Chesapeake Bay

After the glaciers melted at the end of the last ice age, the continental shelf and then the river valleys of the Susquehanna and James rivers were flooded by rising sea levels.

About 3,000 years ago, the Chesapeake Bay finally looked like what we see today. Native Americans were in the region for perhaps 10,000 years before that, so humans saw the landscape change dramatically.

Chesapeake Geology and Sea Level Rise

Hurricanes

Chesapeake Bay: Avenue for Attack

Chesapeake Bay Water Quality

Pirates

Where is "Tidewater" in Virginia?

Why "Save the Bay"?

Links

• American Society of Civil Engineers - Virginia Section (see "Virginia History And Heritage")
  • The Chesapeake Bay-Bridge Tunnel
• Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay
• Bay Journal
• Bay Program Zeroes in on Sprawl Goals - Bay states must protect 1.1 million more acres to meet goal
• "Cap" Strategies Envision New Approaches to Nutrient Control
• VA creates sanctuary to protect spawning female blue crabs
• Submerged Aquatic Vegetation (SAV) restoration program
• Chesapeake Renewal Project Findings
• Fact Sheets for Chickahominy, Elizabeth, James, Rappahannock, and Shenandoah rivers
• Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission Habitat Management Series
  • HMS #5 - Evaluating Fishing Gear Impacts to Submerged Aquatic Vegetation and Determining Mitigation Strategies (July 2000)
  • HMS #3 - ASMFC Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Policy (June 1997)
  • HMS #1 - Atlantic Coastal Submerged Aquatic Vegetation: A Review of its Ecological Role, Anthropogenic Impacts, State Regulation and Value to Atlantic Coastal Fisheries (April 1997)
• BayLink
• Bay Plain and Piedmont: A Landscape History of the Chesapeake Heartland from 1.3 Billion Years Ago to 2000
• Chesapeake 2000 Project
  • Chesapeake Bay Agreement
  • Chesapeake 2000 Watershed Commitments (CWiC) Taskforce
  • Watershed Profiles
• Chesapeake Bay and Mid-Atlantic from Space (at Towson University)
• Chesapeake Bay Gateways Network
• Chesapeake Bay - Native Americans (from the Mariners' Museum)
• Chesapeake Bay Trust
• Chesapeake Bay Vicinity map
• Chesapeake Bay primer from Bay Link
• Chesapeake Bay Foundation
• Fact sheets
• Sprawl Threatens to Overwhelm Chesapeake Bay Restoration Efforts (Land and the Chesapeake Bay)
• State of the Bay report
• Chesapeake Bay (Lite) of the Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS) to avoid groundings and collisions
• Chesapeake Bay Local Assistance Department
  • Chesapeake Bay population estimates, 1990-2020
• Chesapeake Bay Program
• About the Bay
• Blue Crab
• Capsule History of the Chesapeake Bay
• Chesapeake 2000 (and the now-signed Chesapeake 2000 Bay Agreement)
• Chesapeake Futures
• for Local Governments
• Introduction to an Ecosystem
• Submerged Aquatic Vegetation (SAV)
• Watersheds
• Chesapeake Bay Program (DEQ)
• Chesapeake Bay Watershed (GMU)
• Chesapeake Bay Watershed Map (Maryland Sea Grant - Chesapeake Bay)
• Chesapeake Club ("Save the Crabs ... Then Eat 'Em ")
• Chesapeake Information Management System
• Chesapeake Watershed Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit
• Cruises, Mainly in the Bay of the Chesapeake (1909)
• Environmental Law Institute
• Chesapeake 2000 Tax Policy Study
• Environmental Protection Agency
• Chesapeake Bay Program Office (CBPO)
• Mid-Atlantic Integrated Assessment (MAIA) - an environmental atlas
• Elizabeth River Project
• picture gallery
• current satellite image
• "pet" oysters for water filtering
• estuaries
  • Estuary ecology
  • Estuary-net
  • National Estuaries Day
• Hampton Roads Tidewater
• HamptonRoads.com
• City Guides (with Census2000 data)
• Newcomers Guide
• History of the Dividing Line Betwixt Virginia and North Carolina by William Byrd
• Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin
• Hydrogeologist's Home Page
• Maryland Department of Natural Resources
• National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
• the Chesapeake Bay (in Geomorphology From Space)
