[LINK] "Birth control pill threatens fish populations"

[rfmcdonald]

Aly Thomson's Canadian Press article, hosted by the CBC, notes the inadvertant effects of birth control on fish populations (estrogen from birth control pills in sewage systems).

[Lead researcher Karen Kidd of the University of New Brunswick] said their study set out to build on that research to determine whether the estrogen would affect the fathead minnow's ability to reproduce and whether there were larger effects on the lake's ecosystem.introduced in their habitat.

Reseachers started introducing small amounts of estrogen into an Ontario freshwater lake research facility in 2001, Kidd said.

"Right away, the male fish started to respond to the estrogen exposure by producing egg yolk proteins and shortly after that they started to develop eggs," she said in an interview from Saint John, N.B. "They were being feminized."

Kidd said shortly after introducing the estrogen, the number of fathead minnow crashed, reducing numbers to just one per cent of the population.

"It was really unexpected that they would react so quickly and so dramatically," she said. "The crash in the population was very evident and very dramatic and very rapid and related directly to the estrogen addition."