Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks officials announced today that 478,000 fish raised in the state trout hatchery in Lewistown will be destroyed rather than stocked after elevated levels of PCBs were confirmed in some of the fish raised at the 82-year old facility.
Officials again stressed their decision is based on concern for public safety. "Some of the fish tested show higher levels of PCBs than we are comfortable with for stocking in public waters," said Chris Hunter, FWP’s chief of Fisheries in Helena. "We’ve decided to destroy those fish and continue to test other portions of the hatchery before making any other decisions."
Hunter said the agency is working to get an accurate measure of PCB concentrations in all fish from other areas of the Big Springs Trout Hatchery.
FWP will host an open house to answer questions and concerns on PCBs in Big Springs Creek and the hatchery at 7 p.m. Monday, May 17 at Lewistown FWP office, 2358 Airport Road. Representatives will be available to answer questions on PCBs, health issues, fishing the creek and Big Springs hatchery. The Big Springs Creek PCB Advisory Committee will also meet Monday from 1-5 p.m.
Last summer, the state Department of Environmental Quality discovered much higher levels of PCBs in Big Springs Creek sediments immediately downstream of the Big Springs Trout Hatchery. Subsequent FWP investigations suggest that paint used more than 25 years ago on some hatchery raceways is a major source of PCBs in Big Springs Creek and in the stream’s wild trout.
Follow-up tests of a 56-fish sample gathered last week from seven of the hatchery’s 32 raceways detected .029 to 1.69 parts per million of polychlorinated biphenyls—PCBs—in the fish. Those samples were taken from the hatchery’s short raceways known to have a high concentration of the PCB-laden paint. All of the fish in these and other short raceways will be destroyed, Hunter said.
Montana fish consumption guidelines suggest anglers and others could safely consume about one meal per week of fish with PCB levels up to .10 ppm, and one meal a month for fish with PCB levels between .11 and .47 ppm. "Do not eat" advisories are established for fish containing PCB concentrations above .47 ppm.
Similar fish samples also gathered last week from an additional seven raceways showed trace to low-level PCBs ranging from .015 to .10. Those samples were taken from the hatchery’s long raceways, whose paint contained a lower PCB concentration. Those fish will be retested to obtain accurate measures of PCB concentrations in the hatchery’s remaining 1.4 million fish.
Samples taken from fish raised in the hatchery’s upper 42 raceways show no PCBs. Additional testing of these raceways is underway. All tests are being conducted by Energy Labs in Billings.
Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services officials say PCBs levels at or below 0.10 parts per million pose an extremely minimal risk to human health.
Big Springs Trout Hatchery annually stocks about 1.25 million rainbow trout, 40,000 grayling and a total of 600,000 cutthroat trout, brown trout and kokanee salmon. It is the state’s largest production hatchery responsible for about half of the total weight of the state’s coldwater fish-stocking regimen, with the state’s other eight hatcheries responsible for the remaining half. About 25 percent of the hatchery’s fish are destined for stocking in Canyon Ferry, Holter and Hauser reservoirs near Helena. In all, about 100 different waters are planted with fish raised at the Big Springs hatchery.
Hunter said Big Springs hatchery stocking regimen is now about three weeks behind schedule. Today’s decision is designed to eliminate the risk of stocking contaminated fish, Hunter said.
Due to the problems at the Big Springs hatchery, Hunter said officials are reevaluating the year’s fish stocking plans to protect the health and meet the needs of Montana anglers and citizens.
PCBs are chemicals widely used through most of the 1970s as ingredients in a number of industrial materials, such as electric coolants; sealing and caulking compounds; and ink and paint additives. By 1977, concern about the impact of PCBs on human health and the environment led to a North American ban on manufacturing and importing PCBs.
Small amounts of PCBs are found in the environment all over the world. Traces of PCBs are found in our food as well as in our bodies. The body fat of animals and fish for example, can contain PCBs. PCBs do not occur naturally in the environment, yet are among the main chemical contaminants found in sport fish in several areas of the country, including the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Excessive exposure to PCBs may cause a wide variety of adverse health effects, including cancer.
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