Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2023
Abstract
Organochlorines like Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) have been used profusely in the past for their convenient nature and effective insecticide ability. With agricultural runoff and the anthropogenic introduction of this substance in sediments and water bodies, its bioaccumulation within species can be observed. This indicates that DDT is stored in the fat tissue of animals and detectable levels increase upon each higher trophic level. With skipjack tuna being a large and popular fish around the world, this experiment aims to investigate if pesticides could possibly carry large and observable implications towards human health upon consumption. To conduct our study, we have a population of skipjack tuna that will receive different dosages of pesticides. The different pesticide dosages (low-level, medium-level, high-level) will be administered every week and our measurements for the five indicators of tuna health will be taken on the first day of every month over the span of a year. Different instruments were used to take these measurements. These measurements were used to calculate our dependent variables, including oxygen-carrying capacity, blood glucose concentration, and the average weight. Reproductive rate was indicated by the count of the number of eggs, the number of hatched eggs, and the proportion of male and female juveniles. We also counted the number of fish in either colour category, and the number of fish measuring above a certain threshold in length (over 80 cm) to calculate the proportion of large fish in the population (as a percentage). The findings of this experiment should provide the foundation for how live tuna populations are impacted by the introduction of this pesticide for future studies regarding their development and growth.