Bay Facts

The surface area of the Bay and its tidal tributaries is approximately 4,480 square miles.

While one-third of watershed residents have volunteered their time or donated their money to a charitable organization, less than two in ten volunteers have done so for an environmental organization.

Salinity is highest at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, where water from the Atlantic Ocean enters.

Eighty-six percent of watershed residents believe if people work together, water pollution can be fixed.

Half of pet owners always pick up after their pet, but one-third of pet owners seldom or never do so. Pet waste contains bacteria that can harm human health and contaminate the water we use for drinking, swimming and fishing.

The Bay itself is about 200 miles long, stretching from Havre de Grace, Maryland, to Virginia Beach, Virginia.

The Chesapeake Bay’s land-to-water ratio is 14:1: the largest of any coastal water body in the world. This is why our actions on land have such a big impact on the Bay’s health.

Forty-six percent of watershed residents never use toxic pesticides in or around their homes. You can evaluate a pesticide’s toxicity to judge the risk in using it, or make your own non-toxic pesticide with garlic, vinegar, cooking oil and other common household items.

At filter feeders, oysters can filter up to 50 gallons of water a day.

The Bay produces about 500 million pounds of seafood per year.

There are nearly 1,800 local governments in the Bay watershed, including towns, cities, counties and townships.

More than 1,800 vessels have met their end in Bay waters, lying broken and battered on the Bay's floor.

The deepest part of the Bay, located southeast of Annapolis near Bloody Point, is called “The Hole” and is 174 feet deep.

The area of the watershed is about 64,000 square miles.

The mouth of the Chesapeake Bay is about 12 miles wide between its northern point near Cape Charles, Virginia, and its southern point close to Cape Henry, Virginia.

There are 6,282,718 acres of accessible green space within the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

The Chesapeake Bay watershed stretches approximately 524 miles from Cooperstown, New York, to Norfolk, Virginia. It includes parts of six states—Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia—and the entire District of Columbia.

The Bay’s width ranges from four miles near Aberdeen, Maryland, to 30 miles near cape Charles, Virginia.