A new study says pretty much every lake in northern Saskatchewan has some level of nitrogen in it, but one of the co-authors of the report says he doesn’t expect it will impact the fish.
Professor Peter Leavitt of the University of Regina says industrial pollution and a century of agriculture have left their mark on the Earth’s atmosphere.
A few years ago, Leavitt and a group of other scientists set out to investigate what the evaporation of fertilizer and the burning of fossil fuels were doing to the wilderness.
He says they determined that nitrogen can now be found in almost every lake in the province, no matter how remote.
Leavitt says he doesn’t think the nitrogen will impact fish, at least not yet.
However, he notes this could eventually change the type of microbes that live in the lakes — and that would have a bearing on the types of nutrients and toxins that fish are exposed to.