Choptank

White sails and large vessels once were a familiar sight on the Choptank River. Cambridge was a major base for oyster boats and a coastal port that accommodated ocean-going freighters. As the oysters and the food-packing plants that attracted the freighters have dwindled, so has the water traffic and the fortunes of the Dorchester County seat.But not for much longer, if Cambridge business and community leaders have their way. After several false starts, they have embarked on transforming the Cambridge waterfront into a festival park and magnet for tourists that should brighten the city's future.

Now for a bit of good news - and from an environmental group at that. Drew Koslow, the Choptank Riverkeeper, reports that while walking the shore of Harris Creek in Talbot County, he saw an "amazing" abundance of oysters growing in the intertidal zone, inundated by water at high tide but exposed to the air at ebb. "You literally couldn't take a step without walking on oysters," Koslow said in a recent release by the Mid-Shore Riverkeeper Conservancy....

The river had been good earlier in the day, despite a fast-receding tide and a steady wind pushing the muddy water even faster across Pealiquor Shoal below Denton on the Choptank.It was Saturday, and the river was not crowded -- the Choptank, it seems, is almost never crowded with bass fishermen, who launch their boats and disappear into innumerable creeks and deeper tidal guts.Thirty minutes past dawn, there had been but eight vehicles and trailers in the launch ramp parking lot at Martinak State Park.

Maryland's fledgling oyster aquaculture industry gets a little national exposure this week, as the Cooking Channel pays a call on the Choptank Oyster Co. near Cambridge. In this week's episode of " Pitchin' In " a new series that appears to be the Cooking Channel's version of "Dirty Jobs ," Chef Lynn Crawford learns the hard way that "farming oysters is a filthy, dirty job," according to the online show blurb . The Choptank Oyster Co ., also known as Marinetics Inc., is arguably one of the most established of the state's oyster farms.  It's been raising millions of oysters in floats since 1996.  Its "Choptank Sweets" and "Choptank Salts" are sold and served on both sides of the Chesapeake Bay. The episode airs at 2:30 a.m. and 10:30 p.m. EST Thursday, Dec. 8, then again at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 10.

The operator of a cabin cruiser that struck a fishing boat anchored at the mouth of the Choptank River in July has been charged with six violations of Maryland maritime laws and regulations. Keith David Price, 42, of Landenburg, Pa., is accused of negligence and unsafe boat handling in charging documents filed by Natural Resources Police in Easton District Court. Several people fishing aboard the Jil Carrie were injured, and one was thrown overboard, when Price's 53-foot cabin cruiser, Price Pirate, rammed the stern of the charter boat at noon July 7. Price has been charged with operating a boat in a reckless or dangerous manner, negligence, speeding, failure to maintain a proper lookout, failure to take all risk-assessment measures and failure to take appropriate action in a narrow channel.

Environmentalists are urging the state to act quickly to clean up Maryland's Choptank River, which has become more polluted due to farm runoff and development as well as a major drop in the oyster population. At a hearing on the state's rivers yesterday in Annapolis, several Choptank advocates asked legislators to consider new solutions to help the river. Among them: an effort to determine how much water quality damage is caused by each new development; a tax-incentive program to encourage homeowners not to pave along the shoreline; and a moratorium on oyster harvesting in the river.

Poachers have devastated three thriving, taxpayer-funded oyster research reserves in the Choptank River, taking about 61,000 bushels of healthy 2-year-old oysters from sites where scientists were learning more about the oysters' crucial role in cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay, according to state biologists and fishery managers. The three reefs were created in 1997 at a cost of about $87,000 as part of a continuing experiment in oyster restoration by the Army Corps of Engineers, with help from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.

CAMBRIDGE -- It looked like just another beautiful day on the water as Bill Dennison and his crew of biologists pushed off from their pier at the Horn Point Laboratory and sailed toward the mouth of the Choptank River. The sun glistened on the waves. In the distance, craggy, tree-lined peninsulas carved the river into jagged coves that have long been home to crabs and rockfish. But there were hardly any fishing boats. In fact, hardly anyone was on the river at all. It soon became clear why. The researchers passed large patches of brownish-white foam - so-called "mahogany tides" where the water is so thick with algae that no light can get through.

CHOPTANK -- Connie Coughenour-Prue just could not bring herself to let go of her family's country store. In the 20-by-30-foot riverside grocery, her parents have served the 90 or so residents of this tiny Caroline County village since 1946. And she's helped out since she "was old enough to count pennies." So when her mother -- known to everyone around as Miss Audrey -- finally decided on retirement last spring at age 87, Coughenour-Prue gave up her 35-year career as a sales representative for an Easton lithographic equipment company to take over the place.

