Author: cscia
The Caper – July/August 2023
The dog days of summer have certainly arrived in full force. But it’s July… in Maryland… what did you expect? For many, they wouldn’t have it any other way. The new double issue Caper has hit the “store” shelves and it’s a good one. Beau, in his Presidential message, discusses the many activities that have taken place in the past few months. The extraordinarily successful Strawberry Parade & Festival, they planted 1,500 native grasses at Main Beach and Lake Claire, and had, maybe, the best July 4th parade and festival yet.
Beau then takes the time to really shine the light on notable people who have really made a difference around Cape St. Claire. Stacey Wildberger, President of Cape Conservation Corps, has really shown u p and made a huge difference to many locations around the Cape. In addition, Brad Knopf, another volunteer with CCC, has really been instrumental in keeping the Oyster Nursery going.
As always, Beau, thanks Mary & Jimmy Lamb for their tireless efforts to bring fun and excitement to the Cape. So many more people to thank so please make sure you read this message in this month’s Caper.
Frank Tewey, CSCIA’s Town Manager, takes a few minutes in his message to give a shoutout to this very site you sit on today! There’s lots of good info up here ya know. 💘 Be sure to check it out.
The Cape Nurse gives a great overview of our Cape St. Claire Volunteer Fire Department (CSCVFD). She sits down with Carson Doyle, professional paramedic and volunteer there, and they go over what it means to support the community. It’s a must read.
In Community News, Goshen Farm free Friday summer concerts series continues this Friday with the Biondi Family Band / Dirk and the Truth. Check their website for more details. Also, a big congratulations to Riley Hoover for his Eagle Scout project work at Goshen Farm. Check out what he was able to accomplish in this month’s Caper.
The Garden Club takes the summer off from meetings but their Yard of the Month judges will be out in full force so make sure you are keeping those yards looking good during the dog days.
Cape Conservation Corps has given out a driving/walking tour of sorts in telling you about the Champion Trees of Cape St. Claire. What is a champion tree? I won’t spoil it here but there’s a great write-up and a map in this month’s Caper. Think of it as a treasure hunt of sorts. You don’t want to miss this.
The 2024 Cape Calendar photo contest is looking for great photos of the community. Check out this month’s Caper for details on how to enter your great photo.
Lastly, this Caper is filled with Strawberry Festival and July 4th celebration pictures galore, and even has a Back to School Word Hunt. In fact, I would argue that if you’ve gotten this far, you’ve spent too much time reading this and NOT reading that. Get to it.
See you around the Cape!
Calling All Volunteers!
Capers
Calling for Volunteers, we need help at Main Beach and Lake Claire, this Saturday, June 24th from 9am-Noon (hopefully sooner if we have many volunteers).
We have received over 1,000 free native sea grasses to plant and help continue restoration of our living shorelines from our project partners at Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay
We are lucky to in this beautiful community with all of the wonderful amenities. Main Beach and Lake Claire Beach have both gone through major restoration projects over the last several years, and we are being given the opportunity for additional Shoreline grasses to replace some that have been lost through natural and human occurrence. We are requesting help as a community to plant these wonderful shoreline grasses that will help prevent erosion and create habitat.
Let us know you are coming if you can with the signup genius. More hands make light work. Sign up here.
https://m.signupgenius.com/#!/showSignUp/70a0d49aaac22a57-shoreline
Service hours available too!
Shoreline Grass Planting
Beau Breeden
The Caper – June 2023
We are approaching Memorial Day weekend and with that comes the promise of even better things to come. The Strawberry Festival. Set for June 3rd, it’s THE event to attend in Cape St. Claire every year. We hope to see you there.
In this month’s Caper, Beau, President of Cape St. Claire Improvement Association, talks about being respectful to the beach attendants. They are there to help make sure that residents and their guests have a fun and safe time at the beaches and parks. If you are a boat slip holder, make sure that your boat is in the water by June 1st.. this is in your contract! The rest of his message can be found in this month’s Caper.
Frank, the Town Manager, gives a shoutout to all the kids graduating from high school, trade school, college and universities, and the like. He gives a friendly reminder on making sure your orange sticker has been affixed to your vehicles and wants you to mark your calendars for the July 4th celebration! More details in this Caper.
In Community Group news, Goshen is still holding their kayak raffle. For $5 per ticket, you can get a chance to win 2 beautiful kayaks with paddles! Be sure to get on their website for more details and a chance to win. Goshen’s first summer concert will be held on June 16th, where Sparks and McCoy and Guava Jelly will be performing. More details are in this month’s Caper.
The Garden Club’s Plant Sale was another huge success and they thank the community for their continued support. More details on mosquitos and how to help prevent them can be found in their writeup in this month’s Caper.
Don’t forget that the Cape Community Swap will be held on Sunday June 11th at 10am-2pm down at the Cape Clubhouse field. Cape Clean up will be held on July 14th and July 15th at the corner of Broadview and Cape St. Claire Road. Both are great cleaning out the house type events.
Every Wednesday through October, Cape Conservation Corps will meet at one of the three areas to remove invasive plants and plant natives. Email Stacey at [email protected] to volunteer. June 24th is their Habitat hero tour from 10am to noon. More information can be found in this month’s Caper and online.
See you around the Cape!
