Mark Rasmussen, president of the Buzzards Bay Coalition, stopped by Tabor Academy on Monday night to speak on the current state of Buzzards Bay. He mainly addressed the 2015 State of Buzzards Bay, a report put out by the BBC every two years. In 2015, when the healthiest score possible was a 100, Buzzards Bay scored a 45.
Rasmussen began by recounting the good news.
“We have seen an improvement from the 1980s, when the score was probably a thirty-two and seventy percent of the bay was closed to shellfishing due to pollution, and oil spills occurred with alarming regularity. In 1990, all of New Bedford’s public beaches were closed to water pollution. That is not the case today.”
He went on to note that 32% of the bay had been reopened to shellfishing and New Bedford was one of the healthiest cities due to improved septic systems and water sanitation.
“I know the score sounds bad, but if you think about it, the Chesapeake Bay is scored at a twenty-five. We’re in reasonably good shape because Senator Kennedy made sure Buzzards Bay was designated a National Estuary in 1985 and secured a lot of money to help clean it,” Rasmussen remarked.
He then went on to discuss some of the major challenges that the bay faces today.
“The biggest single threat, to any bay, is nitrogen pollution.” The signs of nitrogen pollution, easily visible in the tri-town area today, are cloudy water, dark, slimy algae, and declining fish and shellfish populations. “A lot of the urban areas like New Bedford have really cut back on nitrogen production,” Rasmussen explained, “because they’ve paid a lot of money for public sewer upgrades. That works in an urban space. The problem areas are now areas undergoing sprawl, where people try and live fairly far apart. They usually have new roads to reach their houses and individual septic tanks. Those places become nitrogen producers instead of nitrogen sinks, and as we lose more forests, we’re losing more nitrogen sinks.”
One of the easiest signals of nitrogen pollution (and frequent stream damming) is the loss of herring in the area. In 1921, 1.85 million herring were counted in the Mattapoisett River. In previous years, visitors to nearby lakes and rivers commented that the water “seemed black with herring.” However in 2015, 42,322 herring were counted in the Mattapoisett River, which is actually up from an all-time low of 11,380 herring in 2011.
A great amount of wetlands and forests have been lost to development. Rochester is the second-largest offender in Buzzards Bay, having lost 34.9% of its wetlands and forests since 1997. It lags only behind Carver, which lost 78.9% of its forests and wetlands in the same time period.
In contrast, Mattapoisett and Marion have lost 15.8% and 9%, respectively, of their forests and wetlands since 1997. Rasmussen believes that some of this loss is due to Rochester and Carver being ‘cranberry country’ where wetland alteration around bogs is often exempt from conservation and wetlands laws.
The other challenge facing the bay is climate change.
“Over the last twenty-five years, the water in the bay has warmed by four degrees,” Rasmussen said. “Species are shifting. Lobsters are leaving for colder shores up in Maine. New species who couldn’t tolerate the colder water are coming in.”
He cited the loss of saltmarshes in the area in the last 10 years, probably due to a mixture of new crab species that actually eat the saltgrass and warmer temperatures affecting hydrogeology.
“It comes back to nitrogen pollution,” said Rasmussen. “A warmer bay is more susceptible to pollution, because warmer water means a longer period of biological activity.”
These problems took more than 100 years to create, Rasmussen reminded the audience, “And fixing them is going to be the work of the next hundred years. The quicker we can address the problems like updating sewer systems, the better off everyone will be.”
The Coalition marked a goal to get Buzzards Bay to a score of 75 by the year 2100.
“We think it’s doable. But,” he warned, “that’s really only if everything goes well and we can address all of these issues. I hate to be grim about it, but I have to stress that.”
By Andrea Ray