Outdoors Maryland; 708

Coming up a long Chesapeake tradition of oystering and oysters is fading. But a monumental effort by dedicated scientists may turn the tide. And see why digging in the dirt may mean a cleaner Bay for other creatures of the Chesapeake as well. Next. On outdoors Marilyn. Beneath the waves of the Chesapeake Bay biological warfare has waged for

years untold millions of oysters have fallen under the attack of two mysterious diseases with science names M.S. sex and dermal. The decline in oysters has had an alarming ripple effect threatening the fisheries economy of the entire state. From seafood processors to restaurants. Centuries of cherished Bay tradition and culture are disappearing. Lost perhaps forever. The livelihoods of watermen who have depended for generations on the harvest of oysters. The loss of the huge filtering capacity of oysters threatens the health of the bay and all species that need clean water to thrive and survive. Dr. Leonard is director of fisheries for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.

Now the year 1950 the oysters in Chesapeake Bay could filter the entire bay in 3.4 days it now takes well over a year. That gives you an idea of the phrase. The population oysters. Along with the decline in harvest. Three generations of the Mr family have built their lives on the harvest of oysters. But now John C. Mister Jr. has had to find another way of life and work. It's amazing you know to put a set of tongs in the water and. You know you make what we call a lick or stir lick and you come up with these beautiful words for. And now. And now we're not doing that. So. It is quite a change of course my grandfather my father and me you know I did it by myself and then it got to a point where. I just couldn't make it. You know and I had to. I had to give it up. It's put people out of work and they just can't depend on it anymore because they can't provide for their family. My song tried it before

generation and. It's just not there. You know in a really really hurts to see that. Because you know it's it's born in you it's Brady and you know when you're a waterman it's nothing like it. Now a new hope caressed the horizon with the launch of a monumental initiative to bring oysters back. It's a bay wide multi pronged approach executed by a dedicated team united by their passion to restore oysters to the bay. The list of members reads like the who's who of scientific expertise including the Corps of Engineers the Environmental Protection Agency the University of Maryland the oyster recovery partnership Maryland Waterman Association and the Department of Natural Resources. Leonard leads the charge. With all these groups working together. We've designed a plan that will extend for the next six years or so. And my goal is to put it into the

Chesapeake Bay. Two billion oysters a year starting in year 2002. When we have two billion oysters in the bay we will be adding those in addition to the naturally spawning populations. So what you will see is a bay populated with oysters are. There filtering capacity is such that you'll have much cleaner water. You'll have more submerged aquatic that's a taste and. You'll have better habitat for all the fin fish and the other species that are in the bay. So overall you have a much healthier Chesapeake Bay. I'm determined to I'm certain we can do it. And I think it's critically important not only to Chesapeake Bay but to other estuaries throughout the world. The multi-step challenge of gearing up to generate hundreds of millions of oysters over the next several years begins at the beginning and experienced oyster hatcheries here new oysters called larva. They are spawned from carefully selected disease resistant roots stuff.

The bird shot this year came from Nanticoke River. We'll see a show or Sabbar. That particular bar was selected because Forster's own that bar grow. To 45 H or sisters without succumbing to disease pressure. Biologist Leon Williams's hatchery manager a deal on shell fish hatchery for the Department of Natural Resources. He supervises the delicate process of spawning and then screening microscopic larvae by size determining their readiness to go on to the next stage of growth. Last year we produced things in excess of 300 million odd larvae. But you know it's hard to say what we'll do until the end of the season. Well I've always been interested in growing things. Any time we can put something by it you know helping Mother Nature along. It's always better for society in general. When orse your larvae

is first on the second day is probably about 35 microns in size and it grows up to about 200 microns before we set it. At 200 microns one million would fit in a teaspoon full when the larvae get to about 180 to 1 Nonny Micron. You see an eye spot and you also look for foot microscopically. What she say that you know you have to. Bring him down and pack and ship them out. The process of spawning and nurturing millions of new larva is repeated throughout the summer at other hatcheries at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental study at Horn point. Biologist Dawn Merritt supervises the spawning of new oysters. Ultimately destined for the chop tank river. The process is we will stimulate the animals with going out a product from a couple animals that we sacrifice. So what we try to trick them into thinking is that sprawling is occurring and then a

