Clear Lake Hitch hover near the surface during a brief calm moment in their spawning migration on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Ed Oswalt.

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – There are many signs of spring's arrival in Lake County, and one of them – the spring spawning migration of the Clear Lake Hitch – is making a gradual comeback after many years when it appeared the fish was about to disappear into memory.

The hitch – known as the “chi” to the local Pomo peoples – is a Clear Lake native, has strong links to the Pomo cultural past and is well remembered by many people who have called the county home for the last several decades.

Sometime within the last 40 years the hitch started to decline, but more recently the fish has become a comeback kid of sorts, as it's the focus of tribal monitoring projects and a community group, the Chi Council for the Clear Lake Hitch, that's dedicated to the fish's preservation.

On Saturday, April 2, the Chi Council hosted a field trip for community members who wanted to watch the fish make their way up local streams for spawning.

Peter Windrem, a Chi Council member who led the tour, said he remembered the hitch in abundance in local creeks when he was a boy.

His childhood friend, Keith Petterson, who joined in the Saturday morning field trip, said the fish would sometimes be backed up into the little streams that ran through pear orchards.

A Chi Council map shows that most of Clear Lake's major tributaries at one time were home to hitch spawning runs.

But over the last several decades the hitch population has taken a precipitous decline, according to those who study the fish. Now, the hitch are mostly to be found in Kelsey, Adobe and Thompson creeks, although a small population is believed to live in Middle Creek near Upper Lake.

Windrem said the hitch is one of four fishes native to Clear Lake, the largest natural freshwater lake completely within California boundaries.

In addition to the hitch, those native species included the Clear Lake Splittail, now believed extinct – biologist Rick Macedo said the last sighting of one was in 1975 – the pikeminnow and Sacramento sucker.

Windrem said the sucker isn't seen much, but when it is he said it's a treat, because it's such a beautiful fish – golden in color, with black markings.

Where once the streams ran thick with hitch, today its numbers are far fewer, with little columns of them now making their way upstream to spawn.

Unlike salmon, however, the trip upstream isn't a long goodbye. Rather, once they spawn, it's back to Clear Lake for the hitch, with the possibility that they can return for several more years to come to repeat the process.

The reasons for the hitch's decline are many, according to Chi Council members and biologists.

On the first stop of the Saturday field trip, Windrem led the group to the bridge over Kelsey Creek at the west end of Kelseyville.

Looking down from the bridge, he showed a historical picture from 1899 of hitch crammed together in Kelsey Creek, taken from a vantage point about 100 yards down the creek from the bridge. At the time of that picture, the creek was more shallow, like an omelet pan, said Windrem.

“Historically, these streams have a very gradual grading,” he explained.

However, today the creek runs much deeper, with more defined banks.

In the 1960s and 1970s, gravel extraction operations on local creeks caused the level of Kelsey Creek to drop by about 30 feet, Windrem said.

At one point, there were concerns that the footing of the Kelseyville bridge over Kelsey Creek was being exposed so much that it might fall over, so Windrem said reinforcements were installed along its base to stabilize it.

But the changes to the creek's essential topography had more far-reaching consequences for the hitch, he said.

Whereas once the hitch could move easily along, with no serious changes in creek elevation, Windrem and Macedo, who took part in the Saturday tour, said the fish began to confront barriers they couldn't overcome during their multistage migration.

A fish ladder was added to an area of Kelsey Creek on the north side of the bridge, but the ladder's design favors salmonids, and, as Windrem pointed out, “Hitch don't jump.”

Macedo, considered a hitch expert, said that because they're not strong jumpers, hitch struggled to navigate both the ladders and the streams when the elevations become more steep.

He suggested the crossing under the Kelseyville bridge could be vastly improved for hitch if a trench was dug between the bridge's footings.

Other changes to streams and water resources play a part. Retired state Fish and Game biologist Jim Steele said, “The game is over when you get a reservoir.”

When asked if he remembered a point when the hitch population began to drop off, Petterson said, “I think it's just been a gradual change.”

On the field trip's second stop, at the Bell Hill low water crossing on Adobe Creek, Macedo said needed repairs at the crossing – particularly lowered culvert openings – benefited the fish, allowing them to pass easily pass through to a small area of rapids.

Good-sized clusters of the fish could be seen pooling in various areas around the crossing, and Macedo and Steele waded into the stream to catch a few hitch to show to the group traveling along on the trip.

