Clear Water, Chesapeake & Crabs
Clear Water Cures
For a week this Spring, I was working in a boatyard on the Chesapeake Bay. Beneath the beauty of the Bay, I formed a few impressions of issues facing the Chesapeake Waters.The diversity of trees that surround the Bay can help clear its waters. Some have proposed that planting more trees can help clean up the bay. Agricultural runoff that has nitrogen and phosphorus contribute to algae blooms. These use up the oxygen and dead zones result.
Trees are excellent filters. They absorb water through their root systems. Collectively, trees redirect excess pollutant runoff that goes into streams, rivers and finally into the Bay. Planting programs would build a filtering network, and might help restore the health of the bay waters by reducing pollution.
Bay grasses are another piece of the solution. They offer nurseries for young crabs and fish. Research scientists have measured the crab populations in these bay grasses and found 30 times more juvenile blue crabs in areas with grass beds than in bay areas without grasses.
Caption: A male Osprey with a fish paused atop a 100 foot crane.This series of the
Chesapeake Bay was taken with my Sony Cybershot HX-50V. Much smaller than my DSLR, the Sony weighs less than my sandals. For this handheld image of a feeding male osprey, in camera monochrome and a thirty times zoom setting at a 720 mm focal length seemed to work.
Fishing for Crabs, by God's Grace
Men who work the water have their own tight knit culture. At the boat yard where I photographed, members of the Virginia Waterman's Association were busy sanding and painting the hulls of their fishing boats. After the hull of one vessel had dried, a sign painter added the boat name "God's Grace" to the bow of the crab boat, using only freehand and a small brush.
The signature marine animal of the Chesapeake is the blue crab. In Latin its name, callinectes sapidus means “beautiful swimmer” and “savory”. The blue crabs wedge into the bay's mud and sand over the winter. Now, it was still 10 degrees colder than usual for June, and these Bay water temperatures were not ideal for crab movement or for the Virginia watermen whose work depends on fishing for the blue crab.
The Chesapeake fishery was declared a federal disaster in 2008. A recent survey (1) counted the Virginia blue crab numbers. It showed a 50 percent rise in the population of spawning females, perhaps a sign that management methods to conserve adult female crabs are working.
Yet the decline of the Bay’s blue crabs continues. The total population dropped from 765 million in 2012 and only 300 million in 2013. This 50 percent drop will force commercial harvest restrictions. The female population is 147 million. When the price of crab is lowers, watermen put out more traps.The current limits vary from 25 to 50 bushels a day, and price has varied from 100 a bushel to $25.
The heart of the issue seems to be finding ways that water men can work, and support their families, as the Chesapeake Bay waters recover.
Resting from its morning fishing, a great blue heron leans over to stretch, while standing on a dock piling.
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