Rich; I have no problen with each of use doing their best to help clean up the bay. I applaude Gary and everyone else for "doing their part".

What I said was, "no individual or group of individuals is going to turn this around".

I would go so far as to say, if you took every recreational angler off the bay. Even this would not clean up the bay. Sediment from upstream would still cover the grasses and oysters killing them. Busineses would still be dumping polution into the bay. Sewage treatment plants would still be allowing thousands of gallons of raw sewage into the bay after heavy rains. Those oysters and menhaden that filter the bay will still be depleated to the point where they are no longer effective.
I could go on, but I hope you see my point. Each of us "should" do his part. However, we must be honest with ourselves and admit we can not clean the bay on our own. We need help on a grand scale.
5th (Marty)

If you really want to do something that will help the bay - push for a moratorium

on oyster harvesting. They filter the bay water and need to be left alone to build back the population. Years ago - oysters filter the entire amount of water in the day in a week.

Now , at roughly 2% of the population , bay water volume really is filtered once a year - at best. Diseases hurt the oysters but now they seem to be immune to the diseases. If we left them alone for 5-10 years - they could build back up and do wonders for cleaning the bay waters.

The Magothy river saw a black mussel population explosion and in just one year - water clarity went from 4-5 inches to 4-5 FEET. Sadly , the mussels died off and sure enough , water clarity went back to inches.

As much as I enjoy eating oysters - I'd gladly give them up to help cleanse the bay waters.

I fully support individual efforts to reduce our impact on the bay, but the things we do are far outweighed by the problems inherent to the bay that are bigger than us. Sounds like Marty and I are on the same page.

Everyone will have to sacrifice something to improve the bay's health, but as with most problems of this scale, somebody will have to sacrifice more than the rest.

Skip might be right about the oysters (Well scientifically speaking I think he's on the money.) So the people sacrificing more would be the oystermen of the bay. I can give up eating oysters easily enough, as much as I love them though. But what are we really willing to give up as an incentive to make the oystermen agree to a moratorium? Tax incentives? State sponsored jobs reconstructing the oyster beds with their now dormant boats?

Research the ORP - Oyster recovery program.

Lot of money already flows to oystersmen. It is more a put / take then a real recovery effort - IMHO. Seems that kind of money should give better results.

Then there are the poachers - raiding the sanctuary areas.

Oysters left alone would help clear up the bay. Then sea grasses could grow - these help even more.

I talk to guys who fished in the early 60's - just 50 years ago. They tell me how clear the water was and grass beds so thick they could not get boats through them in summer time.

While everyone argues / studies what needs to be done - oysters are quietly filtering bay water. Get enough of them out there - water would improve.

Oysters never go on strike, work for free and never call out sick. Hard to bet!..........Gary

I fished the early 60's and most of the 50's. The key was the amount of rain and runoff, just like it is now.

The difference between then and now is the number of people and the effluent that is pumped into the bay. Oysters can't live in a septic tank. They couldn't then, they can't now.

I agree that the runoff is a big part of the problem.

But oysters, when in abundance absolutely could liveand thrive in a polluted bay. There just needs to be enough of them that each one can handle the burden.

I couldn't soak up a bottle of spilled water with one paper towel. But if I had an entire roll, the job would be easy.

Not trying to be smart - oysters can tolerate some nasty / polluted waters.

Certain areas are off limits to harvesting oysters - all the time - due to pollution concerns.

Other oyster beds have been closed for short periods when found to be contaminated by polluted water.

Sad part - sometimes oysters watermen would take them to market :eek:.

Yeah. They tolerate polluted waters, but they don't reproduce.
What happens when Dermo and MSX goes on the upswing again?

Unless the bay is cleaned up, the diseases will find a way to keep the oyster population down.

So are we in a big circle of never seeing any gains?

The oysters can't survive because of disease and pollution and the disease and pollution will stay rampant because there's no oysters to filter the water?

It's a shame people decades ago couldn't foresee this problem. I have a client who used to work at the Coast Guard yard in Curtis Bay. He told me how the ships' maintenance crews used to just dump leftover paints and solvents into the water to get rid of them.:mad:

In the ealy 90's I volunteered on a few cleanups of the Patapsco Valley State Park land along River Rd in Linthicum. People used to dump SO much trash and old tires along there....it was disgusting.