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LAKEPORT, Calif. – Heelers, shepherds, a Chihuahua and a great big mastiff are up for adoption at Lake County Animal Care and Control.
Two McNab-blue heeler mix pups join a number of adult dogs waiting for new homes.
Thanks to Lake County Animal Care and Control’s new veterinary clinic, many of the animals offered for adoption already are spayed or neutered and ready to go home with their new families.
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.
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”).
Female lab mix
This female Labrador Retriever mix is 2 years old.
She weighs 51 pounds and has a short brown brindle coat.
Find her in kennel No. 9, ID No. 33985.
Female mastiff mix
This female mastiff mix is 4 years old.
She’s a big girl, at 102 pounds. She has a short tan coat and has been spayed.
Meet her in kennel No. 10, ID No. 34050.
Male Chihuahua mix
This is a male Chihuahua mix of undetermined age.
He has a short tan coat, weighs just over 15 pounds and has not been neutered.
He’s in kennel No. 11, ID No. 34054.
‘Willie’
“Willie” is a 7-year-old male border collie mix.
He is not yet altered, weighs about 40 pounds and has a short black and white coat.
Find him in kennel No. 13, ID No. 33930.
Male McNab-blue heeler
This male McNab-blue heeler is 10 weeks old.
He has brown eyes, a short black and white coat, and has not yet been neutered.
He’s in kennel No. 18e, ID No. 33939.
Male McNab-blue heeler
This male McNab-blue heeler is 10 weeks old like his litter mate.
He’s got a short black and white coat, brown eyes and has not yet been altered.
Find him in kennel No. 18d, ID No. 33938.
Male shepherd mix
This male shepherd mix is 1 year old.
He has a short tricolor coat weighs just over 62 pounds and is not yet neutered.
He’s in kennel No. 20, ID No. 34097.
Female Labrador Retriever mix
This female Labrador Retriever mix is 1 year old.
She has a short black coat, weighs just over 41 pounds and has not yet been spayed.
Find her in kennel No. 21, ID No. 34098.
‘Fergie’
“Fergie” is a 1-year-old female German Shepherd mix.
She has a short black and tan coat and has not yet been spayed.
She’s in kennel No. 24, ID No. 34030.
Adoptable dogs also can be seen at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control/Adopt/Dogs_and_Puppies.htm or at www.petfinder.com .
Please note: Dogs listed at the shelter's Web page that are said to be “on hold” are not yet cleared for adoption.
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 past June more than 170 all-time US heat records were tied or broken – many of them originally set in the historically hotter months of July and August.
And with a drought plaguing much of the country, the ground is as dry and crispy as a saltine cracker.
By early July, 56 percent of the contiguous U.S. was experiencing drought. That’s the largest percentage in the 12-year record of the U.S. Drought Monitor. Fires scorched over 1.3 million acres across the US in June, reducing hundreds of homes to ashes in the West.
Just imagining prospects for the rest of the summer is enough to bring sweat to your brow. And last winter is partly to blame.
“Seven hundred and ninety-nine daytime heat records were broken in the first five days of January in the US,” said Jake Crouch, a climate scientist from the NOAA National Climatic Data Center. “Last year’s was the fourth warmest winter since 1895. And it was dry, with a dearth of snowfall in many places. During most of this past winter and spring, a positive North Atlantic Oscillation pressure pattern kept the jet stream further north and the US warmer and drier than normal.”
With little moisture in the soil to evaporate and dissipate some of the sun’s energy, more solar radiation is converted to sensible heat, he says.
Of course global warming is on the tips of many tongues.
“CO2 is up from 280 parts per million in the 19th century atmosphere to 400 parts per million now – a 43 percent increase,” said NASA climatologist Bill Patzert. “We’re emitting six times more carbon from fossil fuel use now than we did 50 years ago. Atmospheric CO2 hasn’t been this high in 400,000 years.”
Greenhouse gases like CO2 and methane have higher heat capacities than many other gasses, causing the atmosphere to retain more heat.
