ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2015
Rapidly increasing methyl mercury in endangered ivory gull (Pagophila eburnea) feathers over a 130 year record.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers.
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Who cites it
20 citing papers in PubMed, 98 citations in OpenAlex.
- Measuring historical pollution: Natural history collections as tools for public health and environmental justice research.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Global mercury concentrations in biota: their use as a basis for a global biomonitoring framework.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2024Review
- Impact of Holocene environmental change on the evolutionary ecology of an Arctic top predator.Science advances · 2023Article
- A bibliometric analysis: what do we know about metals(loids) accumulation in wild birds?Environmental science and pollution research international · 2021Article
- Reconstructing avian mercury concentrations through time using museum specimens from New York State.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2020Article
- Trace elements' reference levels in blood of breeding black-browed albatrosses Thalassarche melanophris from the Falkland Islands.Environmental science and pollution research international · 2020Article
- Historical patterns in mercury exposure for North American songbirds.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2020Article
- Mercury exposure to swallows breeding in Canada inferred from feathers grown on breeding and non-breeding grounds.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2020Article
- Relationships between mercury burden, sex, and sexually selected feather ornaments in crested auklet (Aethia cristatella).Environmental science and pollution research international · 2020Article
- Detection and Phylogenetic Characterization of a Novel Herpesvirus in Sooty TernsFrontiers in veterinary science · 2020Article
- The Extended Specimen Network: A Strategy to Enhance US Biodiversity Collections, Promote Research and Education.Bioscience · 2020Article
- Metal content in the liver, kidney, and feathers of Northern gannets, Morus bassanus, sampled on the Spanish coast.Environmental science and pollution research international · 2019Article
- Feather mercury concentrations in North American raptors sampled at migration monitoring stations.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2019Article
- Museum specimens of terrestrial vertebrates are sensitive indicators of environmental change in the Anthropocene.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2018Review
- Retrospective biomonitoring of mercury and other elements in museum feathers of common kestrel Falco tinnunculus using instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA).Environmental science and pollution research international · 2017Article
- Predictors and immunological correlates of sublethal mercury exposure in vampire bats.Royal Society open science · 2017Article
- Relationships between blood mercury levels, reproduction, and return rate in a small seabird.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2017Article
- Living on the edge of a shrinking habitat: the ivory gull, Pagophila eburnea, an endangered sea-ice specialist.Biology letters · 2016Article
- Toxic metals and associated sporulated bacteria on Andean hummingbird feathers.Environmental science and pollution research international · 2016Article
- Avian mercury exposure and toxicological risk across western North America: A synthesis.The Science of the total environment · 2016Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Mercury (Hg) is increasing in marine food webs, especially at high latitudes. The bioaccumulation and biomagnification of methyl mercury (MeHg) has serious effects on wildlife, and is most evident in apex predators. The MeHg body burden in birds is the balance of ingestion and excretion, and MeHg in feathers is an effective indicator of overall MeHg burden. Ivory gulls (Pagophila eburnea), which consume ice-associated prey and scavenge marine mammal carcasses, have the highest egg Hg concentrations of any Arctic bird, and the species has declined by more than 80% since the 1980s in Canada. We used feathers from museum specimens from the Canadian Arctic and western Greenland to assess whether exposure to MeHg by ivory gulls increased from 1877 to 2007. Based on constant feather stable-isotope (δ(13)C, δ(15)N) values, there was no significant change in ivory gulls' diet over this period, but feather MeHg concentrations increased 45× (from 0.09 to 4.11 µg g(-1) in adults). This dramatic change in the absence of a dietary shift is clear evidence of the impact of anthropogenic Hg on this high-latitude threatened species. Bioavailable Hg is expected to increase in the Arctic, raising concern for continued population declines in high-latitude species that are far from sources of environmental contaminants.
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