[Leica] The Bay Project...

[bquinn at sgi.com (Bernard Quinn)]

OK, Don, here goes.............

 

I am by training a chemist and a broadcaster, and that was a long time
ago - in the Sixties. I have no idea if they still use molecules and
atoms or if these have been supplanted by something more fashionable. I
doubt that I have the talent much less the energy needed to do a full
scale PAW. But, Don was asking about the Bay and that put an idea in my
head that I want to try. The Bay has been my life and home for decades.
I can certainly post a picture related to the Bay along with some
information about it every week or so, if y'all would like. 

 

I am not a historian or a biologist, nor am I a naturalist. I don't even
play one on TV or te Internet. My only claim to expertise about the Bay
is that I have been living, sailing, working, photographing, and
exploring this part of the world since I was a teenager, and that was
half a century ago. I have probably managed to pick up a fact or two
along the way along, I am sure, along with a generous portion of urban
legend. and just plain old fashion mis-information. There are many LUG
members who know far more about these things than I can hope to learn in
the time left to me. I will do my best to get it right, but if I goof up
not only will comments be welcome and helpful. 

 

The Chesapeake Bay divides Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia each into
two parts. We call the "mainland" or Washington, DC,side where I live
and work the Western Shore, and the other side, ocean side, The Eastern
Shore. The Bay is long and narrow. It's length is something like one
hundred and ten miles. Where I live, near Washington, DC, it is only
about six miles wide. The Bay is very shallow. The deepest part of the
Bay is called Bloody Point. The depth reaches 115 feet there. ( I'll
save the story of why we call it "Bloody Point" for another time.) The
average depth of the Bay is only two or three feet. This may give you an
idea of how shallow most of the Bay actually is. Its shores and
tributaries are covered with estuaries, which are a kind of marsh land.
The water in the Bay is brackish, meaning that it is salty, but not
nearly as salty as a proper ocean. The marshes and estuaries which line
the Bay are ecologically very important because they serve as the
nurseries where Crabs, Rockfish, Clams, and Oysters along with a lot of
other marine life are born and nurtured. But, more about that as time
goes on.

 

The computer gods who govern what happens to me on my day job were
neither benevolent nor kind to me this week. One of the things which I
do when I am tired and need to recharge myself spiritually is to pack up
my camera and to drive around the Eastern Shore looking for pictures, at
least during the winter. On summer weekends the way is congested with
killer traffic jams composed of people trying to get to Ocean City, one
of our local Atlantic Ocean Beaches. There are two ways to get from the
Western to the Eastern Shore in the Northern part of the Bay. You can
drive over the Bay Bridge which connects Sandy Point State Park, which
is not far from Annapolis, our State capitol, with the Eastern Shore's
Kent Island. The Bay Bridge is about six miles long, making it one of
the longer bridges in the world. Or, you can use your boat. At my age
there is little that could induce me to cross the Bay  Bridge in the
weekend summer traffic, though when I was younger taking a date to the
beach with all the hope that entailed would certainly do the job. 

 

Yesterday afternoon I went to the Blackwater Wildlife Refuge. It is
located on the Eastern Shore, just outside of Cambridge, Maryland. As
far as I am concerned it is one of the gems of American Parks. The Bay
is located on one of the major flyways used by migratory birds as they
travel north in the summer and south in the winter. This time of year
the Blackwater Refuge is filled with thousands of birds. I was there
late in the afternoon yesterday. It was an incredible experience. It was
an unusually mild winter day. The thermometer on the dashboard of my Jag
said that it was 61 outside. A storm was blowing up. I could feel it,
and so could the birds. They were making a great deal of noise and
flying about this way and that. Being there as the storm came in was an
incredibly powerful emotional experience. You could feel that you were
in the presence of something strong, primal, and far larger and stronger
than you or I are as individuals. This is what it looked like and felt
like to me.

 

 

 

http://www.leica-gallery.net/barney/image-91228.html

 

Barney