The America's Watershed Initiative Report Card project continued with a regional workshop for the Lower Mississippi River Basin, held in Memphis, Tennessee, on March 25-26, 2014. At the workshop, stakeholders and experts from social, economic, and environmental sectors identified easily understood and transparent ways to measure status and trends for the Lower Mississippi River Basin in relation to six broad goals.

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The America's Watershed Initiative Report Card project continued with a regional workshop for the Ohio River Basin, held near Cincinnati, Ohio, on December 12–13, 2013. At the workshop, stakeholders and experts from social, economic, and environmental sectors identified easily understood and transparent ways to measure status and trends for the Ohio River Basin in relation to six broad goals.

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The America's Watershed Initiative Report Card project began with a regional workshop for the Upper Mississippi River Sub-Basin, held in Moline, Illinois on September 11–12, 2013. At the workshop, stakeholders and experts from social, economic, and environmental sectors identified easily understood and transparent ways to measure status and trends for the Upper Mississippi River Sub-Basin in relation to six broad goals.

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Your woods are always changing and adapting as they grow and mature, or regrow after a disturbance. Events like storms, droughts, insect and disease outbreaks, or other stressors can damage trees or slow their growth. A changing climate may make your woods more susceptible to the problems these events can cause.

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The Chesapeake and Atlantic Coastal Bays Trust Fund newsletter describes the factors that affect the water quantity and water quality of stormwater. It features one Best Management Practice, a Regenerative Stormwater Conveyance System, and provides the monitoring results from that case study in Anne Arundel County, Maryland.

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Maryland citizens are blessed with an abundant supply of water. However, many water systems are already stressed during droughts, and infrastructure damage and water contamination occurs during floods. Future population growth will combine with increasingly variable weather patterns to place more communities at risk of property damage, regulatory liabilities and uncertain access to drinking water.

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Risk management is critical in any restoration project. Risks include those associated with climate patterns, such as more intense storms, as well as those associated with land use change, site selection, and design. Addressing these risks in conjunction with ongoing restoration efforts will prepare communities for greater variability and may result in cost savings and reduced risk. Best Management Practices (BMPs) should be sited and designed with climate change impacts in mind.

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Maryland’s extensive aquatic ecosystems range from freshwater swamps and bogs to freshwater rivers and marshes to coastal bays and salt marshes. These ecosystems are influenced by precipitation, temperature, tropical storms, and human activity. Human development and pollution have degraded their natural resilience, leaving them more vulnerable to climate change and extreme events.

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Changes in Maryland's climate system will likely have far-reaching impacts, most notably those associated with rising sea level, increasing temperatures, and changes in precipitation patterns. Acknowledging the increasing likelihood and magnitude of these impacts and their associated risks is necessary to protect both natural and man-made environments for years to come.

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Agriculture is the largest commercial industry in Maryland, employing about 350,000 people, on almost 13,000 farms covering two million acres. With increasing impacts of climate change, water management will become a larger concern, rising temperatures, carbon dioxide, and ozone will increase stress on nearly all crop and livestock species, and pests and diseases, such as soybean rust will likely plague farmers in the future.

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