LAKEPORT, Calif. – Susan Krones has joined the race to become Lake County’s next district attorney.

Krones is currently a senior deputy district attorney and has 25 years of experience prosecuting criminal cases in Lake County.

Also in the race so far is local attorney Steven Brown, as Lake County News has reported.

Krones started out in the District Attorney’s Office Family Support Division in 1992 and then transferred to the Criminal Division in 1997 where she has prosecuted serious and violent felonies including murder, child sexual assault, domestic violence, vehicular homicide and animal abuse cases, to name just a few.

While assigned to the child sexual assault cases, Krones was instrumental in establishing the first child interview center in Lake County for victims of sexual assault.

Krones is a U.S. Army veteran, having served as a judge advocate general attorney for seven years reaching the rank of captain.

While in the military she served as a prosecutor and a Medical Board Advocate for soldiers.

When she was stationed in Germany during Operation Desert Shield, Krones served as a trial defense attorney and then the chief of the Civil Division in Stuttgart.

Krones received her law degree from UC Hastings College of the Law in 1984.

While in law school Krones worked part-time as a law clerk at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Francisco. She received her undergraduate degree cum laude in history from UCLA.

Krones is involved in the local community and serves on the Lake County Arts Council Board, the Lake County Community Radio Board and is a member of 100 Women Strong and the Lake County Bar Association. She is also a member of the California District Attorney’s Association.

She pledges to work closely with local law enforcement agencies and community leaders to reduce crime in Lake County.

“Over my 25 years in prosecuting crime in Lake County I have forged the relationships and gained the experience required to lead the District Attorney’s Office,” Krones said. “I will maintain the highest degree of ethics in the office and will be responsive to the people of Lake County.”

For more information about Krones visit her Web site at www.susankronesforda.com.

CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – Two Clearlake men were arrested this week following a six-month investigation conducted by the Lake County District Attorney’s Office that focused on a human trafficking for prostitution operation.

Timothy Lee Williams, 52, was arrested for four counts of human trafficking, one count of pimping and a parole violation, and 38-year-old Nicholas Troy Brooks was arrested for human trafficking for prostitution, pimping, procuring a person for prostitution, inflicting traumatic injury on a person, threats to kill or produce great bodily injury and solicitation of perjury, according to District Attorney Don Anderson.

As part of the sting operation in Clearlake Oaks, on Thursday District Attorney’s Office investigators rented a room at a local motel and ordered a woman, whose name is not being released at this time, from an Internet service, according to Anderson.

Investigators had prior knowledge that the woman was working for Williams and possibly not of her free will, Anderson said.

Anderson said that when the woman arrived at the motel she agreed to have sex with two men, not knowing they were undercover agents, for a sum of $200 per hour.

She had been driven there by Williams who waited in the car while the woman was supposed to be transacting business, Anderson said.

Once the deal was made, District Attorney’s Office investigators – with the assistance of undercover agents from the Mendocino Task Force and officers from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office and Clearlake Police Department – arrested Williams, Anderson said.

Further investigation revealed that the woman was not selling herself of her own free will, but was doing so under force and fear of Williams. Due to the fact she was forced into prostitution, Anderson said she is being treated as a victim rather than a suspect of prostitution.

On Friday, as part of the same investigation, Anderson said his investigators arrested Brooks at the Lake County Jail, where he was being held on charges of transportation of controlled substances and possession of a stolen vehicle.

In both cases involving Williams and Brooks, Anderson said five of the women interviewed were forced into prostitution out of fear of being harmed and in some cases were actually beaten by the suspects. In one case, a developmental disabled young adult was forced into prostitution by Williams.

Brooks is being held on $1 million bail, while Williams is on a no-bail hold, according to jail booking records. Both men are scheduled to appear in court for arraignment next week.

Anderson said both Williams and Brooks have a history of pimping and pandering. If convicted both Williams and Brooks could be facing life sentences.

“Human trafficking is the fasted growing crime in the United States and California,” Anderson said. “It is estimated that human trafficking is a multi-billion dollar operation throughout the country. Often time the victims are minors and/or immigrants from other countries.”

