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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson
The 14,500-acre fire, located about 14 miles east of Clearlake Oaks in an area that is mostly remote wildland, had about 329 firefighting personnel on scene Saturday, according to Cal Fire.
Cal Fire spokesman Kevin Colburn said the fire is expected to be fully contained by Sunday, which will mean it will be completely surrounded by fire lines.
But the work isn't over yet, said Colburn.
“There's a difference between contained and controlled,” he said.
The latter term means the fire is out. That, said Colburn, likely won't happen for at least a few days after containment.
Many firefighters are either being sent to other fires or sent home, said Colburn.
But before Cal Fire moves to the next incident, they'll complete some rehabilitation of the area which has already begun, he said. That includes repairing some damage done during firefighting, such as line clearances, and moving dirt so that it doesn't get into creeks.
Cal Fire puts the cost to fight the fire to date at $4.1 million.
Work on the 3,560-acre, four-fire Soda Complex in the Mendocino National Forest's Upper Lake Ranger District also continued Saturday, according to forest officials. Those fires were caused by last weekend's lightning storms.
The complex includes the Big Fire, 1,400 acres and 40-percent contained, the Back, 1600 acres, 85-percent contained; the Mill, 400 acres, 0-percent contained; and the Monkey Rock, 750 acres, 0-contained. Total containment was at 55 percent Saturday.
There have been a total of two injuries to firefighters. Thirty structures continued to be threatened, with two destroyed, according to the report.
On Saturday, the California Highway Patrol reported that the brakes failed on a very large truck traveling up Elk Mountain Road to take supplies to firefighters.
The truck crashed and injured the driver, according to CHP. A REACH helicopter was requested but visibility concerns prevented it from going into the area. Cal Fire was planning to use its own helicopter to transport the driver out, but no further information was available Saturday.
Another 1,051 acres are burning elsewhere in the forest. Those fires on Saturday triggered closures on the Sanhedrin and Yuki Wildernesses in the Mendocino County portion of the forest, according to spokesperson Phebe Brown, in order to keep the public safe and help fire suppression efforts. The Yolla Bolly-Middle Eel Wilderness also was closed late last week.
Lake Pillsbury's Pogie Point Campground remains closed to the public, because it's being used as a sleeping area for firefighters, officials reported.
Elk Mountain Road from the Bear Creek Road junction to Soda Creek have been closed by Lake County due to fire activity associated with the Back incident. However, officials reported that the public can still gain access to Pillsbury Lake via Potter Valley (County Roads 240 and 301 to the Soda Creek Store).
Anyone visiting the forest should be aware of the heavy fire vehicle traffic, as well as smoke and haze, according to officials.
In Mendocino County, 60 active fires continued to burn Saturday, with 30,100 acres burned and only 5 percent containment, according to Cal Fire.
The cost to battle those fires, which have caused evacuations all over Mendocino County, is currently estimated at $6,660,000, officials reported.
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- Written by: Lake County News reports
The agreement is on behalf of a student who was persistently subjected to verbal taunting and physical abuse throughout elementary and middle school based on his perceived sexual orientation.
Lake County News was unable to reach a school district attorney, and Superintendent Kurt Herndon also could not be reached for comment because he is out of the office until next month.
The ACLU-NC sought this settlement in light of federal and state laws that allow for school administrators to be held liable if they fail to take adequate measures to remedy anti-LGBT harassment and discrimination.
"I can't remember a day at school when I wasn't called a faggot or gay," recalled the student. Since the third grade he has been the target of taunts, bullying and anti-gay name-calling on a regular basis.
The years of harassment finally culminated in the student being attacked by a group of boys in the school locker room after gym class last fall.
The boys knocked him to the ground and kicked him in the stomach, head and sides while screaming "fag" and "queer" at him. He received medical care for his injuries, which is when his parents contacted the ACLU to try to finally put a stop to the abuse, believing that the district was not going to independently take the appropriate steps to respond and protect him.
"We talked to the school about this harassment for years. We wanted to know that the adults in charge cared enough to make sure that our son was safe and secure at school," said the boy's mother. "I'm happy about the policy changes in the district and hope that addressing this will help protect my son and other students in the area."
