ACCUMULATION AND DEPURATION OF RESIN ACIDS AND FICHTELITE BY THE FRESH-WATER MUSSEL HYRIDELLA-MENZIESI

Freshwater mussels incubated in the effluent of a kraft pulp and paper mill rapidly accumulated resin acids and fichtelite in their tissues, approaching a steady state in 7 d or less. Mean bioconcentration fact ors (BCFs) for individual resin acids varied from 110 to 330 L/kg dry wt. for 14-chlorodehydroabietic acid and abietic acid, respectively. T he mean BCF for fichtelite was 4,900 L/kg dry wt., at least an order o f magnitude greater than that of the resin acids. Resin acids were dep urated rapidly from mussel tissue (biological half-lives of 3 d), wher eas fichtelite concentrations declined more slowly (biological half-li fe 12 d). Depuration kinetics for these compounds appeared to be descr ibed by a first-order process. The possibility that the uptake process for fichtelite is zero order is explored.