Las cuernas del corzo como elemento bioindicador de la contaminación en el Campo de Gibraltar

Resum

The antlers are characteristic elements of roe deer that have a representative form of the species, usually with three points on the same plane, with variations in the length, volume and weight. Generally fall once a year, in late autumn, and immediately re-grow at an amazing speed of up to two or three millimeters a day. Being elements grow and develop annually, studies of deer antler used as a bioindicator of pollution in the area, by having the ability to accumulate large amounts of heavy metals found in the environment. It has always been assumed that the industrialization of the Bay of Algeciras was a focus of industrial pollution and that this could affect living things. In this case, to test this hypothesis we compared the composition of heavy minerals of the antler of deer killed in 2013 in the area of influence of the Campo de Gibraltar with others in the rest of the province of Cádiz and outside trophies in the province of Cadiz and outside Andalusia. We used 31 deer trophies of six game preserves that are in the area of study, 12 deer trophies in the province of Cadiz and 21 trophies from the rest of Spain. The study analyzed key elements that go into the making of the antler with a magnitude of about 1 g per kilogram, such as phosphorus (P) and sulphur (S), calcium (Ca), potassium (K), sodium (Na), magnesium (Mg); also used other elements considered “essential heavy metals” such as zinc (Zn), copper (Cu), chromium (Cr), selenium (Se) and nickel (Ni), and other heavy metals can be considered pollutants such as cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb) and mercury (Hg), although the latter could not be analyzed. Among the heavy metals cadmium and selenium appear only as trace elements (values belw 0.01 mg/Kg). Regarding the analysis of the means of the heavy metals, although you can see a pattern, there are no significant differences between sites (ANOVA; F = 0.246, p = 0.783), mainly due to the high variability found between them. For example, lead (Pb), the values were in the Campo de Gibraltar x = 1.20 mg/kg (sd = 2.21) The results of heavy metals, although generally present no significant differences between areas, refer only to 2013, although it intends to continue analyzing more samples and longer to check for validity the antlers of deer as a biological indicator pollution. Should also consider other more particular aspects that may influence the absorption of these minerals, such as wind conditions occurring in the area, which could determine a non-concentric gradient abundance of pollutants, or even elements the actual management of bounded as supplementary feeding.