Concentration of Selected Heavy Metals in Brown Hare (Lepus Europaeus) and Wild Boar (Sus Scrofa) From Central Turkey

Abstract

In the present study, concentrations of heavy metals viz. chromium (Cr), manganese (Mn), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), cadmium (Cd), mercury (Hg), lead (Pb), and a metalloid selenium (Se) were examined in kidney, liver and muscle tissues of 15 brown hares (Lepus europaeus) and 9 wild boars (Sus scrofa) obtained from Kırıkkale province located in central Turkey. Significant variation in the concentrations of the studied heavy metals in the selected tissues was recorded. Mean concentrations of Cr (1.02 mg/kg), Mn (6.00 mg/kg), Se (1.15 mg/kg) and Cd (4.49 mg/kg) were the highest in hare kidney compared to other tissues, whereas concentrations of Cu (2.34 mg/kg) and Zn (40.51 mg/kg) were the highest in hare liver, and Pb (7.83 mg/kg) was the highest in hare muscle. On the other hand, mean concentrations of Cr (1.82 mg/kg), Cu (1.25 mg/kg), Se (3.55 mg/kg) and Cd (3.05 mg/kg) were the highest in boar kidney compared to liver and muscle tissues, whereas concentrations of Mn (3.89 mg/kg) and Pb (0.75 mg/kg) were the highest in boar liver, and Zn (45.65 mg/kg) was the highest in boar muscle. Strong positive significant correlations were found between Cr and Hg, and between Cu and Pb concentrations in kidney in all wild boar samples. There were also strong positive significant correlations between Cd and Pb concentrations in liver and Cd and Pb concentrations in muscle in all hare samples. Our results revealed that Hg (1/9 boar kidney; 4/15 hare kidney), Cr (9/9 boar all three tissues; 9/15 hare kidney and 11/15 hare liver), Pb (4/9 boar muscle; 5/15 hare liver, 15/15 hare muscle) and Cd (9/9 boar all three tissues; 15/15 hare all three tissues) concentrations detected in wild boar and hare tissues in the present study were higher than the hygienic limits.

Concentrations of cadmium, lead, arsenic, and some essential metals in wild boar from Sweden

“…However, there is no correlation between Cd concentrations in kidney and muscle (Medvedev 1999) and, therefore, predicting the Cd concentrations in muscle is not possible in our study. However, in several studies of wild boar with similar or somewhat higher kidney concentrations as in this study, it was found that if the level of Cd exceeded the maximum permissible level (set by the EU for domestic pig kidney), there was a proportion of muscle samples also exceeding the maximum permissible concentration in meat (Piskorová et al 2003;Bilandžić et al 2009;Bilandžić et al 2010;Amici et al 2012;Demirbaş and Erduran 2017;Gašparík et al 2017). This relationship emphasizes the need for studying the muscle concentrations in wild boar from Sweden, especially as the Swedish government has recently appointed an inquiry on how to facilitate the availability of wild boar meat to the public, as a measure to stimulate culling and limit damage to crops (Swedish Government 2018).…”