On the Eastern Shore, the Army Corps of Engineers and state highway officials announced that they will spend $6 million to remove a dam at Bishopville pond. The removal will add more than 10 miles of stream for fish migrating up the St. Martin River, which runs north of Berlin. The U.S. has more than 77,000 dams over six feet high, only a fraction of which provide electricity. But fewer than 200 have been removed because of the cost …

In Washington, a court settlement last week will require the EPA to study whether the herbicide atrazine is the culprit for endangered Chesapeake Bay sea turtles and other aquatic creatures. Some 70 million pounds of the chemical are applied to fields each year in the United States, and the Natural Resources Defense Council won an agreement for studies that could lead to restrictions …

In West Virginia, where coal companies blow the tops off mountains and the state has long turned a blind eye to environmental abuse, the Department of Environmental Protection is trying to settle for pennies on the dollar several hundred pollution violations incurred by Massey Energy. Reporting from documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws, the Charleston Gazette said Massey could have been fined at least $7.9 million …

Our Creature Feature comes from Pennsylvania, where the specter of “intersex” fish is prompting new efforts to prevent people from flushing pharmaceuticals and other chemicals rather than disposing of them safely. In farm-rich Bucks County, for instance, new regulations require people to use special boxes to get rid of old prescription drugs, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports.

Discovery in the Potomac River several years ago of dual-sex smallmouth bass — fish that produce both sperm and eggs — has fueled research in Pennsylvania and around the country about endocrine disrupters, chemicals that mimic hormones and prompt fish and other creatures to develop both male and female attributes.