NEWS ARTICLE ARCHIVE — in chronological order, with pagination below
-
Hatchery fish are key to salmon survival
Kori Roberts has a seasonal job that might sound like a horror movie script. She collects heads in Noyo Harbor for the Department of Fish and Wildlife, going to commercial and private boats to saw them off, bag them and carry them away in a cooler. The DFW sends the king salmon heads to a…
Read More » -
Lions, pets a bad mix in Inglenook
Dave Paoli hopes the mountain lion that attacked family dogs twice recently on his Inglenook place never comes back. But if the lion does in the next few days, authorities have given Paoli a depredation permit to take the animal. These special 10 day permits are rarely issued, with only about a dozen lions taken…
Read More » -
Crash trial delayed
An infant injured in a bizarre tourist homicide case in Fort Bragg last year appears to still be suffering from the impacts of a crash that killed his aunt. On Oct. 17, 2014, Michael Bradford Bitney, 56, of Oregon was allegedly driving his pickup when he crashed through the wall of the Beachcomber Motel just…
Read More » -
Another whale stranded; search for causes of death continues
The bad news literally continues to pile up about marine mammals in 2015. More than a dozen whales have washed ashore in the last two months including a sperm whale, a humpback and an orca. More than half were gray whales. This year’s gray whale deaths, while disconcerting, don’t compare to the gray whale die-off…
Read More » -
Salmon season: next year’s options revealed
Seasons aren’t final yet but Fort Bragg fishermen should have lots of chances to catch salmon this summer and fall, with happy returns in the federal numbers forecast. Yet the continuing California drought could have a major — and still unknown —impact on salmon, as well as everybody else. Two summer recreation fishing season options…
Read More » -
Hearts and hands needed to save Salmon BBQ
Help! We need volunteers for the World’s Largest Salmon Barbecue to survive. This is now and for real. Funny story. The tale of how our Salmon Restoration Association got into the position to ask this question now began with that same question 10 years ago. The need for willing bodies to run some of the…
Read More » -
Charges dropped against shooter
Jesse Van Wormer’s beloved hunting dog, a Queensland heeler cross, will no longer sleep in her large doghouse. She sleeps instead in a tunnel she dug under the doghouse after a black bear chased her away and carried her dog dish and food into the woods. The bears that invaded the family property have been…
Read More » -
Food Bank full of breathing reasons to give
Driving into my parking lot, I waved at Yuki Holand from the Food Bank. I thought “she was a great story I missed. “ Holand turns donated Food Bank foods into a fantastic lunch for volunteers three times a week. She is a lovely and powerful personality. Next, I thought of programs for the developmentally…
Read More » -
Community
I interviewed Donna Byers in 2012, after trying for some time. She told me how she had turned her life around and was enjoying volunteering at the Fort Bragg Food Bank. At the time, she didn’t really want to be named in that round of these Season of Sharing series. She actually dodged the camera…
Read More » -
Big ocean waves give Dungeness Crab Christmas vacation
Like those heady days when salmon are coming in on joyful and full boats, crab season can enliven Noyo Harbor with motion, aromas and noise. And then take it all away, leaving the place silent and with only the faint aroma of the sea. That was the crabby up and downs of the past two…
Read More » -
Anonymous donor drops off $10,000
An anonymous donor recently walked into Harvest Market and gave $10,000 to the Fort Bragg Food Bank. Harvest owner Tom Honer delivered the check last week. At the Christmas season, this kind of amazing gift does happen, but never ceases to impress and surprise the receivers. “The absolute beauty of the “spontaneous things” as you…
Read More » -
Community
What could be more Mendocino dreamin’ than a classic Volkswagen bus with a trailer carrying peace signs? But something now makes many residents turn away from this image of their only partly apocryphal past. Christian Williams, 26, and Kitty Lyons, 30, were parked out front in that rig enjoying what they got from the Fort…
Read More » -
Crab season starts with tasty, high quality samples Dungeness fishing brings tasty danger, cash to Noyo
Consumers will soon be able to buy and cook big, juicy Dungeness crabs caught off the coast of Fort Bragg. But the first to sample their flesh every year are government biologists. Commercial fishermen out of Fort Bragg were allowed to pull their pots up on Monday. Crab fishing may be the most lucrative and…
Read More » -
Season of Sharing
I”ve been investigating strange disappearances at the Fort Bragg Food Bank. Chips. Soda pop. Lemon pies in plastic boxes. At the same time, newcomers like brown rice, yogurt and fresh chard have appeared on the scene, sliding into the places once occupied by the yummy junk foods. Others beyond this cub reporter have noticed these…
Read More » -
Season of sharing: Fort Bragg Food Bank
There are those rock hard but delicious fresh Mexican squash, or the seemingly endless supply of canned capers and sour little canned mandarins. And there was that can of “spotted dick” I found on Nancy Severy”s desk seven years ago. The Fort Bragg Food Bank”s executive director was visibly mortified after I put our laughs…
Read More » -
Runners brave fog
As a woman passed her husband in Sunday”s 5K Salmon Run on the trestle over Pudding Creek, she said with a laugh; “Never thought I”d breeze by you.” “I can”t breathe. It”s the fog,” he said. Women, fog and salmon education did well on Sunday. Women were among the fastest runners on the course, which…
Read More » -
Mother of two killed while waiting for family to return from excursion
Police are mystified about why a man crashed his work truck through the wall of a Fort Bragg motel on Friday night, killing a Lafayette woman in her room and injuring her 7-month-old nephew. No relationship has been established between the driver of the truck, Michael Bradford Bitney, 56, of Fort Mohave, Arizona, and the…
Read More » -
Few facts released about Oct. 8 death of Cleone man in Mendocino County Jail
Why did Shane Murphy”s cell mates think the 36-year-old Cleone man had committed suicide last Wednesday? Was Murphy a mentally ill person who slipped through the Mendocino County Jail”s screening process? These and all other questions remain unanswered in a case involving five law enforcement agencies, but virtually no facts released to the public about…
Read More » -
Boards convene historic meeting
Serious efforts by the state to improve water quality and restore salmon led to a “historic” meeting at Fort Bragg Town Hall last week between two former rival state agencies. The California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection and the North Coast Regional Water Board met together, the boards, lawyers and staff filling up Town…
Read More » -
UC Berkeley expert contradicts Caltrans on replacement of Albion, Salmon Creek bridges
(Editor”s note: This newspaper will feature a full story in the Aug. 14 edition on Astaneh”s two-hour-plus presentation and later feature responses from Caltrans, if that information is forthcoming.) A bridge expert and UC Berkeley professor of structural and bridge engineering told a packed Ledford House audience last Tuesday in Albion he sees no reason…
Read More »