Wearing a backpack device that some of the tour members said reminded them of equipment in “Ghostbusters,” Macedo used a long pole with a mesh square at one end that was attached to the backpack to mildly stun the fish in order to catch a few to put in a bucket of water.

Macedo called the fish – about a foot in length – “exceptionally large.”

The field trip goers gathered around to take a closer look at the silver-colored fish which, as they started to come out of their brief stupor, slapped disapproving tails on the insides of the buckets.

After just a few minutes in the bucket, Macedo carried them around the rapids and deposited them in a still pool so they could resume their trip upstream.

Biologist Erik Ringelberg tags a Clear Lake Hitch on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Ed Oswalt.

Research filled with new discoveries

For all of science's power to collect data and expand understanding, the hitch is still a fish largely surrounded by mystery.

“Everything that we learn about this fish is completely new,” said Paula Britton, environmental director for the Habematolel Pomo of Upper Lake.

Britton has been part of a study of the fish that's now in its third year.

For the county's tribes, the hitch historically was an important food source, with its spring spawning runs providing tribes with a critical harvest.

Today, the tribes aren't engaged in catching the fish for food, but rather for research, with a view to preserving it.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service granted Habematolel, Big Valley and Robinson Rancheria grants to study and tag the fish, now a “species of special concern,” Britton said.

Britton said the hitch project is the only one that doesn't involve an endangered species, and competition for funding is intense.

On Saturday, Britton was part of a team tagging the fish on a narrow portion of Thompson Creek off of Highland Springs Road, between Lakeport and Kelseyville.

The previous day they tagged 76 hitch in four hours, she said.

In about 45 minutes Saturday morning, they tagged 14 more, and Britton said they were planning to continue their work throughout this week and, possibly, into the coming weekend.

The fish – which must be 1 pound before they'll be tagged – were caught, put into a large cooler with water and a mild sedative to calm them. The fish were then handed to biologist Erik Ringelberg, who measured them and looked for anomalies like parasites, bird strikes and other injuries.

Ringelberg then handed them over to Britton – who was keeping the statistics – who then weighed them before putting them into another cooler filled with water with added oxygen to help the fish recover from the anesthetic.

“They're pretty amazing little fish,” said Britton.

Part of Habematolel's effort includes restoration on Middle Creek, including improving weirs there, she said.

The equipment being used to track the hitch allows researchers to follow the hitch's movement in the creeks, mostly on Adobe Creek, said Ringelberg.

However, they can't currently track what the fish do when they ultimately return to Clear Lake. Ringelberg said another proposed project would pursue tracking them in their lake home.

All of this carefully pursued research is adding to knowledge of the fish, but raising yet more questions that still haven't been answered, such as if the fish return to their natal streams, much like salmon do, he explained.

One of the surprising findings of the research, said Ringelberg, is that the fish, if they meet obstructions while passing through streams, will attempt to burrow through the streambed to get around the barriers.

Ringelberg said a requirement of Habematolel's grant is that the information be reported. Among the entities they report to are the California Natural Diversity Database.

Exploring the causes of the decline

The hitch is known to scientists as Lavinia exilicauda chi. The fish is the only species reported to be within the genus Lavinia.

University of California, Davis biologist Dr. Peter Moyle's seminal work, “Inland Fishes of California” discusses the fish in detail. It's an important book that Macedo keeps with him, pulling it out on Saturday to show to those on the tour interested in the hitch.

Moyle is a much respected scientist who is considered an expert on anadromous fish – those that migrate from salt water to fresh water for spawning – and whose knowledge and opinion have been called upon in studies on the Bay-Delta and the state's larger water issues.

In a 2009 e-mail exchange with Lake County News, Moyle said that he believed there was no question the hitch's numbers have declined, although the evidence is largely anecdotal.

The hitch and splittail were historically the lake's main plankton-eating fish, and had an enormous food supply, in addition to also eating the Clear Lake gnat, he said.

Moyle, who worked in Lake County in the 1970s, recalled seeing hundreds of spawning fish at “virtually any stream with water in it,” including drainage ditches of fields near Seigler Creek which he estimated was as many as 15 miles from Clear Lake.

Moyle attributed the fish's population decline to three main causes.

