The Chesapeake Bay - Part 2

I remember, as a child, riding the ferry across the Chesapeake Bay on our way to Chincoteague.  When I was born, my father was in the US Navy, and we were stationed at Oceana, Virginia; then at Millington, Tennessee, then Corpus Christi, Texas.  Dad retired from the Navy on my fifth birthday, and we moved to Gainesville, Florida.  Anytime we visited Mom's home town, which was usually once or twice each year, we took the ferry from Norfolk to Cape Charles, Virginia.  That happened until 1964, when I was 8 years old; in April of that year, the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel opened.  I was astonished that you could drive both over and under Chesapeake Bay and did not have to take the ferry.  I can even tell you that we crossed the Bridge-Tunnel in my Uncle's brand new Jeep Wagoneer - my sister, Mom, and I in the back seat, and Aunt Ruth in the front passenger seat, with Uncle Claude driving.  I remember seagulls flying alongside the car, and how scared I was when we entered the first of two tunnels.  Now, 52 years later, I enjoy the scents of the salt water and the rhythmic beat of the tires across the joined slabs of the road bed - as well as the sight of the gulls flying beside the car.  For me, the Chesapeake Bay has always meant that I was almost home...
    The Chesapeake Bay is home to many fauna that either migrate to the area, or live there year round.  There are over 300 species of fish and many shellfish and crab species. Some of these creatures include the Atlantic menhaden, the striped bass, the American eel, the eastern oyster, and the blue crab.  Birds include ospreys, great blue herons, bald eagles, and peregrine falcons; the last two listed were threatened with extinction by DDT: their numbers plummeted, but have risen in recent years.  The piping plover is a threatened species which inhabits the wetlands around the Bay.
    Larger fish, like the Atlantic sturgeon, as well as several varieties of sharks, and stingrays visit the Chesapeake.  The waters of Chesapeake Bay have long been regarded as one of the most important nursery areas for sharks along the east coast.  Megafaunas  like bull sharks, tiger sharks, scalloped hammerhead sharks, basking sharks, and manta rays are also known visitors.  Bottlenose dolphins are also found in the Bay.  The unconfirmed sightings of humpback whales seem to be proven, as four dead humpbacks have washed up recently along the Eastern Shore.  The endangered North Atlantic right whale, as well as fin, minke, and sei whales have also been seen within and near the mouth of the Chesapeake.  Loggerhead turtles are also known visitors in the Chesapeake.
    The Bay is mostly known for its seafood production - especially blue crabs, clams and oysters.  In the middle of the 20th century, the Bay supported 9,000 full-time watermen and their families.  Today the Chesapeake is less productive than it used to be .  This is due to runoff from urban areas along the western shore of the Bay, runoff from farms on the Eastern Shore and from the Susquehanna River watershed, over-harvesting of marine life, and the invasion of foreign species into the waters.
    In the 19th century, the plentiful oyster harvests in the Chesapeake led to the development of the skipjack, the state boat of Maryland, which is the only remaining working boat type in the United States that is still under sail power.  Other characteristic bay-area work boats include sail-powered boats such as the log canoe, the pungy, the bugeye, and the motorized Chesapeake Bay deadrise, the state boat of Virginia.
    In contrast to harvesting the wild oyster, oyster farming is a growing industry in the Chesapeake Bay that helps maintain the estuary's productivity, as well as a natural effort for filtering the impurities, such as excess nutrients, from the water in an effort to reduce the effects of man-made pollution.  The Chesapeake Bay Program is using oysters to reduce the amount of nitrogen compounds entering the Bay's waters.  Oysters are hermaphroditic and will change gender at least once during their lifetime; they often begin life as a male, and end life as a female.  There are numerous ways to cook and eat them (besides raw on the half-shell), as well as many recipes and sauces to accompany oyster dishes.  According to Kendra Bailey Morris, of the National Public Radio in 2007, "The Chesapeake oyster - sometimes called Chesapeake white gold - has a flavor and texture that begs connoisseurs to come back and shuck just a few more."
    The Chesapeake is also famous for its rockfish, a regional name for striped bass.  Once on the verge of extinction, rockfish have made a significant comeback because of legislative action that placed a moratorium on rockfishing, which allowed the species to re-populate.  Rockfish are now allowed to fished again, but only in strictly controlled and limited quantities.

    Chincoteague Island, my maternal family home, was long famous for its oysters and clams.  For many years, Campbell's Soup Company had an exclusive contract for the oysters and clams caught, or raised, in and around the island.  For quite a few years only Chincoteague oysters and clams were used in Campbell's soup.....  The island had problems with pollution, and our shellfish production took a huge dive.  The waters are now cleaner, and our oysters and clams are being noticed again.

The Chesapeake Bay - Photos

View of the Chesapeake Bay, with the much smaller Delaware Bay above it

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge span the bay in Maryland - almost 5 miles 

