ShoreRivers is pleased to announce the addition of three new members to its Governing Board: Jack Broderick, Ann Swanson, and Loribeth Weinstein. As a grassroots nonprofit organization, the hard work and support of board members is imperative to the organization’s efforts for thriving rivers on the Eastern Shore. ShoreRivers extends deep gratitude for the wise counsel, encouragement, and vision of these exceptional community members. See the full list of Board members at ShoreRivers.org/leadership.

These new voices will bring a wealth of expertise to ShoreRivers, including equal opportunity and civil rights, social and economic justice, grantmaking and local governance, and environmental policy and conservation. Paired with a deep commitment to clean water and healthy Eastern Shore communities, these new members will strengthen the organization’s robust science-based advocacy, restoration, and education efforts.

Jack Broderick is a retired federal manager and long-time community activist and leader on Kent Island who serves on numerous local and state boards and committees, including the Maryland 250 Commission and the Bay Bridge Reconstruction Advisory Group. A former Captain in the U.S. Army, he retired in 2021 as the Director of Equal Opportunity for the National Guard Bureau, U.S. Department of Defense, after 34 years of combined Federal military and civilian service. Broderick lives on Cox Creek and enjoys crabbing, fishing, hunting, and generally spending time on the water.

The former Executive Director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, Ann Swanson, has spent four decades as a leader in Chesapeake Bay restoration and been recognized for her work on a regional, national, and international scale. Swanson was the catalyst for the early formation of the Chester River Association and the Sassafras River Association — two of ShoreRivers’ legacy organizations. In recognition of that, and her tireless efforts on behalf of the Bay, and its landscapes and communities, she was the winner of ShoreRivers’ inaugural Award for Environmental Stewardship in 2019.

Loribeth Weinstein spent her career at the helm of non-profit and philanthropic organizations addressing issues of gender parity and social and economic justice. Now retired, she served for two decades as the CEO of Jewish Women International, an organization committed to protecting the rights of women and girls, and is a founder of the Washington Area Women’s Foundation, a philanthropic organization that has provided more than $16 million in grants to organizations in the Washington D.C. region since 1999. She has a love of Eastern Shore waterways that inspired her to deepen her commitment to environmental stewardship, and is also a Master Gardener.

In addition to its new members, the Board also recently elected its Executive Committee for 2025, which consists of Marian Fry, Chair; Barbara Boyd, Vice Chair; Frank Lewis, Treasurer; Maura Bollinger, Secretary, and Gene Lopez, At-Large.

ShoreRivers also celebrates several long-time Board members whose terms end this year: Meta Boyd, Bruce Abel, Ron Rothman, and Philp Webster. The organization is incredibly grateful to each of them for their years of dedicated service and invaluable contributions.

The Perdue AgriBusiness soybean processing plant in Salisbury, MD, added machinery without a permit, leading to more air pollution, according to the Maryland Department of the Environment.

Two major agricultural companies ramped up operations recently on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, and the environment paid a price, according to the Maryland Department of the Environment.

One case involves the agency’s second-largest cash penalty in its history while the other has reopened a long-running pollution saga that local environmentalists hoped had been resolved.

Perdue’s plant, situated a couple blocks away from its parent company’s headquarters, extracts the oil from soybeans to be used in cooking, among other uses.

Perdue applied for a permit in 2017 but withdrew the application the following year after MDE indicated it would require additional review. The company went ahead anyway with the installation of the new machinery in September 2017, followed by a second round in May 2019, according to the settlement agreement.

After the plant’s expansion, the hexane emissions, state officials say, exceeded the 40-ton annual threshold to be considered a new “major source” of pollution, MDE alleged. Hexane is a volatile organic compound, a major ingredient in ground-level ozone that can worsen an array of breathing problems from asthma to emphysema, experts say.

MDE records show annual VOC emissions increased at the facility by 28% from 2017 to 2019, from 246 tons to 315 tons.

“Everyone must follow the rules which are in place to keep Marylanders safe. When Perdue failed to comply, it was the community who suffered the undue burden, so there must be meaningful penalties,” said Attorney General Anthony Brown. “I am glad that Perdue has accepted responsibility and will be investing in the surrounding neighborhoods moving forward.”

The settlement calls for Perdue to pay an $8 million fine to the state. The only larger civil penalty in MDE’s history was the $29 million settlement in 2018 with Volkswagen over the auto manufacturer’s installation of “defeat devices” on certain vehicles, aimed at circumventing emissions tests.

