Maryland is targeting five of its ailing watersheds for a concentrated push to restore them — but the state’s budget crisis has put funding for the effort in doubt .

The Department of Natural Resources announced March 6 that it has selected Antietam Creek in Washington County, Baltimore Harbor, Newport Bay near Ocean City, the Severn River in Anne Arundel County and the upper Choptank River on the Eastern Shore for a “collaborative and science-based approach” to reducing pollution and improving shallow-water habitat.

The watersheds — four connected with the Chesapeake Bay and one that’s part of an Atlantic coastal bay — are the first chosen under the state’s Whole Watershed Act passed in 2024. The law calls for focusing “cost-effective” water quality improvement measures over a five-year period in areas likely to show a rapid response.

The legislation came in response to a 2023 scientific report that warned existing programs to curb urban and farm runoff polluting the Bay and its rivers were falling short. It recommended shifting efforts to improve habitat for fish, especially in shallow waters.

“These five watersheds, which span the state of Maryland, will usher in the next phase of Chesapeake and Atlantic coastal bays restoration,” DNR Secretary Josh Kurtz said in a press release. “By working closely with local partners and focusing on specific areas, we believe we can more quickly attain statewide clean water goals.”

DNR chose the watersheds from nine proposals submitted last fall by teams made up of community organizations, local governments, private firms and other groups in each watershed. The winning proposals were selected for most closely meeting the law’s requirements that they target a mix of urban, suburban and rural areas, and that at least two be in “an overburdened or underserved community.”

The lead organization on the Baltimore harbor proposal, as an example, is the nonprofit South Baltimore Gateway Partnership, which is already engaged in creating wetlands along the Middle Branch of the Patapsco River to reduce flood risk and filter stormwater. The partnership is also working to improve fish habitat, plant trees, increase waterfront access and spur economic growth in South Baltimore neighborhoods like Cherry Hill and Westport.

On the upper Choptank, the nonprofit ShoreRivers and its partners proposed targeting pollution management practices in four predominantly agricultural areas and also working with local governments and disenfranchised communities to address stormwater, wastewater and habitat concerns.

The law calls for financing the work by pooling funding from several existing sources, including the Maryland Cost Share Program (MACS), Maryland Agricultural Land Preservation Foundation (MALPF), Bay Restoration Fund, Clean Water Commerce Act fund, Chesapeake and Atlantic Coastal Bays Trust Fund, and Waterway Improvement Fund.

DNR had planned to award $2 million in the coming year to each of the selected watersheds, using money from the Chesapeake and Atlantic Coastal Bays Trust Fund, Bay Restoration Fund and Clean Water Commerce Act fund. Some farm-related projects are to receive grants through funding controlled by the Maryland Department of Agriculture.

But Maryland lawmakers are struggling to close a projected $3 billion state budget gap, and legislative analysts have proposed taking revenue normally earmarked for land preservation and runoff pollution reduction grants, draining at least three of the funding sources DNR had planned to use.

DNR is urging lawmakers to ignore the analysts’ recommendation.

“We have emphasized to state legislators, who just passed the Whole Watershed Act last year, that this funding is integral to implementing their vision to achieve watershed-scale environmental improvements and community benefits,” DNR spokesman AJ Metcalf said.

The post Maryland to focus restoration efforts on five watersheds, but funding is in doubt appeared first on MarylandReporter.com.

From the Bay Journal

The Chesapeake Bay’s once-moribund oyster industry has been on a roll recently, and last season Maryland watermen hauled in their biggest harvest in 36 years — 623,000 bushels.

After an “exceptional” crop of juvenile oysters spawned in 2020 and better than average reproduction since then, the state’s annual reef survey last fall found the third greatest abundance of bivalves in the last three decades.

Yet state fisheries regulators say they see clouds on the horizon, including a sizable increase in harvest effort and overfishing in areas of the Bay and its tributaries that harbor the most oysters. As a result, the Department of Natural Resources might impose new harvest restrictions in the second half of the upcoming season, which begins Oct. 1 and normally lasts until March 31.

“We are making really good progress with oysters, and as an agency we’re just tickled that we have these big harvests,” said Lynn Fegley, DNR’s acting fisheries director. “But we also are starting to see in certain areas … that harvest rate is going up quicker than abundance.”

Though DNR plans no changes in harvest rules for the first three months of the season, it informed its Oyster Advisory Commission June 6 that changes were possible in January. Depending on what its reef survey finds this fall, DNR said it may close the season a month early — either statewide or in those areas with the heaviest harvest pressure — to boats using the most efficient gear. Or, alternatively, it may leave the season length unchanged but reduce the daily permitted catch for that gear the last three months by roughly 20%.

DNR is seeking industry input and public comment on its options by June 20, with plans to publish its final decision in a public notice by July 1.

Such mid-season tweaks are new for Maryland, where oyster regulations traditionally are set on an annual basis. It’s an unwelcome shift for watermen, who amid such bounty were counting on no changes at all — and some even hoped to see a return to higher catch limits of the past.

“Everything is going right. Why do we have to change it?” asked Robert T. Brown Sr., president of the Maryland Waterman’s Association. He insisted that the fishery is sustainable and disputed DNR’s assessment that overfishing has been occurring.

