It wasn’t a rain delay that postponed Thursday’s matchup between proponents of a plan to add a second baseball diamond at Veira Park in Oak Bluffs and a group of neighbors who oppose the expanded facility on grounds that it will create problems with noise, traffic and safety.

A public hearing before the Martha’s Vineyard Commission was instead postponed — actually continued — due to a potential lighting problem.

The Martha’s Vineyard Commission on Thursday heard emotional testimony, both from a group of Edgartown neighbors who support a plan to protect several old pathways from development, and from a well-known Island family who argued the plan violates their property rights.

About a dozen residents living near the old pathways — called ancient ways — argued in favor of a plan to place five ways in a special protection zone that would limit their use and prevent them from being clear-cut or widened.

With well over 2,000 fishermen competing in the 62nd annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby, the contest is now on the home stretch.

More than 13,000 pounds of striped bass, bluefish, bonito and false albacore have been weighed in at the derby headquarters so far.

Last weekend the evidence of interest could be seen along Vineyard shores, all populated by anglers with gear. The flat waters from Chappaquiddick to Aquinnah were crisscrossed with boiling waves from fast boats, driven by intent anglers.

A forum bringing together those for and against the controversial Cape Wind electricity project drew more than 120 people to the Katharine Cornell Theatre on Thursday night and generated far more light than heat.

The forum, organized under the auspices of the Vineyard Haven library lecture and workshop series, was intended to establish a factual basis for further discussion of the project rather than encourage debate, and by that measure can be counted a signal success.

The central figure in the legends of the Gay Head Wampanoags is a giant named Moshup . He and his wife Squant had 12 beautiful daughters and they lived together happily on the Gay Head cliffs. Today two daughters of Moshup still work and live on the Cliffs. Sisters Adriana Ignacio and Berta Welch run stores across the way from each other. This weekend they took a break to talk about growing up as members of the tribe, the meaning of sisterhood and what’s cooking for dinner.

Interviews by Julia Rappaport

Adriana Ignacio

By MIKE SECCOMBE

Sengekontacket Pond has been cleared of the bacterial contamination which saw it closed to shellfishing for most of the summer, and the pond will reopen on Oct. 1.

Persistent contamination with fecal coliform bacteria resulted in the pond closure in June and again in July, when the state Division of Marine Fisheries determined the pond would be closed to shellfishing for four months in summer every year.

After no one from the public attended last week's public hearing, the Tisbury selectmen voted unanimously to raise the fines for parking violations by $10 apiece. The new fines will go into effect next spring.

Ten-dollar parking tickets for violations like parking overtime, in the wrong direction, or more than one foot from the curb will now be $20. Fifteen-dollar parking tickets for violations like parking in a restricted or prohibited area, within 10 feet of a fire hydrant, or overnight will now be $25.

Bluet damselflies and Ice House Pond visitors may soon get the chance to get along together.

The storied West Tisbury glacial kettle pond is potentially two steps away from public access, nearly ten years after it was designated by the Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank as a priority property to be acquired.

Public use of Ice House Pond, also known as Old House Pond, has been a point of contention for neighbors, the land bank and the town since the land bank purchased the property for $2 million in 2004, quietly using a straw buyer.

There are two kinds of Shakespeare fanatics: The first group is down with the concept of William Shakespeare having written all the plays attributed to William Shakespeare. The second group believes anyone but William Shakespeare wrote the canon of sonnets and plays: It could have been Will’s young patron, the third earl of Southampton, or the proven Christopher Marlowe, or even Queen Elizabeth I in a secret need to hone another dimension of her marvelousness.

About 24 years ago, a group of Vineyard gardeners with no place to garden began to brainstorm. The dilemma: how to have a working garden when life leaves little time or energy to do so? How to garden when the backyard is too small? And how to spread the gospel that food grown at home tastes better? The solution: provide a community garden.