Scientists put the blame on birds for toxins in Arctic animals

0 Comments | USA TODAY, July, 2005 | by Elizabeth Weise

For decades, scientists have struggled to explain how high levels of toxins such as mercury, DDT and other now-banned pesticides were ending up in the bodies of polar bears and other animals in the seemingly pristine Arctic north, thousands of miles away from pollution sources.

Now researchers at the University of Ottawa in Canada may have discovered part of the secret: bird droppings.

Contaminant levels in lakes near colonies of the northern fulmar, a medium-sized gull-like bird found across the North Atlantic, were 70 times higher than in lakes with no bird colonies.

Fulmars travel hundreds of miles to hunt fish in the open sea, then fly back to their nests where they live, breed and defecate.

Huge quantities of guano, as the dried excrement is...