Document Type
Report
Department/Program
Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Publication Date
1996
Abstract
In August 1990 the City of Hampton placed approximately 276,000 cubic yards of sand from a designated borrow site on Thimble Shoal onto Buck:roe Beach for beach restoration. The Buck:roe reserve identified by Kimball et al. (1989) contains large quantities of beach quality material and is located less then 2.5 km offshore of Buck:roe Beach. In early 1989 a small section (330 m by 240 m) located in 5 m of water was delineated and permitted for dredging. This project represents the first instance of permitted, sand-mining activities for beach nourishment in the lower bay. Although the impacts of the project on the benthic community were projected to be low (Kimball et al. 1989), the Commonwealth of Virginia retains an interest in the quality of state-owned bottomlands and, consequently, recognized the need to monitor the recovery of the site to provide information for modeling of similar projects in the future. This report summarizes results of monitoring activities and assesses the impacts on benthic (bottom) communities and resource value.
Keywords
Ocean mining -- Environmental aspects -- Chesapeake Bay (Md. and Va.)
Recommended Citation
Schaffner, L. C., Horvath, M. A., & Hobbs, C. H. (1996) Effects of sand-mining on benthic communities and resource value : Thimble Shoal, Lower Chesapeake Bay. Virginia Institute of Marine Science, William & Mary. https://scholarworks.wm.edu/reports/2477