The problem, DNR explained to the advisory commission, is that neither the oysters nor the harvest pressure is evenly distributed. The bulk of the bivalves are in just two areas, the Choptank River and Tangier Sound, and 60% of the harvest came from Tangier Sound and the lower Patuxent River. Nine out of 36 areas open to public harvest experienced overfishing last season, according to DNR, including Tangier, the lower Patuxent and the St. Mary’s River.

The oyster population is not in jeopardy of imminent collapse, Fegley said. But at the current harvest rate, the state’s bivalves could decline again over time, especially if there’s another outbreak of Dermo and MSX.

Those diseases, triggered by a weather-driven rise in salinity of the Chesapeake Bay, erupted in the mid-1980s, causing widespread oyster die-off. Maryland’s annual harvest, which had topped 2 million bushels a few years earlier, slid to an all-time low of 26,000 bushels in 2003–2004 and has been slowly coming back up since, with a dramatic resurgence in the past few years.

DNR’s reef survey last fall found a slight uptick in Dermo and MSX but still below the long-term average, and the estimated mortality from disease remained well below past levels.

But with the rebound in oyster abundance and harvests, more watermen are getting back into the fishery. Last year, more than 1,400 paid the state surcharge required to harvest oysters, the highest in the past 30 years. Most harvesters caught their limit up until the end of the season on March 31, and the dockside value of their harvest reached about $27 million, the highest in the last three decades.

What worries regulators is that the harvest pressure could increase still more. Only half of the waterman eligible to harvest oysters paid the surcharge last year, so their ranks could conceivably double.

“We want to work toward continued improvement of oyster abundance and habitat,” Fegley said. “To keep that going you’ve just got to balance the harvest rate.” She likened it to adjusting spending to maintain a healthy balance in a bank account, ensuring that withdrawals don’t keep exceeding deposits.

The mathematical model DNR used to update its assessment of the state’s oyster population forecast a slight increase in harvestable bivalves this season but a decline in the juveniles that represent the next generation.

Fegley acknowledged that there’s a “cone of uncertainty” around those forecasts, so harvest limits may not be needed. But DNR wants to be prepared to act quickly, she said, if evidence emerges during the upcoming season that the population is heading downward.

To determine whether harvest curbs are warranted, Fegley said the department will evaluate preliminary results from its annual survey, which uses a dredge to sample more than 250 reefs in October and November. State biologists will check to see how many young oysters there are and how many newly spawned “spat” were produced over the summer. They’ll also look for MSX and Dermo infection and mortality.

If the survey indicates problems, DNR is considering three different options for curtailing the harvest, which would be imposed by Jan. 15, 2024.

One would end the oyster season a month early, on March 1, for watermen using dredges or patent tongs, the most efficient types of gear used to retrieve bivalves from the bottom.

Alternatively, only Tangier Sound and the lower Patuxent River would be closed a month early to dredges and patent tongs, which could still be used elsewhere in the Bay. Under either option, watermen harvesting oysters with less efficient hand tongs or by diving to hand-harvest them would also be able to continue everywhere until March 31.

Under a third option, DNR would simply impose about a 20% reduction everywhere in the number of bushels of oysters that watermen could harvest daily using dredges or patent tongs.

Fegley said there are pros and cons to each option. Closing all Maryland waters early would penalize watermen working areas that are not experiencing overfishing, she said, but closing only certain areas could prompt watermen to shift their effort and concentrate harvest in areas left open.

The state’s plan drew praise from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. Allison Colden, a fisheries biologist and the foundation’s Maryland executive director, warned that without adequate controls on fishing effort, increased harvests could contribute to declines in the population when conditions in the Bay affect oyster reproduction.

“We are encouraged that DNR has proposed a more responsive approach to oyster management, based on the fall dredge survey,” Colden said, “and urge them to consider further regulations that aim to end overfishing in the regions where it is occurring.”

Fegley acknowledged, though, that watermen aren’t happy with the prospect of harvest restrictions.

“I think the oyster industry was really hoping to see some liberalization, which frankly in some areas we could do,” she said. “The problem that we have is we … can’t have one bushel limit in one area and a separate bushel limit in another area. We can’t enforce that. It’s just impractical.”

Jim Mullin, executive director of the Maryland Oystermen Association, said he’s optimistic DNR won’t need to clamp down in January.

But others aren’t so sure, and they’re bothered that DNR is even talking about the possibility.

“Basically, the watermen are saying, ‘We don’t like any of it, leave us alone,’” said Jeff Harrison, president of the Talbot Watermen Association. “We’re doing better than we have in 37 years.” There might be a few areas where concentrated harvest exceeds natural reproduction, he added, but those will take care of themselves, because watermen will move somewhere else when the harvest tails off.

Simon Dean, a Calvert County waterman on DNR’s advisory commission, said he believes the harvest limits should be relaxed rather than reduced — returned to what they were until about four years ago.

“When we have a high recruitment year, a high market year, the science never matches up. The only thing the watermen hear is cut, cut, cut. There’s no chance of gaining anything back.

