Anglers who catch the most different species of fish in the unique Rod and Reef Slam Fishing Tournament can win a grand prize worth up to $1,400 in Under Armour fishing apparel and All Tackle gift certificates while division winners receive other exciting prizes.

The tournament takes place from Oct. 9 to 17 and registration remains open. The entry cost is $25. Today, tournament organizers Coastal Conservation Association Maryland, Chesapeake Oyster Alliance, and Chesapeake Bay Foundation are announcing the following prize packages for the tournament:

Overall Grand Prize

• $300 All Tackle gift certificate; Under Armour Apparel Kit that includes footwear, bottoms, shirt, and fleece or outerwear with a retail value of about $1,400; and a Coastal Conservation Association MD soft-body Engel backpack cooler.

Powerboat Division

• First Place– $200 All Tackle gift certificate and Under Armour shirt and fleece or outerwear with a retail value up to $150.
• Second Place – $125 All Tackle gift certificate and an Under Armour top.
• Third Place– $75 All Tackle gift certificate and an Under Armour hat.

Kayak Division

• First Place– $200 All Tackle gift certificate and Under Armour shirt and fleece or outerwear with a retail value up to $150.
• Second Place – $125 All Tackle gift certificate and an Under Armour top.
• Third Place– $75 All Tackle gift certificate and an Under Armour hat.

Youth Division

• First Place– $100 All Tackle gift certificate, Chesapeake Bay Foundation or Coastal Conservation Association hat, and an Under Armour shirt and fleece or outerwear with a retail value up to $150.
• Second Place– $75 All Tackle gift certificate, Chesapeake Bay Foundation or Coastal Conservation Association shirt, and an Under Armour shirt.
• Third Place– $50 All Tackle gift certificate, Under Armour hat, and Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Coastal Conservation Association stickers.

Invasive Species Division

• 50-quart Engel hard side cooler with an estimated value of $300 and an Under Armour shirt and fleece or outerwear with an estimated value of $150.

All winners will also receive a 40 percent off Under Armour apparel coupon.

The contest is designed to highlight the diversity of fish that surround oyster reefs. To do that, anglers will fish in areas where oyster reefs have been restored in Maryland. Anglers will use the iAngler Tournament app to document their catches and fishing locations.

During the past two centuries, Maryland has lost nearly all its oyster reef habitat due to overfishing, pollution, and disease. The loss of reef habitat has corresponded with less fish that frequent oyster reefs, such as sheepshead, black sea bass, and tautog. However, ongoing oyster reef restoration throughout the Bay is showing signs of success and the potential to lure more of these types of fish back into Maryland waters. Oysters are also valuable in the Bay for their natural filtering abilities. An adult oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water per day.

All anglers who register will also be entered into the new invasive species division this year. The person who catches the longest 3-fish stringer of blue catfish, flathead catfish or Northern snakehead will be declared the winner of that division.

Anglers can pick fishing locations ranging from the large-scale restoration tributaries on the Eastern Shore such as Harris Creek, the Little Choptank River, and the Tred Avon River to smaller Western shore restoration sites, including those in the South, Severn and Magothy rivers around Annapolis. There are more than 100 reefs to fish in the tournament that can be found using the tournament’s interactive map.

Winners in previous Rod and Reef Slam tournaments have caught more than a dozen different species including white perch, spot, toadfish, drum, blue crabs, rockfish, and bluefish.

A live online awards ceremony will take place to announce the winners.

Anglers interested in participating can register on the CBF website. More information about the tournament is on the iAngler Tournament page.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation raised concerns about Bay restoration efforts following the August dead zone report. The report, from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and Old Dominion University, found that dissolved oxygen conditions in Maryland and Virginia were worse than average this August following two better-than average months. The report attributed the increased size of the dead zone to significantly warmer than average temperatures, lower-than-average wind speeds, and greater-than-average precipitation.

The Bay’s living resources, including fish, crabs, and oysters, require healthy levels of oxygen to survive. For example, Atlantic sturgeon, a federally endangered species, require 5 mg/l of dissolved oxygen throughout their range.  An expanding dead zone may curtail recovery efforts for this ancient fish.

