Assateague Voices

Billy Weiland of Assateague Coastal Trust is a long-time friend of the podcast, and I'm happy to welcome him back for this third visit. We spoke in ACT's spacious new offices, into which they had just moved. Even with unpacked boxes lining the walls it's a very impressive space, and we can look forward to some awesome public events there in the future. In this episode, Billy updates us on a few new projects that ACT is undertaking, most importantly a three-year program to extensively monitor the Pocomoke River's health. The results will help guide policy and practice to improve and maintain the river's water quality. And they'd love you to lend a hand.

Meghan Rhode, Assateague State Park's assistant manager, hadn't given much thought to pollinator habitats until she was put in charge of one. Since then, she and the habitat have blossomed. In this episode Meghan gives us a fascinating guided tour of the park's pollinator habitat, discusses COVID's impact on park operations, introduces us to a determined osprey, and much, much more. This is the third and final episode in our three-part series on Assateague State Park's shoreline resiliency and wetland enhancement project. You can hear Underwood & Associates's Chris Becraft in part one, our Episode 14, and Maryland Coastal Bays Program's Kevin Smith in part two, our Episode 15. 

In this episode we meet Sandi Smith, marketing and outreach coordinator for The Maryland Coastal Bays Program. MCBP  celebrates 25 years of education, restoration, and collaboration this year, and Sandi Smith has been a key part of it for 14 of those years. She jokes that she came here on a surfing scholarship, but she has found much more here than the perfect wave. As she tells it, she found connection and community — two things often cited by people who have found a home here. She's also made tremendous contributions to Maryland Coastal Bay's mission. In this episode, Sandi discusses program outreach, the first Water Keeper, turning COVID-19 into an opportunity for growth, engagement with the local business community, and much more.

In this episode we meet Kevin Smith, Executive Director of the Maryland Coastal Bays Program. Kevin takes us through the history of the Assateague State Park shoreline resiliency and wetland enhancement project, the benefits of living shorelines over revetments, connecting upland and shoreline to create a living, thriving coastal habitat, and much more. Oh, and we take a left turn into a topic that I've been interested in for a while — the Ocean City Inlet.  This episode is part two of a three-part series on the shoreline resiliency project. Part 1, our "Episode 14: Dynamic Living Shorelines," features Chris Becraft of Underwood & Associates. Part 3, our upcoming "Episode 17: Meghan's Garden," will feature Meghan Rhode of Assateague State Park.

In this episode we meet Chris Becraft of Underwood & Associates. Chris designs and builds ecological restoration projects. Chris fills us in on his Assateague State Park Shoreline Resiliency and Wetland Enhancement Project, dynamic living shorelines, taking the hundred-year view on climate change when designing projects, and much more. 

In this episode, we go back in time to October, 21, 2017, and visit Telescope Night at Assateague Island National Seashore. We talk with three volunteers from the Delmarva Space Sciences Foundation about the need for dark skies, homemade telescopes, colliding galaxies, and the magic of discovering the cosmos. Telescope Night was part of the Night Sky Summer Series, which was cancelled in 2020 due to COVID-19. This episode includes real gas music from Jupiter.

Angela Baldwin manages one of my favorite spots on earth — Maryland's Assateague State Park. ASP is nestled inside Assateague Island National Seashore, at the north end just before the sand barrens. We've camped there in one iteration or another since 2005. In this episode, Angela discusses the challenges of adapting to an ever-changing barrier island while making sure the park fulfills its mission to provide an exceptional park experience to its hundreds of thousand visitors each year. 

In this episode, I talk with Gretchen Knapp of the National Park Service. Gretchen runs the Visitors Center in Tom’s Cove at the Virginia end. Gretchen and Assateague Island have been practically inseparable for most of her adult life. As we say in this episode, it’s not so much that she claimed the island as the island claimed her. In her two and a half decades there, she’s learned and taught what seems like everything there is to know about Assateague, from… well, too much to squeeze into this paragraph. You’ll just have to listen to find out. Recorded May 2018 and produced January 2021.

