Bay Facts

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

The widest point of the Chesapeake Bay measures 35 miles, and is located near the mouth of the Potomac River.

The Chesapeake Bay Program was organized in 1983 to help lead and direct restoration in the Chesapeake Bay.

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.

At 4,863 feet above sea level, Spruce Knob is the highest point in the Chesapeake watershed.

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

The Chesapeake Bay was formed about 10,000 years ago when glaciers melted and flooded the Susquehanna River valley.

The Bay and its tidal tributaries have 11,684 miles of shoreline—more than the entire U.S. west coast.

Major rivers emptying into the Bay include the James, York, Rappahannock, Potomac, Patuxent, Patapsco and Susquehanna from the west and the Pocomoke, Wicomico, Nanticoke, Choptank and Chester from the east.

The Susquehanna River watershed includes nearly 50 thousand miles of rivers, streams and creeks.

Healthy forests can capture more than 85% of the nitrogen that falls onto them from the air.

The 110-mile-long Patuxent River is the longest river to flow exclusively within the borders of Maryland.

Captain John Smith and his men sailed the Chesapeake Bay in a modest wooden boat called a shallop–an open wooden workboat such as a barge, dory, or rowboat that was small enough to row but also had one or two sails.

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.

The Bay is surprisingly shallow. Its average depth, including all tidal tributaries, is about 21 feet. A person who is six feet tall could wade through more than 700,000 acres of the Bay and never get his or her hat wet.

Water temperatures in the Bay fluctuate widely throughout the year, dropping as low as 34 degrees in winter.

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 Chesapeake Bay watershed has 150 major rivers and streams, but contains more than 100,000 smaller tributaries.

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