Fish

Even if you're not yet ready to retire, San Miguel de Allende is perfect for a vacation or long weekend getaway. Getting there United and American airlines offer connecting flights (via Texas) to San Miguel's two closest airports, Leon/Guanajuato (BJX), 90 minutes away, and Queretaro (QRO), one hour away. Round-trip airfares start around $600. Multiple airlines offer flights to Mexico City, which is three hours from San Miguel. When to go January may be the sole inclement month to travel, and even then it's nothing compared to a typical Baltimore winter.

It took almost 56 years, but I've finally mastered my table manners, and in the process learned something about the curious and controversial history of the fork. And all it took was two hours of bearing up under Carol Haislip's patrician gaze as she waved the silver instrument of torture with the twisted prong known as a "butter pick" through the air, perilously close to my throat. Possibly, the danger was all in my mind. It's true that I lack the higher, lower and intermediate social graces - I am a child of the lawless '70s, after all. And it's equally true that I had never fully grasped silverware's potential for inflicting bodily harm until I attended "Fish Forks and Finger Bowls," a seminar that teaches table manners to adults.

Always, there were those lovely old country estates and gracious manor taverns with roaring fireplaces, but in the old days fine dining was associated with the city. Not so anymore. Now, there are more compelling reasons than ever for diners to cross county lines for a good meal. The 50 best county restaurants in Howard County, Anne Arundel County and Baltimore County is a mix of the old and the new, destinations for special occasions and joints for Monday night suppers, the chef-driven and crowd-pleasing.

A preliminary report on the deaths of two anglers on the opening day of the Chesapeake Bay rockfish season says all six persons aboard the boat that capsized off Point Lookout had life vests, but not all wore them, according to the Maryland Natural Resources Police. David Fletcher, 43, and David Chase, 55, both of Lexington Park in Southern Maryland, died Saturday morning when a friend's fishing boat took on water and capsized. Four persons, including the owner-operator of the boat, were rescued.

IN SAXIS, VA., RESIDENTS say they knew something big was up when the call went out this spring for anyone with a pickup truck that could haul fish.Big catches of fish and crabs are nothing new in Saxis. The Eastern Shore village, on Pocomoke Sound about six miles southeast of Crisfield, is as dedicated to harvesting bay seafood as Iowa is to growing corn.Still, people had to search back decades for a catch of "hardhead," or Atlantic croaker, to exceed what two watermen reportedly landed that day.Their haul of this popular sport and commercial species was too big to empty from the net all at once.

When people walk into the huge rectangular building filled with row upon row of fish tanks, they almost always ask the two young farmers the same question: "Where did you get your degrees in marine biology?""We didn't," Randy Mattson says, laughing, looking down at the slimy rubber boots he once would have predicted would be wingtips. "We're not exactly farmers. We're businessmen."About two years ago, Mattson and his business partner, Scott Lee, were shrewd enough to spot a potential moneymaker.

On paper, McFaul's IronHorse Tavern has everything going for it: A charming location, an appealing menu with a focus on local flavors, friendly staff. That's a good start. But in practice, the restaurant needs some fine-tuning. Start with the name. Officially, it's called McFaul's IronHorse Tavern at Sanders Corner. Descriptive, but a mouthful. The name McFaul's represents the current ownership: Glen and Kristin McFaul are two of the restaurant's five owners. "IronHorse" is a nod to the old Northern Central Railroad tracks — the NCR Trail runs behind the building.

The Sun got it right in its recent editorial entitled "Dollars and scents," (June 1) discussing the economic impact of the declining health of our harbor and our bay. As algal blooms and resulting fish kills happen year after year, citizens and regulators start to think that it's a normal phenomenon, caused only by high temperatures and extreme weather events. But we cannot pretend that this is normal, particularly when the science presents an urgent situation. Once the recent algal bloom began, the water samples taken in the harbor showed an increase in levels of chlorophyll and nutrients.

SCIENCE HAS taken on entertainment, and entertainment wins. A Texas firm will soon be offering up pet zebra fish genetically enhanced to glow bright red in the dark. Demand is predicted to be high, even at the sticker-shock price of $5 a head. They should appeal to baby boomers who miss the joy of their Day-Glo posters and kids who have outgrown the glow-in-the-dark star stickers once plastered to their bedroom ceilings. Not to mention the hordes of aquarium lovers, always on the lookout for a unique addition to their aquatic landscapes.

Descendants of fish that roamed the seas when dinosaurs ruled the earth, Atlantic sturgeon are in danger of disappearing just like their ancestors. They're the biggest, strangest-looking fish most people have never seen in the Chesapeake Bay, so few are left in these waters. Now, at the urging of an environmental group, the federal government wants to formally classify them as endangered, which triggers stricter legal protection from harm for the remaining sturgeon. But some scientists and state officials worry it could also complicate efforts to restore their numbers.