He said that his office treats the cases as extremely serious. “We will make every effort to free these victims from those who force them into prostitution against their will and help give them a new start in life. It is anticipated as the investigation develops, further victims and suspects will be identified.”

LUCERNE, Calif. – A man was injured on Friday evening when his motorcycle went off a Lucerne roadway and hit a power pole.

The crash occurred shortly before 6 p.m. on Country Club Drive at 16th Avenue, according to the California Highway Patrol.

CHP Officer Ryan Erickson told Lake County News that the motorcyclist was traveling westbound on Country Club Drive at an unknown speed when he failed to negotiate a curve in the roadway at 17th Avenue.

The motorcycle went off the roadway and hit a small culvert. Erickson said witnesses reported that the motorcycle then became airborne.

Erickson said the motorcycle landed and hit a power pole on the side of the roadway between 15th and 16th avenues.

Initial reports indicated that the rider was trapped under the motorcycle.

He said the rider was conscious and talking after the wreck.

The rider was transported via Northshore Fire ambulance to a landing zone set up at Lucerne Harbor Park.

There, a REACH air ambulance picked up the injured man and transported him to an out-of-county trauma center.

Erickson remained on scene for some time afterward as he documented the crash site. The motorcycle appeared to have sustained major damage.

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

California law protects a spouse’s undivided one-half interest in Community Property assets from wrongful actions taken by their other spouse. The same rules apply to registered domestic partners.

What is community property? Property acquired while married and living together – excluding gifts and inheritances – is presumed to be community property and not either spouse’s separate property. Each spouse has an equal undivided one-half interest in community property assets.

Even when title is in one spouse’s name only, an asset remains community property. This can happen when one spouse uses marital earnings to purchase an asset. Only if the other spouse voluntarily and knowingly signs an express declaration to relinquish their community property interest does the asset become separate property of one spouse.

Generally speaking either spouse acting alone can control and manage community property assets. A spouse’s management and control of community property is subject to a fiduciary duty to act in the “highest good faith and fair dealing.” A spouse who takes any unfair advantage of the other spouse has breached the fiduciary duty.

Section 1101 of the Family Code allows a spouse to bring suit against the other spouse, or estate, for a breach of the fiduciary duty to not impair their spouse’s undivided one-half interest in community property assets.

A spouse cannot gift the couple’s community property assets without the written consent of the other spouse. Gifts by one spouse alone can be revoked by the nonconsenting spouse.

The nonconsenting spouse has three years from discovering the gift to bring legal action if pursued during the marriage while both spouses are alive.

However, as discussed below, the three year limitation does not apply when the nonconsenting spouse sues after the death of their spouse or in a marital dissolution proceeding.

In Francine S. Yeh v. Lie-Cheng Tai et. al. (December 2017), the California Second District Court of Appeal decided a case brought by a surviving wife against the trustees of her deceased husband’s trust estate for his breach of the fiduciary duty.

While alive the husband had persuaded his wife to transfer title to a residence they had purchased into his name only on the grounds that he could then obtain lower interests rates on the mortgage using his credit alone.

The husband promised that the wife would maintain her one-half interest in the residence and later be restored to title. The loan was paid-off using the couple’s community property money.

Three days prior to his death, the husband assured his wife that her name was on the title and that the property would be all hers.

In fact, however, Mr. Lie had secretly transferred title to the residence into a living trust naming other persons as beneficiaries. Thus the husband had taken away the wife’s one-half undivided community property interest.

The defendants claimed that the wife’s lawsuit was untimely because it was brought more than one-year after the husband’s death. Generally speaking most claims against a decedent’s estate must be filed within one year of the decedent’s death.

The court, however, instead agreed with the wife: The general rule did not apply because Section 1101 specifically allows a spouse to bring a claim for breach of the fiduciary duty either at the time of a dissolution proceeding or, as in this case, after the other spouse’s death. Only if the case was so delayed to cause an unfair prejudice to the defendants could the defendants object based on timeliness.

