Once upon a time, if you lived in Chesapeake Country, you probably worked the water. Nowadays, you probably don’t. Statistics are against it.     Open the current edition of Waterman’s Gazette, and smack in the center of the monthly publication of the Maryland Watermen’s Association, you’ll read the legend: Endangered Species: Watermen of the Chesapeake. On the same page, right next to photos of real live specimens of this endangered species, you’ll...

Those plants that are taller than me were all volunteers sewn by last year’s plants.     They say hybrid plants might not be as strong as their parents, but I’ve had pretty good luck. The UPS driver wanted to know if I got my topsoil from Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant. I think it’s just the right amount of sun and shade per day, but if other farmers want to know, I rotilled one bag of 10-10-10 soil conditioner into my 25-by-25 garden plot on an 80-degree...

Bay Weekly has acquired a furry friend, an orphaned baby squirrel. He (or she?) first caught our attention when he was stretched across the screen of our front window. We heard his cries through the open windows. Once our awhs stopped, we went back to work.     When the mailman came with his delivery later that day, he stepped over the squirrlel to get through our front door.     With mother nowhere in sight and baby crying at our door step, we decided to take...

We should hope that Mantra, the 88-foot sportfishing yacht from Weaver Boatworks, about to depart Tracy’s Landing for some of the world’s most dangerous waters, avoids the perils of the last Mantra.     Capt. Thomas Holmes was marlin hunting in that 68-footer off the Seychelles, an island nation 900 miles from Africa’s east coast, when two skiffs closed fast behind him. Powerful skiffs, operated by Somalis with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades,...