Cops take kids fishing at Fort Bragg’s Moura Pond on Saturday, June 29

FORT BRAGG, 6/25/24 — More than 1,500 unusual visitors arrived in Fort Bragg on Tuesday, taking up residence in a watery bed & breakfast.  A truckload of rainbow trout rode down from the Mad River Hatchery in a cold water tank, then were coaxed to swim into Moura Pond, a pond just south of the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens.

At Saturday’s Mendocino Coast Police Activities League, also known as PAL, clinic, kids are expected to fill the banks of the pond. The fishing clinic is part of community policing efforts, where working officers meet and mentor youngsters in a positive setting, according to Joel Hendricks, a warden with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. The event runs from 8 a.m.-1 p.m. with no dogs allowed. However, free hot dogs will be available for participants Kids can borrow one of over 100 fishing poles available or bring their own. Last year there were more than 100 kids using borrowed poles, and a scramble commenced after the 100th pole was taken. This year, PAL brought more.

“Every kid is guaranteed a fish, pretty much,” said Jaclyn Moura. Her father, the late Joe Moura, was one of Fort Bragg’s s best known builders. “They bring the fish in the truck, and then they hook up a pipe to the little box on the back of the truck and open up the valve,” said Moura. “True to their instinct, they swim upstream out of the pipe into the pond.”

Hatchery trout are 8 to 12 inches long. Moura explained that the pond has big mouth bass and some catfish in residence. “So sometimes kids get a really big one. You never know.”

Hendricks said more than 30 volunteers from PAL participate in the event most years. Volunteers come from the Fort Bragg Police Department, Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department, the California Highway Patrol, California State Parks, Fish and Wildlife and the Coast Guard. The cops and other volunteers show kids how to fish while they barbecue hot dogs and serve chips and soda. The event is free for coast youth, preschool through 5th grade.

Since 1971, California PAL’s 150 chapters has served more than a half million kids according to the PAL website. The coast’s unusual addition to PAL activities has now gone on for two decades. In the past it was held at Lake Cleone, but Hendricks pointed out Cleone is too big and too hard to get to the shore to cast.

The PAL is also involved in efforts to create a city-operated bicycle park, where kids can learn skills and have fun jumping bikes and performing in the same way that now happens on skateboards at Fort Bragg’s Skate Park. The original location for the bike park was at the old Georgia Pacific mill site property, but a new location is now being sought, Hendricks said. PAL is also known for its annual bicycle rodeo and for getting kids on two wheels from unclaimed and renovated bicycles. PAL also hopes to bring back an event quashed by the pandemic, the annual Big River Run, a series of foot races that attract participants from around the world and honors the life of Deputy Ricky Del Fiorentino, who died in the line of duty in 2014. Hendricks said there are hopes to bring the event back in 2025.

Moura Pond is adjacent to the sprawling Moura mansion. Joe Moura, a Portuguese immigrant from the Azores, became one of the area’s best known builders of upscale homes. While many of Moura’s fellow countrymen formed the backbone of the Noyo Harbor fishing industry, Joe Moura was a landlubber for life after a terrifying adventure being lost at sea, his daughter Jaclyn Moura recalls. 

Last year, the fish had to be trucked twice as far, from the Shasta County area, Hendricks said. That the Mad River Hatchery was back online this year was good news, because the fish didn’t have to travel so far in risky hot weather. The Mad River Hatchery raises steelhead trout and chinook salmon, two of the state’s most important and protected fishes.

Fishing for hatchery trout in a lake was once featured at many county fairs and scout jamborees. But science has shown that hatchery fish can harm fish populations due to their lesser genetic diversity.

There’s a lot of debate whether hatchery fish can potentially pollute the gene pool of native wild stock, Hendricks said. He said that is not a concern here. This is not a natural body of water, so there’s no potential for those fish to get out and mix with the wild population.

In fact, the Moura Pond trout cannot reproduce, Hendricks said. Triploid trout are created with three sets of chromosomes instead of the natural two, which makes them sterile.

Noyo Fish Company donates bait, but many kids bring their own lures or bait.

“The Police Activities League wants to provide kids in our community with opportunities that they may not normally have,” Hendricks said. “This is about bringing them out and supplying all the gear necessary to go out and enjoy the outdoors and having fun outside.”

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