Cape St. Claire Garden Club – May 2023 Update
Articles like this one, titled Gardening has taken off: here’s why the popular activity can replace your gym workout, tout not only the physical benefits, but also the sense of accomplishment & reward, as reasons why interest in gardening is growing exponentially across the country. And don’t we know it! Here in the Garden Club, we’ve added 8 new Members this year already, and we experience additional benefits such as comradery, teamwork, shared mission to contribute to our community, & perhaps most importantly, having fun together! April’s meeting began with attendees working shoulder to shoulder outdoors around three long tables, efficiently potting up a selection of local perennials, including ferns, bugleweed, & black-eyed Susan. After the potting work was completed, we enjoyed snacks and a brief meeting, and those with lucky raffle tickets won lovely plants. Along with many others, these perennials we potted will be at our Annual Plant Sale on Saturday, May 20th – read on!
In the garden now, the spent blooms of daffodils and other spring bulbs can be pinched off, with the foliage left in place, unbound, until it yellows, so that the bulbs can photosynthesize to store energy for next spring’s bloom. Many gardeners plant daylilies or iris in front of bulbs to hide the yellowing foliage, and May is a lovely time to drive about the Cape and see the riot of color among the bold, ruffled irises, peonies, azaleas, rhododendrons, & fragrant lilacs.
And our Members have been out in droves admiring Cape beauty as well! Yard of the Month is judged anonymously by rotating pairs of Member judges working all over Cape St. Claire, applying these criteria: design creativity (color, texture, form), neatness, health, and overall appeal. Every Cape yard is automatically entered to win every month April – September as our judges drive through the Cape – no need to enter or nominate, and awards are given by independent judging teams without any input from our Board. The Garden Club takes pride in the impartiality of our judging process, and thanks our hardworking Member judging teams for continuing this Cape tradition. Enjoy your beautiful gardens, Capers, and keep up the good work!
What if your garden needs some help? Or if you just plain love plants? You won’t want to miss our Club’s ever-popular Annual Plant Sale on Sat May 20th (rain date Sun May 21st). Colorful annuals and hanging baskets, native and pollinator plants, tomatoes, herbs, & veggies, & flowers for every season! Growing flowers for as much of the year as possible benefits everyone, humans and wildlife alike, as studies show that providing nectar over the longest season possible, using a diverse mix of plants from around the world, is best for feeding pollinators. Biodiversity means more flowers for you & your pollinator friends – and our sale has got you covered for all of it!
Congratulations to our April Yard of the Month Winners!
Area 1: The Shanahan Family, 982 Woodland CIrcle Area 4: Tony Millet, 1227 Blue Ridge Drive
Area 2: The Zdun Family, 1123 Crestview Drive Area 5: Yun and Tom Ale, 718 Mt Alban Circle
Area 3: The Hammond Family, 1048 Lake Claire Drive
UPCOMING EVENTS
Tuesday, May 2: Members’ Preview Auction & Plant Sale Planning
Saturday, May 20: 2023 Plant Sale Invite friends, mark your calendars, we’ll see you there!
Tuesday, June 6: Speaker Claire Jones on Before & After Landscaping Solutions Using Native Plants
The Caper – May 2023 Edition
It’s the Pre-Strawberry Festival issue and it’s strawberry jam packed. In Beau’s Presidential message, he keeps it short by only running to two pages (😉) but as always, has great things to say. Spring is a hectic time. In addition to normal board meetings, there have been many sessions with the Chesapeake National Recreational Area (CNRA) at the Federal Level, with local properties being considered, such as Whitehall. He gives great detail on the process thus far. Frank, the new Town Manager, has really hit the ground running. He is learning the systems very quickly and beginning to make assessments to help improve as an organization, in both the short and long term. He has conducted interviews for beach attendants, and is looking for some help regarding part-time groundskeeping for the summer maintenance of our beaches and parks.
Frank, the Town Manager, is warning everyone with the arrival to spring to slow down when driving around Cape’s roads. Also, you should’ve received your orange sticker for this year (if you paid your $10 dues) so if you haven’t received them, be sure to contact the office. Also, if you’re taking on any summer construction projects, be sure you read the building codes.
The Cape Nurse has a great write-up on Printer Claus, the Cape’s mysterious person using a 3-dimensional printer to create palm-sized colorful toys (animal creatures, lettering, lights, etc…) and placing them around the neighborhood for folks to discover. It’s been a real treat. She talks about why that act of kindness is so important for us in her great Caper article.
In other community news, Goshen Farm’s summer concert series kicks off this year on June 16th with Sparks and McCoy / Guava Jelly. They start at 6:30pm at Goshen Farm. Also, don’t forget to sign up as a member this year and to get into their free kayak giveaway. Information can be found in this month’s Caper.
Don’t forget that the Garden Club has their Annual Plant Sale on May 20th at the Cape Clubhouse field. This is a must see event for those who want to add a little green and color to their gardens. More details can be found in the Caper.
In Cape Conservation Corps news, join CCC on June 24th as they travel through Cape to visit the three 2022 Habitat
Hero winners and see what they are doing to be a good steward of their land. Details on how to attend this event, see this month’s Caper. As always, every Wednesday night through October they will meet at one of the 3 areas to remove invasive plants and plant natives. Details can be found on their Facebook group page.
Saturday June 3rd, 2023, the event the entire Cape has been waiting for … the STRAWBERRY FESTIVAL. Sign up forms are in this month’s caper. Parade begins at 10am at the firehouse so don’t miss it!
See you around the Cape!