Although I’ve never
been a sport fisherman, one of the things I remember from growing up in West
Virginia was the enthusiasm so many of my friends and neighbors had for
fishing. Lake fishing and trout fishing were a big deal, with lots of folks out
on their boats or standing in their waders waiting for that next strike.
Well,
there is some new research out that demonstrates that mountaintop removal
jeopardizes this pastime. Rivers and streams affected by mountaintop mining
have only about a third as many fish as rivers and streams that have not been
affected by the massive mining technique. Affected streams also have fewer than
half as many species of fish than unaffected streams. These are the findings of
research conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey. The title of the paper,
published this week in the journal Freshwater Science, is Temporal changes in taxonomic and functional diversity of fish assemblages downstream from mountaintop mining.
Some
of the data used in the study was collected between 1999 and 2001 by a team
from Pennsylvania State University. The USGS collected data for the study from
2010 to 2011. Other recent research had also found fish populations to be negatively
affected by mountaintop removal.[i]
And still other research found a link between the surface mining of coal and the
extirpation of stream benthic organisms.[ii]
To me, this research just points out the obvious. Anybody who has spent time
around the sulfurous streams around surface mines will tell you that you won’t
find many fish in them, and sometimes not much other life, either.
As
with other studies, this scientific work found heightened levels of selenium in
the mining affected streams. Previous research, mandated by state legislation
in West Virginia, found that high levels of selenium in streams were associated
with deformities of fish larvae. In streams with especially high levels of
selenium up to 20 percent of some fish species had deformities. This research
dovetails with the USGS findings. If a lot of your offspring have deformities,
a lot of those deformed offspring will not make it to maturity.
How
much more research is needed to convince people that mountaintop removal is
harmful? I fear that nothing besides the depletion of all the viable coal seam
in Appalachia will bring about the end to large coal companies blowing up our
beautiful mountains. The paper’s press release from the USGS is here. And a hat
tip to Ken Ward and his Coal Tattoo blog where I found out about this
scientific study.
[i] Hopkins, Robert
L., and Jordan C. Roush. "Effects Of Mountaintop Mining On Fish
Distributions In Central Appalachia." Ecology Of Freshwater Fish 22.4
(2013): 578-586. Environment Complete. Web. 27 Sept. 2013
[ii] Cormier, Susan M.,
et al. "Assessing Causation Of The Extirpation Of Stream Macroinvertebrates
By A Mixture Of Ions." Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry 32.2 (2013): 277-287. Environment Complete. Web. 3 July 2014.