The settlement agreement was reached without a lawsuit. It contains a series of proactive steps that the Upper Lake Union Elementary School District will take to create a safe learning environment for all students and to educate students and staff about preventing harassment and discrimination at school.
The district also now has adopted clear policies prohibiting harassment and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, as required by California law.
"We're pleased the district is taking such a big step in the right direction," said ACLU attorney Juniper Lesnik. "The lesson for other schools is to address anti-gay harassment early before it escalates to violence."
Lesnik pointed to the murder of an openly gay 15-year-old in Oxnard earlier this year as a tragic example of what can happen when schools don't take harassment seriously. Oxnard student Lawrence King was murdered by a peer in February 2008 after long-term harassment went unchecked.
Among the steps the district has adopted to foster a supportive and safe learning environment are the following:
– Parent/student handbooks will be revised to include the newly adopted anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policies, as well as an explanation of the process for filing a complaint and a description of the steps the district will take in response to the complaint.
– Each school site will identify a teacher, administrator or staff member to serve as the point person for employees on how to prevent school-based harassment.
– The district will provide copies of a National Education Association publication addressing LGBT sensitivity and discuss it with all staff. At each staff meeting, administrators will inquire about incidents of harassment and review the steps teachers and staff should take to intervene.
– Experienced, qualified trainers will provide student training at least once each year at each school site to educate students regarding the harmful effects of discrimination.
– Experienced, qualified trainers will provide professional development to help all teachers and staff to understand the harmful impacts of harassment and discrimination and to learn intervention tools to help prevent and stop discriminatory behavior.
– The district will implement the Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network's ("GLSEN") "No Name Calling Week" curriculum in all district schools.
– The district will implement programs that draw attention to anti-LGBT bullying and effective responses, such as the GLSEN National Day of Silence and the Gay/Straight Alliance Network's "Making your School a Hate-Free Zone" program.
– The district will support the maintenance of a Gay/Straight Alliance club at the middle school.
The settlement also includes a modest monetary award to the family. The ACLU has waived all attorneys' fees.
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- Written by: Ross A. Christensen
KELSEYVILLE – On Saturday the Kelseyville Business Association and Clear Lake Performing Arts (CLPA) hosted the sixth annual Lake County Home Wine Maker’s Festival.
The event allowed home winemakers a forum to show off their hobby, and local wineries a place to give tastings of their products.
The festival is the largest annual fundraiser for CLPA, which promotes music education, community concerts and student scholarships in Lake County.
It was a well-attended event with people from all areas of Northern California including Lake, Mendocino, Sonoma, Yuba, Colusa and other counties.
Thanks were given to North Coast Sen. Pat Wiggins and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for making this Lake County’s first technically legal home winemaking festival. (For more about Wiggin's legislation, see http://lakeconews.com/content/view/4494/764/.)
The festival was open from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. In addition to the offerings from home brewers, small wineries and some of the larger local wineries, there was food, live music, and arts and crafts available.
There was a silent auction and several raffles held throughout the event, along with ribbons awarded to the brewers. Local businesses were open including Focused On Wine, Rosa D’Oro, and Wildhurst tasting rooms.
Providing tastings were:
Laujor Vineyard
DiMario
Eastside Winery
Cesar Toxqui Cellars
Pretaris
D’Agostino
Nowhere Near Loreto
Mount St. Helena
Mother Mountain Wines
Muritage
Tulip Hill
Glory Hole
Honeycutt Vineyard
Steele Wines
F Street Ale Works
Shannon Ridge
Tres Amigos
Berenger
Paul Smith
Langtry/Guenoc
Cobb Mt. Brewing Co.
Ployez
Screeching Peacock
Bell Hill
Koenig Family Cellars
Dusinberre
If you would like to learn more about the Clear Lake Performing Arts, you can visit them online at www.clearlakeperformingarts.org or contact them at Clear Lake Performing Arts, P.O. Box 974, Lakeport, CA 95453.
Ross A. Christensen writes about food and wine for Lake County News.
