South River Federation Releases Scorecard

Like the Magothy, Severn, and Patuxent, the South River had a rough 2007. The South River Federation's latest report gives the River a 34 out of 100.

The full report can be found here.

Magothy in Decline

In what appears to be a pretty consistent trend, the health of the Magothy River declined last year, according to the just released State of the Magothy Report Card. Among the worst performing indicators was underwater grasses, which experienced a 165 acre drop from 2006.

Severn River Report Released

Today's Post reports on the recent release of the Severn Riverkeeper's state of the River report. Bad news, particularly for the yellow perch.

Voluntary Strategies, Regulation, and the Patuxent

Dennis King, a professor at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, has published an interesting paper in the Bay Journal focusing "on why government decisions have so little influence on the millions of land and water-use decisions that do have a direct effect on the health of the [Patuxent] river." His conclusion is that, in essence, unless lawmakers find the spines to implement "hard strategies" which create expectations among individuals in the watershed that: "a) their individual decisions to comply with environmental laws will contribute to a collective effort to restore the health of the river that may succeed, and b) their individual decisions to ignore environmental laws will be detected, and that they will be prosecuted and penalized," the health of river and the Bay will continue to decline.

Students Study Local Environment

Friday's Capital reports students in the International Baccalaureate program at Old Mill High School have undertaken a number of projects researching the condition of a nearby stream which feeds into Marley Creek, integrating considerations of biology, chemistry, and physics.

The International Baccalaureate program is a course of advanced study for high school students that trains them in critical thinking and prepares them for college level work. Projects conducted by the students included looking at the effect of fertilization of the football field on the health of the stream (the students found no impacts, concluding that the wooded buffer between the two absorbed excess nutrients), as well as local biodiversity.

Future classes will look at the stream again, seeking the best options for restoration, and eventually track the effects of those improvements.

I heartily applaud this effort by the students and teachers of the Old Mill IB program, and I encourage other schools in the County to undertake similar monitoring and restoration efforts.

The Value of Our Forests

This month's Bay Journal has an extremely informative piece on the condition of forests in the Bay watershed. Did you realize that at the time of early European settlement, the 64,000 square mile watershed was 95% forested (it's 58% forested today)? Or that the trees in those forests were so mature they stood an average of 40% taller than the trees of today?

The forests were so ubiquitous and dense, that early settlers were prompted to declare sentiments such as, "[this is] not a land of prospects. There is too much wood."

According to the report, many still fail to recognize the value of these ecosystems until they have been bulldozed and covered with homes. However, Bay region forests provide timber and wood products worth $22 billion a year, and at least an additional $24 billion a year in free "ecological services." These "services" include removing air and water pollutants, providing cooling benefits, and serving as vital habitat for critical species, such as pollinators.

In fact, the report estimates that an acre of trees in Washington, DC can reduce stormwater construction costs by $25,000.

Despite these benefits, we lose 100 acres of forested land per day in the Bay watershed. According to Richard Birdsey of the U.S. Forest Service, "Every 1 percent of forest area (about 250,000 acres) that is lost is about another million pounds of nitrogen per year going into the Bay." The watershed lost 3 times that much forest between 1982 and 1997.

The 120-page State of the Chesapeake Forests, produced by the Conservation Fund and the U.S. Forest Service is available on-line.