60% Of Virginia Is Within The Chesapeake Bay Watershed - That Watershed Lost 50,000 Acres Of Forest Canopy In 7 Years

[hatrack]

Approximately 60% of Virginia is located inside the Chesapeake Bay watershed, and those communities now have access to an updated map that shows precisely how their landscapes are changing over time.

The Chesapeake Bay Program’s land use and land cover change mapping project compares the landscape across three different snapshots in time, offering a detailed view of the watershed up to as recently as 2021. The research shows Virginia has lost nearly 50,000 acres of tree canopy in its portion of the watershed to development over just seven years.

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“The concern from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation is that when the land use changes completely to something other than forest, pasture or agriculture, then you lose the infiltration ability of the land,” said Ann Jurczyk, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s Virginia manager of urban restoration. “Generally, that’s when you have increased storm water runoff and increased heat and the other things that are detrimental to both the people and the critters that live in the Bay,” Jurczyk said.

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Taking these lands into account, data shows the watershed as a whole lost about 177,000 acres of forested extent to development, with Virginia contributing a loss of over 70,000 acres. The research uncovered several emerging threats to tree canopy in Virginia, which include the construction of utility scale solar arrays, warehouses, road expansions and electrical transmission lines. Landscape changes like these are considered permanent, whereas harvesting land for timber and then allowing it to regenerate, an industry that statewide adds over $20 billion to Virginia’s economy annually, is viewed as a temporary change to tree canopy and the forest structure.

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https://virginiamercury.com/2025/09/29/watershed-mapping-project-shows-rapid-loss-of-forests-offers-new-view-of-va-s-changing-landscapes/