Perdue also must install $3.5 million in pollution-reduction measures at the plant, including electrifying diesel-fired equipment, and contribute $400,000 to Salisbury for a tree planting campaign in areas with poor canopy coverage.

In separate press statements, the two sides left a muddled picture about when and how the problem came to light. MDE’s legal complaint says that agency staff and Perdue representatives “met at various times” to discuss the cause of the emission increases. It wasn’t until correspondence on April 11, 2022, however, that Perdue “finally admitted” it had installed the equipment without a permit, MDE alleged in a legal complaint.

Meanwhile, Perdue spokeswoman Kate Shaw said in a statement that “The discrepancy was discovered in May of 2020, as part of our air permit renewal process.” Her statement doesn’t indicate who discovered the discrepancy or whether state inspectors were aware of it at the time. She added, “We take full accountability for what occurred. The individuals who did not reapply for the permit are no longer with the company.”

When asked for clarification via email, Bill See, another Perdue spokesman, replied, “Our original statement stands on its own.”

In a separate case, MDE charges that Darling Ingredients, owner of the Valley Proteins poultry rendering plant in Dorchester County, has violated its October 2022 consent decree. Under that settlement, Darling Ingredients agreed to pay $540,000 to the state while fixing wastewater and stormwater problems at the troubled plant.

“I would say this facility is in no better shape than it was in 2021 when we filed the lawsuit,” said Matt Pluta, the Choptank Riverkeeper and director of riverkeeper programs at ShoreRivers, one of the environmental groups whose lawsuit triggered the decree. “In fact, it’s probably gotten worse.”

A few months after the settlement was signed, MDE renewed the plant’s discharge permit, allowing a nearly four-fold increase in the amount of wastewater it can release into the Transquaking River, a nutrient-impaired Chesapeake Bay tributary. Environmentalists had pushed MDE to impose tougher limits and not let the company expand until showing it could meet them, but the agency didn’t do so.

Problems have piled up since that approval. MDE inspectors say they uncovered 51 violations of the decree’s requirement to maintain at least 2 feet of freeboard – the distance from the surface of the wastewater to the top of the holding pits. In May, MDE announced plans to fine Darling $15,000.

The Texas-based company formally contested the fine, arguing that all the exceedances fell under an exception in the decree for lagoon levels to rise because of heavy rainfall.

MDE also contends that the plant has been hauling away production waste from the lagoons without going through the complete treatment process. Farmers use the material, known as “dissolved air flotation,” to fertilize their fields. But in adjoining Caroline County, the practice has sparked an outcry from neighbors about foul odors and prompted county commissioners to enact a moratorium on its storage.

Darling representatives have told the state they believe their current permit allows the hauling to continue. Ongoing upgrades to the wastewater treatment plant, required as part of the 2022 decree, will substantially reduce, if not eliminate, such hauling, they say.

“We have responded to the MDE and share its commitment to resolving this issue through the established MDE process,” Darling spokeswoman Jillian Fleming said in a statement.

The agency notified Darling in June that it was referring the hauling matter along with other recent violations to the state Attorney General’s Office.

By Jeremy Cox

Horacio Savala oversees the fileting and packaging operation for Tilghman Island Seafood’s blue catfish processing facility. Quality control is paramount with the fish on ice from the time they leave the water until placed on the fileting table.

Buena Vista Seafood in San Francisco deals in high-end seafood from all around the world. European blue lobsters, Kambatia Reef Fish from Kenya, California Purple Urchins, and Icelandic Arctic Cod, to name a few.

Now, the company has added wild-caught Chesapeake Blue Catfish to its list of offerings.

“Chesapeake blue catfish check all the boxes,” says Polly Legendre, who’s involved in sales and operations for Buena Vista.

 “They’re a great tasting fish, clean and neutral with a nice flake. They’re also an affordable dinner fish whether for white tablecloth restaurants or for the family table. That’s very important in the current state of the nation.”

Legendre said the blue cats check the sustainability box because they’re an invasive species, ”insanely prolific in terms of reproduction. Targeting them for harvest will help ease the toll they’re taking on the rockfish and blue crab populations, both iconic value species that have built the Chesapeake reputation. Tilghman Island Seafood’s processing capacity and dedication to quality control give their filets a long shelf life and are the reason we can get them from the East Coast to the West Coast in great condition. So they’re a sustainable and reliable fishery.

