Courtesy Photo A close-up view of oysters is available at Oysterfest 2009. Below is a skipjack. The festival is set for Nov. 7 at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum.

The bivalve will take center stage during the daylong festival, which will include oysters prepared a multitude of ways including on the half-shell, fried and stewed, along with live music from two bands, boat rides and special children's activities.

The Choptank Oyster Company, aquaculture growers of Choptank Sweets, will offer their fresh-from-the-Bay oysters on the half-shell for sale. Choptank Oyster Company is the only privately funded oyster hatchery in Maryland, culturing only the crassostrea virginica, the oyster species native to the Chesapeake. They supply oysters to many restaurants throughout the watershed.

An oyster stew tasting will feature culinary creations from Eastern Shore restaurants including The Bridge Restaurant, Key Lime Caf?, Tilghman Island Inn, and Town Dock, with more signing on each day. Fried oyster sandwiches, platters and sweet potato pie from Susie's Kitchen will be featured.

Throughout the day, Captain Ed Farley will provide boat rides aboardthe skipjack H.M. Krentz, one of the last commercial sailing vessels that continues to dredge oysters in Marylands Chesapeake waters. Skipjack cruises will be available for a $10 fee. There will also be boat rides every half-hour aboard the museum's replica buyboat Mister Jim, at $5 per passenger. Martha Lewis, a skipjack built by legendary Bay boat builder Bronza Parks, will be dockside for visitors to walk aboard for tours.

OysterFest boasts plenty of family educational and fun activities designed to help kids get to know the oyster and how important they are to the Chesapeake Bay. Families will be able to design their own oyster can and label, explore the animals in an oyster reef, and conduct science experiments about filter feeders.

Two films will featured. "Watermen," a documentary film by filmmaker Holly Fisher, shot by Fisher in the 1960s, follows the life and work of Captain Art Daniels and other skipjack captains of the era. The second film, "Common Ground," from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, looks at the history of the oyster fishery, examines the biology, habitat and critical role of the oyster in the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem. Both films will be screened in the Museums Van Lennep Auditorium throughout the day.

Admission to OysterFest, which includes general admission to the museum, is $15 for adults, $12 for seniors, and $6 for children between the ages of six and 17. Children five years and under and museum members are admitted free. Food and boat rides are an additional cost. For information about the festival or upcoming events at the museum, visit www.cbmm.org or call 410-745-2916.

For information on "Fall into St. Michaels," visit www.stmichaelsmd.org or call the St. Michaels Business Association at 410-745-0411.