PARENT SESSION
PS21 - POPs: Organisms & Atmospheric Transport
Sunday, 17 November 2002
8:00 AM to 6:30 PM
Exhibit Hall
(P203) Comparing persistent pollutants in eggs from two Alaskan seabird species.
Vander Pol, Stacy*,1,2, Becker, Paul2, Kucklick, John2, Christopher, Steven2, Pugh, Rebecca2, Roseneau, David3, York, Geoff4, Simac, Kristin4, 1 College of Charleston, Charleston, SC2 NIST, Hollings Marine Laboratory, Charleston, SC3 USFWS, Homer, AK4 USGS/BRD, Anchorage, AK
ABSTRACT- In 1999, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, US Geological Survey, and National Institute of Standards and Technology implemented the 100-year-long Seabird Tissue Archival and Monitoring Project (STAMP). STAMP was established to monitor long-term trends in environmental pollutants by collecting, cryogenically banking, and analyzing Alaskan colonial seabird tissues. Through 2001, 111 eggs from 3 species have been archived from 6 nesting locations. Egg contents were cryohomogenized, and aliquots earmarked for analysis of persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic pollutants (PBTs) were extracted by pressurized fluid extraction, cleaned up with size exclusion and aminopropylsilane LC methods, and analyzed by gas chromatography (GC)–electron capture detector (ECD) or GC–mass spectrometry (MS). Mercury was determined in the eggs using isotope dilution cold vapor inductively coupled plasma (ID–CV–ICP)–MS. Significant differences in contaminants were observed between eggs of common murres (Uria aalge) and thick-billed murres (U. lomvia) from the same location. At Bogoslof Island, the mean (SD) lipid corrected, wet mass concentrations for 4,4′–DDE were 1030 ng/g (250 ng/g) and 712 ng/g (140 ng/g; t17 = 3.54, p = 0.0026) for these species′ eggs, respectively. The concentration difference between murre species may be due to differences in diving depth, food consumption, and/or wintering locations. Concentrations of PBTs in Alaskan murre eggs were generally lower than values reported from Scandinavia and Eastern Canada. Mercury content in common murre eggs from St. George Island was 26.0 ng/g (8.1 ng/g; the EPA′s action limit is 500 ng/g). Mercury measurements on thick-billed murre eggs are in progress to enable species comparisons.
Key words: birds, contaminant, Alaska, biomonitoring