Val on a Sierra beach. Hard to believe this was just a week ago. Especially since we are facing yet another evacuation threat, here in Upper Ojai…nearly three weeks after the Day fire started. Gather ye beauties while ye may…
Author Archives: Kit Stolz
Day Fire, Day Twenty-One
The perimeter map posted on the useful-if-slow InciWeb site, which tracks big wildfires across the country. We are closest to the little nub of fire to the southwest. It’s about ten miles away and the Santa Ana winds, as forecast, are blowing, although relatively mildly at this point. We have been given a preliminary evacuationContinue reading “Day Fire, Day Twenty-One”
Don’t Eat Your Spinach
Over a hundred people recently came down sick after eating bagged spinach contaminated by the rare but potentially deadly E. coli 0157 bacteria. One person died, according to the FDA. But insight into this sickening has been hard to come by until today, when three excellent stories were published on the subject, the first linkedContinue reading “Don’t Eat Your Spinach”
The Peace of the Mountains
While on a brief vacation last weekend in the Sierras, the aforementioned Day Fire came charging southwest towards our neck of the woods in Upper Ojai, forcing our daughter to evacuate. Never a dull moment in Southern California! While I’m trying to put the office back together, and hoping the Santa Ana winds don’t bringContinue reading “The Peace of the Mountains”
The Angry Fall
Ah, the coming of fall in Southern California. Flakes of ash fall as thickly and softly and white as snow. Clouds of smoke bigger than mountains fill the sky. Orangish sunlight and hazy gray skies last for weeks on end. Thousands of firefighters struggle to contain blazes with flames twenty and thirty feet high. BulldozersContinue reading “The Angry Fall”
Day Fire, Day Nine
The Day Fire (so named because it began on Labor Day) continues to burn in the Los Padres National Forest northeast of Ventura County. It so happens I spent about the last month working intensively on a fire story, to be published tomorrow, so this issue has been on my mind. The good news isContinue reading “Day Fire, Day Nine”
A Couple of Q&A’s
Here’s mine, with the climatologist Kelly Redmond, in Grist. Here’s Andrew Revkin’s, with genius scientist James Lovelock, in the NYTimes. Lovelock is predicting flat-out doom from "global heating," and within twenty years. He told the Washington Post: "Our global furnace is out of control. By 2020, 2025, you will be able to sail a sailboatContinue reading “A Couple of Q&A’s”
The New Desert Dwellers
Once, I hear, the Western desert attracted crazy dreamers; prospectors, pioneers, fanatics waving crazy religious tracts, some of whom even claimed to have seen and spoken to Jesus Christ and God the Father. Now the Southwestern desert attracts developers, and people who dream of a house of their own, even if they can’t afford theContinue reading “The New Desert Dwellers”
Unusual El Nino Develops
An El Nino condition is developing, which will likely bring a good helping of clouds and rain to the West Coast this year…for the third year in a row. This is also breaking up hurricanes that could develop along the Gulf Coast. It’s worth mentioning that the record-breaking rain Southern California lived through last yearContinue reading “Unusual El Nino Develops”
Hellraiser Ain’t Quitting
Ten years ago in December a wildlife biologist named Roy Van de Hoek was arrested, thrown face down, and handcuffed forcutting non-native shrubs out of the legendarily wild and beautiful Carrizo Plain. He faced twelve misdemeanor charges, but eventually was given three years probation. That’s according to a Mother Jones "hellraiser" piece on Van deContinue reading “Hellraiser Ain’t Quitting”
Kit Stolz 