The Back Bay Story--Up, Down, and Starting to Rebound

Imagine a single fishery accounting for 43 percent of a whole state's bass-fishing citations for an entire year. Sounds preposterous, I know, but that's exactly what happened. In 1980, the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) issued 240 bass citations to Back Bay anglers.

As explained by VDGIF biologist Chad Boyce (pictured right), Back Bay consistently produced more than 200 largemouth citations annually during the late '70s and early '80s. And that says nothing about the additional 22,500 bass reported to have been caught and released each year during the same period.

Check out this typical 1970s 5-bass string belonging to a friend of my friend, Charlie.

Another person who claimed his own piece of the Back Bay glory days' action was none other than Dewey Mullins, the man for whom the Dewey Mullins Memorial Bass Tourney Series is named.

In September 1979, he boated the 13-lb. 3-oz. bass pictured here, which hung on the wall in the West Neck Marina Store while he was manager of the facility.

When word of this bassin' bonanza spread, anglers flocked to Back Bay from all over the countryside. It's estimated that some 46,000 visited between 1978 and 1980, putting about $1,058,000 into area coffers.

Those impressive numbers went in the toilet, though, starting in 1985, when only seven bass citations for Back Bay catches were issued. For the years 1986 and 1987, the totals were equally dismal, with only 13 and five issued, respectively.

As a result, those Back Bay marina-parking lots that had been filled to overflowing days on end in the past became nothing more than ghost lots, and marina owners eventually were forced to shutter their businesses.

So, What Happened?

That's the question many asked early on--and to some degree, still do.

Mitchell Norman (pictured here May 3, 2011, being recognized for his heroic actions in saving the lives of two Nottoway River fishermen), provided an answer. As the then-regional supervisor with the VDGIF fish division penned in an August 1988 Virginia Wildlife magazine article, "The answer to that question can be summed up in just five words: changes in salinity and vegetation."

Following is a digest of his thoughts and findings, as expressed in that 1988 article.

"To fully understand what destroyed the fishing in Back Bay," Norman said, "you have to go back about 25 years and look at how the bay has changed." (To fully appreciate just how much the bay indeed has changed geographically over the years, be sure to compare the series of four maps my friend, Charlie, provided. This first one here is from the year 1916.) Norman pointed out that the fish population there had been a dynamic one, influenced by several environmental factors, including (but not limited to) salinity, turbidity, vegetation, and pollution, as well as commercial and sport angling.

"Of all these, the dominant environmental factor on the fish population (and probably on the entire ecosystem as well) has been salinity," he wrote. "The reason for this is simple: The amount of salt in the water determines the species which will inhabit that water and also their relative abundance."

Norman continued by saying the second most important factor influencing the Back Bay ecosystem was submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV).


1943 Back Bay Map

In 1959, the water in Back Bay essentially was fresh [e.g., less than 2 percent sea strength (SS], and the plant and fish communities followed suit. Submerged aquatic vegetation was fairly abundant, and water clarity was good. Largemouth bass were common in the bay, albeit on the small side, with most in the 12-to-14-inch range. These conditions lasted until March 7, 1962 (Ash Wednesday), when a nor'easter breached the barrier sand dunes and dumped a large volume of seawater into Back Bay.

The salinity immediately jumped from 2 percent to about 11 percent, and with that, for reasons not fully understood, there was a resurgence of SAV. This resurgence, however, was short-lived, and as the water freshened, the brackish-water-adapted plants began to decline. And by 1964, SAV was reported lower in Back Bay than it ever had been.


1954 Back Bay Map

No fish kills were reported during this period, but a population sampling in the summer of 1962 showed poorer reproduction of largemouth than data obtained from the previous three years.

Meanwhile, visibility readings in the bay went from 30-40 inches in 1973 to 20-30 inches in 1978, and it stayed in that range until 1980, when the water clarity started a steady decline to a reading of less than 8 inches in 1987. This decline was attributed to changes in the abundance of rooted, aquatic plants.