“We’ve been told for generations trust the science, trust the science,” Dean concluded. But it only seems to lead to curtailing harvest at a time of resurgence in the industry, he said. He questions why he should trust such science.

“It’s tough. I get it. I understand it,” said DNR’s Fegley. “We’re just going to have to work our way through it, and we will.”

The post Amid oyster bounty, Maryland worries about overfishing, eyes harvest limits appeared first on MarylandReporter.com.

By Timothy B. Wheeler

Bay Journal

The Chesapeake Bay’s oyster population is still a long way from what it once was, but lately it’s shown signs of a rebound. Maryland and Virginia watermen harvested more of the bivalves in the most recent season than they had in more than three decades.

So why is Seafood Watch, a widely consulted guide to sustainable seafood, recommending that people avoid eating wild-caught oysters from the Bay?

The Monterey Bay Aquarium, which produces Seafood Watch, isn’t saying. A spokesperson for the California aquarium declined a request for an interview to answer questions about its draft report, which includes a recommendation to shun oysters from Maryland or Virginia.

“At this time, we are not able to comment on the draft assessment as the report may change based on feedback we receive in the public comment period,” the spokesperson said by email.

The aquarium was taking feedback through May 22. Since making its draft report public in April, it has received an earful from watermen, fishery managers, scientists and even other conservationists. Critics contend it erroneously portrays the Bay’s oyster population as overfished and poorly managed, a characterization they say even in draft form is hurting the region’s seafood industry.

“They have no idea what they’re doing,” said Robert T. Brown Sr., president of the Maryland Watermen’s Association, “… and they’re interfering with people’s livelihoods.”

Since 1999, the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program every few years has been offering what it says are science-based recommendations on which fish and seafood across the United States are sustainable “best choices” or “good alternatives” — and which should be avoided because of the risk of that species’ depletion or of harm to the marine ecosystem. It distributes about 2.5 million printable online guides every year aimed at influencing the purchasing decisions of nonprofit organizations, businesses and consumers.

Based on its last assessment in 2018, Seafood Watch currently rates oysters from Maryland and Virginia a good choice, despite some concerns, for those who care about sustainable seafood.

The new draft assessment downgrades those recommendations, citing “high concern” for the abundance of oysters in both states and deeming their public fisheries management ineffective. It even finds fault with the methodology Maryland has used in assessing the abundance of its wild oyster stock and whether it’s being overharvested.

Officials with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources say no one from the aquarium contacted them in developing the new assessment, and they were stunned to learn of the “avoid” recommendation.

“There’s missing information, there’s outdated information. They have misinterpreted information, and they have failed to live up to their own standards of using the best science and collaborating,” said Kristen Fidler, assistant DNR secretary for aquatic resources.

Agency officials defended the state’s oyster management, which they say is based on a science-driven stock assessment that has been reviewed favorably by a panel of outside scientists.

Mike Wilberg, a fisheries scientist with the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science who led the development of DNR’s stock assessment, said he thought the Seafood Watch drafters applied an overly broad and uneven brush when rating the sustainability of oyster stocks along the East Coast. He said they failed to appreciate the complexities of the Bay’s oyster population and how it varies from one place to another.

“Some of the things we were criticized for [by Seafood Watch] are things we were praised for in the expert review of our stock assessment,” he noted.

“I applaud their efforts to get consumers to make conscious decisions [about sustainability],” Wilberg added. “Unfortunately, with all this stuff, the devil is in the details.”

Roger Mann and Mark Luckenbach, a pair of veteran oyster biologists with the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, likewise contend that the Seafood Watch ratings of their state’s fishery are “based on old data and are entirely inappropriate.” The data cited by the report’s drafters in deeming oyster abundance “a high concern” was more than a decade old, they pointed out.

JC Hudgins, president of the Virginia Waterman’s Association, said that the Virginia Marine Resources Commission and members of the seafood industry “do a lot to keep the Eastern oyster a sustainable species,” even as the state’s harvest from public fishery areas in the 2022–23 season topped 300,000 bushels for the first time in 35 years.

Since 2018, when Seafood Watch rated Virginia oysters a good choice, the fishery has steadily improved every year, Hudgins said. Last year, he noted, reef surveys found oyster densities at levels not seen since before diseases struck in the late 1980s and triggered a catastrophic decline in population and habitat.

Brown, head of the Maryland watermen’s group, said he believed the Maryland oyster recommendation was also based on outdated information. In the six-month 2022–23 season that ended March 30, watermen harvested more than 600,000 bushels, the most since 1986–87.

In the recently ended season, Brown said, “a lot of people were still catching their limits [early] at the end of the season. That’s telling you we had plenty of oysters there.” He also noted that since the first stock assessment in 2019 that found widespread overharvesting, the state has reduced daily catch limits. “We’ve got a good management plan,” he said.

Even conservationists, who have at times voiced their own criticisms of oyster management in the Bay, have qualms about the draft Seafood Watch recommendation.

Allison Colden, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s Maryland director and a fisheries biologist, said she thinks the aquarium may be jumping the gun because a fresh update of the state’s oyster population is due to be completed and released within a matter of weeks. She noted that conditions for oyster reproduction and survival have been on the upswing lately, with very low mortality rates from the once-devastating diseases MSX and Dermo.