“The atmosphere becomes a heat source itself, radiating heat back onto the Earth. Eighty-five to 90 percent of that heat is absorbed by the oceans, because water has a high heat capacity. So the oceans expand and rise. Global sea levels have risen 8 inches over the past 130 years, and the average surface temperature of the entire earth (land surface temperatures plus ocean temperatures) has increased 1.6 °F. These facts,” he asserted, “are unequivocal proof of global warming.”
But is the record-setting summer 2012 evidence of climate change?
“Not necessarily,” said Patzert. “We’ve always had extreme weather. US history is written in great natural calamities – tornadoes, hurricanes, heat waves, droughts, floods. Global warming is happening, but it would be irresponsible to say that this heat wave and all these broken records are due to global warming from human causes. It’s just not that simple.”
John Christy, a scientist from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, agrees. “Heat waves are a natural part of the climate system, and while the recent heat wave was remarkable, it was not as intense as others in the past.”
He offers a few examples of past heat waves and droughts.
“The central US suffered several heat waves in the 1930s – the dust bowl years – when more statewide, all-time record high temperatures were set than in any other decade,” said Christy. “And the western US experienced decades-long droughts in the 12th century. So dry were mountain areas that we can still see near-hundred-year-old trees standing upright in the bottom of alpine lakes where they grew on dry ground 900 years ago.1 This shows that in the 12th century it was so dry and hot that the lakes dried up and allowed trees to grow over a significant period before moisture finally returned.”
Patzert and Christy are on opposite sides of the global warming debate.
Patzert firmly believes that Earth is warming up and humans are the main reason why. Christy, on the other hand, argues that natural climate variations are almost solely to blame.
Yet they both agree that the summer 2012 weather might be just that – weather. They also both believe that improvement is needed in models indicating effects of human and other factors on weather and climate.
“Today’s climate models are extremely sophisticated, constantly improving, and will be crucial to charting our future – but they aren’t perfect,” said Patzert.
One component that needs improvement: clouds.
“Clouds play a key role in climate because they affect the amount of sunlight reflected and absorbed,” said Christy. “We need higher resolution models to portray them more accurately. The distance between grid measurement points in current models is too great to capture meter to meter variations in clouds, land cover, and other variables that affect climate.”
One more point of agreement: the summer of 2012 is too hot to handle.
Dauna Coulter writes for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
NORTH COAST, Calif. – A lightning-caused wildland fire complex burning in northern Mendocino County destroyed several more structures and damaged a fire truck on Saturday.
The North Pass Fires – which began a week ago 10 miles northeast of Covelo in the Williams Valley – have so far burned 24,214 acres and are 32 percent contained, according to a report from Cal Fire and the US Forest Service, which have unified command on the incident.
US Forest Service spokesperson Tamara Schmidt reported late Saturday night that a fire engine was severely damaged by the fires, with preliminary reports indicating that no injuries to the four person crew were sustained.
The engine crew is being assessed by incident personnel and the incident is being reviewed, she said.
Since Friday, the fires have destroyed a residence and three additional outbuildings, bringing the number of destroyed structures to a total of six, officials reported.
Approximately 1,287 firefighting personnel were assigned to the fire on Saturday. Resources dedicated to the incident included 111 engines, 26 fire crews, two airtankers, 10 helicopters, 32 bulldozers and 23 water tenders.
Evacuations east of Covelo that were ordered due to the fires remained in effect on Saturday, with dozens of structures still threatened, according to the unified command report.
The fire area includes part of the Mendocino National Forest.
The Saturday night report from Cal Fire and the US Forest Service said the fires are continuing to spread east to Forest Road M2, south toward Anthony’s Ridge, north to Cedar Springs Ridge and northeast towards Pothole Creek and Steel Bench. The fires are projected to have limited movement north toward Castle Peak and Red Rock over the next 48 hours.
The Mendocino County Air Quality Management District issued an air quality alert for smoke concentrations leading to “hazardous” air quality conditions for the Covelo and Round Valley areas through Monday.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – Amidst the charred acreage left behind by a wildland fire complex that burned east of Clearlake Oaks earlier this month is a freestanding rock archway.