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- Details
- Written by: Ross A. Christensen
However your typical broiler/fryer chicken in your grocery store doesn’t get that chance. It has lived only between 6 and 10 weeks before it was processed (translate – “slaughtered”). That’s right, it isn’t even old enough to celebrate a three-month anniversary.
This is not only economical for chicken ranchers so they don’t have to feed a critter for years before sale and profit, but it raises the chicken to the perfect size for frying, and the consumer gets the benefit of a young healthy animal that wasn’t on this earth long enough to pick up toxins and disease. This last particular fact is why I collect chicken livers over a brief period and make liver and onions with them rather than with the traditional beef livers. They have a cleaner and more delicate flavor than beef liver.
Capons, however, are something else. To be precise, a capon is a castrated rooster. He got to live a long life (minimum of 16 weeks), and as he did he got fatter, bigger and actually tastes more “chickeny” than the broiler/fryer.
Since you are what you eat and chicken feed is largely soy-based, the broiler/fryer only gets the opportunity to taste like tofu. However, the average capon gets a more diverse feed including free range forage, so they have the opportunity to develop more flavor.
Capons are something you have to try not only for the flavor but for the cheap price, and the fun in telling your family dinner is a chicken eunuch. Capons are typically castrated between 3 to 6 weeks old but can be done well up to 20 weeks. The process makes them more docile, and they can even be used to act as surrogate mothers for chicks (why do my articles always seem to end up talking about chicks in some way or another? Be quiet, that was rhetorical). It also causes them to put on weight more than average and become less active (translate – couch potatoes). I guess you can say that castration turns roosters into middle-aged married men (too ... many ... jokes ... entering ... brain ... at ... one time!).
You can find capons in most major grocery stores in the frozen meats area. Look around where the frozen turkeys, ducks and geese are kept. Capons are larger than a chicken but smaller than a turkey. Due to having been on this planet longer, being castrated and having nothing to do, capons are massive beasts and are really fatty. This makes them poor candidates for frying because by the time the meat is fully cooked the skin is burned. This high fat content also makes them “self basting” and so they hold up well to long, slow cooking methods. Because of this, in the past capons were called “stewing hens” or “roasting chickens.”
I prefer to buy a capon (usually one a month), thaw them and butcher them myself into parts. The breasts are massive so you can actually cut one of them in half and serve two people with it. Since the capon is fuller-flavored you can make better-tasting dishes, and since they are larger they are easier to work with.
It’s almost a treat to make Chicken Kiev or Chicken Cordon Bleu because the breasts are large and easy to work with. The thighs are easy to de-bone and put on skewers to make yakitori. The larger wings I save and make impressively massive Buffalo wings (see recipe below). When I’m finished dismembering the capon, I pick the carcass clean of scraps and throw them to the cats and the bones go into the soup pot. The offal is turned into gravy or cat food. Yeah, my wife has really spoiled cats. Many people want to die and come back as one of my wife’s cats.
The other thing about capons is that they’re cheap, typically right about $2 a pound. One capon will typically feed eight people. We are talking about a cheap, more flavorful “alternative” to chicken, even though they are chicken. If you are broiling or frying a chicken then “broiler/fryers” are the thing to get, but if you have other plans then reach for the capon.
You’ve read previously about my love of spicy foods. Well here is my ultimate-yet-simplified recipe for Buffalo wings that I am particularly proud of. The sauce is thick, smooth and clings perfectly to the wings.
Buffalo wings
Ingredients
4 dismembered capon wings minimum (making eight winglets, use more if you got them)
¼ cup sriracha sauce (available in the Asian section of your grocery store)
6 tablespoons melted butter
I prefer to pan fry the wings until done. This allows me them to get a nice crispy skin and I can control the temperature myself. You can deep fry them if you prefer.
Meanwhile mix the melted butter and sriracha. Toss the cooked capon wings in the sauce. Serve. Have something cold to drink (and lots of it) nearby.
Ross A. Christensen is an award-winning gardener and gourmet cook. He is the author of "Sushi A to Z, The Ultimate Guide" and is currently working on a new book. He has been a public speaker for many years and enjoys being involved in the community.
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