The Chesapeake Bay and its rivers have lost 44 percent of their underwater grasses over the past three years, scientists reported Thursday, reducing vital habitat for crabs and fish to a level not seen in nearly three decades. Scientists blamed weather and storms for much of the decline seen last year, but they said an as-yet unexplained long-term decline in the bay's water clarity has played havoc with this key indicator of the Chesapeake's health. An aerial survey flown from late spring to early fall last year found 48,191 acres of submerged vegetation, down 21 percent from the extent of grasses seen in 2011, according to scientists from Maryland and Virginia.

Seismic testing for oil and gas off Maryland and other Atlantic coast states could cause widespread harm to whales, dolphins, sea turtles and fish, as well as to fishing and tourism, an environmental group warned Tuesday. Oceana said the federal government's own environmental impact statement estimates 138,500 whales and dolphins could be injured if seismic "airguns," which generate blasts of noise underwater, are used to explore for oil and gas along the Atlantic coast.  The Department of Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management is weighing applications to conduct offshore seismic testing from Delaware to Florida.

Last summer, Anna Estremsky competed in the first-ever Youth Angler of the Year contest hosted by the Maryland Saltwater Sportfishing Association. In the association's seasonal magazine, Tidelines, Anna was pictured with a 37-pound rockfish and the caption "Way to go, Anna!" Her parents, Gary and Sherry, left an open copy of the magazine on a coffee table in their Edgewater home. Anna liked the picture, and she liked the fish, but she felt bad because the magazine also listed the contest's standings, and she was in last place.

The Maryland Saltwater Sportfishermen's Association will host the first event of its youth fishing seminar series on Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Alltackle retail showroom in Annapolis. The event, one of eight that MSSA will host this year for young fishermen and their parents, will feature lessons on knots and fish handling from Captain Randy Dean and his son, Ryan. Pizza and beverages will be served. In recent years, MSSA has hosted a handful of events that have allowed children and parents to learn about fishing together.

The Air Force service member infected with rabies before his organs were transplanted into several patients — including one Marylander who died — was thought previously to have been poisoned by a type of fish. Kathy Giery, a director at LifeQuest Organ Recovery Services in Gainesville, Fla., said Monday that the organ recovery service oversaw the transplant process from the rabies-infected donor. The hospital where the donor died told the organ service the person was poisoned by ciguatera, a toxin found in certain kinds of fish, she said.

In Baltimore, everybody knows Costas Inn. The Dundalk institution has been around since 1971, when Costas Triantafilos - still the owner, now working with his son, Pete - opened the restaurant. Since the '70s, Costas has grown into a nationally recognized crab powerhouse, serving steamed crabs year-round and shipping crab cakes and crab seasoning all over the country. But back in Baltimore, the restaurant is more than just a place to pick crabs. We visited Costas during the "off" season to see what else the Baltimore landmark has to offer.

- Christopher Gearhart does not know where he would be without fly fishing. Growing up in this Frederick County town, Gearhart's father left the family when he was a small child. Donald Lewis, the town's mayor, took Gearhart and a few other kids to an annual event on the grounds of Camp Airy run by a group of men who taught boys like Gearhart how to fly fish. "Honestly, my father left us and these gentlemen kept me out of trouble," Gearhart recalled Saturday. "They knew I liked to fish, and they kept me doing it. " Now 40 years old and an insurance executive who lives in nearby Waynesboro, Pa., Gearhart has stayed involved in the organization that taught him so much.

The aquarium in the living room of Meir and Leah Lazar's Baltimore County home isn't just for decoration. The tilapia and bluegills packed into the 50-gallon glass tank are waiting their turn to wind up on dinner plates. Out back, Meir Lazar is putting the finishing touches on a bigger new home for the fish inside a plastic-covered greenhouse. There, he hopes, the waste from the fish he's tending will help him raise enough lettuce, tomatoes and other produce to feed his family of five year-round.

100 Years Ago Yankee Doodle Dandy "Ford's Grand Opera House: Week, February 24th, Cohan and Harris offer, a new satirical comedy, The Children of Today, by Clara Lipman and Samuel Shipman. Representative Company. "Children of Today, a play which will appeal to all classes and to every parent, is a modern satirical comedy full of fun and good sense, entertaining from start to finish. It is by Clara Lipman and Samuel Shipman and produced under the auspices of Messrs Cohan and Harris.

Scientists have found reproductive abnormalities in yellow perch in three Maryland rivers that are either heavily suburbanized or rapidly developing, which they say helps explain why the distinctive black-striped fish are not thriving in those Chesapeake Bay tributaries and may be linked to toxic pollution. Significant numbers of eggs produced by spawning female perch in the Severn and South rivers in Anne Arundel County and in Mattawoman Creek in Charles County failed to develop completely, according to a three-year survey conducted by federal and state researchers.