“Warmer waters and greater precipitation, both hallmarks of climate change, are a growing threat to the Bay and its living resources,” said CBF’s Maryland Senior Scientist Doug Myers. “Combined with declines in both the number of crabs and acreage of Bay grasses, it is clear that we must significantly ramp up efforts to reduce pollution and combat climate change.”

Time is running out for the watershed states to adopt the Bay restoration practices and policies they committed to in the Chesapeake Clean Water Blueprint. While Maryland and Virginia have plans to achieve the 2025 goal, additional funding and implementation are critical. Pennsylvania’s plan, however, is sorely deficient and the Commonwealth needs to increase spending by more than $300 million dollars annually to implement a plan that falls short of achieving Pennsylvania’s clean water commitments.

These plans require farmers, primarily in Pennsylvania, to achieve 80 percent of the remaining pollution reduction necessary by the 2025 deadline. That means that farmers will have to significantly increase the use of conservation practices.

Conservation practices, such as planting forested buffers and rotating where livestock graze, are among the most cost-effective ways to reduce pollution from agriculture. The same practices also help mitigate climate change by sequestering carbon as well as boost local economies by creating jobs and generating business in the community.

Achieving the Blueprint goals will require more than just conservation funding. All the federal partners must step up to the plate. To date, EPA has failed to meet its Clean Water Act responsibilities by refusing to hold Pennsylvania, and to a lesser extent New York, accountable for failure to develop plans that meet the Blueprint requirements.

More than a year ago, CBF and its partners Anne Arundel County, The Maryland Waterman’s Association, Robert Whitescarver and Jeanne Hoffman, and the State Attorneys General for Delaware, Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Virginia filed suit in federal court.  To date that litigation continues, and EPA has not taken action.

“The good news is that CBF is working with a broad range of partners to increase conservation funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In addition, partners are working to put in place a program in Pennsylvania that would, for the first time, provide significant state funding for conservation practices,” said Alison Prost, CBF Vice President for Environmental Protection and Restoration. “The bad news is that without EPA leadership to hold the states accountable, and additional conservation funding, the Blueprint will be just another failed effort to save the Bay.”

Anglers cast lines in the Chesapeake Bay in northern Maryland.

The Rod and Reef Slam Fishing Tournament returns for its fourth year in Maryland waters this fall from Oct. 9 to Oct. 17. 

In this unique fishing tournament, anglers who catch the most different species of finfish can win gift cards and prizes worth up to $300. The family-friendly tournament includes powerboat, kayak, and youth divisions.  The entry cost is $25 and all entrants receive a shirt if registered before Oct. 1. 

The contest is designed to highlight the diversity of fish that surround oyster reefs. To do that, anglers will fish in areas where oyster reefs have been restored in Maryland. Anglers will use the iAngler app to document their catches and fishing locations.  

Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Coastal Conservation Association Maryland are organizing the contest. 

“We’re hoping to demonstrate the value of oyster reef restoration through this tournament,” said Allison Colden, CBF’s Maryland Senior Fisheries Scientist. “Oyster reefs provide habitat to a wide range of Chesapeake Bay marine life. The reefs are important to dozens of types of fish, which hunt for food and use the space between oyster clumps for protection. The reefs are ideal for recreational anglers to target different fish species.” 

A contestant in the 2017 Rod and Reef Slam Tournament holds up a toadfish caught while fishing over an oyster reef. Credit: Will Parson/ Chesapeake Bay Program

During the past two centuries, Maryland has lost nearly all its oyster reef habitat due to overfishing, pollution, and disease. The loss of reef habitat has corresponded with less fish that frequent oyster reefs, such as sheepshead, black sea bass, and tautog. However, ongoing oyster reef restoration throughout the Bay is showing signs of success and the potential to lure more of these types of fish back into Maryland waters. Oysters are also valuable in the Bay for their natural filtering abilities. An adult oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water per day. 

“If we want more fish in the Chesapeake Bay, we need more oyster reefs,” said David Sikorski, Executive Director of Coastal Conservation Association Maryland, which works to protect the state’s marine resources. “For years now, CBF and CCA have worked together to advocate for and undertake reef restoration. During the past decade hundreds of acres of Bay bottom have been restored. Fishing in this tournament is a way for us to enjoy that progress and gather information about the types of fish gathering at rebuilt reefs.” 

