The Chesapeake Chapter of the U.S. Lighthouse Society maintains a web site offering history, information and locations of over 30 lighthouses and lightships in the Chesapeake Bay region. The society also offers an annual challenge on a September weekend to visit a dozen of these local attractions in just two days. The chapter meets monthly from March through September with visits to lighthouses on land and sea. The society often offers opportunities to access to lighthouses not normally open to the general public. Individual and family memberships are offered by the society, and volunteer opportunities are available to help preserve our Chesapeake heritage.

Worcester County has released a new publication titled Rain Gardens in Maryland’s Coastal Plain.

Rain gardens, are depressions in the ground that are strategically placed to capture runoff from impervious surfaces like rooftops, driveways, sidewalks, and even lawns. A strategically placed rain garden can intercept the runoff, allow the water to infiltrate into the soil, and filter out pollutants like oils, fertilizers, and pesticides before entering the bays.

The brochure suggests ideas regarding the construction and plant selection for a rain garden that will maximize the effect on water runoff from properties in Maryland’s coastal plains. The publication is available for free at the Worcester County Department of Comprehensive Planning office in Snow Hill, MD. An electronic version is available online.

Although she is not on Delmarva, she is just across the water in Mathews County, Virginia. Chesapeake Bay Woman authors a blog about Life in Mathews that is always engaging and humorous and often insightful. I have enjoyed the posts of CBW for some time now, and I encourage readers on Delmarva to stop by for a visit. Tidbits like horseflies that are practically as big as horses will hit home with readers on the shore.

All of the attention received by the truck plunging off of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge sent me looking for traffic web cams for that area. The Maryland DOT has two cameras that cover the bridge. One shows the traffic at the west bound toll booths. The other feed alternates between the east end of the bridge and the intersection of 50 & 404. Looks like things have cleared up now.

The Carla Massoni Gallery in Chestertown, MD, announces their current exhibition titled The Water Margin showing over 45 new watercolors by Marc Castelli. The exhibition will run from May 16th to June 21st in the Massoni Gallery located at 203 High Street in Chestertown. The works on display include an amazing series of paintings depicting Chesapeake Bay log canoes along with other captured moments of life on and around the water. Castelli’s watercolors offer action, contrast and light that is uncommon in this medium. If you are not able to visit Chestertown to see the exhibition, it is definitely worth your time to visit the online catalog of Castelli’s work. The bio of Castelli for the exhibition includes the following quote by Malcolm C. Salaman that provided some inspiration to the artist.

The sea marks a man as nothing else does, and despite weaknesses and faults, he will combine a childlike simplicity with a stolid bravery, which may rise at times to epic heights without seeming to him to be anything out of the ordinary.

That the original healthy population of oysters could filter the entire volume of the Chesapeake Bay in less than one week. The remaining bay oysters now take more than a year to filter the 19 trillion gallons of bay water.