They included loss of spawning habitat, with streams being “increasingly channelized, dewatered, altered with barriers, and otherwise made inhospitable to hitch, including making them more vulnerable to predation, human and non-human.” He added that the hitch “have survived mainly because they spawn so early, the eggs hatch quickly, and the larvae wash into the lake.”

The second cause Moyle identified was loss of rearing habitat, particularly tules and marshes. He said that the larval hitch appear to benefit from being reared among tule stems, which protects them from predators like silversides and provides them with abundant microscopic food sources like rotifers, a tiny aquatic animal.

Moyle said the third – and probably most important – cause is the introduction of alien species into Clear Lake, including silversides and threadfin shad that compete with hitch for important food sources like zooplankton and which he believed also prey on the larvae and small juveniles.

The Florida largemouth bass for which the lake has become known are what Moyle called “a voracious predator” on larger hitch, which also are preyed upon by three species each of catfish and sunfish, and mosquitofish.

He estimated that huge fluctuations in shad numbers should have an impact on hitch populations both by periodically depleting food supplies and by allowing predator populations such as grebes to build up before the crash.

Moyle concluded, “It is evident that the Clear Lake hitch get hammered throughout their life cycle. It is a bit of miracle that they have persisted despite all this. Their decline makes the work of the Chi Council extremely important. Without active protection and management, the hitch will disappear.”

To learn more about the hitch, visit the Chi Council's Web site, http://lakelive.info/chicouncil/ . The group next meets at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 27, at the Lake County Agriculture Center, 883 Lakeport Blvd., Lakeport. The public is invited to attend.

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Cal Fire, which has a worldwide reputation as a superior wildland firefighting and emergency response department, is hosting the group from France’s Ecole Nationale Superiure des Officiers Sapeurs Pompiers (ENSOSP), which translates to “The National School of Superior Fire Officers.”

The group will shadow Cal Fire Incident Command Team 5 and meet with Cal Fire personnel from April 4 to 12.

“Along with the privilege of living in our beautiful and diverse state comes the responsibility to be prepared for the host of natural and man made disasters California is vulnerable to," said Ken Pimlott, acting Cal Fire director. “We are happy to share our experiences with our French colleagues who experience similar challenges such as a climate that's hospitable to large, damaging wildfires and terrain that can make fighting them difficult.”

The French instructors and graduates are members of the 72nd French Academy for Fire, Rescue and Civil Protection Officers of ENSOSP.

Each class from ENSOSP has the opportunity for further study once they have graduated and this year the group decided to come to the United States to exchange ideas, information and technology with CAL FIRE personnel regarding “All Hazard” emergency service techniques.

The entire cost of their trip is being paid for by the ENSOSP group through donations and fundraising efforts.

On Tuesday, April 5, the group will be in Napa County to receive instruction on Cal Fire's Fire Prevention Program and Cooperative Fire Protection Services.

On Wednesday, April 6, the group will be in Lake County in the morning and see a demonstration of Cal Fire's hand crew and bulldozer operations. In the afternoon the group will tour the State Capitol in Sacramento and visit the Fallen Firefighters Memorial.

In the morning on Thursday, April 7, the group will be introduced to Cal Fire's Air Program at McClellan Air Park and will meet later with Cal Fire Acting Director Ken Pimlott. The day will end with a visit to California Operation Center at CalEMA.

On Friday, April 8, the group will tour the Angora Fire Incident in South Lake Tahoe where 3,100 acres and 309 homes were destroyed in 2007.

The group will be in Butte County on Saturday, April 9, and Sunday, April 10, and will review a vegetation management plan burn, a hazardous material incident, a swift water rescue and a high angle/low angle rescue technique demonstration, as well as other rescue type demonstrations.

The last stop on the tour will be a trip to Cal Fire's Northern Operations Center in Redding on Monday, April 11, officials said.

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These fingerling potatoes are so small that this pile could easily fit into a cereal bowl. Photo by Esther Oertel.

The varied shapes of these long, slender potatoes captured not only my eyes, but my imagination, beginning a train of vegetable rumination that hasn’t quite stopped.

We are a nation of potato eaters. Each year more than a million acres of farmland in the U.S. are devoted to growing potatoes, and our per capita consumption each year is a whooping 126 pounds.

Worldwide, the potato is the fourth largest food crop, following rice, wheat and maize (known to us as corn).

Much of the potato’s popularity in the U.S. is due to the fast food industry and the deep-fried potatoes served up in these neon bright establishments. Snack foods such as potato chips also contribute their share.