“Finally, and very important,” said Legendre, is the positive social impact for the Chesapeake’s fishing community. “While addressing a real environmental problem, the growing blue catfish industry is also benefiting ice providers, truck drivers, cutters and packagers in the processing facility, and providing a new opportunity for watermen feeling pressure from fewer crabs and rockfish.”

That’s particularly notable, she said, in an era when watermen, here and in other parts of the country, are suffering from more and more restrictions on their harvesting. “This blue cat fishery is adding quota and volume to fisheries, allowing fishermen to catch with abandon. That’s positive for the industry.”

Good diet = Good fish

Unlike other species of bottom-dwelling catfish, blue catfish feed throughout the water column. That diet of other fish, crabs, clams and even rockfish eggs foraged from grasses in spawning grounds, no doubt contributes to the attractive flavor profile that differentiates them from other catfish.

On Tuesday this week, Tilghman Island Seafood Company air-shipped 400 pounds of fresh blue catfish filets westward to Buena Vista, just the latest in many shipments. That’s only a sliver of the estimated 100,000 pounds of fish Tilghman Island is now processing each week for its retail, restaurant and institutional customers such as schools and food banks.

All of those thousands of pounds of fish have been on ice from the time they have been pulled from the Bay’s waters. Tilghman Island Seafood president and owner Nick Hargrove set that water-to-ice standard early on.

Tilghman Island Seafood Vice President Norm McCowan and Office Manager Becky Miller with some of the packaging used to ship orders from coast to coast. Dennis Forney Photos.

He provides insulated composite vats filled with ice for the fishermen and truckers who catch the fish and transport them to the Tilghman processing facility, beside the island’s drawbridge over Knapp’s Narrows. “Keeping the fish on ice throughout the process has become second nature to everyone.  Quality is critical to the marketing of them as Wild Caught Chesapeake Blue Catfish. They have to be marketed that way.”

In the past few weeks, Hargrove has flown twice to Boston for, first, a fisheries conference, and then last week to follow up on more potential new business.  “We have to have sales,” he said.  “I already had a military customer.  More may be on the way. You can’t produce 20,000 pounds a day if you have no customers.  All of it is wild caught and sustainable. Can’t emphasize how important that is.”

While Hargrove is off cultivating new customers, or out on local waters placing spat on shell for his oyster leasing operations, Vice President Norm McCowan manages Tilghman Island Seafood company. “Nick is a great spokesman with great  vision,” said McCowan, “and because he’s a waterman himself, he knows the other watermen and how important the seafood industry is to the region.”

McCowan said Hargrove gets calls almost every day from fishermen wanting  to sell blue cats, while he and office manager Becky Miller handle shipments, processing and packaging.  “We send out samples every day to restaurants and other seafood distributors like Buena Vista. We are meeting the demand for the market we’re creating but we know our potential market is much larger than just state and local.  Texas, for example, is the largest catfish-eating state so we know we need to penetrate the South with our product.”

Exponential growth

The Tilghman operation is a busy place, with trucks always coming and going–coming with iced fish and leaving with more vats filled with ice for the next catch.

“We’re growing exponentially,” said McCowan  “Eighty percent of our sales are frozen, with 20 percent going to the fresh market, locally and across Maryland and as far away is San Francisco. But the catfish problem in the Bay is huge.  Like Nick says, we have to eat our way out if it. We have to take out 15 million pounds of fish a year just to keep up with the current balance. We’ve processed a half million pounds of fish in the past two months–2.4 million pounds since we started a year and a half ago or so. A guy is coming in today with 2,400 pounds of fish.  At 60 to 70 cents a pound, that’s a nice check for him.”

At 30 percent yield, those 2,400 pounds of fish will produce about 800 pounds of filets.

The numbers keep coming.  Hargrove said it’s estimated that the total blue catfish biomass in the Chesapeake is about 150,000 tons, or 300 million pounds. In Virginia’s James River, where the blue catfish were first introduced as a recreational species in the 1970s, Hargrove said it’s estimated they now represent 80 to 90 percent of the river’s entire biomass. “I’ve seen as much as 200,000 pounds come out of the Potomac in one day,” said Hargrove.  “With each fish producing up to 20,000 offspring a year, they’re not going anywhere.  We’re never getting rid of them.”

