Factors Affecting Water Quality

Issue: The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) needs to accelerate progress on multiple outcomes to meet deadlines in the Chesapeake Watershed Agreement. The CBP partnership spends about $1.2B annually on activities toward achieving the Watershed Agreement, with a focus on water-quality improvement. Recent funding increases, including the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, provide additional opportunities to...

The Award USGS received a 2022 Blue Pencil & Gold Screen Award, in the category of Technical/Statistical Reports, from the National Association of Government Communications (NAGC) for the U.S. Geological Survey Circular titled Nitrogen in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed—A Century of Change, 1950–2050. Each year the NAGC recognizes products that provide excellence in government communications and the...

Issue: Managing stormwater runoff in developing areas

Issue: As human population has increased, land-use changes have led to increases in nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and sediment into the Bay. The excess nutrients cause algal blooms which contribute to water-quality impairments such as low oxygen or hypoxia (dead zones), and poor water clarity in the Chesapeake Bay. Management efforts to improve water quality focus on dissolved oxygen needed...

Issue: The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) partnership is striving to improve water-quality conditions in the Bay by using a variety of management strategies to reduce nutrient and sediment loads. The partnership uses monitoring results and modeling tools to implement management strategies, relying on the scientific community to synthesize existing information and direct new research to address...

Groundwater discharge zones are important spawning areas for fish because they provide a thermally stable habitat. Research at three streams in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed with areas of focused groundwater discharge revealed that groundwater also is a source of phytoestrogens and herbicides that could result in fish exposure during sensitive life stages.

Issue The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) partnership is striving to improve water-quality conditions in the Bay and its tidal waters. The partnership needs to understand water-quality conditions in different tributaries to help assess the influence of nutrient-reduction practices and progress toward attaining water-quality standards.

Issue: Atmospheric deposition is one of the principal sources of nitrogen to the Chesapeake watershed with implications for patterns of nutrient loading, anoxia, and eutrophication in the Bay.

Scientists determined the risk factors associated with smallmouth bass melanistic skin lesions on smallmouth bass in the Susquehanna and Potomac Rivers, in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. A new virus, which appears to be a member of an emerging viral family, the Adomaviridae, was identified in the lesions. Questions remain about the full characterization of the virus and the role of environmental...

Issue: Trends in nitrogen and phosphorus, and the complex factors affecting their change, provide important insights into the effectiveness of efforts to reduce nutrients from reaching the tidal waters of the Bay. The nutrient reductions are needed to improve water-quality conditions in the tidal waters for fisheries and submerged aquatic vegetation.

Issue: The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) is pursuing restoration efforts to improve habitats and associated water quality for fisheries, both in the watershed and estuary. Excess sediment decreases light in tidal waters for submerged aquatic vegetation, harms oysters, carries contaminants, and impairs stream health throughout the watershed. The CBP is implementing management actions and policies...

Issue: Excessive nitrogen and phosphorus in Chesapeake Bay since the 1950s have contributed to low dissolved oxygen leading to fish kills, and poor water clarity and associated loss of submerged aquatic vegetation. The Chesapeake Bay Program partnership has been working to improve aquatic conditions in the Bay and its tidal tributaries, and streams in the watershed, by reducing inputs of nutrients...