Daniel Laine Wood, 29, appeared briefly Tuesday morning before Judge Stephen Hedstrom in the Lake County Superior Court's Clearlake division.

Wood was convicted last month of misdemeanor indecent exposure and annoying or molesting a child for an August 2010 case in which he exposed himself to two 12-year-old girls, as Lake County News has reported.

Last week the Lake County Sheriff's Office reported that in the wake of Wood's arrest late last year information from several new cases began surfacing.

That has resulted in as many as 15 new charges involving crimes against children under age 14, the agency reported.

Wood, represented by attorney Jason Sherlock, went before Hedstrom for the scheduling of his sentencing in the case from last August as well as a preliminary examination readiness conference in the new case.

Hedstrom asked if Deputy District Attorney Ed Borg and Sherlock had attempted to discuss the case in order to reach a settlement.

Sherlock said they had, but added, “At this point we have not reached a resolution.”

Borg estimated a preliminary hearing in the case will take two to three hours.

Hedstrom ordered Wood to appear at 8:15 a.m. April 29 in Department 2 in Lakeport for the setting of the sentencing hearing and the preliminary examination and assignment.

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 demonstration will begin at 9 a.m. and will be held at the Suchan Valadez Farm & Nursery, 10005 Elk Mountain Road, Upper Lake.

Local nurseryman and walnut expert Alex Suchan will demonstrate two kinds of grafting; whip grafting of small diameter trees, and bark grafting of larger diameter trees.

In addition to demonstrating grafting techniques, topics will include followup care of grafts and proper training and care of young trees.

The demonstration is open to the public and there is no charge to attend.

For further information and directions to the meeting site, please contact UC Cooperative Extension at 707-263-6838 or Suchan Valadez Farm & Nursery at 707-275-2461.

The site has limited wheelchair accessibility; those requiring special accommodations should call 707-275-2461 two days in advance to make arrangements.

Insect traps in the Napa area, where the infestation was first detected in late 2009, have picked up only one EGVM so far in 2011, compared to more than 70 thousand moths detected in January-April of 2010.

“It is remarkable what a community can do when it pulls together,” said CDFA Secretary Karen Ross. “There is still a good deal of work to be done – but the signs so far this year are all positive, and we’ll develop a clearer picture of our progress as the spring season continues.”

As their name suggests, European grapevine moths are not native to California and they have a strong preference for grapevines.

As grapevines bloom and grow in spring and summer, the moths feed on the emerging flowers and grape clusters.

To minimize this damage, the California Department of Food and Agriculture, in cooperation with the USDA and county agricultural commissioners, is continuing in 2011 with fruit removal, treatments, trapping, surveys and other activities begun last year.

The initial infestation in Napa County and subsequent trapping throughout the region triggered a quarantine that affects portions of Napa, Sonoma and Solano counties.

More isolated infestations have triggered smaller quarantines in portions of Mendocino, San Joaquin, Santa Clara, Merced and Fresno counties over the past year.

The quarantines primarily affect farmers as well as those who harvest, transport and otherwise process or handle crops and nursery plants.

Single moths were detected last year in Monterey and Santa Cruz counties, but subsequent trapping has not detected any additional moths so quarantines have not been declared in those areas.

The program for 2011 will include fruit removal and treatments in core areas within the quarantine zones, near sites where moths have been detected.

For property owners who grow grapes non-commercially in an area targeted for treatment, fruit removal is the preferred option.

For those who choose not to have their grapes removed, treatment with the organic pesticide Bt (bacillus thuringiensis), a naturally occurring extract from bacteria, is a secondary option.

In the Napa region near where the heaviest infestation was found, officials will also employ a mating disruption technique using twist ties infused with a pheromone that distracts male moths and keeps them from locating females to mate with.

Affected residents will be notified of plans for public meetings in advance of fruit removal or treatment. Meetings have already begun in some areas, and CDFA is in the process of scheduling additional meetings in April and May.

The following meeting has been confirmed:

Fresno

Wednesday, April 20, 5-7 p.m.

Fresno County Agriculture Department

West Wing Conference Room

1730 S. Maple Avenue, Fresno, CA

Residents of the affected areas who have questions about the program may also call 800-491-1899.

For quarantine maps, please see www.cdfa.ca.gov/phpps/PE/InteriorExclusion/egvm_quarantine.html .

For treatment maps, please see http://www.cdfa.ca.gov/phpps/egvm/treatment_maps.html .

Lifecycle of the European grapevine moth

The European grapevine moth larvae, not the adult moths, are responsible for the damage to grapes. Larvae emerge early in the spring and feed on grape bud clusters or flowers. The larvae then spin webbing around them before pupating inside the web or under a rolled leaf.

If heavy flower damage occurs during this first generation, the affected flowers will fail to develop and yield will be reduced.

