Noisy spring, silent summer?

Following the path of contaminants from your bathroom to the birds

Posted by Fawn Pattison (Guest Contributor) at 10:56 AM on 14 Mar 2008

Read more about: wildlife | scientific research | US Geological Survey

This is a story about sludge, worms, and songbirds, and it starts in your bathroom cabinet.

When we treat our wastewater to remove "biosolids" -- a polite term for our human waste -- all sorts of other things end up in the leftover sludge, including the drugs we take and the "personal care products" like lotion, shampoo, makeup, and cologne that we slather on our bodies, which have been absorbed through our skin and then excreted in our waste. The treated wastewater is usually discharged into the local river, and the sludge that's been removed from it frequently becomes fertilizer for agricultural production.

Researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey have found that the hungry earthworms who feed on this sludge in farm fields contain concentrated levels of our drugs and personal care products in their bodies. In fact, a USGS study published in February found that the compounds bioaccumulate in earthworms, meaning that the worms bear higher levels of these pollutants than the surrounding soil does. The USGS researchers note that worms could become monitoring species to help us determine the relative pollution levels in soil, but state that the pollution in these worms have "unknown effects" for wildlife (read the story in Science News).

"Unknown" maybe in that particular study, but researchers in the U.K. published a disturbing study about a week later that provides some insight into what happens to the polluted worms: Birds eat them.

This particular study examined European starlings in the wild, who like to forage in farm fields where fertilizer from sewage sludge has been applied, because the soil is rich in earthworms and other organisms who are busy feasting on the nutrients in the fertilizer. But they're also feasting on the contaminants in the fertilizer, and those contaminants have an impact on the foraging birds (story in The New York Times).

The contaminants in sewage sludge can contain hormone-mimicking compounds that act like estrogen in the birds' bodies. (Following the thread here? Those compounds are the drugs and personal care products that the USGS was examining in the earlier study.)

The U.K. researchers found that the contaminants boosted development in the part of the male birds' brains that control their songs, making them sing longer and more complex songs. The researchers also found that female starlings preferred the long, complex songs of the contaminated male starlings.

The bad news is ... they're contaminated. The same endocrine-disrupting compounds in the male starlings that made them attractive as mates make them unfit as fathers, because the compounds suppress the birds' immune systems and make them sick. While that might be good news for American birders who aren't fond of invasive starlings, it's rather bad news for birds everywhere who like to eat worms. While that fat earthworm might taste good and improve a male songbird's chances of attracting a pretty lady bird, it could actually be crippling his chances of producing a healthy brood of babies.

This might seem like just a scientific curiosity if the same kinds of effects hadn't also been noted in many other species, including fish, reptiles, and amphibians. Sort of makes you think twice about that nice body spray in your bathroom cabinet that's supposed to make you more attractive to a mate, doesn't it?

For story: Noisy spring, silent summer?
11 Comments | Post a Comment

"same kinds of effects"

This is a fascinating and troubling post, Fawn. The omnivorous starlings are a terrific subject species. But it will be interesting to see what effects are observed in other birds, with not altogether similar diets. The pictured cardinal, for example, does indeed eat insect larvae, but primarily eats seeds and fruits; and its preferred habitat is thick brush with a mix of tree-cover and open sky, not planted fields.

In the last paragraph, "same kinds of effects" is not quite accurate for the three examples given. The example from reptiles, marine iguanas in the Galapagos, has to do with harm from an oil spill. The examples from fishes (the British roach, Rutilus rutilus) and amphibians (certain frogs) are closer, having to do with reproductive disruption caused by sexual re-expression as an effect of chemical-induced hormone imbalance. But with the European starlings, apparently the males and the females are getting along together and reproducing just fine, only the males are passing along some dangerous inheritable deficiencies, which is a problem of a different sort.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 11:46 AM on 14 Mar 2008

Aerobic digestion

Aerobic digestion, composting toilets, would stop these compounds entering the water. And it saves huge amounts of water too.

Other waste water can then be easily recycled. Saving even more water. All waste water not containing human waste can serve as irrigation water with simple lagoon treatment, covered in hot dry climates to prevent evaporation losses.

Drug compounds would break down in the digestor as water evaporates into the air. Oh well. Another simple solution that goes against the mass delusional corporate culture.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

by amazingdrx at 11:56 AM on 14 Mar 2008

re: same kinds of effects

Thanks, caniscandida, for your clarification! The authors of the UK article reference these studies and several others for evidence of endocrine-disrupting compounds' ability to harm reproductive success in wildlife, including behavioral and physioloigcal effects. Instead of "same kinds of effects" I should have said something like... "same kinds of compounds, various pathways, disruption of reproductive success in various species..." I oversimplified. Thanks!

by Fawn Pattison at 12:25 PM on 14 Mar 2008
[ Parent ]

My bad on the cardinal

I added the picture to the post, not knowing the cardinal isn't a big worm consumer. Canis, can you suggest a different bird that's more prone to chow on earthworms?

by Lisa Hymas at 12:35 PM on 14 Mar 2008

robins and meadowlarks

Oh gosh, it is OK, Lisa, in this context. Fawn's excellent post was clear enough.