All anglers who register will also be entered into the new invasive species division this year. The person who catches the longest 3-fish stringer of blue catfish, flathead catfish or Northern snakehead will be declared the winner of that division. 

Anglers can pick fishing locations ranging from the large-scale restoration tributaries on the Eastern Shore such as Harris Creek, the Little Choptank River, and the Tred Avon River to smaller Western shore restoration sites, including those in the South, Severn and Magothy rivers around Annapolis. There are more than 100 reefs to fish in the tournament that can be found using the tournament’s interactive map. 

In previous years, the tournament took place only at oyster reefs on the Eastern Shore. This will be the first year it’s expanded to restoration reefs throughout all of Maryland. 

Winners in previous Rod and Reef Slam tournaments have caught more than a dozen different species including white perch, spot, toadfish, drum, blue crabs, rockfish, and bluefish.  

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, there will be no formal gathering, but a live online awards ceremony will take place to announce the winners. 

Anglers interested in participating can register on the CBF website. More information about the tournament is on the iAngler page.

Photo credit: CBF

Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) educators are excited to welcome teachers and students back to outdoor education programs this fall. The outdoor class program was suspended in March 2020 when the pandemic began.

Since the early 1970s, CBF’s award-winning outdoor education program has guided over one million students from Chesapeake Bay watershed schools to forests, rivers, and on the Bay to teach them about the nation’s largest estuary.

“Our education program’s mantra has always been to ‘learn outside,’ so we’re thrilled to get back on the Bay as well as the watershed’s rivers and trails to teach, learn, and explore with students in person,” said Tom Ackerman, CBF’s Vice President of Education. “We are eager to make up for the opportunities students have missed with us during the last 18 months. However, our priority has always been the health of our participants.”

CBF is taking several steps to protect the health of students and educators as outdoor education programs resume this fall for the first time since the pandemic began.

Photo credit: CBF

This year’s outdoor programs will be different than in previous years due to pandemic precautions. All day trip activities will take place outdoors, where studies have shown the risk of transmitting Covid-19 is much lower compared to indoor activities. Students will be required to undergo a health check 24 hours before attending a day program and wear masks when social distancing isn’t possible, such as on boats. To protect their own health and the health of others, All CBF educators have been vaccinated.

For residential programs, when students stay overnight at CBF facilities such as Smith Islandor the Karen Noonan Center on the Eastern Shore, students and other participants must be vaccinated. At the residential centers, participants will also be required to wear masks when indoors, with exceptions made for eating and sleeping.

In Maryland, CBF provides day trip education programs at the Phillip Merrill Environmental Center and Arthur Sherwood facility in Annapolis as well as out of the Baltimore Harbor. Schools in the Washington, D.C., area have the option of joining the Potomac River program in the nation’s capital.

On these experiences, students perform water quality tests, trawl for fish, examine plankton, and learn about the history and ecology of the Bay, its tributaries, and watershed. Participation in a CBF meaningful watershed educational experience is an important part of schools’ environmental literacy programs.

Studies of outdoor education classes have found students are more engaged and develop important skills such as perseverance, self-efficacy, and leadership through their participation. Students report after learning outside they feel more confident and connected to nature.

Teachers interested in signing their class up for a fall program can visit CBF’s education website to do so. This year’s fall field experiences will take place from late September through early December. Teachers can choose from canoe, boat, or land-based experiences.

CBF Oyster planting vessel Patricia Campbell on its way to seed oysters in the Tred Avon River.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) continued its long-term push to restore oyster reefs in the Chesapeake Bay by adding more than 14 million oysters in Maryland waters during 2020’s pandemic-affected season.

More than 10 million of the oysters were added to the Tred Avon River on the Eastern Shore, where CBF is working under a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to restore oyster reefs at the tributary scale along with other state and federal partners. This effort contributes to the Chesapeake Bay Agreement goal of restoring oyster reefs in 10 tributaries by 2025.

Despite the pandemic limiting CBF staff’s ability to connect with volunteers, CBF’s cadre of oyster gardeners contributed 500,000 adult oysters to the 2020 tally. These oysters were added to Maryland’s portion of the Bay from as far south as the Virginia border to the Baltimore area in the north. The work helps engage citizens with limited access to the Bay and exposes them to this iconic reef-building species they may only be familiar with from eating.

