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- Title
The corticosterone stress response and mercury contamination in free-living tree swallows, Tachycineta bicolor.
- Authors
Franceschini, Melinda D.; Lane, Oksana P.; Evers, David C.; Reed, J. Michael; Hoskins, Bart; Romero, L. Michael
- Abstract
We determined mercury concentrations in tree swallows, Tachycineta bicolor, from Massachusetts and Maine with different levels of contamination. Baseline and stress-induced plasma corticosterone concentrations from adults and nestlings (Massachusetts only) were compared with mercury concentrations. In Massachusetts, adult baseline corticosterone was negatively correlated with blood mercury, but showed a nearly-significant positive correlation with feather mercury. There was a negative relationship between baseline corticosterone and blood mercury in nestlings and between baseline corticosterone and egg mercury. There was no relationship between mercury and stress-induced corticosterone in any of the groups, or with baseline corticosterone in Maine sites where mercury levels were lower. The findings suggest blood and egg mercury may be a better indicator of current condition than feather mercury. Further, mercury contamination may not alter stress-induced corticosterone concentrations in tree swallows but appears to have a significant impact on baseline circulating corticosterone.
- Subjects
UNITED States; CORTICOSTERONE; TREE swallow; MINERALOCORTICOIDS; MERCURY &; the environment
- Publication
Ecotoxicology, 2009, Vol 18, Issue 5, p514
- ISSN
0963-9292
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s10646-009-0309-2