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Way Downstream

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In Anne Arundel and Calvert counties, the first week of hunting season left 802 fewer deer in our woods — among more than 18,000 killed by hunters statewide and reported to Maryland Department of Natural Resources …

In Annapolis, the Board of Public Works grants two Christmas wishes with Project Open Space money — though neither protects open space from development. In the first, $1,350,000 will help pay for the return of the popular reflecting pool and ice skating rink at Quiet Waters Park. That’s just 67 percent of the amount needed to get skaters back on the rink and the pool running again for Christmas, 2008. The second wish is a stone’s throw from the first: $250,000 will help build a children’s playground and concessions/restroom, plus install energy efficient, night-sky friendly athletic field lighting, all at Bay Head Park …

In North Beach, a neighborhood backyard shines in the national television spotlight of Home and Garden Television at 9:30am on Dec. 16. Though the house overlooks the Bay, the backyard was not much to look at — a vast sea of pea gravel housing a large pond — according to Annapolitans Nancy and Pierre Moitrier of Designs for Greener Gardens Inc., who won the popular gardening reality show Landscaper’s Challenge. With the owners’ $40,000 budget, the duo sculpted a large tropical-inspired garden and a serious outdoor cooking area …

In the South Atlantic region, when it rains, it pours. Global warming is already causing extreme downpours much more frequently, according to a new Environment Maryland report. Drenching storms in our part of the nation are now 15 percent more frequent than 60 years ago. Nationally, that figure rises to 24 percent since 1948. One extreme local storm hit Maryland in June of 2006 with upwards of 12 inches of water, leading to three deaths and over $25 million in property damage. More such deluges are coming. Our rain-filled skies, however, don’t mean more water will be available: Longer periods of relative dryness between extreme rainstorms mean higher risk of drought …

In Virginia, they’ve also begun worrying about the effects of global warming, like seas rising between two feet and five feet this century — to flood Virginia Beach, Norfolk and other low-lying communities. In Forecast Virginia, a forum at the College of William and Mary last week, a NASA scientist warned that people in our part of the world can reduce damage only if we quickly attack the problem …

Our Creature Feature comes from Maine, where holiday shoppers weren’t alone last week near the famous Kittery outlet stores. Indeed, it was moose on the loose on a busy Sunday with the huge, three-year-old leaping about Love Lane.

Finally, near Carl’s Meat Market, game wardens tranquilized the moose and placed it onto a “moose stretcher.” Then it was moose vamoose with the creature transported on the back of a tow truck to quieter pastures. Said Kittery Police Chief Ed Strong: “We had no trouble finding it. It liked Gourmet Alley.”