It’s what’s left of the spired house on a hill overlooking Clear Lake that the Thorburn family built more than two decades ago.
The family’s dream home came to its end in a nightmarish scenario, with Patsy Thorburn barely escaping from her hilltop residence before it was consumed by flames on Sunday, Aug. 12, when the Wye Fire tore through the hills along Highway 20.
By the time it was fully contained on Saturday, Aug. 18, the Wye Fire – which included two fires, the Wye and Walker – burned a total of 7,934 acres, destroyed three structures and damaged two others, and led to the evacuations of the Spring Valley and Wilbur Hot Springs areas. The causes of both fires remain under investigation.
Thorburn would lose her home, all of her possessions – including family photos and mementos – as well as her beloved cats, Muffin and Sylvester, and was within mere feet of the flames as she escaped her burning property.
Despite that experience, Thorburn and her family are moving forward, trying to recover from what her daughters said is a tragedy for their entire family.
The home now is a burned ruin, with just the rock arch that framed the front door and a portion of wall still standing.
Yet, the family said the 90-acre property where the home sat remains beautiful despite its new scars.
“It has an aura of peace up there,” said Thorburn.
Her daughter, Cathy Wilson, agreed. “The fire can’t take that essence.”
A family effort
The home, sitting on a cliff above Clearlake Oaks, with a vast view of Clear Lake, was a family gathering place. It hosted Christmases and other holidays. A family member proposed to his wife there. Wilson’s wedding reception took place at the home and the Thorburns’ other daughter, Melody, held the ceremony there for her wedding to Scott De Leon.
Patsy Thorburn and husband, Max, raised their daughters in a home not far from the nearby quarry. Later, they purchased the property overlooking the lake, where they didn’t initially plan to build a home.
However, Melody De Leon recalled how her father first confided in her that he wanted to build a home on the hilltop site.
Patsy Thorburn remembered only asking that the house have a bigger pantry. She got that as part of the 4,200-square-foot home that she and Max built in 1990.
The look of the house was unique inside and out. On the roof were several cones or spires, which Patsy Thorburn said had a habit of multiplying when she told her husband she didn’t like them.
Inside was wood paneling, tile and ornate woodwork. Max Thorburn was born in Scotland, and the Scottish national symbol – the thistle – appeared in touches around the home, including stair railing details and a tile mosaic at the front entrance.
Daughter Melody would come home on summer weekends from her real estate job in the Bay Area to do masonry work on the home project, including the rock wall that extended out along the front of the property.
While working on the house she met a young engineer, Scott De Leon, who was working for her father. She and De Leon later married. Today he serves as Lake County’s director of Public Works.
The land has a big pine tree that Max Thorburn liked to climb. His wife recalled coming home at times to find the tree swaying, with her husband perched at the top. His daughters said he liked to yell out and startle them from the treetop while they were hanging out by the pool.
Max Thorburn would enjoy the home and land until his death in August 1997.
“It was his grand finale,” said daughter Melody.
Trying to escape
On the afternoon of Aug. 12, Patsy Thorburn was home alone. Her partner, Hank Everett, was out; he was expected back later in the day from Ukiah.
She heard sirens going up Highway 20. Shortly before 4 p.m., firefighters had been dispatched to the Walker Fire, near Walker Ridge Road east of Clearlake Oaks. She said she turned on her scanner to find out what was going on.
Just minutes after 4 p.m., the Wye Fire, at the intersection of Highway 20 and 53 – visible from Thorburn’s house – began. Thorburn said she watched it begin to burn, and then jump the highway.
From there, it moved rapidly up the hill, toward Thorburn’s home.
She went to get her front gate open, tried to gather some belongings and called her cats – Muffin, a small female Siamese, and Sylvester, a big female tuxedo cat. The cats didn’t appear.
Thorburn went to back her car out of the garage to load things up, and by the time she got the car out, the driveway was on fire.
“It was so quick,” she said.
The roof to the patio was on fire and she couldn’t go back to the house, which she said the flames descended on rapidly.
“I saw the house just explode,” she said.
She couldn’t get down the driveway, which was blocked by flames.
