Urban fish show perturbed spawning cycle

From Baltimore, at a meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry

Sediment-dwelling English sole living in and around Seattle’s urban waterfront exhibit spawning anomalies that might compromise their reproductive success, a team of aquatic biologists finds. The changes indicate chronic exposure to environmental contaminants that mimic the animals’ own estrogen, the primary female sex hormone.

When roughly half the male English sole at several collection sites near downtown Seattle were found to be making vitellogenin, an egg-yolk protein typical of females, toxicologist Lyndal L.