But despite these not-so-healthy offerings, the potato stripped of such fatty preparation is a surprisingly healthy food choice.

I’m not sure if I meet the average per capita consumption of 126 pounds – especially since I stay away from fast food restaurants and rarely eat potato chips – but I do know that I enjoy nearly every potato I consume. They’re among my favorite foods; there’s just something about them that’s immensely nurturing.

Being a favorite comfort food for many – myself included – it’s not surprising that its scientific name, Solanum tuberosum, is derived, in part, from a Latin word that means soothing.

The potato's name also reflects that it belongs to the Solanaceae family, otherwise known as nightshades, whose members include tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and tomatillos.

The potato is a tuber, rather than a root, meaning the edible portion underground is a swollen part of the stem that develops to feed the leafy green portion of the plant. If allowed to flower and bear fruit, some varieties will yield small, inedible, green tomato-like globes.

There are more than 100 varieties of potatoes (some sources claim more than 1,000), and they come in varied colors such as golden yellow, deep blue, lavender or rosy red. Size and shape varies, as well, with the aptly-named fingerling potatoes in my CSA box a fraction of the size of heavy, lumpy, brown Russets stacked high in supermarket bins.

The potato wasn’t always such a popular fellow, however, and its history is a checkered one.

Potatoes originated in the Andes mountain range in South America, and the Inca Indians of what is now Peru were the first to cultivate them. Not many other cultivated foods were able to withstand the high altitudes of this area, making potatoes the staple food crop of the people there.

The traditional Irish mashed potato dish known as

The Anderson Marsh Interpretive Association's sixth annual Old Time Bluegrass Festival will be held on Saturday, Sept. 10, 2011, and will feature a lineup including Grammy award winner Laurie Lewis with her band, the Right Hands, the always exciting Stairwell Sisters. Courtesy photo.

LOWER LAKE, Calif. – The Anderson Marsh Interpretive Association (AMIA) has announced the acts that will be performing at the sixth annual Old Time Bluegrass Festival, to be held rain or shine at Anderson Marsh State Historic Park on Saturday, Sept. 10.

The event will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.

“I’m thrilled about this year’s lineup, which will include Grammy award winner Laurie Lewis with her band, the Right Hands, the always exciting Stairwell Sisters, Lake County’s own Pat Ikes and Bound to Ride and the singing and yodeling of Fur Dixon & Steve Werner,” said Festival Musical Director Don Coffin.

Also being featured from Lake County are 3-Deep, the Cobb Stompers, the Konocti Fiddle Club and the Clear Lake Clikkers, Coffin said. Joining the Festival from Sonoma County are Mighty Chiplings and Two Rock Ramblers.

“The festival is a family event, with great music, food, art and crafts, a children’s activity area and more,” says Festival Coordinator Henry Bornstein. “With two stages and non-stop music from 10 a.. to 6:30 p.m., there’s something for everyone.”

Bornstein said in addition to music there will be special activities for children all day and musician’s workshops led by pros such as Laurie Lewis, Jim Williams, Steve Werner, Pat Ikes, Andy Skelton and Don Coffin.

There also will be a wine and beer garden featuring Lake County wines, demonstrations of wool spinning and weaving, an Art-in-the-Barn exhibit and dozens of food and handicraft booths.

“We encourage those attending to bring their instruments for workshops and informal jam sessions behind the ranch house,” Bornstein said.

This year, the festival will close with everyone being invited to an outdoor dance to the music of the Stairwell Sisters, a favorite of festival attendees.

“The Old Time Bluegrass Festival is a community fundraiser supporting the work of AMIA”, says Gae Henry, AMIA Board member. “Our mission is to protect and support the natural and cultural resources at Anderson Marsh State Historic Park.”

The event is held each year at the Park, which is on Highway 53, between the towns of Clearlake and Lower Lake.

For more information, or to become involved in this year’s Bluegrass Festival as an AMIA member, volunteer or sponsor, you may contact AMIA at 707-995-2658 or by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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High lake levels have led to flooding in some campground areas at Clear Lake State Park in Kelseyville, Calif., pictured here on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Elizabeth Larson.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – On Saturday morning, after more than a week of flood warnings, Clear Lake's waters receded back to below flood stage.

The lake's waters went below the flood stage mark, 9 feet Rumsey, early Saturday. By the end of the day the level had gone down to 8.92 feet Rumsey, with the Cache Creek Dam releasing at 3,340 cubic feet per second, according to the US Geological Survey.

