North Fork Patch Best-Of Multimedia Coverage 2010

Peconic Bay Scallops, Peter Tork, a Shelter Island war hero, and a wind-powered winery. North Fork Patch presents a look back at 10 stories served up in the format the website does best — with words, pictures and video.

Every year starting in November, hardy professional anglers of all ages leave their fishing poles behind as they spend hours hunched over pulling dredges — some weighing up to 75 pounds when full — along the bottom of the Peconic Bay. They have one goal: to harvest as many fully grown Peconic Bay scallops as humanly possible. We shot a video and slideshow of owner Charlie Manwaring scalloping in the middle of the bay and working back at his shop on Nov. 16.

Fires happen on the North Fork — sometimes in a big way. After a huge pile of commercial mulch literally exploded into flames in the early morning hours of Dec. 6 behind North Fork Self Storage on Route 48, we and later posted a short video of the fire's containment. The footage depicted about 75 firefighters from five local fire departments doing what they do best.

Occasionally, the North Fork draws some of entertainment's biggest names — but not very often to a tiny ice cream shop. The odd venue of the in Greenport didn't deter Peter Tork from playing an energetic solo show to about 40 people on the night of Oct. 3. We published several articles, one a and a multimedia piece on the performance and the loyal group of local fans that still follow him around.

This video depicting what it's like to volunteer as a kitten cuddler at theis simply irresistible. The process is therapeutic, helps the abandoned cats become social with people and hopefully speeds their adoption process.

Starting almost immediately after Thanksgiving, locals and visitors flock to the North Fork to buy their Christmas trees at one of several local Christmas tree farms. We grabbed the video camera and caught the height of holiday mania on Dec. 3.

Since 1896, Mattituck Village Market had been an old-fashioned conglomerate of grocery store, butcher shop, bakery, and deli until its last day on Sept. 30, when the owners of 22 years decided to move on. We caught the deli's last morning on video. Stay tuned for coverage of the store's new life as an upscale specialty food store in the new year.

: A Section of Shelter Island's Route 114 was renamed on Oct. 14 to honor U.S. Army 1^st Lieutenant Joseph Theinert, a 24-year-old Shelter Island native who was killed in combat on June 4 while on foot patrol in Afghanistan. We caught the short but touching ceremony in pictures and video.

We caught Jamie Minnick, CEO of Mattituck-based alternative energy company Eastern Energy Systems, and crew members on the first day of installing a much-anticipated 100-foot-tall, 20-kilowatt wind turbine on the ground of on Nov. 10 in Southold. The vineyard now joins the ranks of wind-powered vineyards like in Mattituck and in Cutchogue, both of which had modern-day windmills installed on their properties earlier in the year.

We posted almost 10 articles relating to one of the North Fork's most popular events of the year — the , which took place over the unusually balmy weekend of Sept. 25 and 26. Profiles of key players like bagpipe band junkie and helped advance the event, whileposting during the festival and apublished after the fact helped bring the exciting weekend to life for those who missed it — and that confusing Sean Connery impersonator who lead the parade.

10. Cutchogue's 17th Annual Whitebread Sailboat Race: Seasickness be damned — we got right in there with 130 sailboats as they raced from Cutchogue Harbor around Shelter Island and back the morning of Oct. 3. The ever-popular and exhausting event sponsored by the Peconic Sailing Association is a local take on the famous Whitbread Round the World race.