Furthermore, even a spouse who has silently suffered a wrong to his or her community property interest during the marriage – but has not voluntarily and knowingly signed an express written declaration to relinquish her rights – may still bring a timely action either after their spouse has died or during marital dissolution proceedings; provided that such delay is not unfair to the opposing side.

Dennis A. Fordham, attorney, is a State Bar-Certified Specialist in estate planning, probate and trust law. His office is at 870 S. Main St., Lakeport, Calif. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and 707-263-3235. His Web site is www.DennisFordhamLaw.com.

Three billion miles away on the farthest known major planet in our solar system, an ominous, dark storm – once big enough to stretch across the Atlantic Ocean from Boston to Portugal – is shrinking out of existence as seen in pictures of Neptune taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.

Immense dark storms on Neptune were first discovered in the late 1980s by NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft.

Since then, only Hubble has had the sharpness in blue light to track these elusive features that have played a game of peek-a-boo over the years.

Hubble found two dark storms that appeared in the mid-1990s and then vanished. This latest storm was first seen in 2015, but is now shrinking.

Like Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS), the storm swirls in an anticyclonic direction and is dredging up material from deep inside the ice giant planet’s atmosphere. The elusive feature gives astronomers a unique opportunity to study Neptune’s deep winds, which can’t be directly measured.

The dark spot material may be hydrogen sulfide, with the pungent smell of rotten eggs. Joshua Tollefson from the University of California at Berkeley explained, “The particles themselves are still highly reflective; they are just slightly darker than the particles in the surrounding atmosphere.”

Unlike Jupiter’s GRS, which has been visible for at least 200 years, Neptune’s dark vortices only last a few years. This is the first one that actually has been photographed as it is dying.

“We have no evidence of how these vortices are formed or how fast they rotate,” said Agustín Sánchez-Lavega from the University of the Basque Country in Spain. “It is most likely that they arise from an instability in the sheared eastward and westward winds.”

The dark vortex is behaving differently from what planet-watchers predicted. “It looks like we’re capturing the demise of this dark vortex, and it’s different from what well-known studies led us to expect,” said Michael H. Wong of the University of California at Berkeley, referring to work by Ray LeBeau (now at St. Louis University) and Tim Dowling’s team at the University of Louisville. “Their dynamical simulations said that anticyclones under Neptune’s wind shear would probably drift toward the equator. We thought that once the vortex got too close to the equator, it would break up and perhaps create a spectacular outburst of cloud activity.”

But the dark spot, which was first seen at mid-southern latitudes, has apparently faded away rather than going out with a bang.

That may be related to the surprising direction of its measured drift: toward the south pole, instead of northward toward the equator.

Unlike Jupiter’s GRS, the Neptune spot is not as tightly constrained by numerous alternating wind jets (seen as bands in Jupiter’s atmosphere). Neptune seems to only have three broad jets: a westward one at the equator, and eastward ones around the north and south poles. The vortex should be free to change traffic lanes and cruise anywhere in between the jets.

“No facilities other than Hubble and Voyager have observed these vortices. For now, only Hubble can provide the data we need to understand how common or rare these fascinating neptunian weather systems may be,” said Wong.

The first images of the dark vortex are from the Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) program, a long-term Hubble project that annually captures global maps of our solar system’s four outer planets.

Only Hubble has the unique capability to probe these worlds in ultraviolet light, which yields important information not available to other present-day telescopes.

Additional data, from a Hubble program targeting the dark vortex, are from an international team including Wong, Tollefson, Sánchez-Lavega, Andrew Hsu, Imke de Pater, Amy Simon, Ricardo Hueso, Lawrence Sromovsky, Patrick Fry, Statia Luszcz-Cook, Heidi Hammel, Marc Delcroix, Katherine de Kleer, Glenn Orton, and Christoph Baranec.

Wong’s paper appears online in the Astronomical Journal on Feb. 15, 2018.

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in Washington, D.C.

For additional imagery, visit: http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2018-08. For NASA’s Hubble web page, visit www.nasa.gov/hubble.

Ray Villard works for the Space Telescope Science Institute of Baltimore, Maryland.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Lake County is home to many talented female high school wrestlers, with the group putting on strong performances in the weekend’s North Coast Section championships.