According to a Department of Natural resources press release, Maryland’s watermen harvested 609,525 pounds of blue catfish in 2013. By 2023, that number had jumped to 4.2 million pounds and is still rising.

With the help of Maryland’s two US Senators, Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen, and First District Congressman Andy Harris, more than $3 million in federal money has been allocated to stimulate blue catfish processing facilities like Tilghman Island Seafood which is currently Maryland’s only United States Department of Agriculture-certified processing facility.

Hargrove said he is interested in expanding to another facility in Talbot County, preferably on Tilghman Island. “This is where we want to be,” said Hargrove. He said he would also be interested in adding an automatic fileting machine to his operation if he would qualify for grant money to help with the million-dollar expenditure.  “It’s a lot of money but it would enable us to process four or five times as much fish as we do now.  I can’t wait for that though. We have to keep operating and expanding as we are now.”

He said if he were able to get an automatic machine, current cutters could be redeployed downstream in the operation for other aspects such as portioning, creating more of the popular blue catfish nuggets, packaging and shipping.

Harris said he is also working with at least two other parties on the Eastern Shore who are interested in becoming blue catfish processors.

Big buy from USDA?

Meanwhile, at the federal delegation’s urging, the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service has recently advertised draft specifications allowing it to purchase wild-caught blue catfish filets for national-level institutions, including school systems, penitentiaries, and military installations.

The USDA requires a federal inspector to be onsite at facilities such as Tilghman Island Seafood whenever it is processing fish, to guarantee its safety and quality.  Catfish are the only category of fish for which the government’s most rigorous inspections are required.  Up until now, according to Harris, and due to lobbying pressure from southern, farm-raised catfish producers, the AMS could only buy farm-raised catfish.

The new draft specifications allowing the government purchase of wild-caught catfish are in a comment period before final distribution to potential bidders.

“The good news is they buy by the truckload,” said McCowan. “That’s about 38,000 pounds, which we can do.”

“This would be a big deal for the industry,” said Hargrove. “Eight months ago when the AMS announced plans to purchase farm-raised catfish for its programs, it was for 800,000 pounds of filets. This time around we’ll try to get into it.  We’ll bid.”

He said there’s another plus for wild caught blue catfish. According to a recent Virginia Tech study he said, the heart-healthy omega-3 oil levels–found in many fish–are several times higher in blue cats than in farm-raised catfish.

Hargrove noted that Tilghman Island Seafood has recently been certified for exporting overseas to Poland and Asia.

“There’s definitely room for growth in blue cats,” he said.

Buena Vista’s Legendre will be traveling this week from San Francisco to Tilghman Island for further reviewing, videoing, and discussions with Hargrove and his crew as she continues her plans for ramping up sales of blue catfish west of the Mississippi.

To say she’s excited about the prospects is an understatement.

“I want to sell in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle and San Diego.  The fish and its quality are important to the California chefs but they’re also concerned about the sustainability, the problems associated with invasive species, and helping the fishing communities. We need to let the nation and world know that in this case harvesting this resource is solving more problems than it is causing.  I want to get chefs on some of the cooking shows talking about the virtues of Wild Caught Chesapeake Blue Catfish.”

Upward trajectory comes to mind.

“It’s hold on to your hat with this one,” said Hargrove. “This is still just the beginning.”

Dennis Forney has been a publisher, journalist and columnist on the Delmarva Peninsula since 1972.  He writes from his home on Grace Creek in Bozman.

The number of blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay is down slightly from last year, to 317 million, but researchers said the numbers are manageable and they see “no serious reason for concern.”

The population estimates come from the annual winter dredge survey released last month by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. It estimated that the overall number of crabs this year is down from the 323 million estimated in 2023.

The decrease was due to a drop in the number of adult crabs, which fell from 207 million in 2023 to 179 million this year. But adult populations are still within a range researchers consider safe.

Although the population of juvenile crabs continued to rise in recent years, it still remains below average.

Romuald Lipcius, a VIMS researcher who helped conduct the survey, pointed to the juvenile and female crab populations as points of focus.

“The number that we saw this year for the females was just below the average … it’s remaining at what I would consider to be at an average level,” said Lipscius, who is also a professor of marine biology at William and Mary University. “Not the safest level, but it’s no serious reason for concern.

“The issue that we have is that the juveniles have remained low for three years in a row,” he said.

Both female and juvenile crab numbers set off a “red flag” in 2022, said Allison Colden, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. Although fluctuations in the population are normal, she said recent years have been concerning.