The National Weather Service subsequently ended its flood warning, which had been in effect since last week, with Lake County the only area in the state to be under such a warning during the last few days.

The Rumsey gauge is the special measure used to determine Clear Lake's depth. Lake County Water Resources said it's based on the natural lake level maintained by the Grigsby Riffle, a rock sill located at the confluence of Cache and Seigler Creeks near Lower Lake.

Last Friday, the lake had gone into flood stage for the first time since 1998, according to Water Resources officials.

The lake peaked at 9.37 feet Rumsey on Monday and then began its decline, which during the last several days was aided by no rain, warm spring days and continued high releases from the Cache Creek Dam.

The dam was built in 1914, and since then it has been used to manipulate the lake level, according to Water Resources.

Over the 97 years since the dam was built, only 15 of those years have seen the lake above 9 feet on the Rumsey gauge, according to US Geological Survey records on Clear Lake.

Besides 2011, the records show those years in which the lake was in flood stage include 1914, 1915, 1927, 1938, 1942, 1956, 1958, 1965, 1970, 1974, 1980, 1986, 1995 and 1998.

Lake County News correspondent Ed Oswalt contributed research on lake levels for this story.

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MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – Alcohol is believed to be a factor in a weekend crash in the south county that injured three people.

The crash in question occurred Saturday, April 2, at 6:20 p.m. on the Dry Creek Cutoff near Middletown, according to the California Highway Patrol.

A Monday report from CHP Officer Steve Tanguay explained that the single-vehicle collison involved a 1981 Toyota pickup driven by 23-year-old Middletown resident Justin McCarty.

Tanguay said McCarty was driving the pickup eastbound on the Dry Creek Cutoff toward Highway 29, with 24-year-old Shane Sims of Middletown riding in the front passenger seat and Sina Radley, 21, of Clearlake riding in the truck's bed.

According to the report, McCarty lost control of the truck, which veered to the left and went off of the roadway, colliding with a tree and rolling over onto its left side.

Radley was thrown from the bed of the truck, which came to rest in a ditch, Tanguay said.

Sims was able to get out of the truck while McCarty was trapped in the driver’s seat. Tanguay said neither McCarty nor Sims were wearing their seatbelts at the time of the collision.

When McCarty was removed from the vehicle, he was flown to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital for major injuries sustained in the collision, Tanguay said. Sims and Radley were transported by South County Fire Ambulance to Saint Helena Hospital, Clearlake for treatment of their injuries.

CHP Officer Erica Coddington is the investigating officer, Tanguay said.

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But an advocate for the contractor counters that the percentage of Army reservists medically ready to deploy within 72 hours actually has jumped over the last several years, from 24 percent to 62 percent.

Rep. Joe Heck (R-Nev.) says he has watched with rising frustration as an arrangement with Logistics Health Inc. (LHI) of La Crosse, Wis., has handcuffed his Reserve medical staff on weekend drills from providing basic preventive health services to fellow reservists.

Heck charges that this has cut training opportunities for reserve medics. And LHI contract rules create barriers to using reserve medical personnel effectively, to give flu shots, for example, or to do preventive dental care.

Heck also contends that thousands of reservists every year are wrongly classified as medically nondeployable because LHI relies too heavily on soldiers’ responses to health questionnaires to assess fitness for duty.

On written responses alone LHI will lower medical readiness profiles of soldiers needlessly, sometimes for conditions that medical boards already have reviewed and deemed soldiers fit and deployable, Heck says.

An advocate for LHI, who asked not to be identified, says Heck seems not to understand that the Army Reserve was and is incapable of providing enough health services on its own to bring overall readiness rates higher.

Besides being a freshman member of Congress, Heck commands the Western Area Medical Support Group in San Pablo, Calif., one of four such groups in the Army Reserve. He oversees 2200 medically trained reservists assigned to 13 units across six states.

LHI does important work to ensure reservists stay medically fit, Heck says. “The problem is it doesn’t really accomplish that in a timely, cost-effective manner.”

“I would send a soldier who was well to a PHA” – Periodic Health Assessment conducted by LHI – “and he would come back broken, this is, medically nondeployable for an issue that was really not an issue,” Heck said. “But it would take six months to a year for us to clear it up.”

