Fishing Forum

I live close to Utah Lake and fish it on occasion. One thing that keeps me from fishing there more often is the signs around that lake that warn of eating more than one ounce of fish per month. This has caused me to avoid eating fish from UL all together. I keep seeing posts of people keeping fish. Is eating fish from UL safe? or are those who keep fish using them for some other purpose?

Thanks for your input.
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[#0000ff]The advisories against eating fish from Utah Lake apply primarily to carp and to LARGER catfish. See the attached PDF file.

Contrary to popular (uninformed) opinion, there is no advisory for mercury in any species...and no advisory against eating any other species besides carp and larger catfish.

Here is a link to the main page for the Utah Fish Advisories organization. You can check other waters in Utah as well.

http://www.fishadvisories.utah.gov/
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Thanks for the information. I feel much more informed about the subject. Now time to go fishing!
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For what its worth, a few years ago, the DEQ released the hard numbers for their mercury testing. The Utah Lake panfish and white bass had some of the lowest mercury counts in the entire state. As Tube Dude noted, these species tested negative for high PBC levels too. In contrast, many of our so-called "clean" lakes like Jordanelle have fish in the mercury advisory level or nearly so.

I have no hesitation eating a plate of panfish or white bass fillets from UL anytime I'm in the mood for it.
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I wouldn't feed UL fish to a pregnant female unless they're having kids to help around the house and want to have three or four hands per child to really get more bang for their buck.

Joking aside, pregnant or potentially pregnant women really shouldn't be eating any UL fish but then they shouldn't be smoking or drinking either. It's good to note, even the small fish meet or exceed the.advisory levels in their fat and offal. You should filet all fish from UL and discard anything that isn't muscle. I would avoid cooking them whole and trying to eat around the parts that contain PCBs.
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[quote Jedidiah]
Joking aside, pregnant or potentially pregnant women really shouldn't be eating any UL fish [/quote]

While this may be true for channel catfish or carp, do you have any facts to back up that it is true for other species at Utah lake? To repeat, there is NO advisory for any toxin for the white bass or panfish at Utah lake. Also to repeat, UL fish had some of the lowest mercury levels of any fish tested in the state.

My wife doesn't like fish but if she did when we were in the gene pool, I would have much preferred she eat UL white bass or crappie than fish from almost anywhere else I routinely angle and that includes supermarket fish as well. That opinion is based on a review of actual data, not some knee jerk, feel good, reaction we see so often regarding this subject.
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I have eaten fish from this lake for years and not had any problems. Cat fish and all the other species excluding carp. I talked with a biologist a couple of years ago, and was told there was more mercury in a can of tuna fish than 1 cat fish in Utah lake. Too much of any kind of food can be bad for you. If you have ever eaten brown trout, there are some advisories on them in certain lakes and streams, but people still tend to eat them. Things may have changed with in the couple of years I talked with the biologist, but I still eat fish out of Utah lake, and love to eat the cat fish.
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Great response. I'm a transplant to Utah and heard nothing but horrible tales of toxicity regarding UL when I first moved here many years back. However, with it's size, beauty, and bounty I took it upon myself to find out what the read deal was and I remember reading some studies done on the fish and the water that prove what you're saying. But it seems Jed is one of those folks who don't let things like studies and facts get in the way of a good ol' fashioned rant.

Oh well. I'm fine with people staying away from for no good reason. Leaves more room on the water and more fish in the water for me [].

[quote jsimmy]
Oh well. I'm fine with people staying away from for no good reason. Leaves more room on the water and more fish in the water for me [].[/quote]

Yep![]
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[#0000FF]Although "Golden Pond" is in pretty good shape ecologically these days it did suffer from shabby treatment in the past. There used to be everything from raw sewage to "fresh" bovine downloads running into the lake. And during the years that Geneva Steel was in operation there was definitely some hazmat stuff flushing into the lake 24/7. Even the walleyes and white bass smelled like used 30 weight oil. Don't know what they might have tasted like. Couldn't get past the smell when filleting them.

Tighter environmental controls on community, industrial and agricultural runoffs helped. And when Geneva Steel shut down around the year 2001 that ended their "contributions" to the water quality issues.