“Over the past few years, that trend, particularly in the juveniles, has remained low. We’re not seeing a spike like we would see typically where it goes up and down,” Colden said.

Colden and others pointed to possible causes for the overall low population numbers, all of which have been caused by humans. Those include pollution and invasive species like blue catfish, which were introduced to the Bay in the 1970s and ’80s for recreational fishing.

“In the James River … blue catfish were consuming on the order of 2 million blue crabs per year,” Colden said. “We know there are tons of catfish out there, and we know that they’re eating blue crabs, so there has to be some sort of impact.”

Mike Glasco, who runs a crabbing charter under the name Captain Puddin’, explained that chemical runoff plays a role in the blue crab population decrease as well.

“What they’re spraying in the fields is where you start the runoff in the bay. Pollution,” Glasco said.

“Three years ago, had a lot of crabs because they were hiding in the grass,” Glasco said. “That spring, after they sprayed the field, we had a lot of rain. Next thing you know, you see the grass floating and the crabs didn’t have anywhere to hide.”

Despite the overall population decrease, Frank Tuma – a commercial crabber who works north of the Bay Bridge – said he isn’t worried about the results from the winter dredge survey because it’s done in the wrong season.

“The dredge survey is done early in the season and what happens is you get a storm or you get a lot of rains like we’ve had and it completely changes what happens to the crabs,” Tuma said.

Weather is more likely to affect the catch, he said.

“Up here, where we’ve had a lot of rain up in the north side of the Bay Bridge, we’re not catching any crabs up here yet. And we should be,” Tuma said.

Researchers said the winter dredge survey is just one tool they have to measure blue crab populations. Carrie Kennedy, the director of DNR‘s Tidal and Coastal Management and Assessment Division, said the agencies are doing a stock assessment this year, which will be more comprehensive.

“Beginning this summer, we’re going to be conducting a stock assessment along with our partners, in the Chesapeake Bay,” Kennedy said. “The winter dredge survey gives us a really good idea of what’s happening every spring and what to expect for the following crab season.

“However, a stock assessment is far more thorough in the biological data … all of our biological data goes into it. All of our harvest data goes into it. and it’s a pretty in-depth look at the dynamics of the life history of this species,” she said.

BY: ELIJAH PITTMAN

For more than two years (and some would say decades), the challenge of the Lakeside housing development in Trappe has been an all-consuming concern for the Talbot County Council, the incorporated town of Trappe, the Maryland Department of the Environment, and most of all, the residents of Talbot County.

In short, could a project approved in 2003 but slow in finding financing and market demand continue with plans to eventually build more than 2,400 homes in a town whose total population was half that number? And were there appropriate plans for wastewater treatment, and had other infrastructure issues like schools and roads been adequately assessed?

These concerns led to the passage of Resolution 338 by the County Council. This resolution required a full review of each additional phase of Lakeside’s development to ensure compliance with the Comprehensive Water and Sewer Plan. It also mandated that any future expansion of the wastewater treatment plant beyond the initial 100,000 gallons per day allocation (around 400 housing units) must evaluate Trappe’s wastewater treatment capacity at each phase.

With the support of the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE), Resolution 338 was intended to safeguard the community and manage growth responsibly.

However, local environmental advocates like the Talbot Integrity Project questioned whether this was enough to protect the county’s critically important environmental assets. Specifically, they raised concerns about whether the maps used to define property and sewer lines were accurate when the project was approved.

The answer became clear at Tuesday night’s Talbot County Council meeting with the passage of two resolutions that attempted to address these concerns.

By a 3-2 vote, the council approved Resolution No. 347 with Amendment No. 3, which amends the Comprehensive Water and Sewer Plan (CWSP) to provide the Equivalent Dwelling Units (EDUs) for all phases of the Lakeside development. This aligns with the Planning Commission’s finding that Resolution No. 347 is consistent with the County’s Comprehensive Plan at their May 1, 2024, meeting.

Additionally, by a 3-2 vote, the council passed Resolution No. 348, which clarifies and confirms the water and sewer classifications for certain parcels incorrectly shown in previous revisions. The County Planning Commission also found this resolution consistent with the county’s comprehensive plan.

