Blogging on the Bay (Part 1)

An oyster bed at low tide. Notice the thousands of individual oysters encrusted on top of one another. Photo taken by JohnCub, from Wikimedia Commons.

The Chesapeake Bay is home to a wonderful variety of plants and animals. One of the invertebrates that makes a home here is the Eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica.  This bivalve mollusk, which was once abundant in the Bay, has faced many hardships in the recent past. Over-harvesting, poor water quality from over nitrification and pollution, and in increase in sedimentation from runoff has caused populations to decline to less than 2% of their historical numbers. This is a problem for the oysters, and other denizens of the Bay.

Spring Break! Again!

I'm sure that many of you have noticed that my posting here has been intermittent in the last month or so. That is in part because I've been gearing up for another trip with the University of Maryland's Alternative Spring Break program. This time around, me and a group of eager students will be headed to the Chesapeake Bay Foundations headquarters at the Philip Merrill Center for the week to camp out and help clean up the bay! I don't know what my internet situation will be like when we arrive, but I'm going to try to keep active on Twitter via my mobile, posting pictures and info along the way if I can't do it here on the blog. Feel free to keep tabs on us at the official ASB Chesapeake 2011 blog as well.

**UPDATE 30 MARCH**

Photos of the week are starting to flow onto my Flickr account. Check out the set here!

Interweb Science of the Week #10

This week, ISW goes to a website that, like last week's awardee, is primarily aimed at school aged children interested in learning about biology. Ask a Biologist aims to provide the best scientific information to anyone (not just children) interested in learning in the ins and outs of the biological sciences, including paleontology - huzzah! It's a really brilliant concept: go to the website, ask a question, and have a professional scientist answer it. Too easy, right? I know, it's awesome. Lots of questions have already been asked, but there are still plenty more out there. If I was going to ask anyone, it would be this lot.

Coincidentally, ART Evolved is also sponsoring an "Ask a Biologist Initiative" at the request of Dave Hone. They are looking for printable posters and blog icons to be used on their site, so if you want to break out your mad art skills and contribute something in honor of them being awarded with "Interweb Science of the Week", now would be a pretty good time.