Heck estimated that 10,000 Army Reservists currently have a “P-3 profile” from LHI “that renders them medically nondeployable. And most of those, I am sure, will be adjudicated as not valid.”

Army Reserve Mobilization Support Units still are responsible for medical processing of reservists when mobilized and on return. But if the same personnel “want to do soldier readiness processing at my unit, they can’t do it on a drill weekend for my soldiers even though that’s their job should they be mobilized,” Heck said.

Heck raised these issues last week at House military personnel subcommittee hearing where senior defense health officials and the military surgeons general testified on TRICARE fees.

He expanded on his concerns in a phone interview for this column. Heck says he has asked Defense and Army medical leaders to answer a number of questions including whether LHI adds value for the government and whether contract changes are planned.

LHI, in a statement, said that neither the company nor the Reserve Health Readiness Program it services prohibits reserve components “from performing their medical readiness services organically.”

LHI said it only follows guidance from the Army Reserve Surgeon’s office and the office for Force Health Protection and Readiness under the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. And “LHI only initiates” the annual health profile for drilling reservists.

“LHI is not the final authority on eligibility. For Army Reserve, the regional support command surgeon’s office has the authority to override any issue identified.”

LHI said in the last three years the Army Reserve “has witnessed historical medical and dental readiness improvement.”

Heck said he has been raising questions about the LHI contract for at couple of years based on “my firsthand experience. Now it’s just that I’m in a position to maybe get some answers.”

Maj. Gen. Richard A. Stone, deputy surgeon general of the Army for mobilization, readiness and reserve affairs, said in a statement that readiness of the Army Reserve and Army National Guard “has steadily improved with the growth of the Reserve Health Readiness Program.”

He notes that the two reserve components “have taken different approaches” to achieve soldiers’ medical fitness. “The Army Reserve has used LHI, thus freeing their medical providers for collective training during a time of intense utilization of the Army Reserve medical force,” Stone said.

Donald J. Weber, a former Marine and Vietnam veteran, is CEO and chairman of LHI. He started it in 1999 and soon landed a contract with DoD to help with mass immunization of military members against anthrax. Weber previously had founded National Health Screenings, which provided preemployment drug testing services, a business he sold before starting LHI.

When Reserve and National Guard mobilizations after 9/11 found many members nondeployable because of dental and medical issues, the departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs and Health and Human Services formed the Federal Strategic Health Alliance (FEDS_HEAL), a joint initiative to provide medical support to reserve units.

LHI’s business boomed under FEDS_HEAL. It hired prominent names in government health. Tommy G. Thompson, former governor of Wisconsin and former HHS secretary for President George W. Bush, became company president in 2005. In 2007, William Winkenwerder Jr., former assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, joined the LHI executive team.

Later that year the FEDS_HEAL contract was restructured as the RHRP, and a five-year contract worth up to $790 million was awarded to LHI. It now has 839 full-time employees at its La Crosse headquarters and uses a nationwide network of 25,000 medical and dental providers.

To comment, send e-mail to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or write to Military Update, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA, 20120-1111.

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The crash, involving a pickup into a ditch, occurred on the Dry Creek Cutoff near Middletown at around 6:20 p.m., according to radio reports.

The California Highway Patrol said one person was ejected from the pickup's bed while another person was trapped inside.

The names of those involved were not immediately available.

An air ambulance transported one subject to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital and the CHP indicated the other subjects were transported to St. Helena Hospital, Clearlake.

The CHP reported a blood draw was ordered as part of the investigation.

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SACRAMENTO – Driver distraction is a significant and growing problem in California, and the California Highway Patrol is joining with other law enforcement partners this month in an effort to save lives by encouraging drivers to keep their eyes on the road.

Inattention while behind the wheel proved to be especially deadly in 2009 as 116 people statewide lost their lives as the result of a collision in which at least one driver was distracted, the CHP reported. More than 17,000 others were injured under similar circumstances.

To address this growing concern, the CHP and more than 200 law enforcement agencies throughout the state are conducting a series of enforcement efforts during April, which is National Distracted Driving Awareness Month.

The crackdown began Monday with the first, two-day statewide enforcement effort.

“When you're behind the wheel of a vehicle, any distraction can be serious, even life-threatening,” said CHP Commissioner Joe Farrow. “Texting, especially, while driving, is not only illegal, it is just not a good idea.”

Farrow said most distracted driving crashes can be prevented if the drivers change their behavior and focus on driving.