chain reaction happens the oysters in their normal pumping activity sense going out a product in the water and then they start to spawn you'll see it in the female when a female sponsor her shelter can open up and show clap and a big pulse of eggs will come out. A male will blow spawn out the side in a steady stream. So it's possible to look at it the spawning behavior and sex animal. Most of the time. And imagine it we're going to see a hundred animals or so in here try we're trying to spawn. Imagine a million animals out on an oyster reef going at the same time which is kind of neat. We will pick the males out and put them in one tub and allow them to spawn out we pick the females and put them in another tub and allow them to spawn out with and mix the proper amount of sperm to ensure proper fertilization. Make a count of the eggs and distribute the fertilized eggs in the tanks for grow out. After a few weeks the newly spawned free swimming oyster larvae are ready to settle down literally to attach themselves to a surface. Once they set their tiny shelves begin to harden.

The Piney Point aquaculture center receives its large buy ready for setting from the deil Island hatchery oysters here are set in the traditional way on the oyster shell or the speck like oysters called spat will grow naturally in clusters. They are called coached oysters. What's new here for the restoration project are micro supplement techniques designed to generate a more marketable oyster. Oysters are set without shelves or with only tiny pieces of ground up show. These are called cultured less oysters. The result a single self-contained oyster. Perfect. Once fully grown for the dining table. Mark Lewis is project manager at Piney Point aquaculture center. He learned oyster aquaculture at hatcheries in his native Australia.

Chesapeake by oyster is. Really quite different to most of the oysters that are consumed in the world. I bet 90 percent of the oysters are there in the world specifically oysters which are grown in hostilities and much of their aquaculture much of Chesapeake Bay has fairly licencees and the oyster itself comes out today. It's it's a quite a fast oyster I think January looks that looks very awesome applied I think compared to what others of us think they are quite different. This is being an exhausting project it really has been that it's been great to contribute to the restoration of voices to speak but I never really knew what the results were going to get. Using different species to what I'm used to and the results of being in Test team that's better than expected. These oysters are being contained within our parlors. They want

to sit on screens. Water flies through the bottom of the screen. It's free or says you can say the water on the outside of the Opera is a greenish color on the inside it's quite clear. The oyster is a filter that over 13 rubbish out of the water and you can see on top of the oysters seven faces and say that feces it will be washed away by this is priceless. Voices can clean up water if you can imagine millions of oysters all doing this and they're going to have quite an impact on the buy. When hatchery grown our shoes have reached half an inch in size they're ready for the final and longest stage of growth. For this. They all returned home to the bay. Most will be used to seed selected natural or human build oyster reefs. Oyster bars in the bay have long been created and then seeded with young small streams.

Now satellites are being used to place and build better reefs. The logistics are monumental in scope. Gary Smith is chief of the mapping and analysis project at the cooperative Oxford lab the Department of Natural Resources. Yeah that's fine you can lay the charge up against that play anywhere you want. We're on board the the RV lately I know a vessel and we're out here today to place artificial reefs on the bottom of Chesapeake Bay. We're in the mouth of the chop shank river off to Cook's point area where we're placing off for reefs of 2000 cubic yards of material which in this material is dredged oyster shell the barges that we have here have approximately the amount of shell that goes down on each of these individual mounts.

OK you want to talk real life. OK Rob. What did they have historically. There are been a lot of repletion efforts with oyster shell on the bottom. This is been going on now. Well half. This century in the past. But usually shell is put down flat on the bottom of barges go around and spread it out over a wide area. The concept here is to provide a large amount of hogs. There is some evidence that getting our oysters off the bottom one reduces the amount of silt Haitian or or sediment coming down the oysters. And secondarily possibly help reduce some of the the disease pressure. So that's what we're

doing we're trying to build these as the shapes that have some similar form to traditional and natural reefs that might have existed in this area at bay in the past. This vessel is specially equipped to transmit and receive satellite signals that accurately map the new reefs location and shape. Its essential information. An oyster reefs lost to the waves can never be seeded. Or harvested. Today the label crew is checking the accuracy of its coordinates for reflate down the day before. Still. Time still within a few yards if things go well we we know where the research going down. For the restoration project Researchers are also using an aqua culture a method of growing oysters out to market size. We're going to be using some different techniques that will cause us to grow