Even so, Colden said, the Seafood Watch assessment “does highlight some of the lingering concerns CBF has had and still has with the fishery.” Though only a few areas are still experiencing overfishing, one of those is Tangier Sound, where the majority of Maryland oysters are harvested.

And while oyster reproduction has been good to excellent the last few years, Colden said, caution is warranted because the fishery has undergone boom and bust cycles in the past.

Colden said she was in wholehearted agreement with another Seafood Watch recommendation — a blanket endorsement of farmed oysters as a “best” choice for consumers concerned about the sustainability of the reef-building bivalves.

“We have long recommended that consumers choose farmed oysters from the Chesapeake Bay,” she said, “because that eliminates any possibility of concerns about sustainability or about oyster recovery.”

But even there, Maryland officials say, the Seafood Watch guides don’t make it clear enough that their “avoid” recommendation doesn’t apply to the state’s farmed oysters.

“We have a successful and growing oyster industry, both wild and aquaculture,” Fidler said. The “avoid” recommendation “could be incredibly damaging to the industry and really a major and unnecessary setback, especially with all the progress we’ve made.”

The post Consumer guide criticized for saying ‘avoid’ Chesapeake oysters appeared first on MarylandReporter.com.

As Maryland seeks federal aid, questions remain about ability to stem invasion

Mike Malczewski used to make his living fishing year-round for channel catfish on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. But then one wintry day about a decade ago, he went out to retrieve his baited pots from the Choptank River and found them full of a different kind of catfish.

Since then, the waterman from Cordova, MD, said he’s had to diversify. He now spends about five months a year also targeting blue catfish, an interloper from the Mississippi River that in recent years has turned the Chesapeake Bay into its domain.

“I’ve made my whole career selling just channel catfish,” Malczewski said recently. “But it’s getting harder and harder because blue catfish are just taking over everything.”

Introduced for sportfishing into a few Virginia rivers in the 1970s, blue catfish were originally thought to be safely limited to freshwater. But in time, the newcomers showed they could not only tolerate but thrive in slightly salty water, enabling them to expand their population to more and more rivers throughout the Bay region.

Complaints like Malczewski’s helped spur Maryland Gov. Wes Moore in March to ask U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to declare a fishery disaster in the state, authorizing it to receive federal funds to help burdened watermen and seafood businesses.

Moore said the state needs help responding to an “explosion” in the numbers of invasive nonnative fish in the Bay and its tributaries, including flathead catfish and northern snakeheads. But the chief culprit he cited was blue catfish, which many believe are responsible for declining abundance and catches in recent years of blue crabs, striped bass and other commercially valuable fish.

Blue catfish are voracious eaters, downing everything from underwater grasses to juvenile crabs and smaller finfish.

“We’re [also] seeing this issue with American eels, with yellow perch, with white perch,” said Josh Kurtz, Maryland’s natural resources secretary. “The sheer number of important species that these fish are preying upon is a big concern of ours.”

The invaders have grown so numerous and large — the record catch in Maryland weighed more than 100 pounds — that they are the dominant fish species in some rivers. Watermen and scientists alike fear they are not only consuming significant numbers of native fish but depriving them of food and habitat.

Federal help

Urged on by watermen and seafood businesses, Maryland officials say they want federal funds to help shift the state’s fishing industry from chasing after declining numbers of native fish to catching more of the nonnative invasive species.

It’s unclear, though, whether the governor’s plea for federal help will succeed or, if it does, whether it will be enough to halt or reverse the surge of blue catfish.

In his March 15 letter to the commerce secretary, Moore invoked two federal laws authorizing disaster assistance to fishing communities suffering significant economic losses because of drastic declines in commercial harvests. The state’s congressional delegation followed up with its own letter a few weeks later urging the administration to “prioritize” Maryland’s request.

It’s a well-worn appeal. In the past 30 years, there have been 127 other requests nationwide for federal fishery disaster declarations.

Southeastern and Gulf coast states have asked for help dealing with disruptions from tropical storms and red tides. On the West Coast, states have blamed some recent harvest declines on climate change and ocean warming. Frequently, though, states asking for help say they don’t know why their fish suddenly became scarce.

States receiving a disaster declaration have received anywhere from less than $100,000 to more than $200 million in federal assistance. Congress appropriated $300 million last year for that purpose, but there are about a dozen other bids for aid pending that were submitted years before Maryland’s.

Maryland’s request is the first to cite invasive species as the cause of a fishery failure, according to Jenni Wallace, deputy director of the sustainable fisheries office in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

There’s nothing in the law that would bar disaster aid in that case, Wallace said. But the governor’s letter did not provide sufficient information for NOAA to decide whether it is warranted, she said. The state must more clearly spell out the fisheries impacted, she explained, and must document revenue losses of at least 35% for affected individuals and businesses.

If the state’s request is granted, it would be only the second federal fishery disaster declared in the Chesapeake. In 2008, Maryland and Virginia received $10 million each in economic assistance from NOAA after crab harvests plummeted for unknown reasons in both states. The states used some of that money to pay watermen to collect hundreds of so-called “ghost” crab pots from the Bay, lost or abandoned gear that could continue to catch and kill crabs.