Not only do drivers put themselves at risk while multitasking, drivers increase the risk of injuring or killing their passengers, bicyclists, pedestrians or innocent victims traveling in another vehicle, the CHP reported, adding that it is the responsibility of all drivers to keep the roads safe.

To help address the deadly problem, the CHP received a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS) through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

In addition, local police and sheriffs’ departments will be adding several “zero tolerance” enforcement days throughout the month.

“OTS is proud to both help provide the CHP with the additional resources they need to combat this problem and to sign up over 275 local law enforcement agencies to join in this kickoff campaign,” said OTS Director Christopher J. Murphy. “This is a problem that threatens to grow even larger and faster if California's drivers are not convinced that mobile device use is dangerous.”

While the number one source of driver inattention is the use of cell phones, distracted driving is more than just using technology when driving. It represents a range of activities that impact a driver’s visual, auditory, physical or cognitive abilities when driving.

Hoping to drive the message home and convince motorists to disconnect from this distracting, often deadly behavior while behind the wheel, the CHP will, in addition to the enforcement effort, launch a grant-funded public service campaign, conduct educational presentations and staff booths at community events at which educational materials can be distributed.

“Through the combined efforts of California’s law enforcement agencies, our traffic safety partners like OTS, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the Department of Motor Vehicles our goal is to enlighten drivers statewide about the dangers of distracted driving,” said Farrow. “Too many lives are destroyed every year because of distracted driving; it’s not worth it.”

To view the distracted driving public service announcements, go to the CHP’s Web site: www.chp.ca.gov or www.chp.ca.gov/depts_divs_offs/omr_texting.html .

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The Clear Lake State Park Education Pavilion in Kelseyville, Calif., was dedicated at an afternoon ceremony on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Elizabeth Larson.

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – As volunteers, park officials, elected representatives and community members looked on Saturday afternoon, the State Parks Department formally received an important gift – the new Clear Lake State Park Education Pavilion.

Clear Lake State Park Interpretive Association President Madelene Lyon not only officially handed over the seven-year labor of love to State Parks Director Ruth Coleman, she also topped off the gift with a hug.

That gesture captured not just personal warmth but also pointed to the greater cooperation that has formed between private and public interests in accomplishing the pavilion's completion.

The new building sits across from the park's visitor center. It features a covered area with an outdoor sink, counter and power outlets, and a secure enclosed portion where equipment can be stored.

CLSPIA's goal, the group said, was to create an outdoor educational space for young people, to keep them engaged and to make sure “no child was left inside.”

The vision turned into action in 2004, and Lyon and the group pursued years of fundraising, planning and lobbying to turn ideas into sketches, and sketches into a structure.

Along the way, one of the worst economic climates in memory hit, which has had critical impacts on state funding and, especially, the state parks.

Clear Lake State Park itself was on a list of parks former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed for closure, but a local grassroots campaign by the group and the community at large spared the park.

It was the community's very vociferous defense of its park – as well as CLSPIA's ongoing commitment to offering educational programs like the Junior Rangers, park tours and bird walks – that kept the park open, officials said Saturday.

Coleman had been a staffer for Mike Thompson when he was in the state Legislature, before he moved into Congress. Noting, “Once you work for Mike you always work for Mike,” Coleman recalled Thompson calling her in about 2005 to ask if she had money to devote to the pavilion project.

The state did put aside funding for the project before leaner times arrived. While it took a lot of time and more than the estimated $20,000 to build it, Coleman said the pavilion was nonetheless an important example of what private and public entities can do when they work together.

She said the park would not be nearly as successful as it is if it weren't for its nonprofit partner, CLSPIA, adding that partnership “is the reason this park is still open.”

Thompson, who along with wife Jan came over for the afternoon for the dedication, credited Lyon's tenacity with pushing the project forward, which he said made “absolute perfect sense” in its goal of reaching young people, whose ability in science will be crucial to the country.

With so many partners – the community, the government and the organization – pushing in the same direction, it spelled success, he said.

Assemblyman Wes Chesbro – who Saturday afternoon was heading back to Sacramento and back to work in the Legislature – said it's seemed like a dark time for the state, with its budget woes.

However, Chesbro was heartened by the hope he said he saw expressed in the project's cooperative nature.

It was an example that Chesbro said could be used to confront other problems.