Wrestlers from Kelseyville, Lower Lake and Upper Lake had top placements at the event.

They included:

– 116-pound champion Bailey Huggins of Kelseyville;
– 121-pound champion Adriana Lopez of Upper Lake;
– 131-pound fourth-place finisher Lily Wetmore of Lower Lake;
– 101-pound eighth-place medalist Kylie Marlin-Ambriz of Kelseyville;
– 131-pound runner-up Christina Wilson of Upper Lake;
– 160-pound seventh-place medalist Rebecca Harper of Upper Lake;
– 143-pound eighth-place medalist Vanessa Gonzalez of Kelseyville;
– 189-pound champion Jasmin Clarke of Kelseyville.

Huggins, Lopez, Wilson and Clarke all advance to the state meet on Feb. 23 and 24 in Visalia.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – A Clearlake Park man has reached a plea agreement with the District Attorney’s Office for the December 2015 murder of a Middletown man and the nonfatal shooting of the man’s fiancée.

District Attorney Don Anderson said Javier Martinez Cachu, 22, has pleaded guilty to the first-degree murder of 25-year-old Luis Pimentel-Arroyo, the attempted murder of Pimentel-Arroyo’s fiancée, Eva Prado, and special allegations of being armed with a shotgun on the night of Dec. 30, 2015.

Anderson said the case involved drugs and insurance money.

Prado and Pimentel-Arroyo lost their Middletown home in the September 2015 Valley fire. Anderson said Martinez Cachu was able to get $40,000 in insurance money from Prado, which he then used to buy marijuana to sell.

However, Anderson said the marijuana was stolen, and Martinez Cachu wasn’t able to pay back Prado.

While Prado and Pimentel-Arroyo were in a vehicle on Butts Canyon Road in Middletown on the night of Dec. 30, Martinez Cachu shot and killed Pimentel-Arroyo. Prado was hit and injured by buckshot from the shotgun blast, according to the District Attorney’s Office.

Following the shooting, Martinez Cachu fled the scene in another vehicle before he turned himself in at the Clearlake Police Department about two hours later.

Martinez Cachu was arrested early on the morning of Dec. 31, according to case records. He has remained in custody ever since.

When Chief Deputy District Attorney Richard Hinchcliff originally charged Martinez Cachu in the case, he included two special allegations, murder for financial gain and murder by lying wait, which he said at the time made Martinez Cachu eligible for the death penalty or life without parole.

Under the plea agreement, Anderson said Martinez Cachu will serve 90 years to life in state prison.

Anderson said that, based on the law, someone who is under the age of 25 at the time of the crime – even one as serious as a homicide – may be eligible for parole. Martinez Cachu was 20 at the time of the murder.

Martinez Cachu is scheduled to be sentenced on April 3.

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

UPPER LAKE, Calif. – One person was injured in a single vehicle rollover crash on Highway 20 near Blue Lakes on Thursday afternoon.

The crash occurred just before 4:30 p.m. at Highway 20 and Blue Lakes Road, blocking the westbound lane, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The driver, the only person reported to be in the vehicle, was pinned when the crash occurred, and had to be extricated, a process that took more than a half-hour to complete, according to reports from the scene.

The air ambulance REACH 6 responded to transport the patient to a trauma center, scanner reports indicated.

The CHP said the driver suffered minor injuries.

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

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – On Thursday, Congressman Mike Thompson (CA-05) applauded the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s announcement that federal funds for October wildfire debris removal were authorized at 90 percent of total eligible costs.

“Our communities are fighting to remain financially solvent as they deal with the enormous costs of recovering from the October wildfires,” said Thompson. “Without additional assistance from the federal government for the cost of debris removal, I am told by local leaders that our fire communities could go into a financial tailspin. I am proud that our California delegation came together in a bipartisan manner to ensure that our communities have the additional resources they need to recover and rebuild.”

On Oct. 10, the president issued a major disaster declaration for the state of California triggering the release of federal funds to help people and communities recover from wildfires that occurred Oct. 8 to 31.

Pursuant to this declaration, the federal government’s cost-share for debris removal was 75 percent, with the state and local responsible for the remaining 25 percent.