Virginia, though likewise swarmed by blue catfish, has not joined Maryland in asking for federal assistance. Michele Guilford, a spokesperson for the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, said officials are “reviewing the claims made by

Maryland” and its rationale for declaring a fishery disaster. Meanwhile, she said VMRC has “already been taking action and [is] looking into all options” for controlling invasive species in Virginia waters.

It was the 2008 blue crab disaster declaration that inspired Bill Paulshock, a seafood business owner in the Baltimore suburbs, to team up with watermen and press the Department of Natural Resources in January for similar federal help with blue catfish.

“The environment and the entire Maryland seafood industry is at risk,” he said. “If we do not attack it immediately, in another four or five years it’s going to be impossible to change the tide because they’re eating everything up at an alarming rate.”

In search of evidence

Scientists agree that blue catfish are likely preying on native species in the Bay, but the evidence of significant impacts is largely circumstantial. Maryland’s commercial harvests of blue crabs, striped bass and several other economically important fish species in 2022 ranged from 27% to 91% below what they were in 2012, according to DNR.

At the same time, annual DNR surveys have tracked a growing abundance of blue catfish in waters frequented by young fish.

Studies in Virginia and Maryland have found that blue catfish are omnivores, eating underwater vegetation and invertebrates when small, then adding fish to their diets as they grow.

Noah Bressman, a biologist at Salisbury University in Maryland, is analyzing the stomach contents of blue catfish caught in the Nanticoke River. In spring, when river herring migrate up the Bay’s rivers to spawn, more of them show up in blue catfish guts. In the summer, their consumption includes more juvenile crabs.

“We’ve also [found] crazy things,” Bressman said. “A wood duck, turtles, rocks, sticks, mud, muskrats. In a 30-inch catfish, we found the head of a striped bass we estimated [had been] 18–19 inches long.”

There’s only been one study so far, though, that took a stab at quantifying the impact of blue catfish on other Bay species. In 2021, researchers at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science estimated that blue catfish in one stretch of the lower James River were consuming 2.3 million juvenile crabs annually — and likely even more.

More research is urgently needed, said Tom O’Connell, director of the Eastern Ecological Science Center of the U.S. Geological Survey.

“One of the challenges with the current fishery declaration is that I think there’s a lot of people who believe blue catfish are having a negative impact on fisheries like blue crabs and maybe striped bass. But … nobody has been willing to make the investment to make the scientific connection.”

O’Connell’s agency is partnering with DNR to study blue catfish diets in the Patuxent and Nanticoke rivers, including partially funding Bressman’s work.

Kurtz, the DNR secretary, acknowledged the information gaps but said the state hopes to use some of the federal disaster aid to fund more research.

Making a market

Meanwhile, say state officials and watermen alike, it’s clear the blue catfish pop-ulation needs to be curbed. The best way to do that, they agree, is for more people to join Mike Malczewski and catch more of them.

Commercial harvests of blue catfish in Maryland have already grown threefold over the past decade, from 188,000 pounds in 2012 to 726,000 pounds in 2022, according to DNR. To begin making a dent in the blue catfish population, many think those landings need to at least double or triple.

It ought to be easy, advocates say. There are no limits on how many blue catfish can be caught, and they’re tasty and nutritious, a worthy substitute for other fish in many recipes. But there are other curbs on how much or how fast the harvest can grow.

One is regulatory. A U.S. Department of Agriculture inspector must be present whenever fish wholesalers process blue catfish into filets. The regulation — imposed in 2017 to protect the farmed catfish industry in the South from Asian imports — adds to the cost and logistical challenges of processing blue catfish. Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD) has tried without success to get Congress to ease the rule.

The other hurdle is harder to overcome. Consumer demand for blue catfish is just not that great. Bill Paulshock said that’s why he doesn’t carry it in his market in the Baltimore suburbs.

Stephanie Pazzaglia sees demand picking up, but acknowledges it’s been a slog. She is the business development manager for J.?J. McDonnell Co., a seafood wholesaler in Elkridge that’s one of just four businesses processing blue catfish in Maryland.

In a region where striped bass is the favorite local finfish, she said it was “pretty tough” at first to get restaurants in Baltimore, Annapolis and the Washington, DC, area to put blue catfish on their menus.

But she’s since changed some restaurateurs’ minds, she said, by promoting it as an affordable alternative to pricier fish. And to expand the market, she said her company ships some blue catfish to California, the South and even overseas.

“Processors like us have to find homes for it in other places,” she said. “I don’t think we’re going to solve it here in Maryland.”

The Maryland Department of Agriculture’s seafood marketing office spends $30,000 a year promoting sales of blue catfish, but more is needed, advocates say.

The newest entry into the blue catfish business may be Tighman Island Seafood on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Originally focused on oysters and crabs, the business got licensed several months ago to process blue catfish, which to meet USDA requirements meant renovating the inside of the old shucking house that formerly housed the Phillips Wharf Environmental Center.

“It’s like an operating room in there,” said owner Nick Hargrove.