Second-generation larvae chew into the grapes to feed before pupating in the clusters or in leaves.

Larvae of the third generation, the most damaging generation, feed on multiple ripening grapes and expose them to further damage from fungal development and rot.

These larvae overwinter as pupae in protected areas such as under bark, and emerge as adults the following spring.

The pest is known to occur in southern Asia, Japan, Europe and North and South America.

For more information on European grapevine moth, visit CDFA’s Web site at www.cdfa.ca.gov/phpps/egvm/index.html .

Because of that, the California Attorney General's Office is handling a number of cases locally and around the state.

Agency officials told Lake County News that the Attorney General's Office regularly handles cases that district attorneys cannot prosecute due to conflicts of interest.

Officials said the need for the Attorney General's Office to prosecute cases commonly arises when new district attorneys are elected. Conflicts usually come about when former clients of a new district attorney are being criminally prosecuted.

Because of that, the Attorney General's Office has experienced trial prosecutors in each of the agency's regional offices who handle these types of cases.

“Based on last November's elections, our San Francisco office is currently prosecuting a number of cases in Mendocino and Del Norte counties, as well as several in Lake County, where the newly elected district attorney has a conflict of interest based on his former representation of the criminal defendant,” said Senior Assistant Attorney General Gerald Engler, the head of the section that provides coverage to the North Coast counties.

In Lake County, as a result of Don Anderson's election to the district attorney's post, the Attorney General's Office said it's handling several cases.

The prosecutions in question include a large marijuana case from 2007 involving charges of cultivation, possession for sale and conspiracy against seven codefendants, one of them Allen Timms, who Anderson said he had represented in the case. Court records show that Anderson was relieved as Timms' attorney last Dec. 20.

Two other cases that present conflicts for Anderson's office because of past representation involve 44-year-old Lucerne resident Todd Drawdy.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Richard Hinchcliff said Drawdy is being prosecuted for misdemeanor annoying or molesting a child, with the second case involving a probation violation.

Perhaps the most notable of the conflict cases, and the most long-running, is that of Derik Navarro, a former deputy sheriff facing prosecution for the alleged statutory rape of his babysitter, the Attorney General's Office said.

Navarro was arrested in April 2007 on a number of felony charges for allegedly having been involved sexually with a 14-year-old girl. The original case included a misdemeanor charge for his alleged involvement with another juvenile female, as Lake County News has reported.

Navarro was employed with the sheriff's office from 2002 until his firing in 2007, which occurred following an internal affairs investigation and ahead of his arrest, according to the original arrest report on the case.

The case has seen numerous delays. Last year it was set for trial but rescheduled, according to court records.

Deputy District Attorney John DeChaine, the prosecutor since the case's inception, said he couldn't comment on the case and its delays. He deferred all comment to Anderson.

Regarding his conflict, Anderson said he had been appointed by the Police Officers Research Association of California (PORAC) to represent Navarro during an administrative hearing regarding his employment. Anderson said Navarro's original attorney left the case, necessitating another attorney's appointment.

That administrative case, too, is still pending, he said.

Another case that Hinchcliff said has been forwarded to the Attorney General's Office is that of Anderson's daughter, 37-year-old Jennifer Anderson of Clearlake Oaks, arrested last month for felony spousal battery.

Capt. James Bauman of the Lake County Sheriff's Office said Jennifer Anderson was arrested after allegedly assaulting her live-in boyfriend of four years, with the man reportedly suffering a laceration to his head.

Anderson said of the case that, as far as he knew, “It hasn't been charged yet.”

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 .

Insect-eating Brazilian free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) in a Texas evening sky in May 2009. Insect-eating bats provide a great pest-control service to agriculture and natural ecosystems. Photo by Paul Cryan , US Geological Survey.

Pest-control services provided by insect-eating bats in the United States likely save the U.S. agricultural industry at least $3 billion a year, and yet insectivorous bats are among the most overlooked economically important, non-domesticated animals in North America, according to an analysis published in a recent edition of the Science magazine.

“People often ask why we should care about bats,” said Paul Cryan, a U.S. Geological Survey research scientist and one of the study’s authors. “This analysis suggests that bats are saving us big bucks by gobbling up insects that eat or damage our crops. It is obviously beneficial that insectivorous bats are patrolling the skies at night above our fields and forests – these bats deserve help."

The value of the pest-control services to agriculture provided by bats in the U.S. alone range from a low of $3.7 billion to a high of $53 billion a year, estimated the study’s authors, scientists from the University of Pretoria (South Africa), USGS, University of Tennessee and Boston University.

They also warned that noticeable economic losses to North American agriculture could occur in the next four to five years as a result of emerging threats to bat populations.

“Bats eat tremendous quantities of flying pest insects, so the loss of bats is likely to have long-term effects on agricultural and ecological systems,” said Justin Boyles, a researcher with the University of Pretoria and the lead author of the study. “Consequently, not only is the conservation of bats important for the well-being of ecosystems, but it is also in the best interest of national and international economies.”

