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Meet Jack and Carol Kauffman, new residents of the Middle Peninsula of Virginia after moving from their longtime Pennsylvania homes in Montgomery and Berks Counties in 2018. Jack, a retired drug discovery scientist, and Carol, a retired teacher, chose their new home along Bland Creek, a tributary of the York River, because of the access is provided to water and nature. Soon after their move, they became involved with the Friends of the Dragon Run conservation group and met the members of the Virginia Master Naturalists, inspiring them to join the Middle Peninsula Master Naturalists chapter. Through this training, they were introduced to the RiverTrends monitoring project with Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay.
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The Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay hosts an annual watershed-wide cleanup initiative called Project Clean Stream. Project Clean Stream (PCS) is a favorite among staff because of its hands-on efforts and the community’s connection with their local lands and waterways. Not only are volunteers preventing trash from entering waterways, but they are also learning the …
Over one-third of the land in the Chesapeake Bay watershed is either covered by development or agriculture. This poses obstacles to water quality in the form of nutrients, sediments, and other pollutants, but also to terrestrial wildlife that have little or no habitat in these settings. Luckily, both water quality and wildlife habitat issues can …
Sally Claggett experienced the lure of the Chesapeake Bay from a young age. Growing up on what used to be a pristine tributary, the Tred Avon River, she spent her summer days outside and on the water. The Chesapeake Bay looked much different then. Claggett recalls, “the seaweed was so thick, the crabs couldn’t swim. …
Did you know: rain washes chemicals and fertilizers into our streams, rivers, and, ultimately, the Chesapeake Bay. Once in our waterways, these pollutants fuel the growth of excess algae, which clouds the water and threatens the health of fish, crabs, and the entire Chesapeake Bay. One of the easiest ways for us to reduce our …
In 50 years, the Alliance has planted over one million trees! We’re not done yet though, not even close. We have dreams of a heavily forested Chesapeake Bay Watershed, where every town, city, and farm have abundant tree cover. This dream would yield a cleaner Chesapeake Bay and a watershed that is more resilient and …
Planting 500 trees in one day sounds like a daunting task. On your own, you would need to plant one tree every 173 seconds for 24 hours straight. But on this beautiful October morning, with a team of motivated volunteers on the job, we had the final tree in the ground in less than two …
Local elected officials in Pennsylvania share their role in supporting their community parks.
Entering the World of Macroinvertebrates For much of my life, the extent of my knowledge about organisms in streams consisted of the crayfish I would sometimes hunt for, the water spiders that skimmed across the water’s surface, and fish. That finally changed in college as I was searching for a summer internship. As I started …
Nancy Baker and Holly May share their stories in relation to their passion for forestry work. Nancy Baker is a Forest Ecologist, forestland property owner, and Leader of “Women and Their Woods”. Holly May is a former Alliance employee, DCNR Service Forester for Jefferson, Clairon, and Armstrong counties as well as a forestland property owner. …
