The Poultry Industry's Threat to the Chesapeake

There are hotspots along the Broiler Belt with even greater concentrations of poultry operations. Nowhere has the problem of managing broiler manure waste and its associated pollution become more evident than in parts of Maryland and Delaware, known as the Delmarva Peninsula. This sliver of land produces 500 million broilers and the 700,000 tons of waste each year (enough to fill the Capitol dome more than 50 times), a significant contributor to the declining health of the Chesapeake Bay.