quite quickly we think and get up to Natchitoches before the disease really hits and. This is the longline system here. Culture is from Piney Point are put back into the bay not on reefs but in special mesh bangs that promote constant water flow and keep the oysters off the bottom. Away from predators silt. And hopefully disease. Paul Genevieve she is the area manager for the Patuxent River Site Fisheries Division Department of Natural Resources. Vince Crawley as administrator for the Piney Point aquaculture center looks pretty close to. Put back. Yeah. This is one of three sites we currently have. Located on the. Throughout the bay region. This one's on the Patuxent River we have one on Eastern Bay and the third one is located on the top takeover. Now this is the largest of the three I have approximately 10 million oysters Eastern day and chop tank each have approximately

four to five million after the oysters have been out here for a few months we have to call them out of the bags because there's no room left in the bags. So one bag will turn into four bags and then we put them back on the line. The plan right now is to leave these lines until we have full growth on the oysters to market size because it's basically an experiment to see if we can do that and get in the market size before disease hits them. Today we're getting samples to send up to the lab in Baltimore they're checking for dirty mouth disease that's grown in the oysters here in Texas and throughout the bed every two weeks we'll be doing that throughout the winter months and throughout the duration of the program. When your sister originally brought out from the hatchery you could see they really they almost fall through the five sixteenths bag. Very small. Then after three months of growth. Now this is what we we agreed so far. But into half its size with a great flow we have here at this location

where we're getting our wonderful growth rates. I would say. This is a good 25 to 30 percent larger. Than a natural waist around the bar right now. The long term goal is to involve Waterman in the aqua culture of oysters giving them many more our stews to harvest dependably year after year. Long line systems an opportunity for the waterman to privatized and and have been hands on with the oysters. So they actually control their own destiny with the oysters their furs are the least remote chance that this program will work. All it's it's wonderful it's wonderful that the state is trying. All around it. You know my feeling is that you know all of the old Waterman should join together and do whatever we can do. While my best dream. My best dream would be that they would come back and that are good to go back to work for. That would be my best dream that I could.

Fulfill what I'd really like to do. And that would be to be back out here like my grandfather my father was. Yeah that would be great. Also two or three. Intuitively we understand there's a connection between deep green forests and cool clean water. It's a fact noted as early as 16 0 7 by Jamestown columnist George Percy. The land the road was covered with good lead tall trees with such fresh waters running through the woods as I was almost ravished at the first sight. They're off. Since colonial times though much of the vast forests that blanketed the bay region has been

cut down and replaced by farms houses shopping centers and rows. And the bays once pure waters are under assault from the runoff pollution associated with this development. Sediments and nutrient rich fertilizers from farms as far away as Pennsylvania and New York make their way into the bay through streams and creeks that crisscross the bays drainage basin. But it's not rural pollution alone. DAVID PALMER A forester with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources in urban areas you have grime and oil grease all the things on the road when it rains and it hits on that pavement the water washes all of those pollutants right into the streams. These contaminants make Marilyn's water less healthy for people. Glenn Paige with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay. Some scientists think although it's not yet proven that nutrients are a direct causal relationship to the growth of hysteria which has been shown to have human health problems

pollutants also harm underwater habitat for crabs and fish. We all love crabs and fish and you know recreating in the bay. Well you know without good water quality a lot of that could be gone. But now trees are providing new hope for the Chesapeake Bay. Across Maryland government agencies are working with private individuals citizen groups and communities to plant strips of trees known as far as buffers alongside streams in the Chesapeake Bay watershed in the whole bay cleanup effort and cleaning up the streams buffers play a very important role because they're one of the cheapest easiest ways to clean up the bay. Forest buffers actis pollution filters the poorest leafy floored traps sediments nutrients and chemicals from surface runoff and water moving underground. Bacteria in the soil and leafy litter break down some of the pollutants while trees use the nutrients for their own growth. Buffers are such effective

