Watersheds 101
This is what a watershed is like... a giant ________________ with a drain.
Bathtub
This aquatic plant helps to maintain the health of the Bay by acting as a "natural filter."
Wild rice
Because wild rice lives for only one year and grows back from seeds, it is classified as this type of plant.
Annual
This is the largest estuary in the United States, located right here in Maryland.
Chesapeake Bay
This is the name of the 64,000-square-mile watershed that covers parts of six states and D.C.
Chesapeake Bay Watershed
This is the process plants in the Bay use to turn sunlight into energy; it becomes harder when the water is too muddy.
Photosynthesis
Wild rice is known as a "nursery" habitat because it provides this for young fish and blue crabs.
Shelter/habitat/hiding place
These are the non-living factors of an ecosystem, like salt levels and water temperature, that affect how wild rice grows.
Abiotic
This is the definition of an estuary.
The place where fresh water and salt water meet.
This green plant is overproduced when excess nutrients flow into the Bay, choking the marine animals that live there.
Algae
Because wild rice makes its own food from sunlight, it holds this position in a food web.
Producer
This is the term for a Canada goose that stays in Maryland all year instead of flying north for the summer.
Resident goose
Water (usually from rain) that doesn't soak into the ground and instead flows into drains or streams is called this.
Runoff
This term describes the dirt and sand that washes into a river, making the water cloudy and choking fish.
Sediment
Scientists build these "underwater fences" to keep geese away from young wild rice.
Exclosures
Geese cause this physical problem when they rip rice plants out by the roots, leaving the mud unprotected.
Uprooting
This term describes how "cloudy" or "muddy" the water is; it increases when geese pull up rice roots.
Turbidity
Too much of these "nutrients," often found in fertilizer and animal waste, can cause harmful algal blooms.
If wild rice roots are removed, this process occurs where soil and mud wash away into the river.
Erosion
This river, which flows into the Chesapeake Bay, is a primary location for wild rice restoration in Maryland.
Patuxent River