Spring Fever : Geology: Water is seeping from the ground beneath houses, driveways and streets. No one knows exactly why.

Margaret Kennedy’s horse sank, to its belly, into the water-saturated earth, and it took eight people nearly two hours to free it.

Bob Doremus is already seeing signs that he will lose at least six of his 50 cherry trees--planted 20 years ago--to root rot.

Water is bubbling up all around the Canyon Country house of Karen McMains, the crack in her concrete patio is getting larger, and her driveway is sinking in places.

What’s going on here?

Some say it’s simply the aftermath of the heavy winter rains. Or maybe underground rivers making their way to the surface. Or even movement of the San Andreas Fault. But no one, expert or lay person, knows for sure.

The only thing that residents of portions of north Los Angeles County know as fact is that weeks after the damaging winter rains stopped, water began seeping up from the ground-- from suburban Canyon Country to remote Lake Elizabeth and rural Leona Valley. And it’s still flowing.

Springs are not a new phenomenon in these communities, which lie roughly between Santa Clarita and Palmdale. The Canyon Country neighborhood where the McMains live went through the same thing about 10 years ago after an unusually wet winter. But many residents say this year is different.

Kennedy, whose horse was OK after it was freed from the mud, has lived on the same five acres in Leona Valley for two decades, but has never seen so much water.

“You can see little bubbles coming out,” Kennedy said. “Most of the water is coming out of the gopher holes. It’s almost like a sieve turned upside down.”

Donald Perkins, who has lived in Leona Valley for 32 years, said the spring that flows under Perkins’ driveway never caused substantial problems in the past. This year it washed the driveway out. Twice.

Other residents in the rural communities of the Antelope Valley contend that springs are surfacing in places where they have never been before, including underneath homes.

Theories for the problem abound.

The north branch of the San Andreas fault runs through Leona Valley and it is possible that the new springs are the result of movement in the fault zone, maybe from the 1992 Landers quake or some other large seismic event, said Devin Galloway, a hydrologist with the U. S. Geological Survey.

“If this segment of the fault is moving at all . . . it can change the flow paths,” Galloway said. “Over a long, long time it’s not only likely, it’s probable.”

Aside from changing the flow paths of ground water that is relatively near the surface, a less likely scenario would be that fault movement has released deep-seated pools of water, allowing them to rise.

During their brief visit last month, a pair of geological survey scientists collected water samples from a few of the Leona Valley springs to test for tritium, a byproduct of nuclear weapons testing from the 1950s that is still detectable in water throughout the world.

If the water has no tritium, Galloway said, it probably means the water comes from pools deep within the earth. If tritium does appear, the water is relatively young, meaning it may have fallen as rain within the last 40 years. The results of the tritium testing may be available this week.

Steve Deverel, a U. S. G. S. geochemist, said the most likely explanation for the west Antelope Valley springs is the high rainfall levels.

“It’s basically excess recharge,” he said.

The agency hopes to conduct a study of the springs in the west Antelope Valley but is having trouble securing the funding.

The best that Galloway could get from his employer is $5,000 in federal matching funds, available only if another agency provides at least that much in non-federal funds.

Los Angeles County Department of Public Works agreed last week to do aerial infrared photography of the western Antelope Valley to help map the new springs. The county estimates that it will cost about $3,300, allowing Galloway to use a comparable amount in federal funds.

It’s unclear how much can be accomplished with that much money. Galloway had originally proposed a $25,000 study.

The city of Santa Clarita recently hired a geologist who specializes in ground water to study the problem in the Canyon Country neighborhood, where water is coming up from the ground, cracks in sidewalks and under the street.

Brad Therrien, a supervising civil engineer for the city, said the Four Oaks area, bordered by Camp Plenty Road, Langside Avenue, Delight Street and Glasser Avenue, is built on an alluvial river bottom.

“We haven’t had any significant rain for 10 years and now we’ve got other problems,” Therrien said. The saturated streets are starting to crumble, a condition that may require that they be torn out and replaced. Street trees are also having to be removed.

Elaine White, a Canyon Country resident since 1965, lost a street tree to the rising waters 10 years ago. This time around, she is spending time every few days pouring bleach on her driveway and sidewalk in hopes of killing the algae that is growing there under the steady stream of water.

Santa Clarita on Friday took a small step in hopes of saving the streets in the area, posting signs prohibiting vehicles weighing more than 4,000 pounds on the roads. Therrien believes that Canyon Country’s troubles come, not from earthquake faults, but simply from rising ground-water tables.

Bill Manetta, president of the Santa Clarita Water Co., the largest water retailer in the valley, said the level of the company’s wells have risen dramatically.

Some of the company’s 13 wells had gone dry during the drought while others were pumping water from 100 feet below the surface. Since the winter rains, the water is just 10 feet below the surface.

While all that extra water cheers Manetta--who now has enough water to supply 20,000 customers for two years--it has created some unexpected problems too.

High nitrate levels have been found in well water in Leona Valley. Nitrates are used in fertilizer and are also found in human and animal waste. It can cause illness and even death in infants six months or younger.

Antelope Valley Water Co., a purveyor that serves the small community, last month discovered one of its two wells had a nitrate count above the 45 parts per million allowed by the state. The company has since stopped pumping water from the well.

Tests of some private wells in the community, where about half the residents and businesses get water from their own wells, have also revealed high nitrate levels in some water supplies.

Galloway said the high water table is probably to blame for the nitrates, which are probably being leached by the ground water from septic systems.

In Elizabeth Lake, a few miles northwest of Leona Valley, many septic systems have stopped working because of all the water in the ground. Warren BeMiller, vice president of the Lakes Town Council, said people are having to pump their tanks on a weekly basis.

All the saturated areas are preparing for an onslaught of mosquitoes and an increase in all types of insects. The Leona Valley Town Council is working with Los Angeles County to be included in the mosquito abatement district.

Some are taking the rising waters in stride. “You’ve just got to accept it,” said White after bleaching her driveway one more time. “When the water goes down, it will dry out.”