The Survival and Growth of Fish in a Settled Industrial-Domestic Effluent

Abstract

Selected aspects of the literature on the toxicity to fish of metal mixtures in the absence and presence of organic matter are reviewed. A continuous-flow tank apparatus for long-term toxicity testing of a humus tank effluent (Minworth Sewage Works, Birmingham) is described. The 50 and 95 percentile values of important determinands and the acute lethal toxicity (Brown 1968) were used to describe water quality of test treatments at intervals over a three year period. Copper was the principal poison, zinc, ammonia and phenol being only occasionally important. Investigations were conducted in three test treatments: tap-water (control) 50% and 100% effluent, when flow rate,stocking density, food supply and dissolved oxygen levels were controlled...