Emeritus professors Dr. Michael Fenster and Dr. Barry Knisley have remained busy in retirement, continuing longitudinal research with environmental studies and biology professor Dr. Charles Gowan on projects aimed at saving the beaches of, and species at risk of extinction in, the Chesapeake Bay.

The work captured on their new website builds on work completed by RMC students during the spring 2023 semester, during which RMC’s Environmental Problem Solving course partnered with professionals from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). The students—taught by Fenster and Gowan and serving the USFWS as a client—identified worrisome trends of narrowing and disappearing Chesapeake Bay beaches corresponding to a decline in population of a federally threatened species, the Northeastern beach tiger beetle. In response to diminishing beaches, Chesapeake Bay coastal property owners have increased the installation of engineered structures made of concrete, large boulders (rip rap), wood, and steel designed to protect and armor coasts.

Given these trends, Fenster, a coastal geologist, and Knisley, an entomologist and tiger beetle expert, secured a National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) grant to assess the impact of those structures on Chesapeake Bay beaches and the tiger beetles. Analyses of Google Earth aerial photographs revealed some answers thanks to the help of Gowan, a quantitative biologist. Some of their findings and a host of other information about sea-level changes, storms, shore protection, and the beetles can be found on a website developed as part of their NFWF grant and called “Protecting Chesapeake Bay’s Disappearing Beaches” at www.chesapeakebay-beaches.com.

“While I wish I had better news, one of the lessons you can learn from this website is that engineering structures are at best only temporary solutions at saving the beaches and the beetle,” said Fenster.

Coastal property owners and others who love beaches are encouraged to learn more about these issues and ways to make informed decisions about shore protection at this website.