October

More than 40 volunteers spent a cold and drizzly day using bales of rice straw to install highly efficient insulation in the walls for one of the Feather River Land Trust’s two new nature centers at the Sierra Valley Preserve.

Don McIntosh died in Bellingham, WA. He was an elementary school student in Downieville, went on to become a successful cinematographer, mostly filming wildlife documentaries around the world, before retiring to Downieville in 1984, where he served two terms as a county supervisor (1989-1977), captained Downieville Search and Rescue and was a faithful docent for the Downieville Museum.

With fuel moisture levels running at above-average levels and favorable weather, the Tahoe National Forest ended seasonal fire restrictions.

The body of a mountain biker who failed to negotiate Downieville Downhill Trail above Pauley Creek was located in the stream by a search and rescue team and recovered by one of the California Air National Guard’s Black Hawk helicopters.

A fundraising event was held at the Graeagle Fire Hall to benefit Gumba restaurant and the Village Bakery, victims of a vicious blaze in Blairsden, on September 15.

The Sierra County Board of Supervisors gave each member a $150 monthly raise, bringing their monthly salary to almost $3,500. The increase is in line with recent changes in compensation for county employees facing higher health insurance fees.

As part of a pilot project designed to test the effectiveness of a trucking program for returning spring-run chinook salmon to the North Yuba River, the South Yuba River Citizens League (SYRCL) and FISHBIO installed rotary screw traps in the river, one upstream from Goodyears Bar and another near the Rocky Rest campground.

November

Cory Peterman’s series of columns about the many Italian families who migrated to Sierra County during the 19th century, “Tracing the Footsteps of Our Ancestors,” continued to run on this paper’s back page throughout the month.(Left to right) Tessa Jordan and Colin O’Mara Green preform in Doctor Devereaux the Dastardly Doctor

The Sierra Turnpike Players reprised their 2012 production of “Doctor Devereaux the Dastardly Doctor” at the Yuba Theatre with Tessa Jordan returning to play Wendy March, the play’s heroine even more hilariously than she had a little more than a decade earlier.

A 71-year-old Downieville resident was found dead in her home, along with evidence she had been visited after her death by a bear.

Jason LaChance, the Sierra County Court Commissioner who has handled a wide variety of civil cases here for more than six years, declared his candidacy for the open judgeship position at the Sierra County Superior Court.

A man who had sustained a serious back injury while tumbling down a remote, steep bank near Cornish House off Henness Pass Road was airlifted, first by a CHP helicopter to the Plum Valley ballfield and, from there, by a Careflight helicopter to a hospital.

Besides using a few chainsaws and a wide variety of heavy equipment (excavators, feller-bunchers, heel-boom log loaders, and a huge chipper capable of grinding logs up to 23 inches in diameter), the ten-member crew of Sierra Valley Enterprises continued to make rapid progress on thinning conifers along both sides of CA-49 from near Yuba Pass down towards Bassetts.

December

An artisan craft fair, Holiday on Main, took place in Downieville, and the Sierra City Mercantile also provided holiday shoppers with plenty of weekend opportunities to fill Christmas stockings.

A Loyalton High School teacher was arrested for having had sexual relations with one of her students.

A bear bit a Calpine resident’s hand, wrist, and leg after the man’s dog had an altercation with the bruin. Ultimately, the dog’s owner used a shotgun, injured the bear, and protected the man’s pet. On the following day, USDA’s Fish and Wildlife officials located and euthanized the bear before transporting it to Sacramento for a necropsy and rabies testing.

The wholesale price of eggs was 65 percent below the level seen at this time in 2022.

The Sierra Valley Preserve Nature Center came a step closer to completion after a group of volunteers created hand-harvested, hand-woven shade structures for the building, now scheduled to open for the public during the Spring of 2024.