Annapolis Green invites you to take advantage of a special invitation from the Oyster Recovery Partnership to tour one of the largest oyster hatcheries on the East Coast, the Horn Point Oyster Hatchery in Cambridge on the Eastern Shore. It produces a variety of oyster larvae for use in oyster research, oyster restoration, and educational projects.

Over the past decade, spawning oysters at the Horn Point Lab Oyster Hatchery have resulted in the deployment of over one billion oyster spat to the waters of the Chesapeake Bay in the hopes of slowing the Chesapeake Bay oyster decline and restoring the health of the Bay. Come see for yourself!

We have only 15 available slots. Send an email by tomorrow at noon to starboard@annapolisgreen.com to get on the list.

The facility is about 90 minutes from Annapolis, 61 miles from Main Street. The address is: 2020 Horns Point Road, Cambridge, MD 21613.

You must arrive prior to 10:30 a.m. The tour will take about an hour.

The importance of oyster hatcheries is, of course, due to the importance of oysters and the many benefits of oysters enjoyed by not just watermen and the local economy, but also the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem and its tributaries. Oysters are filter feeders and as the "vacuum cleaners" of the Chesapeake Bay a single healthy oyster can filter 50 gallons of water a day. Imagine the cleaning power of an entire oyster reef! Not only that, the oyster reefs themselves make a tremendous habitat for other Bay residents.