From the Chickens to the Crabs - The Ripple Effect: The Fate of Freshwater in the Twenty-First Century - page 70

Of all the rivers in the Chesapeake Bay watershed that Vicki Blazer has studied, the
Shenandoah has the highest incidence of intersex bass , with testicular oocytes (the im-
mature eggs) found in 80 to 100 percent of male fish trapped in the river. The Shenan-
doah, Blazer noted pointedly, is surrounded by farmland.
In 2006, the conservation group American Rivers listed the Shenandoah as the “ ith
most endangered river in the United States” (after the Pajaro, Upper Yellowstone, Wil-
lamette, and Salmon Trout Rivers) due to three factors: an overabundance of nitrogen
and phosphorus; industrial discharge; and a murkiness caused by erosion from live-
stock, plowed fields, and construction sites that blocks light and burdens aquatic life.
Advisories warn against eating the river's fish, which may be contaminated by mercury,
spilled by the DuPont plant in Waynesboro over half a century ago, and by PCBs, which
were released by the Avtex Fibers Plant in Front Royal, which was shuttered in 1989.
Kelble was an affable thirty-four-year-old, with dark hair and a boyish face. After
graduating from Tufts, he worked as a Shenandoah River fishing guide. he action was
so good that he quickly attracted clients from around the world. His wife opened a little
B&B. The good fishing lasted for eight years, and then his livelihood began to die off.
In 2004 and 2005, 80 percent of the Shenandoah 's smallmouth bass and redbreast
sunfish died after developing lesions that looked like cigar burns. Since then, the river's
annual mortality rate for smallmouth bass has fluctuated, and Kelble worries about
their “chronic health issues.” Juvenile bass are growing bigger more quickly than
ever—reaching twelve inches in about half the time it took before 2004. Some biologists
theorize that the fish kills have let fewer big predators and have changed interspecies
competition for food.
Scientists from several agencies have conducted water quality studies in the Shenan-
doah, looking for signs of a virus, bacteria, or man-made contaminants. But if there is
one cause of fish deaths, it remains a mystery.
Kelble suspects that arsenic, which occurs naturally but is also present in herbicides
and pesticides, is likely to blame. Critics say that much of the inorganic arsenic in the
region comes from Roxarsone , a feed additive that the industry claims is used to con-
trol intestinal parasites in poultry and promote food safety. “ hat's a lie , ” said Kelble.
“According to the FDA, it's really used to promote weight gain in chickens and give the
meat color.”
Roxarsone contains a relatively harmless form of arsenic. But once chickens excrete
it, bacteria break it down and it releases an inorganic form of arsenic, which is an
immune-system suppressor in fish and a poison that can lead to nausea and cancer in
humans. Scientists like Keeve Nachman at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Fu-
ture have pushed for the banning of Roxarsone from US poultry feed, as the European
Union has done.