Nearly 100 Eastern Shore farmers gathered in Princess Anne recently to discuss the most pressing issues facing their livelihood during Lower Shore Agronomy Day.

At the top of the minds of many farmers was the destruction of 41 confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and 12 cattle barns during the massive round of snowstorms that socked the Mid-Atlantic earlier this month.

CAFOs, also known as concentrated animal feeding operations, are structures holding animals in tight quarters for feeding them, with no vegetations or crops to help naturally absorb their waste.

Factory farms and their CAFOs are an important part of the way farmers and those involved in the poultry industry on the Eastern Shore do their jobs and enact production. However, environmentalists and advocates for the Chesapeake Bay most likely aren’t crying over the damage the storms did to these feeding operations.

In the words of Assateague Coastkeeper Kathy Phillips, who spoke News21 reporters at the University of Maryland last week, the bay would probably be much better off if there were fewer CAFOs in operation in Maryland, because of the pollution associated with  these feeding operations.

Phillips is not alone – other groups, including one in rural Michigan, are spearheading efforts to get rid of CAFOs because of concerns about the pollution they emit.

The Eastern Shore of Maryland, a hotbed for the poultry industry, is populated by chickens versus people at the rate of 1,000-to-1, according to Phillips’s Web site. So the severe damage to 41 chicken houses puts a strain on the production capabilities of an important industry in Maryland.

Yet because of their potential impact large chicken houses can have on water quality, it would be no surprise to see environmental and bay activists favor a slowdown on their repair or reconstruction.