A survey of farmers was conducted to determine the extent of cost-share and non-costshare
BMP implementation and to evaluate the impact of socio-economic variables of the
adoption of BMPs in Virginia's Chesapeake Bay drainage basin. Farmers in 67 counties
in Virginia were randomly selected using VirGIS land use data and GRASS 4.1. All of
the counties included in the study had at least 90 percent of their total land in the
Chesapeake Bay drainage basin. Surveys were mailed to approximately 5,850 farm
operators and 1,377 responses were returned, with approximately 1,099 estimated to farm
in the Chesapeake Bay basin.
A concern for pollution in the Chesapeake Bay was evident by farmers throughout the
Bay basin, as 80 percent of the respondents indicated being concerned about water
pollution in the Chesapeake Bay. However, only 33 percent believed that their farm
contributed to water quality problems. The most often indicated perceived causes of
pollution were runoff from urban or paved areas, industrial waste or factory discharge,
sewer systems, and litter or garbage.
next to an author's name indicates that all files or directories associated with their ETD are accessible from the Virginia Tech campus network only.
![[VT]](http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/images/ETD-db/restricted.gif)
