Oysters’ Impact on Water Quality in the Potomac River Estuary Comment on: Bricker SB, Rice KC and Bricker III OP (2014) From Headwaters to Coast: Influence of Human Activities on Water Quality of the Potomac River Estuary. Aquatic Geochemistry 20:291–323. doi:10.1007/s10498-014-9226-y

摘要

A recent study (Bricker et al. 2014) proposed that oysters can significantly improve water quality in the Potomac River estuary. I contend they cannot, and this conclusion is very important to management practices intending to reduce the loading of Bay waters with the nutrients nitrogen (N) and phosphorus. Frey (1946) states ‘‘…in the late 1800s it [the oyster harvest] averaged approximately 1,600,000 bushels.’’ Given 300 market-sized oysters per bushel, 480 million oysters were harvested annually for a few years. Then, the harvest crashed, and in recent years, it has rarely exceeded 5,000 bushels. Restoration of oyster populations is an unrealistic goal (Mann and Powell 2007).