Bushel

NEIGHBORS eagerly await the Cattail River Garden Club's annual dried flower and herb sale, which takes place Saturday at Union Chapel in Glenwood. Once a year you can share the bounty of the garden club members' gardens by purchasing dried flowers in bouquets, arrangements, wreaths, swags or ornaments.Herbs dried at the peak of their flavor in summer can add seasoning to your kitchen creations all winter. Glenwood's Frankie Pardoe reports that members of the club have been gathering and drying beautiful flowers for this sale all year.

CHICAGO -- Corn continued its sharp rise in price yesterday, driven upward by demand for ethanol and an increasingly prosperous world eager for food. The benchmark price of corn reached an exchange-imposed limit of $3.965 a bushel shortly after trading began at the Chicago Board of Trade. To maintain financial stability, the board limits daily increases and decreases in corn to 20 cents per bushel. Limits are rarely needed, the exchange said, and come into play only when prices are highly volatile.

Lawrence Murphy has been a waterman for 28 of the Chesapeake Bay's leanest years, but he still believes in a generous and forgiving Mother Nature. And this spring in the waters of Eastern Bay near Kent Island, he has been raking in a unique harvest that seems to prove him right:Baby oysters in amazing and mysterious abundance -- so many that 800 million of them are being gathered to help Maryland's Department of Natural Resources re-establish failing oyster...

Workshop set on management plans The Maryland Department of Agriculture and University of Maryland Cooperative Extension will hold a workshop for farmers who want to become certified to write nutrient management plans for their own operations. A workshop will be held on "Crop Operations Using Manure and Fertilizer" starting Oct. 17 in Frederick County. Other workshops on different plans will be offered around the state. Certification requires attendance at two workshops. The first class gives the fundamentals of planning and take-home materials to study.

As state farmers prepare for the new planting season, the outlook is bright for poultry, livestock, and greenhouse and nursery farmers, but grain farmers and dairy farmers will continue to struggle. "There are some trouble spots, but 2002 could be a good year for state farmers," said state Agriculture Secretary Hagner R. Mister. "That is providing we get some rain." For the second consecutive year, corn literally piled up on Maryland's Eastern Shore. The 30- to 40-foot mountains of grain were evidence of another bumper harvest for state grain farmers but also an indication of troubled times in the year ahead.

This could be the year that state grain farmers buy that flashy new pickup truck they have been eyeing for a couple of years. Due primarily to recent floods in the Midwest, "Maryland grain farmers are looking at a huge payday this year," says Kevin McNew, a managing partner of Go Grain LLC, a commodity research firm in Bozeman, Mont., and an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland. "For Maryland farmers, things look great," he said. "It could be their best year ever. "They are sitting on a corn crop that looks to be valued at $7 or $8 a bushel," said McNew.

This could be the year that state grain farmers buy that flashy new pickup truck they have been eyeing for a couple of years. Because of recent floods in the Midwest, "Maryland grain farmers are looking at a huge pay day this year," says Kevin McNew, a managing partner of Go Grain LLC, a commodity research firm in Bozeman, Mont., and an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland. "For Maryland farmers, things look great," he said. "It could be their best year ever. "They are sitting on a corn crop that looks to be valued at $7 or $8 a bushel," said McNew.

Today's burning question -- in my kitchen, at any rate: "Is it better to do the impromptu 'What time can you be here/what can you bring' dinner party or the 'A week from Friday at 7 o'clock/No, of course you needn't bring anything' variation?The latter, of course, involves shopping on Tuesday, getting the things you forgot on Wednesday, making the hors d'oeuvres on Thursday, getting the fresh things that you couldn't get on Tuesday, and hoping your spouse remembers the wine.Then there's making the main course -- which you've never made before and it smells strange -- and finding all the surfaces in the public areas of your home so you can clean on Friday while you whip up the dried fruit poached in port and wonder where you can borrow a chair.

Crabbing for fun is about to get more complicated in Maryland.Under regulations proposed by the state Department of Natural Resources, recreational crabbers will still be able to catch enough crabs for the dinner table -- up to a bushel a day -- without a license. But those who want to take a feast's worth of crabs, two to three bushels a day, will need a new $5 seasonal license.The proposed rules, scheduled to go into effect April 1, will affect crabbers who tie crab pots to their piers or set trot lines and collapsible crab traps from a boat.

ONE MAN'S junk is another man's treasure. Or so the saying goes. Find out if that's true at the fall flea market Saturday at Ferndale United Methodist Church, 117 Ferndale Road.Sponsored by the Ferndale United Methodist Men and United Methodist Women, the event runs from 8: 30 a.m. to 2 p.m.Table rentals are available for $12. Rentals: 410-761-4412. Information: 410-761-2880.Boy Scout breakfastStart your Saturday with a hearty pancake breakfast prepared by Boy Scout Troop 822. The all-you-can-eat breakfast is from 6: 30 a.m. to 11: 30 a.m. at the Linthicum Heights United Methodist Church, 200 School Lane.