Mark Alan Lovewell
Dollar for dollar, pound for pound, conch is the most valuable resource landed at the dock on the Vineyard in the summer. It is a huge, unsung fishery that draws little attention. One reason for this is almost no one on Martha’s Vineyard eats conch. Nearly all the conch is shipped to the mainland.
Nevertheless, it is a profitable business, more profitable than the lobster or bay scallop fishery. According to state figures, one million pounds of conch were landed on the Vineyard last year, nearly half of the 2.4 million pounds landed statewide.
The world’s oceans need protection, a globe-traveling National Geographic underwater photographer told a large audience at the Tabernacle last Saturday.
After 35 years of photographing the oceans, Brian Skerry, 49, said he is troubled by growing evidence of degradation of habitat and the waste and loss of sea life. “I think the oceans are dying a death of a thousand cuts,” he said.
Despite worrying declines in striped bass and lobster stocks, regulators this week deferred any significant action to curb the fisheries. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission did take a step toward restoring menhaden, a bait fish consumed by lobsters, striped bass and nearly all other swimming fish.
Father Thomas C. Lopes had never been to Cuttyhunk until last Sunday morning.
Traveling on a 26-foot patrol boat owned by the Dukes County Sheriff’s department, Father Lopes crossed the water to the small chain of Elizabeth Islands to offer a Mass in the Union Methodist Church on Cuttyhunk.
A Vineyard native, the 72-year-old priest had served on Nantucket from 1991 to 2000, an Island hop of a different nature. He is now retired.
A seven-piece modular home was assembled with a lot of fanfare last week in Oak Bluffs. Bill Potter, a general contractor with Squash Meadow Construction Inc., got his friends together, held an open house on Thursday and began to share the story about how Bruce and Renee Balter got their new two-bedroom house.
Chilmark artist Jules S. Worthington believes the creativity that drives him is fundamental. It is the breath of life, in good times and not so good times.
His home off Tea Lane overflows with signs of it. Every wall, from the kitchen to the den, has his paintings on display. They are bright, big and colorful.