Chesbro said when a community supports a state park, it makes it easier for their government representatives to push to keep them open.

“I'd say this park is in good hands,” said Chesbro, who noted he loved the park and had visited it with his family many times.

Lauding Lyon, Coleman and Thompson, Chesbro added, “Really, the whole community deserves the credit.”

Clear Lake Section Superintendent Bill Salata also spoke, thanking CLSPIA. “What they did was just incredible.”

He also thanked the California Conservation Corps, which built the pavilion.

Lyon, before she turned over the pavilion and the hug to Coleman, thanked everyone, agreeing with others who had spoke that it took the entire community to make it possible.

“We saw such a huge need for this,” she said.

CLSPIA reported that major donors to the project included the Keeling-Barnes Family Foundation, Wildhurst Vineyards, Brad and Kathy Barnwell, William and Roberta Beat, the California State Park Foundation, D.A. and Leona Butts, Henry and Dorothy Hurkett, Madelene and Walt Lyon, Ernie Mendes, Dorothy Meyer, Tom and Val Nixon, Brad Onorato, the Priest Family Charitable Fund, Rotary Club of Lakeport, Grant Cary Family, Thrivent, Neil and Bobbi Towne, and Tom and Tina Wasson.

The dedication ceremony also coincided with the opening of the park for the season. Officials reported that a new ranger was on temporary assignment for the summer to assist at the park.

E-mail Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow Lake County News on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LakeCoNews , on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lake-County-News/143156775604?ref=mf and on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/LakeCoNews .

The blueprints for the education pavilion at Clear Lake State Park in Kelseyville, Calif., were prepared by Bud Hurkett, a Clear Lake State Park Interpretive Association volunteer. The plans were submitted to the state in 2005. Photo by Elizabeth Larson.

A NASA fireball camera at the Marshall Space Flight Center. Photo courtesy of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

What are the signs of spring? They are as familiar as a blooming daffodil, a songbird at dawn, a surprising shaft of warmth from the afternoon sun.

And, oh yes, don't forget the meteors.

“Spring is fireball season,” said Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Center. “For reasons we don't fully understand, the rate of bright meteors climbs during the weeks around the vernal equinox.”

In other seasons, a person willing to watch the sky from dusk to dawn could expect to see around 10 random or “sporadic” fireballs.

A fireball is a meteor brighter than the planet Venus. Earth is bombarded by them as our planet plows through the jetsam and flotsam of space – i.e., fragments of broken asteroids and decaying comets that litter the inner solar system.

In spring, fireballs are more abundant. Their nightly rate mysteriously climbs 10 percent to 30 percent.

“We've known about this phenomenon for more than 30 years,” said Cooke. “It's not only fireballs that are affected. Meteorite falls – space rocks that actually hit the ground--are more common in spring as well1.”

Researchers who study Earth's meteoroid environment have never come up with a satisfactory explanation for the extra fireballs. In fact, the more they think about it, the stranger it gets.

Consider the following: There is a point in the heavens called the “apex of Earth's way.” It is, simply, the direction our planet is traveling. As Earth circles the sun, the apex circles the heavens, completing one trip through the Zodiac every year.

The apex is significant because it is where sporadic meteors are supposed to come from. If Earth were a car, the apex would be the front windshield. When a car drives down a country road, insects accumulate on the glass up front. Ditto for meteoroids swept up by Earth.

Every autumn, the apex climbs to its highest point in the night sky. At that time, sporadic meteors of ordinary brightness are seen in abundance, sometimes dozens per night.

Read that again: Every autumn.

“Autumn is the season for sporadic meteors,” said Cooke. “So why are the sporadic fireballs peaking in spring? That is the mystery.”

Meteoroid expert Peter Brown of the University of Western Ontario notes that “some researchers think there might be an intrinsic variation in the meteoroid population along Earth's orbit, with a peak in big fireball-producing debris around spring and early summer. We probably won't know the answer until we learn more about their orbits.”

To solve this and other puzzles, Cooke is setting up a network of smart meteor cameras around the country to photograph fireballs and triangulate their orbits.

As explained in the Science@NASA story “What's Hitting Earth?”, he's looking for places to put his cameras; educators are encouraged to get involved. Networked observations of spring fireballs could ultimately reveal their origin.

“It might take a few years to collect enough data,” he cautioned.

Until then, it's a beautiful mystery. Go out and enjoy the night sky. It is spring, after all.

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

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