Volunteers also helped CBF collect more than 1,200 bushels of oyster shells, which will be recycled, re-set with oyster larvae and put back into the Bay to grow. In the Bay, oysters naturally produce larvae that attaches to existing oyster shells and grows into larger oysters, which helps build reefs.

CBF Oyster Restoration Manager Karl Willey in front of oysters that were later added to the Tred Avon River – Summer 2020

The oyster restoration figures were down from CBF’s annual average of adding about 25 million oysters to the Bay. This was mostly due to limitations on restoration activities to ensure safety during the pandemic. CBF limited the number of staff working closely on boats as well as how many volunteers could gather for oyster gardening events.

“As soon as we became aware of the pandemic in early March of last year, we took immediate action to change our oyster restoration operations to ensure the safety of staff and volunteers,” said Doug Myers, CBF’s Senior Maryland Scientist. “What we didn’t do is halt the program. Instead, we worked within safety guidelines and continued planting millions of water-filtering oysters in the Bay. We’re so thankful to our dozens of volunteers who were able to assist our efforts during these trying times by helping to pick up and clean recycled shells.”

Chesapeake Oyster Alliance and Large-Scale Restoration Efforts 

CBF’s effort coincided with work by other groups that are also adding more oysters to the Bay. The Chesapeake Oyster Alliance, a coalition of oyster-related businesses, academic institutions and environmental organizations, has now added more than 2 billion oysters to the Bay as it continues its march toward its goal to add 10 billion oysters to the Bay by 2025.

CBF Oyster Restoration Specialist Patrick Beall stands next to one of four trucks used to transport oysters raised by volunteers for planting in Herring Bay in fall 2020. Credit – AJ Metcalf

In 2020, the Alliance and CBF joined forces to help oyster aquaculture operators sell farm-raised oysters directly to consumers. Oyster aquaculture businesses were hit particularly hard by reduced restaurant demand for oysters during the pandemic.

“We were able to help four oyster farmers sell more than 18,000 oysters during oyster pop-up sales hosted throughout Maryland during the summer and fall,” said Tanner Council, Chesapeake Oyster Alliance Manager. “Oyster farming has been one of the great seafood economic success stories during the past decade, with the industry growing by about 24 percent per year in Maryland from 2012 to 2018. We wanted to help any way we could to ensure businesses survive the reduced demand for oysters caused by restaurant closures during the pandemic.”

This past year, CBF also celebrated the completion of oyster restoration work in the Little Choptank River on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, where 358 acres of Bay bottom have now been seeded with 2 billion spat-on-shell oysters. CBF added about 66 million oysters to the Little Choptank during the restoration work, which began in 2015.

The large-scale restoration work is targeted to meet the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement’s goal of restoring oyster populations in at least 10 Bay tributaries by 2025. So far, those efforts have been completed in Maryland’s Harris Creek and Virginia’s Lafayette River and the Eastern Branch of the Elizabeth River, as well as the Little Choptank.

Oyster Innovation 

CBF has been innovating to respond to oysters’ ongoing challenges. In 2020, staff continued monitoring a 700-foot oyster reef ball living shoreline installed in the South River in 2019 in partnership with the Arundel Rivers Federation. The concrete reef balls placed near an eroding shoreline were seeded with spat, or juvenile oysters. Some of those oysters have since grown much larger. CBF is reviewing the project to see if reef balls seeded with oysters could be used in living shorelines elsewhere along the Bay to provide habitat, filter water, and reduce shoreline erosion.  By growing vertically, this nearshore reef could continue to provide shore protection better than bulkheads and other shoreline armoring because the growth can keep pace with sea level rise.

CBF has also been working with engineering firm Northrop Grumman to develop ways to more easily monitor oyster reefs below the often murky water of the Bay. In 2021, CBF and Northrop Grumman plan to deploy new SONAR and acoustic listening devices to help better understand how oysters are faring in the Bay and identify new target reefs for restoration.

Oysters are a keystone species in the Chesapeake Bay. An adult oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water per day, their reefs provide habitat for fish, crabs, and other marine life, and oysters are an important part of the region’s seafood economy. For these reasons, CBF has prioritized the protection and restoration of the Bay’s oyster reefs.

More information about CBF’s oyster-related work can be found in the 2020 Maryland Oyster Annual Report.