Assessment of a Sr isotope vital effect (Sr-87/Sr-86) in marine taxa from Lee Stocking island, Bahamas

Data from Lee Stocking Island, Bahamas, confirms the hypothesis that there are no vital effects with the uptake of Sr isotopes (Sr-87/Sr-86) at the pr esent mass spectrometer resolution [+/- 2 x 10(-5) (2 sigma)]. Our data set contains analyses of 40 samples derived from 37 different calcareous taxa inhabiting a wide range of carbonate subenvironments (i.e., reefal, interti dal, supratidal, mangrove). The mean value of our analyses was 0.709179 wit h a standard deviation of 2.4 x 10(-5) (2 sigma) which was very close to th e long-term uncertainty of the strontium isotope methodology [+/- 2.0 x 10( -5) (2 sigma)] and to the widely reported Sr-87/Sr-86 value of seawater, wh ich clusters around 0.709175.