As a startup, he’s grappling with the dual challenges of finding enough customers for blue catfish filets to keep his staff busy and give watermen incentive to catch the fish that he needs. His first batch in early April was destined for a food bank in Salisbury.

“Because [blue] catfish is a very healthy fish to eat, we’re hoping we can help people with food insecurities [while] also helping the environment,” he said.

It’s not realistic to think blue catfish can be eradicated from the Bay, experts agree. But if their population can at least be reduced, they think it may be possible to curb their impact on other species.

Malczewski sees a big drawback, though, to relying on the market to boost blue catfish harvests. Wholesalers only want fish that weigh between two and 20 pounds, he said, which means watermen like him will throw back the smaller ones, leaving the next generation of invasive fish to grow and multiply.

“Until they figure out what you do with the little ones, nothing’s going to change,” he said. Meanwhile, with a soft market, the prices wholesalers will pay for blue catfish are so low it doesn’t encourage many watermen to go after them.

Paulshock, the Baltimore area seafood business owner, said he sees ways around those hurdles: Avoid the need for USDA inspectors by selling the fish whole to pet food companies, some of which already take fish scraps. Then, he said, use the federal funds to guarantee watermen a decent fixed price for their catch so more will get into the fishery. He sees it as a win-win for all concerned.

“We need this thing to happen now,” he said. “The Chesapeake Bay cannot wait.”

(Editor’s note: Blue catfish fillets are good and tasty coated with Zaratrain’s Fish Fry and baked in the over at 425 degrees.)

The post Can Chesapeake’s blue catfish shift from disaster to dinner plate? appeared first on MarylandReporter.com.

The post NASA-owned forest in Maryland wins new reprieve appeared first on MarylandReporter.com.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has used its orbiting satellites to help scientists understand the value of forests in fighting climate change. Closer to home, though, the space agency is moving to sell a woodland it owns in Maryland, putting the trees there at risk of being bulldozed by a developer.

NASA has used Area 400, a mostly wooded 105-acre tract near Greenbelt, MD, for cryogenics and rocket propulsion testing. NASA is poised to sell the land, but others are calling for preservation, preferably by making it part of the neighboring wildlife research reserve.

The proposed sale of the 105-acre tract by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in suburban Greenbelt, MD, has drawn protests from conservationists and expressions of concern from state and even other federal agencies. They note that the woods surround a headwaters stream of the Anacostia River, providing wildlife habitat, soaking up nutrients in rainfall runoff and capturing climate-warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

“I just think it’s a travesty to lose this  100 acres, especially a forest in an urban area,” said Ann Swanson, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission. “For reasons of water quality, climate change, environmental education, emotional sustenance, we need to protect this.”

Area 400, as NASA calls it, sits several miles east of the main Goddard campus, where scientists, engineers and technicians build spacecraft, instruments and sensors to study Earth, the solar system and the universe. They also oversee the two orbiting space telescopes and help communicate with astronauts aboard the International Space Station.

The tract has several small buildings and sheds in a one-acre clearing in the middle of the woods. NASA once researched rocket propulsion there, but now only uses the site for “storage and support,” according to spokesman Rob Garner. The agency has deemed the site “underutilized” and put it on a list of federal properties to be fast-tracked for sale.

Several members of Maryland’s congressional delegation have added their voices to those of environmental advocates who want to see the woodland preserved by transferring ownership to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The service has expressed interest in adding it to the adjoining Patuxent Research Refuge, a 12,800-acre expanse of forest, meadow and wetlands where federal scientists conduct wildlife research.

The refuge provides habitat for more than 200 species of birds and other wildlife including turtles, foxes, beavers and fish. It contains the National Wildlife Visitor Center, and its grounds are open to the public.

Jennifer Greiner, the research refuge manager, said she walked the NASA woods in September and has asked for more soil and groundwater testing to be sure the site hasn’t been contaminated by the rocket fuel-testing and other activities that have gone on there.

“We liked what we saw, but … we need to make sure it’s safe for public recreation,” she said.

Assuming it passes muster, Greiner said that the NASA tract would help buffer the refuge’s South Tract from the noise and light of traffic and development in the area. It also would expand protected habitat for a variety of birds and other wildlife, including threatened northern long-eared bats that have been sighted on the refuge.

A No-brainer

Joel Dunn, president of the Chesapeake Conservancy, called it a “no-brainer” that Area 400 should be transferred to the wildlife service.

“The refuge is literally next door, he said. Keeping the land in forest fits with the Biden administration’s America the Beautiful initiative, he noted, which aims to preserve 30% of lands and waters nationwide by 2030.

Bypassing the traditional process for divesting surplus federal property, NASA opted to sell Area 400 under a law passed by Congress in 2016 that aims to decrease the federal deficit by identifying properties for accelerated sale. The NASA tract is among 15 federal sites nationwide that the Public Buildings Reform Board, an independent agency, recommended in late December to be sold.

The board did propose transferring Area 400 to the Fish & Wildlife Service, noting that preserving it as part of the refuge would “enhance conservation and further the Biden Administration’s priorities of Climate and Racial Equity.”

But the board stipulated that the wildlife service should pay “fair market value” for the tract, and if that’s not possible, the land should be put up for sale to the highest bidder. It noted that NASA could use the income to cover its costs to demolish the buildings there and relocate those and other operations elsewhere.