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
• Case Study - Chesapeake Bay and Maryland (after the South Florida and Puget Sound studies in the State of the Coast report)
• Chesapeake Bay Office
• National Estuarine Research Reserve System
• Chesapeake Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve
• National Park Service
• Chesapeake Bay Special Resource Study
• National Park Service Cooperative Ecosystem Study Units
• Chesapeake Bay
• North Atlantic
• Old Dominion University
• Economic Forecasting Project
• State of the Region Reports
• Pesticides in Chesapeake Bay
• Pilot Online
  • Flawed Law Fails the Chesapeake Bay
  • Peninsula Projects
• University of Maryland:
• Coastal Marsh Project (including Virginia maps)
• Mid-Atlantic Regional Earth Science Applications Center (RESAC)
• Wetlands Mapping and Monitoring in the Mid-Atlantic Region
• US Geological Survey
• activities in the Chesapeake Bay region
• Chesapeake Bay Habitat Criteria Scores and the Distribution of Submersed Aquatic Vegetation in the Tidal Potomac River and Potomac Estuary, 1983-1997
• Chesapeake Bay: Measuring Pollution Reduction
• Chesapeake Bay River Input Monitoring Program
• nine (9) major rivers
• water chemistry
• Ecosystem Trends and Response: Chesapeake Bay
• Effect of Climate Variability and Human Activities on Chesapeake Bay and the Implications for Ecosystem Restoration
• Chesapeake Bay River Input Monitoring Program: Bay-Related Publications
  • Factors Affecting Nutrient Trends in Major Rivers of the Chesapeake Bay Watershed (Water Resources Investigations Report 00-4218)
• January 1996 Floods Deliver Large Loads of Nutrients and Sediment to the Chesapeake Bay
• Natural Processes for Managing Nitrate in Ground Water Discharged to Chesapeake Bay and Other Surface Waters: More than Forest Buffers
• Nitrate in streams in the Great Valley carbonate subunit of the Potomac River Basin
• Pesticides in Surface Water of the Mid-Atlantic region
• poster map of watershed
• streamflow entering Chesapeake Bay - total and selected portions of the Bay
• Spatially Referenced Regression Modeling of Nutrient Loading in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed (from SPARROW)
• The Chesapeake Bay: Geologic Product of Rising Sea Level
• Virginia District Real-Time Streamflow Data
• Virginia Coast Reserve Long-Term Ecological Research
• Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR)
• Chesapeake Bay and Tributary Strategies Programs
• James River Tributary Strategy
• Potomac/Shenandoah Watershed
• Rappahannock River Tributary Strategy
• York River Tributary Strategy
• Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ)
  • Chesapeake Bay Program
  • Virginia Coastal Program
  • Virgina's coastal zone ("This zone encompasses 29 counties, 15 cities and 43 towns in Tidewater Virginia and all of the waters therein, and out to, the three mile Territorial Sea boundary, including all of Virginia's Atlantic coast watershed as well as parts of the Chesapeake Bay and Albemarle-Pamlico Sound watersheds.")
  • Polecat Creek Watershed Project (Caroline County)
  • Virginia Oyster Heritage Program
  • Virginia Ground Water Protection Steering Committee
  • groundwater in Virginia's physiographic provinces
  • DRASTIC mapping
  • Water Permits
  
• Virginia Division of Legislative Services
• Chesapeake Bay Restoration Fund Advisory Committee (for "Save the Bay" license plates)
• Virginia Department of Transportation
• Hampton Roads Projects
• Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS)
• Chesapeake Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in Virginia
• CBNERRVA Reserve Sites
• Chesapeake Bay watch
• Physical Sciences projects
• Library
  • Tidal Marsh Inventories and other publications
• Virginia Marine Resources Commission - Management Plan for the Ungranted State Lands in Accomack and Northampton Counties
• WAMU - Metro Connection
• Chesapeake Bay Executive Committee
• Health of the Chesapeake Bay - the "dead water" issue (and Economics in Chincoteague)