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel spans the bay in Virginia - 

a little over 23 miles

A tri-color heron

Abandoned home on Holland Island

Early morning sails on the bay

Bay waterfront at St Michaels, Maryland

Friday Review

I spent a great afternoon with Kathy yesterday - Jim was in and out, running errands, and Sarah brought my grand-niece Evie, who kept all of us occupied.  Sister-in-law Tracey stopped by and joined us for lunch, and we had a great family meal.  Kathy received a pile of get well cards yesterday, and a couple of neighbors stopped by with cards and flowers.  Evie finally hit an overload point without her nap (she is, after all, only 15 months old), and Sarah took her home. Kathy finally had some quiet time time for a nap, and Jim went shopping for essentials - toilet paper, milk, and some fresh vegetables and fruit.  After returning, Jim ran me home before Lynn was to arrive with last night's meal...
   The weather folks said we'd have a clear, but cold, morning here with temperatures dropping again, and with snow in the afternoon.  I walked to the store this morning, grabbed a couple of bagels and some crunchies for the kits, and walked back home.  On the way back, I realized that teeny, tiny snowflakes were falling - they looked almost like glitter on the ground.  Right now, the snow is falling and swirling as if we were trapped inside a snow globe.  As soon as I returned this morning, I put out more nuts and dried fruit for the squirrels, and I re-filled the bird seed bowl.  While writing this, I keep seeing squirrels peering in the window and quite a few birds flying in and out, grabbing seeds.  And, just for the heck of it, it was 21 degrees when I went to the store; it's now 17 degrees.
   I am still shaking my head over some of the "news" stories I seen over the past few days.  I agree that the story about the 35-foot sailboat that ran into the pilings along the Chesapeake tunnel of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel was news.  The captain of the boat lost his engine, and the boat hit the bridge pilings, breaking a part of the mast.  The Coast Guard transferred a man over to aid the sailboat captain, the sail was untangled and taken down, and the engine was started.  There was no damage to the bridge-tunnel pilings.
    The story about the "medical miracle" of a young man who survived "internal decapitation" might be news-worthy.  If the young man had been wearing his seat belt prior to an accident that threw him out of the back seat of an SUV, this probably would not have happened.  The impact moved his skull away from his spine - usually, there is a space of 1 millimeter or less between the top (C-1) vertebrae and the skull.  This young man had a 6 mm separation - and his spinal cord was not compromised.  He was extremely lucky to be up and walking about in a neck brace and expecting a full recovery.
   The story about the young man who had a 100-plus pound tumor removed from his scrotum, however, seems to feed the prurient interest groups.  I'm sure it was a wonderful moment to have this tumor removed - in a surgery that took 16 hours - but it's not something I'd want reported all over the country and/or world.  And the surgery was not without complications - a nerve was "touched" during the surgery, and the man no longer has any feeling in his legs.  He will have to learn to walk all over again.   Again, I can see letting a few friends and family know this - but to have USA Today coverage  seems a bit much.
  I have to admit it was curiosity that led me to read the story about the lady who set her underwear on fire, draped over the telephone in her cell, causing the destruction of the telephone, and making scorch marks on the wall to the ceiling of her jail cell.  It appears she had been carrying her cigarette lighter in a space available only to females.  She had originally been arrested on drunk and disorderly charges.
   The only big news around here is that the motion picture "Christmastime" is being filmed on the Pearl Street Mall (here in Boulder) for the next week; and that the Denver Broncos are re-signing Champ Bailey to a one-day contract, so that Champ may retire from the NFL as a Bronco...
   Have a great weekend!
 

House Sold, Anniversaries, Vikings, and Weather

We all are enjoying the warmer weather - the kits like having more outdoor time, and I know that both Rosie and I enjoy the warmth of the sun.  We were supposed to have a blast of cold last night, with rain and snow - but we didn't get any precipitation, and the low was only 34 degrees.  Apparently the lower Chesapeake Bay inherited our winds, as a gravel and coal carrier, the Ornak, a 751-foot cargo ship, was run ashore, dragging her anchors by winds over 70 mph.  An hour before the Ornak was blown aground, a 79-foot rig vessel and a 1,065 foot container ship collided, due to the winds, in a heavily used shipping channel.  Neither vessel sustained major damage; nor the the other 12 ships that reportedly drug anchor.
  Tuesday was the 50th anniversary of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel having opened.  I remember traveling across the Bridge-Tunnel in June of 1964 in Uncle Claude and Aunt Ruth's new Jeep SUV...    And today is the 50th anniversary of the introduction of the Ford Mustang - I always thought that was one of the best cars ever made - it was the dream car of kids in the 1960s.  My friend, Richard Shuler, had a black Mustang when we were in high school, and I always remember how much I envied him...
  It is, of course, Thorsday, which means I'll get another wonderful hour of Vikings on the History Channel tonight.  My guess is that tonight Princess Aslaug will give birth to Ragnar Lodbrok's fifth son, Ivar the Boneless; and I believe that next season, we will see Ragnar with his third wife...   And, if you read Bernard Cornwell's  The Saxon Tales books, you will find that several of the characters in the multiple books are sons of Ragnar Lodbrok.  The protagonist of the series is Uhtred of Bebbanburg, who fights against the Ragnarssons.
  My friend Alexy's house was placed on the market on Saturday and yesterday (Wednesday) the sales contract was signed.  Alexy is happy and sad at the same time - she, her husband, and son lived there for 30 years.  She slowly had the house remodeled to her tastes - including a large, well-lit art studio - and planned the yard plantings and gardens.  She moves out on 26 May, to a condominium in Louisville.  I think she will miss the yard, which was a quarter-acre in the front of the house, and a full acre in the back.  She delighted in the wildlife that abounds in the area - her only complaint was about the coyotes, not the bears or mountain lions.  I think she'll miss having the mule deer buck bed down under her dining room window all winter; but - I'm also sure she won't miss expending so much energy on taking care of the house and grounds.  I will miss her and her two cats, Cloudy and Shady.

Water Views

A view of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel; this is where the bridge ends and one of the tunnels begins - or is it the other way around?

Onancock, Virginia - Chesapeake Bay is on the horizon

A part of the extensive harbor and docking areas at St. Michael's, Maryland on the Chesapeake Bay