Greiner, the refuge manager, said that based on sales of other land in the area, Area 400 might go for around $2 million.

“Not only do we not have the funds for that sort of acquisition, she said, “but we’re questioning the logic. It’s already owned by the United States of America.”

The U.S. Office of Management and Budget is to decide by Jan. 27 whether to approve the public building board’s recommendations for the NASA tract and other properties.

Maryland Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen and four of the state’s congressmen — including Rep. Steny Hoyer, the House Majority leader whose district includes Goddard — wrote to the acting head of the OMB on Jan. 20 urging the transfer of Area 400 to the Fish and Wildlife Service “in the most expedient manner possible.” They noted that conserved land helps keep pollutants out of waters that ultimately flow to the Chesapeake Bay.

In lieu of going ahead with a sale, advocates say, the OMB could opt to approve the transfer without requiring the wildlife service to pay for it, or it could hold off making any decision.

Whatever happens, Dunn said, “This land should not be sold on the open market and put in the hands of developers.”

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By Timothy B. Wheeler
Bay Journal

The Conowingo Dam controversy isn’t settled just yet.

Environmental groups and some rural Maryland officials are calling on federal regulators to reject the deal that the state has reached with the owner of the Conowingo Dam to address the harm the hydropower facility has caused to the Susquehanna River and the Chesapeake Bay. Spurred by that opposition, a bipartisan group of state lawmakers is making a bid to block the agreement through legislation.

Nearly 60 comments, the vast majority critical, have been filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission concerning the dam relicensing agreement announced in late October between the Maryland Department of the Environment and Exelon Corp. Along with a petition bearing more than 600 names, they argue that the settlement falls far short of remedying the ecological harm the dam has caused in the lower Susquehanna River and Upper Bay.

According to MDE and-Exelon announcements, the company pledged to spend more than $200 million over the next 50 years on projects intended to rebuild eel, mussel and migratory fish populations in the Susquehanna and to reduce nutrient and sediment pollution flowing into the Upper Bay.

But the Nature Conservancy, Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Waterkeepers Chesapeake have filed extensive critiques of the settlement, saying that’s nowhere near enough. So did the Clean Chesapeake Coalition, a group representing local elected officials in five Eastern Shore counties, which has long argued that the dam is a major unaddressed cause of the Bay’s woes.

Also writing in were dozens of individuals, most of whose comments were form letters, though many appended personal pleas.

The critics argue that the MDE, in its agreement with Exelon, has abdicated its legal authority and responsibility to protect downstream waters from the hydro facility’s operations. They also contend that the state agency abandoned without explanation many of the conditions it originally imposed when it issued a water quality certification for the relicensing in 2018.

Instead, they say, state officials have settled for much weaker pledges from Exelon of remedial action and financial compensation, which don’t come close to repairing the damage the dam has done and continues to do.

“We recognize that the settlement would reduce some of the project impacts on water quality and the ecosystem,” said Mark Bryer, Chesapeake Bay program director for The Nature Conservancy. “The issue we’re concerned with is whether the settlement mitigates the impacts enough.”

The Bay Foundation, Waterkeepers Chesapeake and Lower Susquehanna Waterkeeper argue that it would violate federal law to accept the settlement. They contend that the agreement imposes “scant” requirements on Exelon to fix the problems the dam has caused. What’s more, they say, many of the things the company has pledged to do are part of a side agreement that won’t be written into Conowingo’s federal operating license, which they say makes them unenforceable.

The Clean Chesapeake Coalition shares many of those concerns. By accepting this deal, the group contends, the state is squandering a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to measurably and cost-effectively improve chances for Bay restoration and lasting water quality improvement.”

The critics are calling on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to send the state and Exelon back to the negotiating table, or to convene a technical conference or some other proceeding to address their complaints about the shortcomings.

“The Susquehanna River is a public resource and should not be sold off to a private company for exclusive use without ensuring that the impacts to the public, waterways, and aquatic life have been properly mitigated,” wrote Lydia Meeks, a social studies teacher at a Queen Anne’s County school, in one of the individual comments filed protesting the deal.

Ecosystem impacts

Arguments over what to do about Conowingo’s ecological impacts have been going on for decades. The 94-foot high dam straddles the lower Susquehanna in Maryland, about 10 miles from the mouth of the Bay. Exelon describes it as the state’s largest source of clean, renewable energy, producing enough electricity to power 165,000 homes.

But since the dam’s completion in 1928, it has effectively blocked many migratory fish from getting upriver to spawn. It’s also impaired the upriver migration of American eels, which in turn has depleted freshwater mussels that once helped filter nutrients and sediments out of the river.

Exelon Corp. agreed to upgrade its fish lifts at the dam to help more migratory American shad and river herring get upriver to spawn. (Bay Journal photo by Dave Harp)

Moreover, it has complicated Bay restoration efforts because the 14-mile reservoir it creates has reached its capacity to trap sediment from upstream sources that flow down the river.