Following this important debate on such a high-impact housing development, the Spy’s Dave Wheelan turned to Councilmember Pete Lesher for an explanation. Yesterday, via Zoom, Lesher (who, along with Council Member Lynn Mielke, voted against Resolutions 347 and 348) clarified in simpler terms what action the Talbot County Council has taken and what it will mean for the Lakeside project going forward.

This video is approximately 15 minutes in length.

At first, oyster biologists were concerned. Monitoring efforts at some restoration sanctuary reefs in 2022 weren’t pulling up many oysters, even though the sites had previously been performing well.

So divers with the Oyster Recovery Partnership went into the water to investigate. What they found there wasn’t a shortage of oysters, but such a dense and mature population that the shellfish had cemented into three-dimensional reefs, thick enough that the team’s patent tongs sampling gear weren’t able to get them out of the water.

“We’re excited because we feel like we’re starting to reach our goal of self-sustaining reefs,” said Olivia Caretti, the partnership’s coastal restoration program manager. “In another sense, it becomes a question of how we adjust our sampling plan. It’s a good problem to have.”

These sites in the Tred Avon River are a part of an ongoing and long-term experiment in oyster recovery. In an effort to shore up declining numbers of the bivalve, Maryland dramatically expanded oyster sanctuaries in 2010 to cover 24% of historic oyster habitat in the Bay, a span of about 9,000 acres spread over a wide geographical area.

Then, in June 2014, Maryland and other regional governments signed onto the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement that outlined a goal to “restore habitat and populations in 10 tributaries by 2025 and ensure their protection.”

Maryland and Virginia split these 10 tributaries, and both states embarked on five large-scale restoration projects. In Maryland, these are known as the “Big Five” sanctuaries in Harris Creek and the Little Choptank, Tred Avon, St. Marys, and Manokin rivers.

Now, nearing 10 years after the agreement, Maryland’s restoration sanctuaries are on track to be completed in time to meet next year’s goal. Across these restoration sanctuaries, scientists are finding impressive signs of recovery, with considerable reproduction and the establishment of dense, vertical oyster reef structure.

“The success of these restoration sanctuaries is a testament to years of dedicated work,” said Maryland Department of Natural Resources Secretary Josh Kurtz. “DNR and our partners are taking oyster restoration seriously, and it’s great to see our efforts result in these productive, living reefs.”

The restoration work is carried out by the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Maryland Oyster Restoration Interagency Workgroup, a partnership between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Baltimore District, the Oyster Recovery Partnership and the Maryland DNR.

Of Maryland’s Big Five restoration sanctuaries, initial restoration is complete at four, and Harris Creek is considered fully restored. In 2022, Harris Creek had an average density of 462 oysters, including spat and small oysters, per square meter.

At the fifth large-scale restoration sanctuary, Manokin River, initial restoration work began in 2021 and DNR estimates it will continue until 2025.

Evaluating the Oyster Restoration Sanctuaries

The restoration sites are exceeding success metrics established by the Maryland Oyster Restoration Interagency Workgroup. The workgroup’s  2021 Oyster Monitoring Report on these large-scale restoration sites showed that 100% of 3-year-old and 6-year-old reefs that year met the minimum success criteria for oyster density–15 oysters per square meter over 30% of the reef area. More than 90% of the reefs had more than 50 oysters per square meter in the same area.

The 2022 and 2023 reports are scheduled to be released this spring, but DNR scientists think it’s likely that the trends already seen will continue.

“The five large scale sanctuaries have significant populations of oysters, given the massive plantings and the occurrence of natural spatset,” DNR Shellfish Division Director Christopher Judy said. “The next monitoring report will likely show a continuation of past results.”

DNR’s own oyster monitoring across the Bay has found that restored sanctuaries are high in oyster density, reproduction, and cultch (the shell or substrate necessary for juvenile oysters to grow on) as well as low in mortality.

From 2012 to 2022, DNR spent $49 million to restore oysters in the five large-scale sanctuaries. By the end of 2022, partners had planted 5.93 billion juvenile oysters and created 894 acres of oyster reefs at the Big Five sanctuaries, according to the working group’s 2022 Chesapeake Bay Oyster Restoration Update. Previously, these sites had only 42 acres of existing reefs that met the restoration metrics, which did not require initial restoration.

The Need for Oyster Restoration

Scientists and environmental advocates say this considerable undertaking was necessary to begin to address the need for oyster recovery.

Once far more abundant in the Bay, eastern oysters plummeted to a fraction of their early-1800s population due to historic overharvesting, disease-related mortality, habitat degradation, and reduced water quality.

