Highlights
In 2003, a "wet" year after a year of severe drought, DNR's Monitoring and Non-Tidal Assessment Division completed the fourth year of the five year Round Two of the statewide
Maryland Biological Stream Survey (MBSS).
- Eighty-two percent of all landowners who responded to phone or letter permission requests allowed MBSS field crews to sample streams on their properties.
- A total of 219 non-tidal stream sites in 33 of Maryland's 138 watersheds were sampled in 2003.
- Two rare fish species were collected in 2003: pearl dace and flier.
- Channelization, a major habitat problem statewide, was common in the Coastal Plain watersheds.
- Other physical habitat problems documented by the MBSS in Maryland streams during 2003 were severe bank erosion, non-vegetated riparian areas, dominance of non-native invasive
plants in these areas, and low amounts of woody debris and root wads.
- Chemistry measurements taken in 2003 showed that watersheds on the lower Eastern Shore, southern Maryland, and far western Maryland were either acidic or sensitive to acid inputs
from atmospheric deposition, mining, agricultural fertilizers, and leaf tannins.
- Stream concentrations of two nutrients, nitrogen and phosphorous, were highest in Eastern Shore streams.
- Information from the results of stream sampling in 2003, plus data collected in 2000, 2001,2002, and 2004 will be used to support a wide array of management decisions by DNR and
other agencies; e.g., 2000 Chesapeake Bay Agreement, 305(b) report, State water quality standards, Maryland biodiversity, and county stream assessments.
The full document is available here as a 8.4 MB Acrobat PDF file.
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