A Review of the Biomonitoring of Environmental Status and Trends Program The Draft Detailed Program (1995) / Chapter Skim
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
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OVERVIEW OF THE FWS BIOMONITORING OF ENVIRONMENTAL STATUS AND TRENDS PROGRAM Biomonitoring programs are scattered throughout the federal government (e.g., the Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program, EMAP, at the Environmental Protection Agency; the National Status and Trends Program at the National Oceanic and Atmosphenc Administration) ; however, the proposed Biomonitoring of Environmental Status and Trends Program would be the only monitoring program that specifically addresses contaminant impacts on FWS trust resources.
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The program's datacollection approach has been designed around two major components: FWS lands (primarily national wildlife refuges) and trust species (anadromous fish, migratory birds, some marine mammals, and federally listed endangered species)
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Mathematical models oftransport and partition dynamics oftoxic substancesincluding their cumulative impacts on organism population dynamics, genetic diversity, and behavior-supplement impact assessments. 6 According to FWS, a key trust species is "a trust species or a group oftrust species with similar habitat requirements and life history" that is used to represent the entirety of a species.
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that includes database hardware and software and connectivity with other federal databases and ecological Information systems. The detailed plan acknowledges that an educated public can help to identify and mitigate the damage from toxic substances, so a section in the detailed plan addresses outreach efforts.
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In the case of identifying local contaminant problems on FWS lands, several methodological questions remain unanswered. For trust-species exposwe-response relationships, the committee believes that the best action for FWS to take would be to upgrade the current National Contarn~nant Biomonitoring Program to include a broader range of contaminant exposure and effect indicators and then fold this program into the Biomon~tonng of Environmental Status and Trends Program.
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Missing is the administrative and budgetary context of an integrated program for reducing effects of toxic substances on FWS trust resources. Because human and financial resources are limited, priorities need to be set among components of the program.
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· The draft detailed plan should be revised to Incorporate sound mon~tonng-program design pnnciples, including - Testing of specific hypotheses regarding contanunant exposures and effects. Defection and characterization of reference sites.
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Causality The cause-effect portion of the detailed plan should be framed in the context of ecological risk assessment and should use a relevant paradigm and ternunolo~v based on the EPA framework. ~7 · To demonstrate causality, analytical procedures need to be used to distinguish between alterations resulting from changes in natural conditions, changes due to toxic substances, and other anthropogenic changes.
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· Pilot studies should be used to assess whether the methods for establishing causality will succeed; they should be designed on the basis of lessons gleaned from previous studies of causality. Management · Administrators of this kind of program should develop and offer for comment to internal and external scientists and managers a description and analysis, In an administrative and budgetary context, of all components of a toxic-substances pro gram.
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By reviewing the furldamental nature of the program and its need to be hypothesis-driven, FWS should be able to evaluate the program's ability to distinguish genuine ecological change from background fluctuation, to assign ecological change to a specific cause, and to distinguish and evaluate the impacts of contaminants and other causes of detrimental ecological changes, and it should be able to evaluate the ability of monitoring and the other suggested techniques, such as "weight of evidence" and "ecological health indicators," to provide the answers to its questions.
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· Outreach and especially partnerships with other federal agencies involved in contaminant assessment and monitoring and with state and local government agencies. Thus, a revision of the detailed plan that keeps in mind the key concept of fundamentals and hypothesis-testing, and management needs, plus the other recommendations in this report, will lead to the development of a scientifically defensible program that wall provide the answers that FWS needs to make its decisions appropriately.
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