever mix.

He has a short brown and white coat, weighs 38 pounds and has been neutered.

Also, Buster loves belly rubs.

He's in kennel No. 12, ID No. 39304.

Male Chihuahua mix

This male Chihuahua mix is 2 years old.

He has a short coat and brown eyes, and has not yet been neutered.

Find him in kennel No. 10, ID No. 39500.

Male pit bull terrier mix

This male pit bull terrier mix is 8 months old.

He has green eyes, a short brown brindle and white coat, weighs 38 pounds and has not been neutered.

Shelter staff said he is good with other dogs, is well-mannered for a pup and eager to learn.

He's in kennel No. 8, ID No. 39269.

Female Chihuahua mix

This female Chihuahua mix is 8 years old.

She has a short tan coat and weighs 12 pounds. It was not reported if she has been spayed.

Find her in kennel No. 7b, ID No. 39319.

Male Chihuahua mix

This male Chihuahua mix is 3 years old.

He has a short black coat and weighs 10 pounds. Shelter staff did not report if he had been neutered.

He's in kennel No. 7a, ID No. ID: 39318.

Beagle-pug mix

This female beagle-pug mix is of undetermined age.

She weighs 32 pounds, has a curly white and brown coat, and has been spayed.

Find her in kennel No. 6, ID No. 39493.

'Monches'

“Monches” is a 2-year-old male Chihuahua mix.

He has a short white and tan spotted coat, and has not yet been neutered.

He's in kennel No. 5, ID No. 39309.

To fill out an adoption application online visit http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control/Adopt/Dog___Cat_Adoption_Application.htm .

Lake County Animal Care and Control is located at 4949 Helbush in Lakeport, next to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.

Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday. The shelter is open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and on Saturday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm .

For more information call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – The fifth-annual, family-friendly Kelseyville Olive Festival, an event which focuses on the olive industry in Lake County, as well as other local products, will be held from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday, April 27.

It will be held at Chacewater Winery & Olive Mill, located at 5625 Gaddy Lane.

The festival will feature locally produced olive oil, education and demonstrations, and a variety of other contests and activities for the whole family.

Vendors offering olive-related and other local products, including options for lunch and snacking, will be present the day of the event, offering samples and selling products, as well as providing educational materials about olives and our local industry. A children’s area will also be featured.

There is no cost to attend the festival; samples and demonstrations are free of charge. Local wine and beer tasting with a commemorative glass will be available for a $15 fee from noon to 4 p.m.

Several related contests will be held up to and during the festival, including a Poster Contest, Olive Pit Spitting Contest, and People’s Choice Olive Oil Contest.

Event proceeds from the silent auction, wine store sales, and wine and beer tasting fees will benefit Lake Family Resource Center. The Resource Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit agency in Kelseyville that provides several programs in Lake County, including the Child Abuse Treatment Program, Rape Crisis Center, 24/7 Community Crisis Line, Behavioral Health Services, Early Head Start, Domestic Violence Assistance, and the Adolescent Family Life Program. For more information, call 707-279-0563.

Bring the family and come enjoy this celebration of Lake County’s olive industry.

For details visit www.KelseyvilleOliveFestival.com .

CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – After six months of construction, the new Live Oak Senior Center is set to open this coming Monday.

The building of the new $1.5 million center on Foothill Boulevard began last September, and this week the county is wrapping up final inspections, with the old center next door demolished on Wednesday.

Live Oak Senior Center Executive Director Pat Grabham said the center has been closed for about a week in preparation for the switch to the new building.

On Monday, seniors will be welcomed back to have their first meal in the new center, she said.

“It's going to be a lot of fun,” she said, adding, “Our seniors are champing at the bit to get back here and have a good lunch.”

Eric Seely, deputy county administrative officer for special projects, said county fire and building officials have completed inspections on the building, with mechanical and electrical engineers inspecting the building on Thursday.

Lake County Environmental Health will conduct one final inspection on Friday and then the county will issue the certificate of occupancy, Seely said.

He said the construction costs for the 4,000-square-foot building have remained pretty much on budget, and the project was completed within the estimated construction timeframe thanks to good weather over the last several months.

“This was a nice, uneventful, smooth project,” said Seely, who also is overseeing other major county projects, including the Lucerne Hotel renovation and, soon, the renovation of the Gard Street School property in Kelseyville, which will be the new home of Child Support Services.

Chico-based Randy Hill Construction is the Live Oak Senior Center project's general contractor. Seely said local subcontractors including Dynamic Construction – which did framing and finishing work – and Totorica Fire Protection, which had the sprinkler contract, were involved.

Seely said the project planning started several years ago when the county still had a redevelopment agency. The county applied for Community Block Grant Funding for the center, but was unsuccessful.

“Then we just started saving money until we had sufficient funds to go to construction,” Seely said.

Grabham, who has been the center's executive director for 17 years, said of the new center, “It's been a long time coming.”

The newer, bigger and better designed center not only will offer seniors a comfortable time to gather and socialize, but will continue to be a community meeting place, Grabham said.

She said the Live Oak Senior Center serves an average of 80 to 100 meals a day on site and 30 to 35 meals daily through its Meals on Wheels program.

Grabham said she is seeing an increase in the need for services for seniors, and she hopes more people will take advantage of the larger senior center, including coming in for the congregate meals.

The center sends a bus out to Spring Valley, Glenhaven and other outlying areas around Clearlake Oaks in order to bring the seniors in for the daily meals, she said. Usually it takes more than one bus load to bring in all of the seniors who want to take part.

Seniors usually arrive around 10:30 a.m., enjoy time visiting, then have lunch and play cards afterward, leaving at around 1 p.m., Grabham said.

