Fish in the Bodybuilder's Diet: The Toxicology of It All

[PillarofBalance]

As bodybuilders, powerlifters and strong-people, our training requires that we take in a fairly significant volume of calories. When we throw in the common anabolics, peptides and hormones the number of calories increases.

However, our goal is not to become fat. So we look for high quality protein sources and good quality fats. We want our chicken organic and free range; our beef is preferred grass fed; our wild game is often hunted and prepared personally - but what about our fish? We're eating it out of a can on many occassions!!!

I may be biased towards eating fresh high quality water foods as I live within minutes of the famous Gloucester MA and Ipswich MA. I've also ran the quality control department of the largest seafood purveyor on the East Coast. So sometimes when I see someone reaching for the can of tuna - or tunafish as its called for some unknown reason I am baffled... But this is not relevant to this post so onward I go.

In my opinion, one of the best protein sources for cutting, or really for eating anytime comes from our oceans. The abundance of different flavors and varied nutritional content make fish a great choice. And of course in typical bodybuilder fashion, we read the nutritional information for a product and decide how much we need to prepare. Take for example the unfortunate can of bumblebee solid white tuna packed in water ( :-& yes I know I'm being snobby here). According to the label, one serving size is 2 ounces (1/2 of 1 can). You get 13g protein from that serving. But we're getting huge right? So lets make ourselves two cans of this stuff for 52 grams of high quality protein and about 240 calories. What a great healthy meal!! You could eat this three or four times a day!!!

Sure you could do that, but one thing you do not see on the ingredient label is the methyl mercury content of each can. While that number varies from one can to the next, its there. In trace amounts generally, but its there. And the problem with a heavy metal like mercury, is once in gets someplace, such as your bloodstream, it finds a home, and remains there. And every time you eat another two cans of tuna it continues to build up.

In the average person who eat 1/2 or 1 can of tuna per week, this isn't much of a threat. But we aren't average. As I've said before, we're superhuman and we'll eat two cans of tuna every three hours for weeks on end. Even if you're not eating that much though, I still think its something you should be cognizant of.

So why all this focus on tuna? Well its common, and on the scale of trace contamination to heavy contamination, tuna falls on the heavier scale. After years and years (a century more like it) of industry and even household releases of mercury into the environment they inevitably wind up in our water bodies where they settle on the plants and soils. Then the little fish, eat the plants, and the little fish are in turn eaten by the bigger fish and so on. Until you get to a long living, large predatory species like shark, swordfish, and tuna. That tuna has eaten the mercury that has built up in the tiny fish, the mid sized fish, the large fish and the really large fish. If that doesn't make sense, here is a graphic that explains this scenario called biomagnification:

Am I suggesting that we no longer eat fish? No... Am I suggesting we are all going to suffer from Minemata disease? No I am not suggesting that either, I am simply helping you to be aware of what you're swallowing and maybe point you in the direction of some healthier alternatives. I will rate some common species of fish based on their typical contamination levels so you can make smarter choices when shopping.

LOWEST MERCURY
Eat 2-3 servings a week (pregnant women and small children should not eat more than 12 ounces (2 servings):

Anchovies
Catfish
Clam
Crab
Crawfish
Flounder
Haddock
Herring
Mackerel
Mullet
Oyster
Perch
Pollock
Salmon
Sardine
Scallop
Shrimp
Sole
Squid
Tilapia
Trout
Whitefish

MODERATE MERCURY
Eat six servings or fewer per month (pregnant women and small children should avoid these):

Bass
Carp
Cod
Halibut
Lobster
Mahi Mahi
Monkfish
Perch
Snapper
Tuna (Canned Chunk light)

HIGH MERCURY
Eat three servings or less per month (pregnant women and small children should avoid these):

Bluefish
Grouper
Sea Bass
Tuna (Canned Albacore, Yellowfin)

HIGHEST MERCURY
Avoid eating (everyone):

Marlin
Orange Roughy
Shark
Swordfish
Tilefish
Tuna (Ahi)

If you prefer to fish yourself, be sure to check out your local fish advisories here

Not trying to scare you folks out of eating seafood. Consider this more like a "right to know" situation. I think keeping these things in the back of your mind when you visit the fish monger is important. I very rarely eat the fish categorized as the worst but I do enjoy tilapia, catfish, anchovies, scallops and many other species.

To your health,


----PoB----

 

[PillarofBalance]

Guess they can't all be winners

 

[sassy69]

Interesting the ones w/ the highest are also those that are on the threatened species list. I used to live in S. Florida where you could get an amazing amount of fresh fish - but stuff like swordfish, etc are just harder & harder to get. Talking to the sportfisherman & tourists in S. Florida, the average size of billfish caught (e.g. marlin) has been shrinking for years. And this past year I've not been able to find orange roughy (my competition cutter of choice) at all -- the last place I found it was in the frozen food section at Costco.. and that was nearly a year ago.

After a decade of competition prep, I pretty much can't stomach tuna anymore - I'll use pouch tuna when I travel & I keep some of it stored ready for earthquake supplies (west coast girl), but otherwise, its pretty much tiliapia these days.

 

[Gstacker]

Was watching shark week on the discovery channel and they were saying alot of the geat whites are pretty much poiseness becouse of mercury and when visiting mexico use caution the fish markets and taco stands will serve that to you claiming it to be somthing else. Makes alot of sense being that the shArks on top of the food chain....