Since then the lake gets flushed annually. Lots of inflow from several natural creeks and rivers. And virtually 100 percent of what comes in goes down the Jordan to water users and Salt Lake. The winds that stir up the water help by recycling much of the sediment on the bottom and sending it on down the river. There are still pockets of "leftover" sludge but none of the heavy layers of toxic waste that some folks seem to believe is there. There are still rock piles and bedrock on the bottom of the lake in many spots. It is not a festering quagmire.

The water coming into the lake from Provo River, Spanish Fork River, American Fork River, Hobble Creek, Spring Creek, Battle Creek and other tributaries is all pretty good water. In a good runoff year the lake might turn over a couple of times. That helps a lot.

I am beyond "three score and ten" years. I have been eating fish from Utah Lake since the 1960s and I know of whole families that have relied on Utah Lake protein as a welcome aid to the family budget for many years. Though some may dispute it, I have not developed any health problems or anomalies from my consumption of UL fish. Nor have I ever heard of any credible reports of anybody else becoming ill from eating those fish.

I loved it during the time I lived in New Orleans. The Mississippi River running through that town was heavily laden with all kinds of stuff from the cities, factories and farms upstream. The joke was that night fishing was easy on the mighty Miss. All the fish glow in the dark.
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All this from the guy with a third eye in the back of his head !! Seriously, most people look at Utah Lake and assume it is polluted. Quite the contrary. Because UL is so biologically active, any thing that goes into it becomes tied up by the alga and diatoms in the lake. They die off and sink to the bottom, carrying the nasties with them. A body of water like Bear Lake is very slow biologically, what goes in stays there and builds up as it is used by the zooplankton, which are consumed by the small fish, which are consumed by the big fish, which are consumed by people. So you are going to get a bigger dose from fish at Bear Lake or Strawberry than from Utah Lake !!

I have a buddy studying to become a biologist/dwr officer and he has told me that the FDAs guidelines allow a lot worse fish to be consumed in restaurants than anything you will find in Utah Lake. I trust him and do not believe eating anything besides carp and large cats as stated here in will do any hard. Plus walleye are too tasty to pass up!!!
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So, if you don't eat fish from Utah Lake, you'll be immortal? Wild game of almost any kind is the purest meat there is.

In contrast, the next burger you eat at a fast food joint is rich in growth hormones, antibiotics, fecal bacteria - and quite possibly employee spit. Enjoy!
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[quote doggonefishin]To repeat, there is NO advisory for any toxin for the white bass or panfish at Utah lake.[/quote]

http://fishadvisories.utah.gov/docs/2008..._Study.pdf

That says white bass are borderline. The reason the big fish have unsafe levels of PCBs is that they eat the little fish. When you eat a lot of the little fish, you become the big fish and the PCBs accumulate in your fatty tissues just like it does in theirs.

Listening to the people who said UL is fine and safe, I went and caught a bunch of white bass and cleaned them in my sink at home and ate some fillets and I can tell you that they taste and smell different, like there's a little bit of detergent in them. I won't be catching any more fish to eat there.
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[quote Jedidiah][quote doggonefishin]To repeat, there is NO advisory for any toxin for the white bass or panfish at Utah lake.[/quote]

http://fishadvisories.utah.gov/docs/2008..._Study.pdf

That says white bass are borderline. The reason the big fish have unsafe levels of PCBs is that they eat the little fish. When you eat a lot of the little fish, you become the big fish and the PCBs accumulate in your fatty tissues just like it does in theirs.

Listening to the people who said UL is fine and safe, I went and caught a bunch of white bass and cleaned them in my sink at home and ate some fillets and I can tell you that they taste and smell different, like there's a little bit of detergent in them. I won't be catching any more fish to eat there.[/quote]



Lets look at the provided link and your statements.

1. A white bass fillet has 10.2 parts per billion of PCB. This value is one half of the minimum advisory level set by the EPA (20 ppb). It is also 8 and 10 times lower than the levels for carp and channel catfish. One half of the minimum standard for white bass is not borderline, it is safe. Bullheads tested even lower.

2. The effects of bioaccumulation are well known. Your statement shared nothing new. That is why so many smallmouth bass and brown trout in this state have mercury advisories on them. However, because of a relatively short lifespan and diet, the fish in question (white bass and panfish) do not bioaccumulate anything nearly as much.

3. Regarding the bottom sediment study, which is the reason this paper was written, the following is a suitable excerpt for this discussion. Please note the last sentence.