Thorburn said she didn’t know at that point that Lake County Fire Chief Willie Sapeta had tried to come up her driveway to find her but the flames blocked him.
He and Cal Fire officials recounted at a Monday community meeting how they had been unable to reach her, and had diverted air resources to the area of the home to try to give her a way out.
Sapeta said that hearing the reports of Thorburn being trapped and beyond the reach of firefighters nearby brought he and other personnel on scene to tears.
On the other side of the flames, Thorburn wasn’t giving up.
Her late husband had cleared an area for a golf driving range, and she drove around on that, dodging the flames, looking for a way out.
The car was filled with smoke and covered by ash. “I couldn’t breathe and I couldn’t see,” she said.
While Thorburn had left the house without her purse or the rest of her belongings, she did have her cell phone.
She managed to get 13-year-old grandson, Max De Leon, on the phone.
Her grandson showed amazing calm, comforting his grandmother. “Be safe,” he told her.
When they hung up, Max called his mother. Melody De Leon then called 911, with dispatch reporting that they had just spoken to her mother.
When Thorburn could see through the smoke, she got down the driveway and out onto the highway, heading west toward Clearlake Oaks. After she got out, trees fell across her driveway.
On the highway, Thorburn met up with firefighters, who asked where she had come from, since the road was blocked off. Another fire truck came up and told the firefighters with Thorburn to get her out of the area.
She drove down to the Highway 20 and Highway 53 intersection, meeting a family member there. Her daughters met her at the nearby shopping center before taking her to stay with them. Wilson said it was good to be together.
Within hours, Cal FIre reported that the fire had scorched thousands of acres. Hundreds of people in the Spring Valley area were evacuated from its path.
The family said they were upset to see pictures of the burned home broadcast on Bay Area television; the video had clearly been shot from the property, which news teams were allowed to access before the family was allowed back.
Nearby, the Hue De Laroque family’s farm was hit by the fire, with damage to the farm’s garden, orchard and vineyard.
A fire break helped save their home, but the family’s farming business was devastated. The solar equipment used to power the farm and home also were destroyed.
A Web site to help the Hue De Laroques has been set up at www.giveforward.com/huedelaroque .
Returning home
On the morning of Tuesday, Aug. 14 – two days after the fire erupted – Thorburn and her family went back to the property for the first time once cleared to do so by fire officials.
“The first few days, you treat it with reverence,” Wilson said.
The remains of the house were still smoldering; they were so hot Wilson’s shoes and gloves melted.
The burned ruin of the house yielded few treasures beyond a cast iron dutch oven that had belonged to Thorburn’s mother, found by son-in-law Steve Wilson. Her other son-in-law, Scott De Leon, was able to dig one of the spires out of the rubble.
“It’s just ash,” Thorburn said of her home.
An American flag on the flagpole near the swimming pool, the goldfish in a little pond and Max Thorburn’s favorite climbing tree escaped unscathed.
The family found no sign of Muffin and Sylvester, Patsy Thorburn’s cats. “There was no place for them to go,” she said.
There were, however, signs of wildlife, including a coyote with burned paws and a burned tail spotted by Cathy Wilson.
Thorburn said she doesn’t know if she’ll rebuild. She said he’s renting a home in Glenhaven for the short-term.
She and her family are grateful for the unbelievable outpouring of love and support they’ve received from the community.
“You have no idea how many friends you have until your house burn down,” said Melody De Leon.
Thorburn is saddest about the loss of her cats and pictures, but as for the rest, “Things you can replace.”
Her home’s destruction was the worst thing that Thorburn said has ever happened to her, and her family said it’s a tragedy for all of them.
Just weeks after she narrowly escaped with her own life, Thorburn concluded, “I guess I’m meant to be here for some reason.”
Email Elizabeth Larson at
The California Assembly is scheduled to vote on a bill next week coauthored by Assemblymember Wesley Chesbro (D-North Coast) to repeal the $150 State Responsibility Area (SRA) fire fee, which Chesbro has long maintained is unfair to property owners throughout his district.