But: The American Robin (Turdus migratorius -- and the genus name has nothing to do with its gross Anglo-Saxon look-alike, but is in fact the Latin word for "thrush") is a famous worm-eater, though perhaps we usually do not associate them with farms and fields.

On the other hand, very well known in Midwestern and Western states, and very photogenic, are the two Meadowlarks, the Eastern (Sturnella magna) and the Western (S. neglecta, a name that brings me to tears). I have never seen them here in the Northeast, though they are here, according to the range maps; I made their acquaintance the first time I visited Montana, by bus, in the late 1980s. Sibley says of the Eastern: "Feeds on seeds, insects, and worms."

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 1:04 PM on 14 Mar 2008

hormones

I assume birth control pills are major offenders here, along with cosmetics that contain hormone-mimicking substances?

I hate when various elements of my politics start fistfights with one another...

by willa at 7:52 PM on 16 Mar 2008

the fault of women?

So, the "biosolids" of women on the Pill should be collected separately, and shipped to Yucca Mountain for storage?

"Hormone-mimicking substances" is a rather harder concept to understand.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 2:14 AM on 17 Mar 2008

Chemical solution

The problem is that even with waste treatment, aneroebic digestion, the compounds in question, hormones, antibiotics, and so forth, are soluble in water and pass right through the system. Right into the ground water.

Aerobic composting toilets evaporate the water from the waste, concentrating the chemical compounds in the biomass/active bacteria, where they are broken down. The evaporation is caused by air flow through the system and heat generated by the bacteria.

The solution of chemicals in water passes right through most waste treatment systems or home based septic tanks.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

by amazingdrx at 9:06 AM on 17 Mar 2008

The birds and the ... toilets?

I read this with interest because many wastewater services are now touting use of recycles bio-solids as a good mulch when combined with soil. An early and famous one was Dillo Dirt from the Horsby Treatment plant east of Austin (a bird Mecca, BTW).

Amazing is right that most of the chemicals we're talking here squirt right through the digesters. The system is tuned to reduce nitrogen, phosphorus, and other compounds found in amounts of parts per million - some of these nasty pharma compounds can be parts per billion or trillion. Note that Austin does say not to eat the dirt (ha!) or vegetables growing in it.

And I appreciate Canis on the birds. Our spring migration is just starting here by the Mexico border ... we have yet to see a Worm Eating Warbler yet this year. Many birds such as the Redwing Blackbird will graze for bugs and worms (thousands of them here now). The Grackle, a very social by nasty back bird, will eat anything, including worms. /sammie

Onward through the fog

by Sam Wells at 10:55 AM on 17 Mar 2008

Waste recycling

Most off the waste from human sewer systems is water. That's a problem, once contaminated with pathogenic bacteria and chemicals from human waste, it is toxic.

Confining the toxic portion of the plumbing and breakdown process to air powered systems for flushing and digesting, would leave regular sewer water easily recyclable in a series of wetland holding ponds. The water would then be suitable for irrigation. Irrigating greenhouses would allow solar and geo heat exchange powered distillation of the water to render it fit for human consumption.

Or it could be filtered using renewable energy.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

by amazingdrx at 11:15 AM on 17 Mar 2008

Icterids vs. Warblers

Sammie,
Red-winged Blackbirds are wonderful examples, very photogenic. I know them from the seashore wetlands of southern New Jersey.

Icteridae includes the blackbirds, the meadowlarks, the grackles and the orioles. As a suggestion to Lisa Hymas, I was looking for a bird both photogenic and with a memorable voice. Meadowlarks fit the bill, as definitely do red-winged blackbirds.

I have nothing against grackles, but they are rather intense and uncompromising, shall we say, who rarely appear on people's lists of "My Favorite Birds."

Orioles are well-loved, with a nice whistle, and they surely will eat worms. But I do not know if they go after worms especially, or if they frequent farm fields at all.

As for Warblers: I hate them. Which they should not take personally. In fact, they are gems, and it is always thrilling to spot one. But I am not a naturalist, nor an outdoorsman, nor a truly dedicated birder, so I have no patience to go trailing after them with my binoculars, getting more and more sea-sick, through the understory of a forest.

The Worm-eating Warbler (Helmitheros vermivora: "worm-hunter" in Greek, followed by "worm-eating" in Latin) may be not quite what we are looking for, anyhow, in spite of its perhaps inaccurate name. Sibley says:

<<
Migrants found mainly in wooded understory, probing dead leaf clusters and vine tangles for insects and spiders.
>>

So: no open fields for this bird, and worms are not the preferred item on the menu.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 2:13 PM on 17 Mar 2008

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