That daily socialization is “really important,” Grabham said.

Grabham said the Live Oak Senior Center doesn't compete with other centers around the lake. “We just all need to work together.”

One last part of the work remains, which is the construction of the parking lot where the old senior center building had stood.

Seely said that work will be completed during the first part of May.

Grabham and Seely said a dedication for the new senior center will be announced in the near future.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A 3.1-magnitude quake was reported Saturday night at The Geysers geothermal steamfield.

The quake occurred at 7:22 p.m., according to the US Geological Survey.

It was centered three miles northwest of The Geysers, 14 miles southwest of Clearlake and 13 miles north northeast of Healdsburg, at a depth of 2.1 miles, the survey said.

The US Geological Survey received shake reports from Calistoga and Middletown.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – Federal officials have completed a preliminary report outlining the events leading to a fatal April 10 crash near Orland involving a FedEx semi and a bus filled with high school students.

On Friday the National Transportation Safety Board released its basic outline of the wreck, which resulted in 10 deaths and dozens of injuries.

The crash occurred on Interstate 5 near Orland when the FedEx semi pulling two trailers, driven by  Timothy Paul Evans, 32, of Elk Grove, crossed the median, sideswiped a Nissan Altima driven by Washington resident Bonnie Duran and collided head-on with the 2014 Setra motorcoach with Talalelei Feleni Lealao-Taiao, 53, of Sacramento at the wheel.

Evans and Lealao-Taiao died in the crash, along with chaperones Mattison Leatrice Haywood, 25, of Chino and Michael Lee Myvett Jr., 29, of Los Angeles; and students Ismael Jimenez, 18, of Inglewood; Jennifer Caroline Bonilla, 17, of Los Angeles; Denise Eraina Gomez, 18, of Inglewood; and Marisa Elaine Serrato, 17, of Riverside.

Humboldt State admissions office staffer Arthur Arzola, who was traveling with the students to a preview event at the campus, also was killed.

Bonnie Duran and her husband had minor injuries, officials reported.

The California Highway Patrol and the NTSB are in the midst of lengthy investigations into the crash, with final reports not expected to be completed for several months at the earliest.

The preliminary NTSB report is published below in its entirety.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

PRELIMINARY REPORT
HIGHWAY
HWY14MH009

The information in this report is preliminary and will be supplemented or corrected during the course of the investigation.

On Thursday, April 10, 2014, about 5:40 pacific daylight time, a 2007 Volvo truck tractor in combination with two 28-foot trailers operated by FedEx Corporation was traveling southbound in the right lane of Interstate 5 (I-5) in Orland, California. At the same time, a 2014 Setra motorcoach operated by Silverado Stages Inc., and occupied by a driver, 43 high school students, and three adult chaperones was traveling northbound on I-5 in the right traffic lane. In the vicinity of milepost 26.02, the FedEx combination vehicle moved to the left, departing the southbound traffic lanes and entering the 58-foot wide center median. The vehicle drove through a line of oleander bushes in the center of the median and entered the northbound traffic lanes of I-5. It collided with the left rear portion of a white 2013 Nissan Altima four-door passenger car, occupied by a driver and one passenger, which had just passed the Sentra motorcoach and moved back into the right lane of northbound I-5. The Nissan rotated counterclockwise and departed the highway on the east side. Following the impact with the passenger car, the combination vehicle collided with the motorcoach, and both vehicles departed the highway to the east.

A post-crash fire ensued. The fire consumed the combination vehicle and partially burned the motor coach. The front of the motorcoach received significant damage that exposed the vehicle’s interior.

As a result of the collision, the drivers of both the combination vehicle and motorcoach were fatally injured. Eight motorcoach passengers were also fatally injured. The remaining passengers received injuries of varying degree. The occupants of the Nissan passenger car received minor injuries.

The combination vehicle had originally departed from the FedEx facility in Sacramento, California, at about 10:00 a.m. and drove to Weeds, California (located in Siskiyou County, approximately 49 miles south of the Oregon border), where the driver delivered two trailers. At about 3:30 p.m., the driver picked up two other 28-foot trailers and was en route back to Sacramento when the accident occurred. The motorcoach, part of a chartered trip originating from Los Angeles, California, was taking high school students to Humboldt University, in Arcata, California, for a tour of the campus. The motorcoach had made a scheduled stop in Sacramento, where a replacement driver took over operation of the vehicle.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Forty boats are expected to set sail Saturday in the 30th annual Konocti Cup on Clear Lake.

And, said race spokesman Pat Brown, that’s surprising because the lake is supposed to be a little shallow this year.

The Konocti Bay Sailing Club is hosting the event, which will be headquartered out of Braito's Buckingham Harbor.

The Cup, which is organized into three different classes of boats, will begin at 10:30 a.m. with the Full Cup race, limited to monohull boats of 19 feet.

Tom Burden from Santa Cruz will be on Clear Lake to defend his 2013 Konocti Cup title in his Ultimate 20 “Layla,” Brown said.

The Bilafer family, which holds the 26-mile course record, Brown added, will not be competing because of low water.

In some places in the southern part of the lake where the race course is located, the draw is reported to be only 8 feet, Brown said.

Following the Full Cup race will be the Half Cup, also restricted to monohull craft, at a distance of 13 miles, according to Brown.

The third launch will be for multihull boats, with Bill Erkelens – who won last year’s multihull Cup in his Master Tornado “Go Nan Go” – set to compete.

An 8:30 a.m. skippers meeting will precede the Cup and a Sunday awards event at Braito’s Buckingham Marine will follow the race on Sunday.

Email John Lindblom at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .