Arctic Bird Poop Loaded With Environmental Poisons

We are all aware that there are numerous toxic elements in our environment that we

come in contact with locally on a consistent basis like toxic heavy metals from amalgam fillings and consumer products like lipsticks and plasticizers from plastic bottles and food storage containers. These are things that we pick up right around us in our homes and in our neighborhoods. But have you ever stopped to think how widespread and how far toxins can travel and the detrimental effect they can have on humans, animals and the environment in general? Toxins are carried on the wind far from their origins, they get into our water ways like rivers and the oceans and end up in animals and sea life.

In a study on birds in the High Arctic it was found that a wide range of toxins including toxic heavy metals like Mercury, Lead, Cadmium and Aluminum was found in their droppings. "The birds are like a funnel and they're concentrating these contaminants," says John Smol, a biologist from Queen's and one of the co-authors of a study on sea birds published in the recent edition of the journal of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. These birds through their contaminated droppings are contaminating the land around their nesting and feeding sites. This is considered a "boomerang effect" The birds, which migrate as far as Antarctica, feed on fish and shellfish that has been contaminated with these toxins and heavy metals. When they return to their nesting grounds they release the toxins back onto the land through their droppings. "Contaminant levels in sediments from 11 ponds from Cape Vera are up to 60 times higher than those found at nearby sites where there are no seabird populations". The birds are helping to "recycle" these toxins and in the process make the land where they live toxic in the process.

Humans are not the only ones that are affected by toxins in their environment, so are other animals and plants. When toxins are released into the environment they can spread far and wide negatively affecting very diverse ecosystems. In trying to clean up our own environment we need to think on a more global basis, what we do here can affect places that we never thought would be impacted by our actions.

by: Patrick Hayes

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