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Category Archives: Nature
NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Chesapeake Bay Office is a division of the National Marine Fisheries’ Office of Habitat Conservation, which works to protect and restore coastal and marine habitat at the national level. The Office is also a key collaborator with NOAA’s North Atlantic Regional Team, which integrates NOAA’s program activities to address priorities at both the national and regional scale.
NOAA has been a partner in Chesapeake Bay Program restoration and protection efforts since the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 1984.
Magothy River Beach Water Quality
The Earth 911 web site offers a service to check the Beach Water Quality for Beaches on the Magothy River. Resources also include information on how to keep beaches clean, beach safety, and water conservation.
Posted in Nature, Water
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The Chesapeake Bay Gateways Network
The Chesapeake Bay Gateways Network connects you with the Chesapeake Bay and its rivers through 150 exceptional parks, wildlife refuges, museums, sailing ships, historic communities, trails and more. Gateways are the special places where you can experience the authentic Chesapeake.
Posted in Chesapeake Bay, Nature, Parks
Tagged boating, Chesapeake Bay, museums, sailing ships, trails, wildlife refuges
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Anne Arundel Waterway Restoration Alliance
The AAWRA is an alliance of communities, dredging officials, Chesapeake Bay associations and trusts, and boaters on navigable waters in Anne Arundel County supporting deeper tidal water channels, sediment reclamation, tidal habitats, and natural fisheries.
Posted in Anne Arundel County, Chesapeake Bay, Community Groups, Nature, Water
Tagged boating, Chesapeake Bay, water
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Chesapeake Bay Program
The Chesapeake Bay Program is a unique regional partnership that has led and directed the restoration of the Chesapeake Bay since 1983. The Chesapeake Bay Program partners include the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia; the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission, a tri-state legislative body; the Environmental Protection Agency, representing the federal government; and participating citizen advisory groups.
The Chesapeake Bay was the nation’s first estuary targeted by Congress for restoration and protection. Since the 1980s, Bay Program partners have signed several agreements to reduce pollution and restore the Bay.
Each Bay Program partner agrees to use its own resources to implement projects and activities that advance Bay restoration. The partnership defines its collective actions through formal, voluntary agreements.
Since its formation in the 1980s, the Bay Program has had numerous accomplishments in environmental restoration, science and modeling, and establishing numeric indicators to track progress toward environmental goals.
Posted in Chesapeake Bay, Nature, Water
Tagged Chesapeake Bay, environment, environmental protection agency, pollution, science
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Maryland Critical Area Commission
The Critical Area Act, passed in 1984, was significant and far-reaching, and marked the first time that the State and local governments jointly addressed the impacts of land development on habitat and aquatic resources. The law identified the “Critical Area” as all land within 1,000 feet of the Mean High Water Line of tidal waters or the landward edge of tidal wetlands and all waters of and lands under the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. The law created a statewide Critical Area Commission to oversee the development and implementation of local land use programs directed towards the Critical Area.
The Commission developed criteria that were used by local jurisdictions to develop individual Critical Area programs and amend local comprehensive plans, zoning ordinances, and subdivision regulations. The programs that have subsequently been adopted by local governments are specific and comprehensive. They are designed to address the unique characteristics and needs of each county and municipality and together they represent a comprehensive land use strategy for preserving and protecting Maryland’s most important natural resource, the Chesapeake Bay.
Posted in Chesapeake Bay, Government, Nature, Water
Tagged Chesapeake Bay, critical area, development, zoning
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Severn River Peregrine Falcons
Dan Haas is a a musician, a singer and an avid birder. His site tells a story about a trio of Peregrine Falcons on the Severn River and the musician who spent a lot of time watching them.
Scenic Rivers Land Trust
The Scenic Rivers Land Trust works with landowners and other partners to preserve natural and scenic areas in Anne Arundel County. This work is accomplished though landowner education and holding and facilitating land protection agreements. The as the organization is unique in the Severn, South, Patuxent, Rhode and West River watersheds able to accept small private conservation easements as well as large parcels. A conservation easement is a legal agreement between a landowner and a land trust that permanently protects property through the property deed. The owner determines the amount and type of development that can take place in the future within the conservation easement deed.
The Scenic Rivers Land Trust is a private, non-profit, non-governmental body chartered in 1988 for the purpose of protecting land through voluntary methods such as conservation easements and educating landholders on issues of conservation and stewardship. The Scenic Rivers Land Trust can accept conservation easements within Anne Arundel County, Maryland. Our focus is the Severn, South, Patuxent, Rhode, and West River watersheds. We work cooperatively with the Maryland Environmental Trust (MET) as an authorized MET easement agency. We are also in compliance with the Standards and Practices of the national Land Trust Alliance.
Our vision for Anne Arundel County and its people is a protected network of forests and greenways where streams run clean and wildlife thrive; tidal and non-tidal rivers abound with scenic shorelines; and sufficient acres of permanently protected natural areas exist where rainwater will be absorbed and cleaned by the soil, aquifers will be replenished, trees will clean the air, and rare and endangered species will thrive.
The Chesapeake Bay Trust
The Chesapeake Bay Trust provides grant funding for on-the-ground Chesapeake Bay restoration projects throughout Maryland, reaching thousands of students, organizations and community leaders each year. Since its inception in 1985, the Trust has awarded more than $20 million in grants, funding thousands of projects that have made a measurable impact on improving the Bay’s health and restoring Maryland’s most treasured natural resource.
The Chesapeake Bay Trust is an independent, nonprofit grant-making organization chartered in 1985 by the Maryland General Assembly to engage the public in the protection and restoration of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributary rivers and streams. Funding provided by the Trust sparks on-the-ground change in communities throughout Maryland and works to cultivate a new generation of Bay stewards.
The Trust receives approximately $4 million in contributions annually and reinvests those dollars through a variety of grant programs in community-led projects that reach each of Maryland’s 23 counties and Baltimore City. In its first year, the Trust funded just 10 grants. Since then, through aggressive growth of our expertise, capacity, and funding, the Trust has received over 10,000grant requests, awarding over $30 million to support environmental education and habitat restoration projects that have measurable impacts on the environment and that actively engage citizens in Bay and river restoration efforts.
The Trust’s goal is to increase stewardship through grant programs, special initiatives, and partnerships that support environmental education, on-the-ground restoration, and community engagement activities.
Posted in Chesapeake Bay, Community Groups, Nature, Water
Tagged Chesapeake Bay, rivers
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Chesapeake Biological Laboratory
The Chesapeake Biological Laboratory is a marine research facility of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES). UMCES sister campuses include the Horn Point Laboratory, Cambridge, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, and the Appalachian Laboratory, Frostburg, in the mountains of Western Maryland. UMCES research fleet is located on the CBL Campus.
Founded in 1925, the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory has long been a national leader in fisheries, environmental chemistry and toxicology, and ecosystem science and restoration ecology. The breadth of expertise among our faculty opens the door for research that cuts across the boundaries of traditional scientific disciplines and fosters collaboration with leading researchers within the CBL community and beyond.
Located where the Patuxent River meets the Chesapeake Bay, CBL’s team of faculty and student researchers are developing new scientific approaches to solving environmental management problems facing our nation, region and the world. From the vast Arctic Ocean to the local streams of Calvert County, CBL is constantly pioneering new frontiers in environmental science.
Training and educating the nation’s next generation of environmental scientists is critical to fulfilling the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory’s mission. While CBL focuses on providing graduate level students opportunities to learn from and work with active field researchers, the laboratory also offers programs designed to engage students of all ages.