A single little brown bat, which has a body no bigger than an adult’s thumb, can eat 4 to 8 grams (the weight of about a grape or two) of insects each night, the authors wrote.

Although this may not sound like much, it adds up – the loss of the one million bats in the Northeast has probably resulted in between 660 and 1320 metric tons of insects no longer being eaten each year by bats in the region.

“Additionally, because the agricultural value of bats in the Northeast is small compared with other parts of the country, such losses could be even more substantial in the extensive agricultural regions in the Midwest and the Great Plains where wind-energy development is booming and the fungus responsible for white-nose syndrome was recently detected,” said Tom Kunz, a professor of ecology at Boston University, another co-author.

Side view of insect-eating spotted bat (Euderma maculatum) in New Mexico. This spotted bat, native to western North America, is a hibernating insect-eating bat that may be at risk as the disease white-nose syndrome moves westward. Photo by Paul Cryan , US Geological Survey.

Although these estimates include the costs of pesticide applications that are not needed because of the pest-control services bats provide, Boyles and his colleagues said they did not account for the detrimental effects of pesticides on ecosystems nor the economic benefits of bats suppressing pest insects in forests, both of which may be considerable.

Bat populations are at risk in some areas of the country as a result of the emerging disease of white-nose syndrome. The loss of bats to white-nose syndrome has largely occurred during the past four years, after the disease first appeared in upstate New York.

Since then, the fungus thought to cause white-nose syndrome has spread southward and westward and has now been found in 16 states and three Canadian provinces.

Bat declines in the Northeast, the most severely affected region in the U.S. thus far, have exceeded 70 percent.

Populations of at least one species, the little brown bat, have declined so precipitously that scientists expect the species to disappear from the region within the next 20 years.

Scientists are also concerned with the potential for losses of certain species of migratory bats at wind-energy facilities.

By one estimate, published by Kunz and colleagues in 2007, about 33,000 to 111,000 bats will die each year by 2020 just in the mountainous region of the Mid-Atlantic Highlands from direct collisions with wind turbines as well as lung damage caused by pressure changes bats experience when flying near moving turbine blades.

The issue raised by the authors is that the impacts on bat populations from white nose syndrome and wind turbines are just beginning to interact and might result in economic consequences.

“We hope that our analysis gets people thinking more about the value of bats and why their conservation is important,” said Gary McCracken, a University of Tennessee professor and co-author of the analysis. “The bottom line is that the natural pest-control services provided by bats save farmers a lot of money.”

The authors conclude that solutions to reduce threats to bat populations may be possible in the coming years, but that such work is most likely to be driven by public support that will require a wider awareness of the benefits of insectivorous bats.

The article, “Economic importance of bats in agriculture,” appeared in the April 1 edition of Science. Authors are J.G. Boyles, P. Cryan, G. McCracken and T. Kunz.

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SACRAMENTO – Coming a month earlier than in normal years, the annual quarantine of all mussel species publicly harvested along the California coast took effect on Tuesday.

The quarantine is beginning earlier this year because testing by the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) detected elevated levels of domoic acid and paralytic shellfish poisoning.

“Poisoning from eating mussels can lead to severe illness, including coma and death,” said CDPH Interim Director Dr. Howard Backer. “It is critical that individuals do not consume sport-harvested mussels because there are no known antidotes to the toxins found in these mussels and cooking does not reliably eliminate the toxins.”

Both domoic acid poisoning (DAP) and paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP) are linked to natural food sources for filter-feeding animals, including bivalve shellfish.

The overwhelming majority of illnesses among humans occur between spring and fall. DAP symptoms can occur within 30 minutes to 24 hours after eating toxic seafood.

In mild cases, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal cramps, headache and dizziness may occur. These symptoms disappear completely within several days.

In severe cases, the victim may experience excessive bronchial secretions, difficulty breathing, confusion, disorientation, cardiovascular instability, seizures, and permanent loss of short-term memory, coma and death.

PSP affects the central nervous system by producing a tingling around the mouth and fingertips within a few minutes to a few hours after eating toxic shellfish.

Typical symptoms are loss of balance, lack of muscular coordination, slurred speech and difficulty swallowing.

In severe poisonings, complete muscular paralysis and death from asphyxiation can occur.

The mussel quarantine runs through Oct. 31.

It applies to sport-harvested mussels along the coast, including all bays, harbors and estuaries.

Commercially harvested shellfish are not included in the annual quarantine. These products are certified by the state and subject to strict requirements to ensure that all mussels, oysters and clams entering the marketplace are free of toxins.

For updated information on quarantines and shellfish toxins, call the CDPH shellfish information line at 800-553-4133 or visit www.cdph.ca.gov .