At
one time, oysters were so abundant in the Chesapeake Bay that their reefs
defined the major river channels. The reefs extended to near the water surface;
to stray out of the center channel often posed a navigational hazard to ships
sailing up the Bay. Now, after decades of damage to reefs from harvest,
increased disease, falling salinity due to the increased runoff that
accompanies increased impervious surface, and increased sedimentation from
runoff, a significant amount of hard bottom habitat has been lost. The oyster
population in the Bay is less than 1% of what it once was.
Degrading water quality is both a cause
and an effect of the oyster decline, because fewer oysters means less
filtration capacity. But oysters, as hardy as they are, can be killed by
prolonged periods of low dissolved oxygen at the Bay's bottom.
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