FAQ

A tributary is a creek, stream or river that flows into a larger body of water. For example, the Susquehanna, Potomac and James rivers are tributaries of the Chesapeake Bay.

The Choptank, James, Nanticoke, Patapsco, Patuxent, Potomac, Rappahannock, Susquehanna and York rivers are just a few of the many rivers that flow into the Chesapeake Bay. These rivers are fed by the hundreds of thousands of streams and creeks that flow through the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

The Chesapeake Bay watershed includes parts of six states – Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia – and the entire District of Columbia.

The Chesapeake Bay watershed spans six states and the District of Columbia. Within this watershed are several large cities, including Cooperstown, N.Y.; Harrisburg, Pa.; Baltimore, Md.; Washington, D.C.; and Norfolk, Richmond and Charlottesville, Va.

Altogether, more than 100,000 streams, creeks and rivers thread through the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

Visit the EPA’s Surf Your Watershed page, where you can enter your zip code to find out what watershed(s) you live in.

A subwatershed is a small watershed contained within the larger Chesapeake Bay watershed. Each of the streams, creeks and rivers in the Bay watershed has its own watershed. For example, the Potomac River watershed is a subwatershed of the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

A watershed is an area of land that drains to a particular river, lake, bay or other body of water.

The Chesapeake Bay watershed stretches across more than 64,000 square miles.