As a result, nutrients and sediment from farm runoff, municipal wastewater and stormwater now flow into the Chesapeake, where they contribute to algae blooms and other water quality woes. Plus, whenever a storm hits or heavy rains fall, as they did in 2018, the surge in river flow scours out sediment and nutrients that have built up behind the dam and flushes them downriver. Those pulses also carry a mass of natural and manmade trash and debris that winds up clogging marinas and littering shores farther down the Bay.

The way in which the river’s flow is harnessed also causes ecological harm. The dam’s retention of water, especially during dry summer months as well as frequent large releases to generate electricity, wind up stranding and killing many fish, studies show. It also impairs habitat for freshwater mussels and other aquatic creatures, according to reports cited by The Nature Conservancy.

Exelon agreed nearly four years ago to upgrade its main fish lift at Conowingo to help more spawning American shad and river herring move upstream. But that deal was contingent on the company getting a new 50-year license to generate electricity there.

That was held up until last year by prolonged closed-door negotiations and public posturing over how much responsibility Exelon bears for the pollution. Environmentalists contended the company could easily afford to spend tens of millions of dollars on cleanup, while the company countered that the dam barely breaks even.

Conditions and counterpoints

Gov. Larry Hogan, meanwhile, declared Conowingo a major unaddressed threat to the cleanup of the Bay — a position advocated by the rural elected officials of the Clean Chesapeake Coalition. He vowed to tackle it and demanded an exploration of dredging the nutrient-laden sediment that has built up behind the dam.

Maryland had leverage because under the federal Clean Water Act, no license could be issued unless the state certified that it would not harm water quality. In early 2018, the MDE issued that certification, under the condition that Exelon either clean up the pollution itself or pay the state $172 million a year to have it done.

Exelon sued shortly thereafter, challenging the legality of the state’s demands. It complained of being forced to shoulder an “unfair burden” for pollution from upriver that the dam did not actually generate.

The state won the early rounds in court, but Exelon also filed a petition with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission arguing that Maryland failed to act within the specified timeframe and forfeited its right to put conditions on the Conowingo license. Then a federal court ruling in another hydropower licensing dispute came along that might support Exelon’s position. Trump administration officials also announced moves to limit states’ authority to use environmental objections to hold up energy projects.

In late October, Maryland and Exelon announced they’d struck what both sides called a comprehensive agreement to address the downstream pollution and other ecological impacts. But it quickly became clear the state had settled for far less than it originally demanded.

The settlement agreement itself showed that less than half of the $200 million Exelon pledged was in cash, with the rest representing the value of facilities or services the company would provide. Actual cash payments would be $61 million over the entire 50-year license, the Waterkeepers argue, with much of that going to species and habitat restoration rather than water quality.

Critics say the agreement also falls short in a couple of other key respects. It doesn’t require Exelon to alter its dam operations enough to prevent harm downriver to fish, freshwater mussels and wildlife.

The Bay Foundation and Waterkeepers also say the deal doesn’t address the impacts to water quality downriver and in the Upper Bay from storms scouring sediment and nutrients from behind the dam.

Federal decision pending

The MDE defends the agreement and urges the federal commission to ignore the critics who say the deal does too little to address the dam’s environmental impacts.

“Many commenters seem to believe it would have been easy for MDE to address those impacts by unilaterally imposing huge environmental mitigation burdens on Exelon through the water quality certification process,” lawyers for the agency wrote, “but in reality, such an approach would have undoubtedly resulted in many years of protracted litigation, during which time the environmental impacts of the dam would have languished without any solutions.

“MDE believes Maryland’s citizens and the Chesapeake Bay are best served by the proposed settlement,” they added, “which allows environmental improvements to begin soon, and not by years of expensive and highly uncertain litigation.”

Exelon, in its response, notes that the settlement has the support of the U.S. Department of Interior and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Pennsylvania state agencies responsible for protecting the environment and fish populations and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission. The company disputed much of the criticism, citing studies done by it and the federal commission staff, and said other claims by critics “are unsupported by the law.”

The company called the agreement reached in October the “last piece of the relicensing puzzle” for Conowingo that it has been pursuing for a decade. Contrary to what critics say, it concluded “there is no compelling reason for additional information, technical conferences, or further proceedings.”

The window to comment on the deal closed Jan. 31. A spokesman for the commission said there is no way to tell when it will rule on the case.

With the deal not yet finalized, its critics hope the state’s lawmakers can act quickly to block it from being approved. Legislation has been introduced in the Maryland General Assembly that, if passed, would prohibit the state from agreeing to waive its authority under federal law to determine whether projects that could impact water quality — such as the Conowingo relicensing — can go forward. The Senate bill has 17 cosponsors from both parties, the House version, 44 sponsors. Hearings on both measures are scheduled for Feb. 19.

“We’re going to have impacts from what happens with this relicensing until 2070, perhaps longer,” said Betsy Nicholas, executive director of Waterkeepers Chesapeake, “so getting it right is really important.”

The Susquehanna River drains 43% of the Bay watershed. Most of its area is upstream of Conowingo Dam, which once trapped 20 percent of the nitrogen and half of the phosphorus from the river. (Bay Journal photo by Dave Harp)

 

This story originally appeared in the Bay Journal and was reprinted with permission.

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