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Can mercury in fish be reduced by water level management? Evaluating the effects of water level fluctuation on mercury accumulation in yellow perch (Perca flavescens)

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Abstract

Mercury (Hg) contamination of fisheries is a major concern for resource managers of many temperate lakes. Anthropogenic Hg contamination is largely derived from atmospheric deposition within a lake’s watershed, but its incorporation into the food web is facilitated by bacterial activity in sediments. Temporal variation in Hg content of fish (young-of-year yellow perch) in the regulated lakes of the Rainy–Namakan complex (on the border of the United States and Canada) has been linked to water level (WL) fluctuations, presumably through variation in sediment inundation. As a result, Hg contamination of fish has been linked to international regulations of WL fluctuation. Here we assess the relationship between WL fluctuations and fish Hg content using a 10-year dataset covering six lakes. Within-year WL rise did not appear in strongly supported models of fish Hg, but year-to-year variation in maximum water levels (∆maxWL) was positively associated with fish Hg content. This WL effect varied in magnitude among lakes: In Crane Lake, a 1 m increase in ∆maxWL from the previous year was associated with a 108 ng increase in fish Hg content (per gram wet weight), while the same WL change in Kabetogama was associated with only a 5 ng increase in fish Hg content. In half the lakes sampled here, effect sizes could not be distinguished from zero. Given the persistent and wide-ranging extent of Hg contamination and the large number of regulated waterways, future research is needed to identify the conditions in which WL fluctuations influence fish Hg content.

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Acknowledgments

Thanks to John Sorensen for comments on an earlier version of this manuscript and to Mark Brigham for assistance obtaining Hg and sulfate deposition data. Several anonymous reviewers provided constructive comments that improved the manuscript. Thanks to Robert Kratt for assistance with Fig. 1. Any use of trade, product, or firm names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. U.S. Geological Survey, Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center, La Crosse, WI, USA

    James H. Larson, Brent C. Knights & Brian R. Gray

  2. Voyageurs National Park, International Falls, MN, USA

    Ryan P. Maki

Authors
  1. James H. Larson
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  2. Ryan P. Maki
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  3. Brent C. Knights
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  4. Brian R. Gray
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to James H. Larson.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

10646_2014_1296_MOESM1_ESM.xlsx

S1. Data appendix. Raw data and site descriptions are included in this spreadsheet file. Also included are all parameter estimates from the model selection procedure. Supplementary material 1 (XLSX 613 kb)

10646_2014_1296_MOESM2_ESM.docx

S2–S13. Precision-adjusted, lake × year-level residuals (units = those of YOY perch Hg) from the base model (lake effects) and the AIC best model (lake-specific effects of ∆maxWL) and average summer pH, water temperature and Chl a, Secchi depth measured on-site, annual sulfate deposition and annual Hg deposition. Supplementary material 2 (DOCX 1398 kb)

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Larson, J.H., Maki, R.P., Knights, B.C. et al. Can mercury in fish be reduced by water level management? Evaluating the effects of water level fluctuation on mercury accumulation in yellow perch (Perca flavescens). Ecotoxicology 23, 1555–1563 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-014-1296-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-014-1296-5

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