GREENSBORO -- Here in its headwaters, the Choptank River is a place you'd want to come to in spring, even if it had no fish at all, let alone the ones we're hoping for today. Most Marylanders know the Choptank for its broad, lower reaches, flowing to the horizons beneath U.S. 50 at Cambridge, a scale fit for reflecting sunrises, sunsets and full moons. But a few dozen miles upstream, the river narrows, and its translucent, dark-stained waters are canopied by forest. Dogwood and viburnum splash its meanders with white.

A Cambridge country club was ordered to pay an "extraordinary penalty" of $500,000 by a Dorchester County Circuit Court for discharging raw sewage into wetlands along the Choptank River that eventually flow into the Chesapeake Bay, according to a Thursday announcement from the state attorney general's office. BSJ Partners LLC, owner-operator of Clearview at Horn's Point, formerly known as the Cambridge Country Club, was ordered to pay a $485,000 civil penalty for environmental violations, a $15,000 penalty for failing to submit discharge monitoring reports for three years; and a $500 penalty for discovery violations.

The state medical examiner's office has determined that a 71-year old Denton man whose body was found floating in the Choptank River Sunday was the victim of a homicide. An autopsy was conducted Monday. Police said that Louis R. Nichols, of the 300 block of South Fourth St., sustained multiple injuries. But the cause of Nichols' death has not been made public because police fear that the information might compromise their investigation. Nichols' body was found not far from the former Route 404 bridge near Denton around 11 a.m. Sunday.

Two women have been arrested and charged with murder after their 71-year-old housemate's body was found in the Choptank River, Maryland State Police said Tuesday. Charlene R. Weddle and Mary S. Chider have been charged with murder and assault after the body of Louis R. Nichols was found in the Choptank River. State police identified Weddle as the daughter of Nichols' deceased spouse and said all three lived together in the 300 block of S. Fourth St. in Denton. Nichols was last seen alive around 10 p.m. Saturday, when he left a friend's home in Ridgely.

Nine recreational anglers from out of state were charged with fishing for striped bass in protected waters during a weekend sting operation in the Choptank River south of Denton, just one week before the start of Maryland's spring season. Working on tips from the public, Natural Resources Police officers shot video of the alleged poachers fishing on known spawning grounds and intercepted them as they returned to shore at Ganeys Wharf. Police say one angler caught 20 striped bass.

Two decades after he successfully lobbied to turn the old U.S. 50 bridge over the Choptank River into a fishing pier, Bill Burton was honored Wednesday when the state named the popular site after him. At the urging of Gov. Martin O'Malley and the Department of Natural Resources, the Board of Public Works approved the measure Wednesday by a unanimous vote. "It overwhelms me to think that they think enough of me to do that," said Burton, 82. "There's a hell of a lot of pride in that." The Board of Public Works also voted Wednesday to rename the Overlook at Green Ridge State Forest after longtime DNR forester Francis Zumbrun.

Heritage Society to hold its Christmas tours The Heritage Society of Essex and Middle River will hold its Christmas tours from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. today and tomorrow and Dec. 13 and 14 at 516 Eastern Blvd. The decorated Avenue of Shoppes will show how people shopped two generations ago. Featured gifts include Maryland jigsaw puzzles and 40th-anniversary apothecary jars. Information: 410-574-6934. Utility rate increase coming to the Shore DENTON: Choptank Electric Cooperative customers can expect a 5.46 percent rate increase starting next month.

Two decades after he successfully lobbied to turn the old U.S. 50 bridge over the Choptank River into a fishing pier, Bill Burton was honored Wednesday when the state named the popular site after him. At the urging of Gov. Martin O'Malley and the Department of Natural Resources, the Board of Public Works approved the measure Wednesday by a unanimous vote. "It overwhelms me to think that they think enough of me to do that," said Burton, 82. "There's a hell of a lot of pride in that." The Board of Public Works also voted Wednesday to rename the Overlook at Green Ridge State Forest after longtime DNR forester Francis Zumbrun.

Environmentalists are urging the state to act quickly to clean up Maryland's Choptank River, which has become more polluted due to farm runoff and development as well as a major drop in the oyster population. At a hearing on the state's rivers yesterday in Annapolis, several Choptank advocates asked legislators to consider new solutions to help the river. Among them: an effort to determine how much water quality damage is caused by each new development; a tax-incentive program to encourage homeowners not to pave along the shoreline; and a moratorium on oyster harvesting in the river.

CASTLE HAVEN-- -- Down a one-lane road past barren fields teeming with squawking Canada geese is something that hasn't been found on the Eastern Shore for more than two decades - a river filled with oysters. And Kevin McClarren knows how many are there, because he and his crew have planted every single one. Five million healthy oysters on 3,000 floats on the water's surface, with anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 oysters each. Every day, McClarren and his four workers - all of whom have degrees in biology or marine science - wade into the water, each with multiple layers of sweat shirts, to tend to their burgeoning crop.