The bivalve is a keystone species, a critical part of the ecosystem of the Bay, as well as an economic driver for the region, making restoration a priority. Oysters also serve as natural filters in waterways. Scientists estimate that adult oysters can filter more than 10 gallons per day in the Chesapeake Bay.

Sanctuaries are permanently closed to harvest, except on aquaculture lease sites, and intended as areas where oysters can grow undisturbed. This enhances the oyster broodstock population and allows the bivalves to build reefs that offer crucial habitat to many other Bay species.

Scientists hope that sanctuaries could also help facilitate pockets of natural disease resistance. In theory, oysters that survive after an outbreak of an oyster disease could better pass on their resistance if left undisturbed in a sanctuary setting. The diseases MSX and Dermo lead to significant die-off in Chesapeake Bay oysters in previous decades.

Restoring a sanctuary involves building cultch, the hard substrate that can support reefs, and planting spat, or juvenile oysters. The University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science’s Horn Point Laboratory in Cambridge grows most of the oysters that supply these restoration efforts.

This fall, DNR’s annual dredge survey on juvenile oysters found prolific spatfall across a wide distribution of the Bay, both in numerous harvest areas and sanctuary areas. (Spatset or spatfall refers to oyster reproduction in an area.) It was the fourth consecutive year of above-median results for juvenile oysters. Data from the survey also indicates that sanctuaries are performing about on par with previous levels and expectations.

Environmental conditions in the Bay, such as higher salinity, have been more favorable to oysters in recent years, likely playing a major part in the increased spatfall. But research suggests that restored sanctuaries provide areas where oysters can thrive in the long term, especially when these environmental conditions are right.

Visualizing Oyster Restoration

Using underwater photographs from tributaries of the Chesapeake in Maryland and Virginia, scientists at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center analyzed oyster habitats at 600 sites, including areas that were restored and unrestored, as well as sanctuaries and harvest locations.

Comparing the percent of the bottom covered by oysters and the amount of verticality—which indicates the buildup of reef structure—at these sites, restored sanctuaries performed notably well.

“Generally the reefs that are in the best condition at a Chesapeake-wide scale are the ones that are both protected from harvest and have seen restoration,” said Matt Ogburn, a senior scientist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center and an author of the study, which was published in October in Marine Ecology Progress Series.

Oysters form reefs on older shells or other hard surfaces, and these structures grow vertically over time. These oyster reefs form the foundation of an underwater ecosystem, providing habitat for fish, crabs, shellfish, and other marine life. The reefs act as nurseries for small fish and hunting grounds for larger fish, which makes for prime angling for sport fish like striped bass and black drum.

Vertical reefs also provide more space for oyster spat to grow, which in turn leads to increased density. Vertical reefs allow the mollusks to stick up higher in the water and have greater access to algae, increasing water filtration, Ogburn said.

Sites that are harvested rarely have this vertical structure, Ogburn said. Harvest sites might be covered in oysters, but they’re all laying down flat at the bottom.

“A core finding of our study was that when oysters are protected from harvest like in the sanctuaries, those oyster reefs all look really good,” Ogburn said. “They often meet the restoration metrics or exceed them, and they also support other species.”

Can Restoration Sanctuaries Reseed Oyster Harvest Areas?

While sanctuaries have seen positive growth, it’s not yet clear how sanctuaries are affecting the overall oyster population in the Bay. Most sanctuaries are relatively new, and DNR scientists suggest that it will take time to gather all the data and have a better understanding of the Bay-wide benefits of sanctuaries.

The next five-year report will come out in 2026, and DNR scientists will analyze that data to determine if there are any indications that restored sanctuaries are contributing to spatset outside sanctuary boundaries. The DNR Shellfish Division has also been planting half-acre shell sites outside the Big Five sanctuaries since 2018, which could help demonstrate whether spat is spreading, either from sanctuaries or harvest areas.

When oysters reproduce, they release eggs and sperm into the water column. Fertilized eggs then develop into free-swimming larvae that drift in the water for two to three weeks before latching onto a hard surface—often other oyster shells. There, the larvae develop into mature oysters and remain sessile, locked in the same spot, for the rest of their lives.

A model developed by researchers at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science suggests that larval oysters are able to spread widely before settling down.

