An extensive three-year research study of lakes in and around the Grand Portage Indian Reservation in Minnesota has found an abundance of pharmaceuticals, personal care products, hormones, pesticides, and other chemicals in water, lake bottoms and fish. What threat this poses for humans and wildlife will need to be studied further. But the presence of
Every spring, Dr. Carl Isaacson, a professor of environmental studies at Bemidji State University, sends his students out to collect perch from waters across Minnesota. Then, they study an egg yolk protein found in the perch’s’ livers, called vitellogenin, which may provide evidence of endocrine disruption in the state’s aquatic species. Over the past few
In species from alligators to humans, males are being born less frequently than they were before. Environmental experts are examining the link between man-made chemicals and their role as endocrine disruptors. Exposure to phthalates, a common class of petrochemicals, can happen through air, water or food. They are contained in cosmetics, cleaning products and consumer
Imidacloprid is the world’s most popular pesticide, and highly controversial. It belongs to a family of neurotoxins, neonicotinoids, that is increasingly being blamed for colony collapse disorder—the sharp die-off of honeybees that has plagued North America since 2006. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Marine Fisheries Service, the National Audubon Society, and the
Attending the Wisconsin Lakes Partnership convention is an annual event that Aquarius Systems looks forward to every year. We enjoy seeing old friends, meeting new friends; customers, DNR agents and academics. This year’s event featured a speaker that has literally made headlines, although not always in a good way. Dr. Tyrone Hayes of the University