At the urging of local leaders, Reps. Thompson and Jared Huffman worked with House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and House Interior Appropriations Chair Ken Calvert to increase the federal cost share for debris removal from the October wildfires from 75 percent to 90 percent as part of the Bipartisan Budget Act that was signed into law on Feb. 9.

The adjustment to the federal share applies to assistance provided before, on, or after the date of enactment of the Bipartisan Budget Act.

“This is good news for Lake County,” said Lake County Supervisor Rob Brown. “The costs to rebuild and recover from the October fires are tremendous. This increased federal funding for debris removal will not only help to mitigate those costs, but also help us to focus our resources on additional recovery and resiliency needs.”

The debris-removal program, conducted chiefly by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, has completed debris removal on 3,584 properties. There are 4,885 approved properties in the program.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – State Senator Mike McGuire and Senator Bill Dodd will honor first responders, community leaders and non-profit organizations that stepped up and supported our communities during the devastating October Firestorm at a special ceremony on Friday morning on the State Senate Floor of the State Capitol.

“The North Bay Firestorm will go down as the most destructive and deadly in modern American history. It would have been a lot worse if it wasn’t for the brave efforts of thousands of first responders, neighbors and community organizations who answered the call in our greatest time in need,” McGuire said. “We cannot thank them enough for their tireless work and constant fight during the devastating October fires and tomorrow’s ceremony will offer a small token of our tremendous gratitude.”

In recognition of the hard work and bravery demonstrated in one of the darkest days in the state’s history, the Senate will host NorCal Heroes Day and Day Of Remembrance on Friday.

The California State Senate has scheduled a special ceremony to honor all first responders, community organizations and residents who delivered for Lake, Napa, Mendocino and Sonoma counties.

Senators McGuire, Dodd, Ted Gaines and Jim Nielsen will be recognizing the local, state and federal agencies who have been instrumental with the disaster response and recovery.

State, federal and local agencies that have taken part in the response and recovery efforts will be honored, including the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, California Highway Patrol, the California Department of Transportation, Federal Emergency Management Agency and the United States Army Corp of Engineers.

Local officials from Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino counties including sheriffs, police chiefs and fire chiefs who led heroic efforts to save homes and lives will also be honored. Local nonprofits and relief funds will also be recognized for their tireless efforts.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Middletown High School won the sixth annual Lake County Mock Trial competition, held Monday in Lake County Superior Court.

Since the Lake County Mock Trial began, it has included just two local high school teams – Middletown and Upper Lake. Middletown has held onto the title for all six years.

However, this year organizers and competitors acknowledged that the event was more challenging than in previous years and that both teams put on stellar performances.

The competition involves high school students arguing a criminal case from both sides – the prosecution and defense – while Lake County Superior Court judges volunteer to hear the cases.

This year, the teams argued the fictional case of People v. Davidson, in which Casey Davidson, a resident of the town of Acorn, Calif., was on trial for first degree murder for the death of Alex Thompson, another young resident of Acorn and member of Ultra Nats, an extremist nationalist group.

In the morning session, Judge Andrew Blum presided as Upper Lake took the prosecution role and Middletown was on the defense.

Judge Stephen Hedstrom presided during the afternoon session, when the two teams switched sides – Middletown on prosecution and Upper Lake on defense.

Based on the arguments, Blum ruled that Davidson was not guilty, while Hedstrom found Davidson had committed the murder.

Going into the final judging it was hard to tell which team was leading after watching their courtroom performances. As it turned out, they were nearly neck and neck.

When Lake County Superintendent of Schools Brock Falkenberg announced the winner, it was Middletown High School.

In the end, it was a squeaker – Middletown High held onto its title by a mere 33 points to just edge Upper Lake High out of what would have been its first win in the six-year competition.

In the morning session, Upper Lake scored 381 points and Middletown 396, while in the afternoon session Upper Lake scored 393 and Middletown 411. Upper Lake’s total was 774 points to Middletown’s 807.

To the experienced eyes of Blum and Hedstrom – with decades of legal expertise between them – the toughness of the case came through.

