On the Bay

I unrolled a map of the Chesapeake Bay, pinned it to the wall, and started pressing blue dots throughout it. It’s a big map and takes up the largest wall space I have in my cubicle at Maryland Sea Grant’s College Park office. 

I walked to the dock’s edge from the parking lot to admire the 13-footer, nicknamed the “River Rat.” Soon, it would transport volunteer Tom Guay across the Severn River on a scientific expedition. Read more...

All year long, hundreds of crab legs arrive in the mail at Baltimore’s Columbus Center, home of the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology.

A decade ago, Donald Webster could count the number of oyster farms in the state of Maryland on two hands. 

The water quality of American streams has declined for years, and a leading cause is fertilizer and pesticide runoff from agricultural land. The policy tool most often employed in Maryland to reduce this pollution has been cost sharing, where the state pays farmers to adopt more sustainable farming methods.