Croaker is a great tasting fish – a few recipes

Grilled Oriental Croaker

4 medium croaker ¼ cup soy sauce 2 tablespoons brown sugar 1 clove garlic, minced 1 tablespoon fresh ginger, minced 2 tablespoons orange peel, finely julienned 2 tablespoons orange juice 1 tsp rosemary 1tsp thyme ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes, crushed 2 tablespoons butter, melted 4 scallions, sliced

Place fish in a bowl. Combine remaining ingredients and pour over fish. Marinate one hour. Place fish on a grill, about 5 inches from heat for about 10 minutes per inch thickness of fish, turning once half-way through cooking time and basting often with the marinade. When fish is tender and flakes easily, remove from grill and serve hot. Fish can also be cooked indoors by placing it on a broiler pan and broiling about 5 inches from the heat for 10 minutes per inch of thickness, turning once half-way through the process. Serves 4.

Pirate Poachers of the Bay: Kevin Tarleton’s Pirate Crew Busted Again for Poaching

Kevin Steven Tarleton Sr., 45, Steven Kevin Tarleton, 21, and Kevin Steven Tarleton Jr., 22, received citations for using illegal harvesting equipment in Broad Creek, a tributary of the Choptank River. Officers observed them on Feb. 27 using a hand scrape in an area designated for hand tonging. The maximum penalty is a $1,000 fine and/or one year in jail.

Leonard Copsey’s Seafood Market: Spiced Shrimp, Crabs, Fresh Fish and Oysters Keep Pee Wee and Ralph Hopping

NEW MARKET — Frances “Pee Wee” Gray, co-owner of Leonard Copsey’s Seafood Market on Rt. 5 in New Market operates a busy seafood carryout that caters to a clientele of long-time native residents as well as those motoring in Southern Maryland that are lucky enough to spot the sign for the business.

“I’ve been working around it since I was little, it seems like its been forever. I started out helping my father, buying crabs as a teen. In 1974 I went to work for him full time, he used to have the Famous Drift Inn Crab House, the oldest in southern Maryland. He had the Crab House in the summer and oysters in the winter, and grew tobacco in the summers too,” said Gray.

Two of her sisters and her brother all operate thriving seafood restaurants in the county. Sissy operates the Sandgates Inn on the Patuxent River, her brother Lonnie and his wife Elaine operate Captain Leonard’s Crabhouse on Rt. 235 in Oraville, and her sister Pumpkin and her husband Jerry Bowles own and operate her parent’s long-time business, Drift Inn.

World’s largest flotilla of Chesapeake Bay Buyboats assemble at Fitzie’s Marina

Fitzie’s Marina owner Dan FitzGerald reports that thirteen historic Chesapeake Bay Buyboats are visiting Fitzie’s this weekend.

“There were thirteen here last night and tonight and tomorrow we expect to host ten at Fitzie’s,” FitzGerald told THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY.

21540 Joe Hazel Rd

Leonardtown, MD 20650

301-475-1913

All around the Chesapeake – Croakers Busting Loose!

Concentrations of sea grass can be a place where croakers stay and feed. For the most part, they move and feed as a school, but some of the larger croakers may be found in more concentrated groups.

The Wicomico River near Quade’s Store in St. Mary’s County continues to be croaker central for much of the season, but so do other locations such as waters near the Ragged Point Bar on the Virginia side of the Potomac, Cornfield Harbor just inside Point Lookout and the Patuxent River near Benedict and Sandgates.

Reihl Brothers Might Have Better Luck with Robbing Banks Instead of Poaching Oysters

EASTON, MD. — The Maryland Natural Resources Police report that last Friday they charged two watermen with violating the State’s oyster laws in Talbot County.

Benjamin Leonard Reihl, 26, of Chestertown was charged with eight counts of possession of undersized oysters, marking the fifth time he had been caught oyster poaching this season. Adam Vincent Reihl, 21, of Church Hill, was charged with six counts of possession of undersized oysters.

“Our Natural Resources Police are a critical part of our efforts to protect the Chesapeake,” said Governor Martin O’Malley. “Poaching oysters hampers our work to protect the health of the Bay and hurts Maryland citizens and hard-working watermen who live, work and play in our waters.”

Officers stopped a truck on U.S. 50 west of the Choptank River just before 6 p.m. After inspecting and sorting through the vehicle’s cargo, officers determined that 14 bushels of oysters were undersized. The two men were arrested on warrants for unrelated violations.