Determination of critical pollutant levels in wild populations, examples from organochlorine insecticides in birds of prey

In assessing effects of pollutants on wild organisms, ecological concern is not so much with the protection of individuals, but with the maintenance of self-sustaining populations. Measures of the toxicity of chemicals made under laboratory conditions are thus of limited use when applied to populations in the field. For wild populations the critical level of any pollutant is that level which will lead to population decline (LPD). Among a range of species, this level may bear no consistent relationship to the LD(50) (or LC(50)). In some British birds of prey, whose numbers had been reduced mainly by HEOD poisoning, it was possible to determine the level of HEOD in the birds below which population recovery occurred. For Sparrowhawk and Kestrel, this was equivalent to a geometric mean HEOD level in livers of birds found dead of about 1.0 microg g(-1) (in wet weight). For Peregrines, it was equivalent to a geometric mean HEOD level in addled eggs of 0.7 microg g(-1) (wet weight).