“The only solution to fix the injustice of this SRA fee is to completely repeal it,” said Chesbro, who is a coauthor of the repeal legislation, SB 1040. “Assessing it as a flat fee of $150 and charging someone who lives in a mobile home or cabin on the foggy, rainy North Coast the same amount as someone who owns a multimillion dollar estate in the tinder try hills of Southern California is egregiously inequitable. The SRA fee has been rendered unworkable and the only solution is to get rid of it.”
Chesbro has been working with a bipartisan coalition of legislators this year in an effort to make the SRA fee more equitable.
As part of this effort, earlier in this legislative session Chesbro authored a bill to address the fee’s inequities. But AB 2474 died in the Assembly Appropriations Committee.
Chesbro also supported an earlier attempt to repeal the fee, a bill by Assemblymember Kevin Jeffries (R-Lake Elsinore), AB 1506, which also died in committee.
SB 1040, authored by state Sen. Gloria Negrete McLeod (D-Chino), would repeal the SRA fee. This provision was added to the bill on Friday during the Assembly’s floor session.
SB 1040 is an urgency bill, written to take effect immediately if signed by the governor, and will require approval of two-thirds of the Assembly, 54 votes.
If it passes the Assembly, the bill will be immediately transmitted to the Senate for consideration.
“Repealing this fee would also remove a financial threat to local fire districts, which face an uphill battle persuading property owners to fund their agencies if they are forced to pay a $150 fee to the state,” Chesbro added. “It is these local fire agencies that are the first responders to structure fires in most rural communities.”
MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – The service of a search warrant by the Sheriff’s Narcotics Task Force Tuesday morning resulted in five arrests, the seizure of 198 marijuana plants as well as approximately 20 pounds of processed marijuana, three firearms, illegal fireworks and $53,096 for asset forfeiture.
Sgt. Steve Brooks of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office said the warrant service resulted in the arrests of 53-year-old Ronald Joseph Whitney of Middletown; Aaron Daniel Alexander, 25, of Lancaster, Penn.; Austin David Alexander, 30, of Maui, Hawaii; and Middletown residents Aaron Whitney, 25, and Ernest Eldridge Cosse, 38, of Middletown.
On Monday narcotics detectives secured a search warrant for Whitney’s person as well as his home, located in the 24,000 block of Highway 29 in Middletown, and served it the following day at approximately 7 a.m., Brooks said.
When narcotics detectives approached the property, two subjects ran from the marijuana grow attempting to get away. Brooks said detectives entered the residence and detained five individuals without incident.
He said the subjects detained were Ronald Whitney, Aaron Alexander, Austin Alexander, Aaron Whitney and Cosse.
During a search of the home, detectives located approximately 20 pounds of processed marijuana, nine ounces of concentrated cannabis, 37 growing marijuana plants inside the garage and three firearms, Brooks said.
Brooks said they also seized a total of $53,096 in cash, which was located in three different safes inside the residence.
In addition, detectives located a digital scale, packaging materials and illegal fireworks, and outside the residence found 95 marijuana plants inside three light deprivation greenhouses and 66 marijuana plants growing in various areas outside, Brooks said.
Brooks said Ronald Whitney told detectives that he was growing the marijuana for a dispensary called “Mary Jane,” which is located in the Los Angeles area.
Whitney also said he was diverting water from the creek to water his plants, believing the water in the creek belonged to him because the creek runs through his property, Brooks said.
Brooks said Whitney was arrested for cultivating marijuana, possession of marijuana for sale, being armed while in the commission of a felony and possession of illegal fireworks.
He reported that Aaron Alexander was arrested for cultivating marijuana and possession of marijuana for sale; Austin Alexander was arrested for cultivating marijuana and possession of marijuana for sale; Aaron Whitney was arrested for cultivating marijuana and possession of marijuana for sale; and Ernest Cosse was arrested for cultivating marijuana, possession of marijuana for sale and being armed while in the commission of a felony.
All of the subjects were transported to the Lake County Hill Road Correctional Facility and booked, Brooks said.
The Sheriff’s Narcotics Task Force can be contacted through its anonymous tip line at 707-263-3663.
