Overview of Ohio's Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program

Program Status

The current Ohio Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program has monitored contaminants in sport fish since 1993. Three state agencies participate: the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR), the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (Ohio EPA) and the Ohio Department of Health (ODH). Both ODNR and Ohio EPA collect fish throughout Ohio’s jurisdictional waters. Ohio EPA analyzes the fish samples, reviews the data and issues fish consumption risk assessment evaluations. ODH releases fish consumption advisory issuance information to the public and provides fish consumption information to Ohio citizens as part of the Women’s, Infant’s and Children’s (WIC) and the Help Me Grow (HMG) Programs’ activities.

Historical Overview

Ohio EPA initiated a pilot fish tissue monitoring program in 1977. Fish samples were collected by ODNR, Division of Wildlife. The samples were analyzed at the Ohio Department of Agriculture (ODA) Laboratory by ODA and Ohio EPA personnel for organochlorine pesticides and PCBs.

Between 1976 and 1986, fish tissue collections were made largely in response to cooperative requests from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA). Samples were provided to U.S. EPA’s Environmental Research Laboratory in Duluth, Minnesota. The samples were used primarily: to develop analytical methods; for studies evaluating special problem areas; and for analyzing for the presence of selected parameters of concern. Other samples were collected from Lake Erie tributaries at the request of U.S. EPA’s Great Lakes National Program Office (GLNPO). Laboratory analyses of these samples were conducted at Duluth, at U.S. EPA’s Central Regional Laboratory in Chicago, or at U.S. EPA’s consultant laboratories.

Ohio EPA used a contract laboratory to analyze fish samples in 1985 and 1986. The samples were analyzed for priority pollutant residues and some non-priority pollutants. The samples were collected in association with Ohio EPA’s biological and water quality survey program, and from known or suspected toxic "hot spot" areas.

Ohio EPA collected approximately 50 fish samples annually for fish tissue contaminant analyses from 1983 through 1989. The Ohio EPA Water Quality Laboratory (the Division of Environmental Services - DES) undertook its first effort to analyze fish tissue in 1988. The purpose of this monitoring program was to use fish tissue contaminant results as markers that could be used to locate and control sources of bioaccumulative toxic pollutants. These sources included wastewater discharges, in-place contaminated sediment, active or abandoned hazardous waste sites and general land runoff. The program was basically regulatory "detective work" aimed at identifying areas of concern and pollutant sources of concern and initiating cleanup efforts.

The original program was never envisioned, or adequately funded, to serve a public health mission. The program examined selected waterbodies, analyzed a limited number of fish samples for the presence of contaminants of concern, and was used to rate waterbodies as:

• apparently healthy (contaminant concentrations below detection or at background levels);
• injured (contaminant concentrations present above background, but not at levels that cause public health concerns); or 
• critically injured (fish tissue contaminant concentrations at levels that cause public health concerns).

The program from 1985 through 1990 lacked resources to evaluate all waterbodies and to distinguish injured waterbodies from critically injured waterbodies. The State used the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) fish tissue "action levels" to determine whether fish tissue contaminant concentrations exceeded fish consumption levels of concern.

The Ohio River Valley Sanitation Commission (ORSANCO) has collected fish for analyses in the Ohio River since 1976. Since 1985, ORSANCO has focused on the collection and analysis of carp, channel catfish and selected game fish species. ORSANCO’s fish tissue analytical results are reported in ORSANCO’s 305b Biannual Report to Congress (2004 Water Quality and Monitoring and Assessment Report). ORSANCO’s fish tissue analytical results from Ohio jurisdictional waters are used in Ohio fish consumption risk assessment evaluations.

ODNR collected Lake Erie fish samples for analyses from 1988 through 1992. Frequently consumed sport fish and fish species commercially harvested were analyzed. These annual collections were done in addition to other fish sample collections and analyses in Ohio waters by Ohio EPA.

In 1990, Ohio EPA, ODNR, ODH and ODA coordinated a one-year transition fish tissue monitoring program as the current Ohio Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program was designed, funded and implemented beginning in1992. Fish samples from selected Ohio streams were collected and analyzed by Ohio EPA for organochlorine pesticides, PCBs and total mercury.

Current Ohio Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program

The current Ohio Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program began in 1992 as a cooperative effort of four State agencies, Ohio EPA, ODNR, ODH and ODA . Ohio EPA and ODNR collected fish samples for analyses, Ohio EPA and ODA laboratories analyzed fish tissue samples for contaminants of concern, and ODH evaluated the tissue contaminant data and issued fish consumption advisories where necessary.

Starting in 1994, ODH began using a modified, tiered sport fish consumption advisory procedure developed by the Great Lakes Governor’s Great Lakes Sport Fish Advisory Task Force (1993) based upon a PCB weight-of-evidence health protection value (HPV) of 0.05 micrograms per kilogram per day for total PCB residue ingested from fish tissue. The HPV falls within the one-in-ten thousand and one-in-one million lifetime cancer risk range and is protective against adverse reproductive and neuro-developmental toxicological endpoints. ODH has calculated consumption rates for additional parameters using an appropriate contaminant Reference Dose (RfD) and the same tiered advisory procedure.

Ohio EPA coordinates Fish Consumption Advisory Program information with the ODH WIC and HMG Programs. The HMG Program is a program for Ohio’s expectant parents, newborns, infants and toddlers. The program provides health and development services so that children start school healthy and ready to learn. The HMG Program promotes the well-being of young children through home-based specialized services and public awareness, with a special emphasis on early intervention and prevention. The HMG Program answers between 40,000 to 50,000 telephone calls per month.

The Ohio Sport Fish Tissue Monitoring Program has accomplished the following objectives over the last 10 years.

1. Every major watershed in Ohio with at least a 50-square mile drainage area has been sampled at least once.
2. Ohio has collected and analyzed screening samples from nearly all inland lakes and reservoirs with public access.
3. Selected Lake Erie species have been collected and analyzed three times.
4. Ohio has collected and analyzed the Ohio portion of the Ohio River twice.
5. Ohio has provided fish consumption advisory information to Ohio citizens most in need through the Ohio Department of Health’s Women’s Infant’s and Children’s (WIC) and Help Me Grow (HMG) Programs.

See "Ohio Water Resource Inventory Volume 2: Ohio Fish Tissue Monitoring Program 1994," for a more detailed historical description of fish tissue monitoring in Ohio, and the "Ohio Water Resource Inventory" Volume 2: Ohio Fish Tissue Contaminant Monitoring 1996," for a detailed description of site evaluations.

See Ohio EPA's protocols on fish collections (PDF 58K), fish advisory development (PDF 53K), and fish tissue collection for environmental monitoring (PDF 23K) for more detailed descriptions of those procedures.

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