Courts start to hold Big Chicken accountable, when will Maryland?

  By Gerald Winegrad: To paraphrase Shakespeare: Something is rotten in the state of Maryland — and all over the Delmarva Peninsula. And it is so rotten that it is contaminating the air people breathe, the water they drink, and the region’s creeks and the bay. The rot comes from major corporations’ industrialization of chicken…

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Gerald Winegrad: Global warming is real and affecting us now

Global warming is real and presents an existential threat to the Earth and its inhabitants. Human activities are the major causative factor centered on fossil fuel burning and extraction, agricultural operations, and deforestation. Sea level rise caused by global warming is accelerating. Last year tied with 2016 as the warmest year on record. The last…

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Chesapeake Bay cleanup efforts have failed. Radical change is needed

Disturbing elements of CBF’s report card include an F for oyster recovery. This critical Bay keystone species has declined to 1% of historic levels inhibiting its ability to filter-cleanse Bay waters. Underwater grasses scored a D-. Along with oysters, their ecological functions make them the Bay’s Most Valuable Players, helping keep water clear and healthy by absorbing nutrients, trapping sediments, reducing erosion and acidity, adding oxygen, and providing essential habitat for crabs.

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LET’S MAKE ’21 A GREEN NEW YEAR

Trumpian transgressions should be reversed: significant weakening of the Endangered Species Act; emasculation of the 102-year-old Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the bedrock law protecting birds from wanton killings including from oil spills; excluding 45 million acres of freshwater wetlands and streams from protection opening a majority of wetlands and 18% of streams to draining, development, and agricultural operations, affecting drinking water, wildlife especially waterfowl, and flood control; and weakening the 50-year-old critically important National Environmental Policy Act that requires environmental review and public input on major federal projects including highway construction.

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We must save the forest to save the Chesapeake !

Written by Gerald Winegrad, The destruction of the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem began more than 400 years ago with the clearing of forests and later, the filling and draining of wetlands. About 66% of our tidal and freshwater wetlands were destroyed, including thousands of acres drained with federal and state funds to create farmland. The Eastern Shore…

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