" It was agreed prior to sampling that locations exceeding the ESL of 59.8 ppb would be
identified as needing additional analysis. However, since all sediment samples are below
this ESL value, additional sediment analysis is not warranted at this time. When
comparing the PCB concentrations of Utah Lake’s fish and sediment to other PCB
contaminated sites, Utah Lake is at least an order of magnitude lower (Figures 3 and 4).


4. Finally, this paragraph, from the conclusions.

" Figure 3 compares the PCB concentrations in carp and catfish from Utah Lake to fish
collected in the Great Lakes, Hudson River, Delaware Bay, and salmon sold in the
market. PCB concentrations in fish from Utah Lake are comparable to those sold in the
market. Utah Lake’s fish are well below the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) safe
level of 2000 ppb. The FDA considers PCB concentrations greater than 2000 ppb in fish
fillets to be a health risk. Additionally, PCBs found in Utah Lake are at least one order of
magnitude below other contaminated sites including the Great Lakes, Hudson River, and
Delaware Bay."


This statement explains that UL carp and catfish PCB levels are comparable to fish sold in the supermarket, and much lower than many other well known fisheries. That is carp and catfish. As we saw earlier, white bass are 8 and 10 times lower than that!




I really don't care whether an individual eats the fish out of there or not. While I'm fussy about the fish I will eat and have never had a problem there, the truth is, if you somehow thought you "smelled something", you probably wouldn't enjoy your dinner and further discussion to convince you otherwise would be fruitless. However, making statements of fact that all the fish are potentially toxic is another matter altogether and will receive scrutiny.
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I'm curious about what makes you think that while the PCB accumulate in fish, they won't accumulate in you? Do you drink more water than fish? The fact is that it accumulates in fat and leeches back out very slowly, if at all.

If you have a strong stomach, do a google image search on PCB birth defects. If not, read this:

http://www.clearwater.org/news/pcbhealth.html
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[quote Jedidiah]I'm curious about what makes you think that while the PCBs accumulate in fish, they won't accumulate in you? Do you drink more water than fish? The fact is that it accumulates in fat and leeches back out very slowly, if at all.[/quote]

The answer of course, is that it slowly does. However, as your own paper demonstrates, different government agencies cannot agree on what is safe or not. EPA says 20 PPb, the FDA says 2000! I'm pretty comfortable that eating fish below the strictest standard is pretty likely to be safe.


Now here's a question for you. PCB's are extremely stable chemically and last in the environment for over 100,000 years. How do you know that the food you eat from other sources is not also contaminated with PCB's? If you are freaked out about UL fish, your own paper demonstrates that you better not eat any fish from a store or restaurant because the average amount and allowable PCB's are an order of magnitude higher. But what about other things? The Great lakes are fairly highly contaminated with PCB's. Water from them is used to hydrate a large acreage of crops in the nations midsection. Then that grain and soybeans are fed to food producing animals. The stuff could potentially be in almost all of our food in some level. It will obviously bioaccumulate in you. What are you to do?
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This is a good discussion, thanks for bringing it it, lots of good points made here in and valid. Good ol Utah lake! It's come a long way over the last few years!
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[#0000FF]Yeah, I know. Bad form to reply to your own post. But I had some info on mercury that I thought might be applicable to current conversation. Here's a link to a [url "http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine-archive/2011/january/food/mercury-in-tuna/overview/index.htm"]Consumer Report article[/url]:

Back in about 1970 I was living in Santa Barbara, CA. My regular work assignments in the chemical business allowed several days a month in which I could work as a deck hand on fishing party boats or commercial boats. It was great to get paid for something I enjoyed.

I had a friend who had recently purchased a long nosed swordfish harpooning boat. He had me join him whenever I could and we made some good money when the swords were out around the channel islands.

When returning from one trip...with several hefty swordfish in the hold...we were stopped at the docks. We were told that they could not buy our fish, inasmuch as recent testing of swordfish off California had revealed high levels of mercury. We donated the fish to a couple of local charity groups and whimpered a lot. My friend ended up losing his boat in the coming weeks.

The rest of the story? Within a few months the ban was lifted...after the testing agency checked preserved samples of swordfish from the late 1800s that had been preserved in a museum...and found levels of mercury even higher than current levels.


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Thanks a lot Rocky. Now Burger King will probably go out of business because I won't be eating there any more.

Good thing we have fish to eat. They're my favorite any way.

I've got to get down to Utah Lake and catch some of those fish so I can find out if there is a difference in taste compared to Willard Bay fish.

RJ
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