In this episode, I talk with Kelly Taylor of the National Park Service. Kelly manages the Assateague Island National Seashore Visitors Center in Maryland, which sits at the foot of the Verrazano Bridge that takes visitors from the mainland to the national and state parks. It’s got everything you need to learn about the island’s inhabitants, from the fish in the bay to the birds on the beach, touch tanks, film, books, and much, much more. Recorded May 2018 and produced January 2021.

In this episode, we talk with Ashlie Kozlowski, Outreach Coordinator of the Assateague Island Alliance. AIA is the non-profit partner of Assateague Island National Seashore, and it contributes greatly to many of the park’s important programs such as the Wild Horse Management Program. Plus, if you want to name a foal, adopt a horse, practice healing yoga on the beach or ID a horse on your phone, AIA has you covered. Recorded May 2018.  

Conversation with Billy Weiland of Assateague Coastal Trust about ACT's #TrashFreeAssateague project, Hands Across the Sand, his blog The Marsh, and the most important lesson he's learned from nature (so far). Recorded at the Assateague Island Visitor Center and edited at the Assateague Island Surf Shop, home of the incomparable Sunset sandwich, great coffee, free wifi, and comfy seating. Come out this Saturday, May 19, for Hands Across the Sand/Assateague (Assateague State Park) at 11:30, and Trash Free Assateague on Saturday, June 2, at the national park from 9-1. #TrashFreeAssateague. Share it!

Assateague offers solitude and surf, but it also offers something else: community. Day use visitors, Eurovan travelers, Mother's Day celebrants, weddings, proposals, surfers and surf fishers, horse lovers, stargazers, and lots of families of all shapes and sizes: They create a vibrant community of voices that connects us to the island and to each other, and gives the island its unique character.  So on this frigid New Year's Day, let's take a warm summer stroll and listen to beach voices. Let's go.

Billy Weiland is a son of Assateague. He grew up here, surfed here, and got his degree from Salisbury U. before leaving for grad school in North Carolina. He’s back home with a newfound appreciation for the island and a passion for preserving and protecting it. Meet the newest staff member of the Assateague Coastal Trust.

This week, Chris & Brady of the Maryland Conservation Corps. share some surprising information about Assateague Island’s legendary wild horses. Are they ponies or horses? The answer to this burning question and more! Episode 5, “Wild Horses.” Let’s go!

This week we visit with Ron Harrigan, the man behind Coastal Campers and Assateague Cottages. Ron talks about his lifelong love of tiny houses and surfing, and we hear from a very satisfied customer. Let's go.

This week's episode of Assateague Voices will actually air next week, while I finish up an unrelated audio project. So next week, we’ll talk with Assateague visionary Ron Harrigan. Ron’s Coastal Campers have saved Assateague camping for many of us. Now he’s transforming camping again with his cool, colorful Assateague Cottages. Ron Harrigan, next week on Assateague Voices. Until then, have fun.

"You're actually in the lineup where everybody is, you can sit on top of your board and just drift. And then when there's a wave you paddle and you go. And then it makes life much funner." 7 yr old wahine Charlie Cox explains it all. Surf's Up Part 3.

Get your jersey, grab your board. There's the horn. The first heat's underway. In this episode, we drop in on the Eastern Surfing Association Delmarva District's Summer Series Surf contest on Assateague's North Beach, on July 22nd. The waves are perfect, the sky is cloudless, and the mood among the 75 or so contestants of all ages is pure joy. We'll meet some of those contestants, including an Assateague surfing pioneer, and listen in as the judges score the action. Surf's Up, Part 2.

From the moment I started planning this Assateague podcast, I knew I wanted Michelle as my first guest. Michelle is the Assateague surfing world's Big Wahini. She's revolutionized surfing lessons for women and kids, and currently is executive director of the world's largest amateur surfing organization. Not bad. Let's go!

Assateague Voices explores Assateague Island and the natural, environmental, and societal influences that shape it. Each episode will tell the story of Assateague Island through the people who live here, work here, play here, care for it year-round, and are in many ways transformed by it. Subscribe to Assateague Voices today.