 

[PillarofBalance]

Interesting the ones w/ the highest are also those that are on the threatened species list. I used to live in S. Florida where you could get an amazing amount of fresh fish - but stuff like swordfish, etc are just harder & harder to get. Talking to the sportfisherman & tourists in S. Florida, the average size of billfish caught (e.g. marlin) has been shrinking for years. And this past year I've not been able to find orange roughy (my competition cutter of choice) at all -- the last place I found it was in the frozen food section at Costco.. and that was nearly a year ago.

After a decade of competition prep, I pretty much can't stomach tuna anymore - I'll use pouch tuna when I travel & I keep some of it stored ready for earthquake supplies (west coast girl), but otherwise, its pretty much tiliapia these days.

The larger species of fish, which also generally live the longest (cause the them collecting mercury) generally have slower reproductive cycles.

For example out of all the scombridae species, Atlantic Bluefin being the largest do not start releasing eggs for around 8 years. Mackeral reach sexual maturity at around age 2.

Awfully impressive that you picked up on that

And also - thanks for the comment here. I spent a good amount of time writing this one and nobody even commented on it

 

[PillarofBalance]

Was watching shark week on the discovery channel and they were saying alot of the geat whites are pretty much poiseness becouse of mercury and when visiting mexico use caution the fish markets and taco stands will serve that to you claiming it to be somthing else. Makes alot of sense being that the shArks on top of the food chain....

That kind of stuff goes on in the US too and its nonsense. Not sure why its allowed... For example what the hell is schrod? Ever see that on a menu? There is no such fish as schrod. It refers to a particular sized fillet of a haddock, cod of pollack. WTF???

 

[400Lb Gorilla]

wow thanks POB. i am now going to look for something to replace the tuna lol. i tend to eat alot of the "out of the can" tuna you mentioned. Albacore being the biggest one. i have never even noticed the mercury content. good for me i love me some catfish, oysters, shrimp, and crab!

thanks for the info and once again solid post!

 

[dangerouscurves]

I use pouch tuna off and on throughout the month out of conveinence but our house its salmon and shrimp. Actually found a sashimi grade salmon with no merury, lower fat than other areas salmon and double the omegas though I will behonest we don't do a lot of fish other than sushi from restaurants once a week or every other week.though I have been aware of mercury since pregnancy and have a mil that had gone through heavy metal cleansing awhile back that got me interested

 

[Ms.Wetback]

I only eat cooked Talapia and sushi (Tuna, Salmon, Eel). I dont know if cooking it has any effect on the mercury levels or not, but thats the majority of fish I eat.

 

[PillarofBalance]

I only eat cooked Talapia and sushi (Tuna, Salmon, Eel). I dont know if cooking it has any effect on the mercury levels or not, but thats the majority of fish I eat.

Cooking does not affect mercury content FYI.

 

[sassy69]

The larger species of fish, which also generally live the longest (cause the them collecting mercury) generally have slower reproductive cycles.

For example out of all the scombridae species, Atlantic Bluefin being the largest do not start releasing eggs for around 8 years. Mackeral reach sexual maturity at around age 2.

Awfully impressive that you picked up on that

And also - thanks for the comment here. I spent a good amount of time writing this one and nobody even commented on it

Yes I was having the same thought -- the longest living and the biggest ... so an accumulation.. I'm a former very avid scuba diver while I lived in S. Florida - I was very heavily engaged in the local charter industry as a dive master and also ran a website for a now defunct ocean environmental organization.... I grew up in N. Minnesota w/ grandparents who lived way up in the north woods on a lake - so we always had some walleye or something in the freezer, and then when I started diving - always either had a freezer full of lobster tails or some fish one of us shot that day on the reef - so these days I just don't care so much for fish that isn't THAT fresh. And now that you can't find orange roughy anywhere, I guess the best one can do is gag down some tilapia, .. or SUSHI! (LOLZ.. then came the nuclear reactor meltdowns in Japan and everyone watching the news every day for reports of radioactive sushi turning up in California... yea .. so not that much fish these days.

 

[biguglynewf]

Its called bioaccumualtion. No offesnse to anyone here but this is not new information guys and gals.

Just like everything, eat in moderation and trim out as much fat as possibly as that is where the Hg(mercury) tends to be stored. Belly fat especially - so be sure to trim the bottom out of your fillets. However remember that, as such, fatty types of fishes can hold greater concentrations but this again is dependant on exposure more so that fat content. Fat content is only to media for which the Hg to be stored. For sure the rule of thoumb would generally be the bigger and older the fish the miore contaminants it could possible hold.

Methylated mercury is dangerous for human consumption as it can pass the blood brain barrier ( due primarily to the attched methyl group) and will accumulate in us just as it does in the fish. I may be wrong on this (if you don;t use it you lose it, and its been a while for this...lol) but once consumed the body cannot excrete Hg. So as far as heavy metals goes it is or at least ranks up there with the worst of the worst. Something say like lead (Pb) can be excreted by the human body....not to say that Pb aint dangerous for us though...lol!

P.S - I would never eat off of a Mexican taco stand....Mercury would be the last thing I would worry about there as far as my health or food safety was concerned....lol!

P.S.S - DC - if they can guarantee no mercury it means that they are controlling the fishes food source and is farm raised. Lots of other potential health hazards to consider there. Namely pathogens but others as well.

P.S.S.S - Take it from someone who knows the fishing industry as well...just a little...lol. As P.O.B said.....Things are labelled and relabelled all the time and can be just about based on anything. I mean WTF is a boston bluefish? Oh just a big dirty ol' pollack...yuck!