Bay Journal

Topics: Fisheries

Last year’s unrelenting rains apparently killed off significant numbers of Maryland oysters in parts of the Chesapeake Bay watershed and generally impaired their reproduction — but the deluge helped survivors fend off disease.

Preliminary results from last fall’s annual oyster survey by the state Department of Natural Resources found high freshwater-related mortalities in the upper Potomac River and to a lesser extent in the Upper Bay. The survey also found that the number of new oysters produced last year fell below the long-term average.

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Timothy B. Wheeler
February 13, 2019
Fisheries
0 Comments

Striped bass population in trouble, new study finds

Striped bass, one of the most prized species in the Chesapeake Bay and along the Atlantic Coast, are being overfished according to a new assessment of the stock’s health — a finding that will likely trigger catch reductions for a...

Karl Blankenship
February 07, 2019
Fisheries
10 Comments

Don’t let the bounty of the Chesapeake become only a memory

You get to a certain point in your life and you know that your days are numbered. You have a lot of years to look back and reflect on the parts that you enjoyed the most. One of those things for me is the Chesapeake Bay. I have traveled all...

Bill Bartlett
February 01, 2019
Fisheries,People + Society
1 Comment

Preserve fish or history? VA dam removal churns up debate

The Maury River appears tranquil as its glides past Lexington, VA. But the debate over its future has been anything but smooth. The Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries is working with the city to tear down a hole-ridden dam that...

Jeremy Cox
January 29, 2019
Fisheries,People + Society
3 Comments

Fisheries: Archives

Lawyers not cannons the big guns in latest round of oyster wars

As Chris Ludford sees it, the oysters he’s growing in Virginia Beach’s Lynnhaven River are helping to restore the Chesapeake Bay tributary, once fabled for having some of the tastiest bivalves anywhere. “Nobody thought...

Timothy B. Wheeler
January 14, 2019
Fisheries,Politics + Policy
4 Comments

Oyster farming bills brewing in Virginia, Maryland legislatures

Jockeying has already begun in Virginia over legislation to determine the fate of the state’s coal ash pits, and new oyster-related measures are in the works in both Maryland and Virginia as the two states’ lawmakers begin their...

Jeremy Cox & Timothy B. Wheeler
January 09, 2019
Fisheries,Politics + Policy,Pollution
2 Comments

Scientists waiting to see if record 2018 rainfall dampens Bay recovery

For the Chesapeake, 2018 was a year of mud, trash and sewage as unrelenting rainfall washed across its vast watershed, sending unusually high amounts of freshwater runoff into the Bay month after month. The water-fouling nutrients and...

Karl Blankenship
January 07, 2019
Climate Change,Fisheries,Pollution
1 Comment

Study on soft-shell and razor clams delivers more questions than answers (Blog)

Though they once served as important filterers and foodstuffs in the Chesapeake Bay, relatively little is known about the long-term population dynamics of soft-shell clams — and even less about razor clams. That was among the findings...

Whitney Pipkin
January 04, 2019
Fisheries
1 Comment

Is nonnative red alga a friend or foe? It all depends…

Any newcomer takes time to size up. And when one makes its entrance as slowly and subtly as Gracilaria vermiculophylla — a red alga native to the Pacific — did in the Chesapeake Bay, it can be even harder to determine whether its...

Sarah Vogelsong
December 19, 2018
Fisheries
5 Comments

‘Just short of a crisis’: Tensions flare as VA halts oyster seed harvest in James

Virginia fishery managers are taking the rare step of halting oyster seed harvests in the lower James River as they seek to protect the baby bivalves from overfishing. Oyster seeds are wild-grown juvenile oysters, or “spat.”...

Jeremy Cox
December 17, 2018
Fisheries,Politics + Policy
3 Comments

St. Mary’s County, MD, issues moratorium on use of commercial docks for new aquaculture leases

Responding to complaints from waterfront homeowners, officials in St. Mary’s County, MD, voted Tuesday to impose a six-month moratorium on using commercial docks to work any new state-issued aquaculture leases that would raise oysters in...

Timothy B. Wheeler
December 12, 2018
Fisheries,Politics + Policy
0 Comments

Young Atlantic sturgeon numbers surge in the James River

A bumper crop of juvenile Atlantic sturgeon in the James River this fall is raising some environmentalists’ hopes that the endangered fish may be staging a steady comeback in Virginia’s largest river. “We’re starting...

Sarah Vogelsong
December 03, 2018
Fisheries
0 Comments

Maryland oyster restoration project remains stalled by lack of federal funds

Oyster restoration work in Maryland’s Tred Avon River appears likely to remain on hold for at least another year, as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers still has no funding allotted through next September for reef construction in the...

Timothy B. Wheeler
November 28, 2018
Fisheries,Politics + Policy
3 Comments

Maryland oyster population down by half since 1999, study finds

Watermen overharvested oysters last winter in a little more than half of Maryland’s portion of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, according to the state’s first-ever stock assessment of the commercially and ecologically valuable...

Timothy B. Wheeler
November 21, 2018
Fisheries
9 Comments

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