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The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk

Consumption of fish has well-known human health benefits, though some fish may contain elevated levels of mercury (Hg) that are especially harmful to developing children. Fish length is most often the basis for establishing fishery harvest regulations that determine which fish will ultimately be con...

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Autores principales: Sackett, Dana K., Cope, W. Gregory, Rice, James A., Aday, D. Derek
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3635168/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23388852
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10020638
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author Sackett, Dana K.
Cope, W. Gregory
Rice, James A.
Aday, D. Derek
author_facet Sackett, Dana K.
Cope, W. Gregory
Rice, James A.
Aday, D. Derek
author_sort Sackett, Dana K.
collection PubMed
description Consumption of fish has well-known human health benefits, though some fish may contain elevated levels of mercury (Hg) that are especially harmful to developing children. Fish length is most often the basis for establishing fishery harvest regulations that determine which fish will ultimately be consumed by humans. It is, therefore, essential to quantify the relationship between fish length and Hg accumulation in regard to harvest regulations for effective fishery and public health policy. We examined this relationship for three sportfish from six lakes across North Carolina, USA. Bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus) had the lowest Hg levels and only the very largest fish in the most contaminated site exceeded the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Hg screening level. Black crappie (Pomoxis nigromaculatus) had an intermediate level of Hg and larger individuals exceeded the USEPA screening level; however, they tended not to exceed this level before reaching the harvest length limit. Largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) exceeded the USEPA screening level at sizes below the fishery length limit in two lakes, leaving only higher risk fish for anglers to harvest and consume. Removing the effects of fish age and trophic position, we found strong positive correlations between Hg and fish length for largemouth bass and black crappie. We suggest public health officials and wildlife managers collaborate to structure fishery regulations and length-based fish consumption advisories that protect consumers from Hg exposure and communicate the relative risk of fish consumption.
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spelling pubmed-36351682013-05-02 The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk Sackett, Dana K. Cope, W. Gregory Rice, James A. Aday, D. Derek Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Consumption of fish has well-known human health benefits, though some fish may contain elevated levels of mercury (Hg) that are especially harmful to developing children. Fish length is most often the basis for establishing fishery harvest regulations that determine which fish will ultimately be consumed by humans. It is, therefore, essential to quantify the relationship between fish length and Hg accumulation in regard to harvest regulations for effective fishery and public health policy. We examined this relationship for three sportfish from six lakes across North Carolina, USA. Bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus) had the lowest Hg levels and only the very largest fish in the most contaminated site exceeded the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Hg screening level. Black crappie (Pomoxis nigromaculatus) had an intermediate level of Hg and larger individuals exceeded the USEPA screening level; however, they tended not to exceed this level before reaching the harvest length limit. Largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) exceeded the USEPA screening level at sizes below the fishery length limit in two lakes, leaving only higher risk fish for anglers to harvest and consume. Removing the effects of fish age and trophic position, we found strong positive correlations between Hg and fish length for largemouth bass and black crappie. We suggest public health officials and wildlife managers collaborate to structure fishery regulations and length-based fish consumption advisories that protect consumers from Hg exposure and communicate the relative risk of fish consumption. MDPI 2013-02-06 2013-02 /pmc/articles/PMC3635168/ /pubmed/23388852 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10020638 Text en © 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Sackett, Dana K.
Cope, W. Gregory
Rice, James A.
Aday, D. Derek
The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title_full The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title_fullStr The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title_full_unstemmed The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title_short The Influence of Fish Length on Tissue Mercury Dynamics: Implications for Natural Resource Management and Human Health Risk
title_sort influence of fish length on tissue mercury dynamics: implications for natural resource management and human health risk
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3635168/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23388852
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10020638
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