Working Waterfront

How the community can respond to climate change

By Rob Snyder Communities are largely absent from national discussions of how to address climate change. Instead they are featured as victims. As a result, we are missing a major opportunity to navigate our way out of this crisis. National conversations highlight how the ocean is warming and becoming more… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Blue Hill grows a second downtown

PHOTO: JACK SULLIVAN An aerial view of the South Street commercial district, just west of Blue Hill village. By Laurie Schreiber The Blue Hill Co-op is on track to move from cramped quarters on a complicated downtown corner to a much larger and custom-designed space a mile to the east,… SEE MORE

Wind turbine blades stacked at the Port of Eastport.

Working Waterfront

Putting the ‘port’ back in Eastport

By Tom Walsh Maine’s Downeast coastline is so far north and so far east that northern Europe seems just over the horizon. Which it is. Washington County’s Port of Eastport is among three deep-water ports on the Maine coast. The two others are in Portland and Searsport. Eastport’s Port Authority… SEE MORE

The view from Treat Island in Passamaquoddy Bay

Working Waterfront

‘Keep the Coast Maine’ campaign nearing finish line

By Jacqueline Weaver The nonprofit land conservation organization Maine Coast Heritage Trust is well on its way to raising $125 million in its “Keep the Coast Maine” campaign, aiming to protect and add public access to the shore, while also preparing for threats to the coast from climate change. MCHT… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Energy leaders urge new governor to focus on transportation

TOM GROENING Participants at a December energy conference discuss issues during a break-out session. By Tom Groening Even before newly elected Gov. Janet Mills stepped into the room, participants in the Acadia Center’s Dec. 7 conference were buzzing about what they believe will be an administration receptive to bold new… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Shetterly’s Seaweed Chronicles explores history of plunder

Review by Carl Little One April day some 25 years ago, fine mesh fyke nets suddenly appeared in the estuary that leads to the Somesville Mill Pond. The market for elvers—glass eels favored by Japanese diners—had exploded, with astronomical per-pound prices driving the new fishery. As they had with urchins,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Teen years in Blaine House primed Hildreth for life of service

PETER RALSTON Horace "Hoddy" Hildreth with his wife, Wooly. By Stephanie Bouchard The seed to make a difference in the world was planted at a young age for Horace “Hoddy” Hildreth Jr. It has remained firmly rooted throughout his life. In October, the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM) recognized… SEE MORE

Quahog Bay Conservancy staff Alec Bolinger

Working Waterfront

Sea to soil: invasive crabs turn fields green

KELLI PARK Sarah Matel, left, a fruit and vegetable farming intern, and Tom Prohl, fruit and vegetable production manager at Wolfe's Neck Center, empty crates of green crabs into the manure spreader. Story and Photos by Kelli Park It sounds like the elements of a macabre ritual—green crabs, a wood chipper,… SEE MORE

A view of the mouth of the Penobscot River from Fort Point in Stockton Springs.

Working Waterfront

Penobscot River mercury study: $300 million in remediation

By Catherine Schmitt The Penobscot River estuary is the largest in Maine, and one of the largest embayments on the East Coast. Islands and rocky shores dominate, but in the upper reaches, along the Marsh River in Frankfort and the Orland River, are extensive salt marshes and mudflats where the… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Whale skeleton work brings school, community together

By Courtney Naliboff It could have been a ghoulish scene: hole saws cut into vertebrae, hammers whacking chisels, loosening chunks of marrow. Small children swept bone and sawdust from the floor. Rather than a scene from a horror movie, this was a community work day on North Haven’s minke whale… SEE MORE