Oyster larvae are extremely small—tinier than a grain of sand—and scientists can’t follow them in the water, said Elizabeth North, a professor at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science who studies the influence of water flow on oyster larvae in the Chesapeake Bay. But the movement of the larvae can be estimated.

With a simulation that took into account tides, river flow, salinity, temperature and a number of other factors, North’s team predicted that greater than 95% of larvae end up leaving their reef of origin and settle somewhere else.

Oysters benefit from having a network of reefs that act as “landing strips” to catch larvae as they drift, North said. Some reefs are naturally suited, because of their size or position in the water, to be the “population hubs” that send larvae to other reefs, while others collect larvae but don’t contribute as many to other reefs. Restoration efforts have created new “landing strips” for oyster larvae.

North said oyster larvae are certainly leaving from restoration sanctuaries, though it’s not yet clear how much the larvae then populate the oyster bars of the commercial fishery, or how many of the larvae from commercial areas populate the sanctuaries that have “landing strips” in them.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that any reefs that have oysters on them, especially high density, 50 per square meter and higher, are broadcasting larvae to other areas,” she said.

Restoration and the Long-Term Outlook for Oysters

Though the Chesapeake Bay oyster population continues to face challenges, there have been other promising signs for oysters, aside from spatset numbers and reef growth. In the past two seasons, Maryland oystermen have brought in the highest number of oysters since 1987, at least in part due to successive years of good spatsets that generated increased numbers of oysters.

The 543,000 bushels in 2021-2022 and 722,000 bushels last winter resulted in a dockside value of $21.5 million and $31 million, according to the DNR Shellfish Division.

The spatset in 2023 marked the fifth highest in 39 years, with a historic geographic distribution that far exceeded prior spatsets, a recent milestone in natural oyster reproduction in the Bay. Shellfish biologists were finding spat in areas where they were rarely observed, including in the upper reaches of some Bay tributaries that are typically too brackish for strong oyster reproduction.

And restoration efforts continue apace. Last year, a record 1.7 billion new juvenile oysters produced at state hatcheries were planted on sanctuary and public oyster fishery sites in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay.

Aside from restoration sanctuaries, there are some unrestored sanctuaries that are doing well. The Nanticoke River sanctuary, which received some limited small-scale restoration since 2020, had an average density of 417 oysters per square meter in 2022. Hooper Straits sanctuary, which received no restoration, had an average density of 294 oysters per square meter in 2022.

But some other sanctuaries that have not received restoration are performing less well. These sites tend to be in lower salinity areas, which are less favorable to oyster reproduction, or in places that didn’t have a lot of good oyster habitat prior to 2010.

But DNR scientists say these sites also present opportunities to get more oysters in the water and further restoration efforts.

“Right now, we have considerable unrestored sanctuary areas that are unproductive because they lack suitable substrate,” said DNR Fishing and Boating Services Director Lynn Fegley. “These areas will need investment to begin producing oysters, and this could come in the form of restoration sanctuaries or in the form of multi-use areas that include aquaculture and some wild harvest. The overarching goal is more oysters in the water and improved ecological function.”

In February, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation released a report calling for additional oyster restoration in Maryland and Virginia, highlighting the benefits oysters provide economically and environmentally, including their ability to protect shoreline habitats from erosion. The Chesapeake Bay Program will determine and approve any new goals for the Bay.

Smaller-scale restoration projects are in the works. In January, DNR committed to planting 147 million oyster spat in Herring Bay Sanctuary with mitigation funds from the Ever Forward running aground on an oyster bar in March 2022.

Cody Paul, a Dorchester County waterman who’s harvested oysters for 13 years, has worked with the Oyster Recovery Partnership on monitoring in the Choptank and Tred Avon rivers and Harris Creek. He said that, although sanctuaries remove bottom areas from harvest, he sees the benefit of them too, from helping build the overall broodstock of oysters to contributing to water filtration.

“The first time I ever went, it was jaw-dropping what you would see there,” he said of the sanctuaries.

Ben Ford, the Miles-Wye Riverkeeper with the environmental nonprofit ShoreRivers, has monitored and captured footage at oyster sanctuaries on the Eastern Shore and said he’s impressed by the recovery he’s seen.

“Oysters loom so large in our culture and our history and our environment,” he said. “So it’s great to give back and have that persist. I know it sounds trite, but for our kids and their kids—I have an almost 2-year-old and I want him to see what I’m seeing, and maybe something even better.”

Joe Zimmermann is a science writer with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.