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Strategic Planning Document -
Environment and Natural Resources
Research Successes
Chesapeake Bay Ecosystem Restored
A restoration campaign for the
Chesapeake Bay has begun to show signs
of great success, especially with the full
recovery of its striped bass population.
The Chesapeake Bay is a vast natural
resource with significant economic,
recreational, and social value to the region
and to the nation. Of the estuaries in the
United Sates, the Chesapeake is the biggest
and most bountiful, a coastal sea capable of
sustaining as much life for its size as
anywhere on earth. The bay is home to
more than 2,700 species of plants and
animals and is visited by millions of people
each year, providing huge economic benefits
to the region.
The Chesapeake has suffered from the
effects of more than two centuries of steady
growth, increasing pollution and runoff, and
accumulation of sediment and industrial
wastes. However, the ailing bay ecosystem
has begun to rebound, largely because of the
efforts of the Chesapeake Bay Program over
the past decade. This is a unique public-
private endeavor composed of governments
in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and the
District of Columbia working with the
federal government and local citizens and
businesses.
The major environmental problems of
the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries were
investigated by a comprehensive study
initiated by the U.S. Government in 1975 at
the request of Congress. As a result of this
research, management strategies to control
nutrients, toxins, wetlands alteration,
shoreline erosion, hydrologic modification,
and dredging were implemented. Strategies
for managing shoreline development and the
effects of boating and shipping on water
quality were also developed.
In 1985, Maryland and Virginia
imposed a moratorium on striped bass
fishing in response to extremely low
catches, overharvesting, and survey data
about spawning. The states lifted their
moratorium in 1990 after a successful spawn
of the species in the upper and lower bay,
but tight regulation of the fishery continues.
Biologists, however, have now logged
record numbers of newly spawned fish in
the bay and project continued population
increases in the years ahead. Declaring
recovery of the striped bass has cleared the
way for relaxation of catch restrictions in
the Chesapeake.
Interdisciplinary research ranging from
understanding the behavior and transport of
nutrient and toxic chemicals in the
watershed, to fish population dynamics and
predictive modeling contributed to the
management strategies taken. Scientists and
resource managers hope to apply lessons
from the striped bass conservation effort to
other important fish stocks that are declining
all along the east coast.
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