pollution filters that states in the bay region have committed to a massive tree planting effort. The Chesapeake Bay program has set a goal of two thousand and ten miles by the year 2010 and that's going to be broken up between a number of states that have streams flowing into the bay and Maryland itself hopes to plant 600 miles of riparian forced off from some of those buffers are being established on public land in urban areas. Today we're located along the north west branch which is a tribute a major tributary of the Anacostia River. And what we did today was we brought a group of volunteers in here and established a force buffer. In a matter of just a couple hours. The volunteers were employees of the KPMG peat Marwijk accounting firm who had the day off to do volunteer work. Street planning was a new experience for many of these accountants says Michael Wallace. But a long time since I've been behind the business end of a shovel I'm feeling it. Some volunteered because they understood the link between trees and water

quality. I live in Maryland I live very close to the water and all these trees have a very strong impact on the bag. So here I am doing my part to save my bag. Others wouldn't know a buffer zone from ozone for them. The tree planting offered a lesson every day. Apologize really. I would imagine a lot of the KPMG employees are out here day maybe never have even heard of a buffer zone so they they probably have learned a great deal today with 80 percent of Maryland's land in private ownership. The state is also relying heavily on private landowners like Harford County Farmer John Hay Goodman to accomplish its tree planting goals. When Hagerman switched from crops to cattle he fenced the cattle out of the stream to keep them from stirring up settlement and with some financial help from the state. He planted 3000 trees along the banks to trap runoff from the pasture. I've always considered myself a conservationist and I guess in the background of many farming decisions not only me but others is.

It's impact on the ballet and stream side buffers like these mature they have an impressive ability to protect waterways. DNR Forester my conic he has calculated the pollution reductions from the half mile long buffer installed on another Harford County cattle farm that borders the little gunpowder Falls River. When this forest boffer becomes mature it will prevent 18000 pounds of nitrogen per year from entering into the little gunpowder falls and twenty five hundred pounds of phosphorus a year. So that is a tremendous amount of pollution abated by this project. But the little gunpowder falls project will also achieve another goal. It will make this stream fit for Trump points out. David Warnock president of the Maryland chapter of Trout Unlimited. It's pretty simple. You know we have strong buffers we have more trout those natural reproducer trout live in cold water and stream buffers provide the shade and elimination of the nutrient runoff that makes a better habitat for those

fish and better fishing. Because of buffers many values Maryland on the federal government recently announced stepped up financial incentives to encourage more farmers to plant trees on stream side crops or pasture land. But while the program is voluntary some farmers have reservations about the buffer push on any given farm. There might be other conservation measures that could yield bigger environmental benefits. Farmer Harford County Farm Bureau President Lee McDaniel. Perhaps it's more cost efficient to do things such as cover crops crop and no till practices than it is to put all the money into the the wooded buffer projects. So I think there has to be an analysis made on what gives the best environmental benefit for the cost. If trees don't make sense for all landowners they did for Dr Harold shot. He's a retired veterinarian who owns a 90 acre farm beside the Menai river in

Frederick County. When DNR Forester stopped by to talk with him about planting a strip of trees beside the river shodan asked why stop there instead of just a buffer along the stream. We decided to plant the whole farm in trees and buy thereby improve the quality of the air the quality of the water the moxy and subsequently the bay and also. Help wildlife over the last 10 years shodan has planted 40000 trees and already he can attest to the wildlife benefits of this budding forest. The wife came with me over the farm about two weeks ago and scared the living daylights out of her when a turkey flew up in front of her. So if there are wild turkeys around we have foxes and all varieties of birds. Shotguns grandchildren who will inherit the farm come out on weekends to help with watering and other chores.

But they take time out to see who's using the birdhouses and nesting boxes scattered throughout the farm. The experience has convinced 11 year old Megan McGinnis of the importance of establishing wildlife habitat. What I've really learned is that there's so many different kinds of animals. I mean again we need to see more land for animals and knives much for people to push up in the tree farmers provided an exercise in trusting to a long term vision for his land. He knows he won't live to see the trees to maturity but knowing they're helping the bay and the environment is enough. I see them growing. I see them growing now and. In the wildlife. It's it's it's important. Oh.