In Annapolis, Gov. Robert Ehrlich’s proposed Clean Power Rule — which predates this week’s commitment to spend $440 million on Open Space and other environmental issues — may not turn out as advertised. A draft of the new regulations released last week proposed that half of Maryland’s coal-burning power plants would be exempted from installing pollution control devices called scrubbers ...

In the Potomac River, old tires, a giant plastic hot dog, glass bottles, aluminum cans, a vintage Chevy and other trash gets the boot as The Alice Ferguson Foundation gets help from two Maryland congressmen — Steny Hoyer and Chris Van Hollen — in keeping their vows to make the Potomac River trash free by 2013. In 17 years, the Potomac Watershed Cleanup has removed 2.5 million pounds of trash. Hoyer and Van Hollen, who is the current chairman of the Trash Free Potomac Initiative Advisory Council, sign on to the Potomac Watershed Trash Treaty in good company, joining Montgomery County Executive Doug Duncan and D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams.

In Baltimore, Mayor Martin O’Malley is playing the Frighten-Your-Foe money game by trumpeting that he has raised $4.3 million recently as he prepares a run for governor. He might instill fear in Doug Duncan, his primary opponent, but he isn’t expected to scare Gov. Ehrlich, a whiz at fundraising...

In Delaware, 105 years ago they built the Victory Chimes, an elegant Chesapeake Bay schooner, and now the 132-foot, three-master, billed as the largest historic vessel still under sail in the United States, is for sale in Maine for $1.5 million. The majestic vessel, which appears on the back of the Maine quarter, was owned by the Domino’s pizza magnate and now is being offered by owners Kip Files and Paul DeGaeta. A catch: it has no engine and uses its yawl to tow or maneuver...

Our Creature Feature comes from Taiwan, where they’re apparently trying to disprove the old adage that you can put lipstick on a pig and call it Monique, but it’s still a pig.

Taiwanese scientists have bred three fluorescent green pigs by engineering jellyfish DNA into pig embryos, the scientists announced last week. “There are partially fluorescent pigs elsewhere, but ours are the only ones in the world that are green from the inside out,” declared Wu Shinn-Chih of Tainwan University. Rather than making green chops, these porkers will be used for studying disease. And yes, he said, they glow under a black light.