Both of the judges lauded the students for their presentations and preparations, and both noted the difficulties inherent in the case the students argued that day.

Hedstrom said he believed this was the best competition by far. He said he and Judge Michael Lunas had discussed the case, which they felt was both the most complex the teams had taken up so far as well as being topical.

Alex Stabiner, one of the Upper Lake coaches, said the students already are looking at how to improve for next year.

“We have a young group that has a lot of energy and determination to win the county competition,” he said, noting eight team members were either freshmen or sophomores.

In addition to recognition for the students, Falkenberg at the event thanked the Lake County Friends of Mendocino College and the Lake County Wine Alliance, which donated $100 and $750, respectively, in support of the competition.

Middletown now advances to the 37th annual California Mock Trial Finals in Orange County next month, where it will be one of 34 counties vying for the state title.

The individual winners and team rosters are below.

INDIVIDUAL WINNERS

Prosecution

Pretrial attorney: Miley Turney
Prosecuting attorney: Megan Talbert
Prosecution witness: Henry Fenk

Defense

Pretrial attorney: Kyle Pryor-Landman
Defense attorney: Dimitri Imbrunetti
Defense witness: Alana Sanchez

Bailiff: Kevin Nance

TEAM ROSTERS

Middletown High School

Alexandra Clayton, Abigail Elder, Jaxsun Ehrlich, Henry Fenk, Emily Gallagher, Dimitri Imbrunetti, Erica Kinsel, Anthony Leggitt, Mason Leggitt, Kevin Nance, Jacqueline Pyzer, Kyle Pryor-Landman, Ximena Ramirez, Jack Rarick, Natalie Rodriguez, Mylie Turnet, Jessica Zell

Upper Lake High School

Angelica Ayala, Andrew Brackett, Daniela Estrada, Sierra Galloway, Russel Gordon, Marylin Halvorsen, Jasmine Haro, Jisel Home, Bolonick Ionsun, Anisha Kalan, Benat Love, Alana Sanchez, Emily Stith, Megan Talbert, Jared Thornberry, Lyndsay Wade, Nicholas Warner

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

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A local nonprofit dedicated to helping animals is sharing information about the dog flu.

The SPCA of Lake County said that while the dog flu – also known as CIV H3N2/H3N8 – has not been diagnosed in Lake County, there are 50 confirmed cases and over 200 suspected cases in the Bay Area.

Dogs can be at risk for canine influenza regardless of age, sex or breed. It is commonly spread through direct dog contact such as sniffing, licking and nuzzling; through the air through coughing or sneezing; via contaminated surfaces, such as sharing water bowls or toys; or through contaminated humans who have viruses from another dog on their hands or clothing, the SPCA said.

Dog flu symptoms are like the human variety of flu and include coughing, sneezing, nasal discharge, decreased appetite, lethargy and fever. The SPCA said most dogs recover in two to three weeks with proper nutrition and rest, however an unlucky few may develop secondary infections such as pneumonia.

The SPCA of Lake County recognizes what an impact contracting influenza will have not only on the dogs that get it, but on their owners who care for them and has decided to take a proactive approach and offer the vaccine to address it now.

Like the human flu vaccine, the canine influenza vaccine will not prevent infection but may limit its duration and severity, the SPCA said. The vaccination is administered in two doses over three to five weeks, providing protection for one year.

The SPCA will be offering the vaccination for $20, followed by a free booster the following month. This is considerably less than most veterinary clinics are charging. It is recommended that vaccination be repeated annually.

The SPCA of Lake County will be holding its monthly vaccination clinic this Sunday, February 18, from 9 to 11 a.m. at 8025 Highway 29 in Kelseyville and will have the vaccine available there.

The Novibac vaccination is not recommended for dogs under 7 weeks of age, or those that are pregnant.

Limited quantities are available and owners must show current proof of rabies vaccination. Rabies vaccines will also be available at the clinic.

If your dog frequently comes in contact with other dogs – at dog parks or doggy day care – or frequents places where other dogs can be found, such as groomers, kennels or dog shows, the SPCA urges you to consider making this one of your pet's annual vaccinations.