Oysters are very important in filtering water in the Chesapeake Bay. One oyster can filter about 50
gallons of water per day, and the Chesapeake Bay has 15 trillion gallons of water. The Chesapeake
Bay has a total of 2.9 million acres, and one acre can store 750,000 oysters. Is there enough area in
the Chesapeake Bay to support enough oysters to filter the entire Bay in one day? What other factors
might contribute to the filtration? Explain in detail.
Dear Mic,
Let's first figure out how many oysters we have in Chesapeake Bay. That would be the number of acres (2,900,000) times the number of oysters per acres (750,000). I'm thinking that we should use scientific notation since the numbers are so large.
Total number of oysters in Chesapeake Bay: (2.9 x 106) x (7.5 x 105) = 2.175 x 1012
The amount of water filtered by these oysters in a day is 50 gallons per oyster. Thus, the total amount of water filtered by all the oysters is the number of oysters (2.175 x 1012) times the amount each can filter (50 gallons).
Total amount of water filtered by all the oysters in Chesapeake Bay in ONE day: (2.175 x 1012)(50) =
1.0875 x 1014
Now, the question is, do the oysters filter all or more of the water in Chesapeake Bay? In other words, how does 1.0875 x 1014 compare with 15 trillion? Let's write 15 trillion in scientific notation. That would be 1.5 x 1013. Thus, the oysters can filter all the water in Chesapeake Bay.
What other factors may contribute to filtration? Perhaps the oysters' diet or the water temperature may affect the amount of water the oysters can filter each day. The cleanliness of the water also could affect the amount of water the oysters can filter each day.