The amount of SAV increased progressively each year from only a trace amount in 1966 to 88 percent in 1973, then became variable and declined slightly until 1980. That year, the amount of vegetation fell to 50 percent, and by 1983, it was at 14 percent. A year later, the SAV stood at only 8 percent.

Following the Ash Wednesday 1962 storm, the barrier dunes were built up to keep ocean waves from overlapping into Back Bay. And in 1965, the City of Virginia Beach began pumping in seawater, which they hoped would clear up the water and allow SAV to take root and grow.


1986 Back Bay Map

The following year, Eurasian water milfoil was found in Back Bay. No surprise there, though, considering the plant had been in Currituck Sound for several years. Everyone knew it was just a matter of time before this oft considered nuisance plant spread north into the bay. By 1973, it covered about 88 percent of the area.

From 1965 to 1974, the salinity in the bay was erratic, averaging no more than about 8 percent SS. Then it began falling and continued doing so until freshwater conditions returned. The salinity remained low until late 1978, when a new and larger pump was installed to deliver seawater into Back Bay. From that time through 1986, the salinity level generally remained uniform, with some notable exception periods.

"What was once a superb fishery and a haven for waterfowl," said Norman, "has suffered from changes that has turned its once clear waters into turbid ones and destroyed its abundant vegetation. There is still hope for the bay, though, biologists believe, if action is taken," he concluded.


This 2013 underwater photo of the entrance to Beggars Creek
by Charlie shows plenty of grass and clarity down to 3 feet. A
lot less grass was found here in 2014. However, biologist
Chad Boyce said the far north end of the bay has much better
grass.

That action started with the VDGIF-recommended cessation of saltwater pumping into the bay in 1987, after much controversy over its ability to clarify the turbid water. While that pumping, as noted by the Back Bay Restoration Foundation (BBRF), once had been thought to stimulate vegetation growth, it actually had created a much more saline environment--one in which bass and many other freshwater species could not reproduce successfully. As a result, the bay's population of largemouth bass, bluegill and crappie that once had numbered in the millions was replaced, in large part, by brackish-water fish, such as spot, croaker and menhaden.

The Picture Is Improving

The 2013 stocking in progress.

Good news can be found, though, as evidenced by a BBRF article I discovered online. According to that article, "Over the past 10 years or so, the vegetation in the bay has begun to return to its previous state. While still far from the thick grass mats that once covered the bay, the vegetation is coming back. With the return of vegetation, the fishing also is starting to heat back up. The largemouth bass, which for the past 30 years only inhabited the creeks around the bay, are beginning to move back out into the main body.

A different shot of the 2013 stocking.

Leading the VDGIF charge to return the Back Bay fishery to its previous glory is regional biologist Boyce. He oversaw a 2009 test stocking of 75,000 fingerling largemouth bass to see how the stocked fish would survive over winter and against the predatory fish in the bay. Based on its success, a full-scale stocking of 125,000 fingerlings, about 2-3 inches in size, was done at various sites around the bay in 2012. Another 125,000 were added in both 2013 and 2014.

Said the BBRF, "These fish are monitored every year, and the numbers are promising. The number of fish in the bay is increasing, and there are signs of good natural reproduction in the system, supplemented with the stocked fish. We are hoping that these trends continue to grow in coming years."

It seems a pretty safe bet that if the bay's big-fish numbers of the late '70s and '80s ever do return, so will the hordes of anglers looking for a chance to feel one or more of those 8- or 10-pounders on the other end of their line.

I cannot take full credit for this story because, in all honesty, it's the brainchild of my good friend, Charlie. We were commiserating via email the other day about how this weather has been cramping our fishing style when Charlie broached the idea of this article as a way of taking my mind off that unhappy thought and getting it on something new for the blog. He provided all the Back Bay maps used here, as well as some of the photos, and for that, I'm more than a little grateful. He also agreed to review my draft and help me retain some degree of credibility, which is always appreciated. Thanks, Charlie. I also must pay my thanks to both Virginia Wildlife magazine and Mitchell Norman for all the info I used from their August 1988 article to help produce this blog post.