Summary

Description

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service New Mexico Ecological Services Field Office has submitted a use study proposal in addition to this assessment of environmental contaminants to evaluate if a fishery use is associated with watercourses on the Laboratory designated by DOE and the New Mexico Environment Department NMED. The Service selected the assessment of fishery potential since a designated fishery use would require the most stringent numeric standards of a discharge. As part of this investigation, native fish will be introduced into cages placed in the perennial reaches of watercourses on LANL. During the exposure of fish to the LANL environment, we propose to analyze the quality of water, sediments, and food availability and determine if any damage occurs to fish DNA and find out if this damage is correlated to exposure. In addition, we propose to conduct toxicity tests to determine if water from each site contributes to toxicity to fish Pimephales promelas or invertebrates Daphnia dubia and identify the likely causative agent. Since, toxicity tests require a strict methodology USEPA 1993 and a certified laboratory, we propose to contract this portion of the study to the National Biological Service Midwest Science Centers Ecology Group.