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Since the mid-1970s, the Ontario (Canada) Ministry of Environment (OMOE) has been collecting data on fish tissue mercury (Hg) contamination in provincial waterbodies. By 2004, approximately 160,000 fish from 86 species at over 1,600 sites were tested for Hg. This large database is primarily used to issue advisories for safe human fish consumption via publication of the biennial Guide to Eating Ontario Sport Fish. Analysis to uncover spatio-temporal trends while maximising the use of data points is complicated by the application of a non-random heterogeneous sampling design. The National Descriptive Model for Mercury in Fish (NDMMF) developed by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) is a statistical model of Hg concentrations that can potentially mitigate these challenges by separating the spatiotemporal variability of fish-[Hg] sampling while considering the effects of species, size, and fish sample portion type. However, the NDMMF has not been fully exploited, likely due to lack of rigorous evaluation. We conduct the first detailed investigation on the ability of the NDMMF to reproduce the observed fish-[Hg] in coolwater walleye (Sander vitreous) and warm-water yellow perch (Perca flavescens). Approximately two-thirds of both walleye and yellow perch [Hg]-length relationships could be accurately predicted using the NDMMF. For these cases, a majority (>85%) of the estimates are within the same consumption advisory categories as the interpolated [Hg] value based on the observed data, using an average-length fish. For the remaining incidences with significantly different NDMMF fish [Hg]-length relationships compared to those from the observed data, the NDMMF notably yields similar results, with a majority (>75%) of [Hg] estimates still falling within the same consumption advisory categories. For the small fraction of incidences with inaccurate advisory categorization, the instances of conservative over-prediction (
South Dakota has six lakes and impoundments that exceed mercury fish tissue advisory limits of 1.0 mg kg−1 for consumption. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), United States fish consumption limits should be at a much lower 0.3 mg kg−1. This study determined water quality parameters that are capable of predicting whether water bodies will have mercury fish tissue concentrations exceeding EPA's threshold fish consumption advisory limit of 0.3 mg kg−1 mercury by statistically comparing mercury fish tissue concentrations to water quality parameters. Phosphorus, alkalinity, pH, DOC, and sulfur have been shown through past studies to influence mercury fish tissue concentration. These water quality parameters, as well as others were collected from the South Dakota Department of Environmental and Natural Resources. (SD DENR). Mercury fish tissue data were collected by the South Dakota Game Fish and Parks (SD GFP). Statistical analyses employed included linear regression, boxplots, binary logistic regression, Akaike's Information Criterion, and stepwise logistic regression. Significant water quality parameters predicting increased mercury concentrations of northern pike in impoundments were phosphorus and pH. For northern pike in natural lakes for this study concluded that alkalinity was the most significant water quality parameter predicting increased mercury concentrations. Mercury concentrations in walleye in natural lakes were influenced by pH and alkalinity.