Smith and Burton (1972) reported values of <0.05 to 16 ppm in 
various marine sediments. Surface sediments from Narragansett 
Bay contain 20 ppm tin (Hodge, Seidel, and Goldberg 1979). Furr 
et al. (1976) reported values as high as 492 ppm tin in sewage 
sludge. Thus, values obtained for sediments in the present study 
are in the same range as reported by other workers. Sediments in 
the Chester River, in the Tenneco holding plant, near the Camp¬ 
bell plant, and in the Chestertown sewage treatment plant all 
contain significant quantities of tin (Table 25) . Based on the 
two samples taken, Spaniard Bar, which suffered an oysterkill, 
did not yield significantly more tin than Buoy Rock, which did 
not suffer such a kill (Table-25). The null hypothesis that 
mean tin concentration (Spaniard Point) did not differ from the 
mean tin concentration (Buoy Rock) was supported. Thus, it is 
not possible to attribute the oysterkill at Spaniard Bar solely 
to pollution by tin, although interaction of tin with other fac¬ 
tors cannot be excluded. It is also possible that different tin 
species are present at the two sites, e.g. inorganic tin vs. one 
or more organotin species. 
Smith and Burton (1972) reported inorganic tin concentrations 
of 0.02 to 0.04 yg/kg (0.002 to 0.04 parts per trillion) in 
estuarine and continental shelf waters. Hodge et al. (1979) re¬ 
ported 2 to 38 ng inorganic tin/liter (0.002 to 0.038 yg/kg, 0.002 
to 0.038 parts per trillion) in water from San Francisco Bay and 
San Diego Bay, and 84 to 490 yg/liter (0.084 to 0.490 yg/kg, 
0.084 to 0.490 parts per trillion) in water from Lake Michigan. 
In Lake Michigan water, the concentrations of organic tin com¬ 
pounds were two to eight times greater than the concentrations 
of inorganic tin. The methods used in these two studies were 
several orders of magnitude more sensitive than the method 
employed in the present work. Some of the values obtained for 
water samples in the present work (Table 25) are significantly 
higher than values reported by Smith and Burton (1972) and by 
Hodge et al. (1979). Variations from one sample time to another 
(e.g., values for water from Spaniard Bar and water from the Ten¬ 
neco pond) can be expected due to variations in input and in flow 
rate, which can also account for the low value in the water sam¬ 
ple from Baltimore Harbor. Our data suggest that water in the 
Chester River and water entering the Chester River from the Ten¬ 
neco plant, from the Campbell plant, and from the Chestertown 
sewage treatment plant sometimes contains significant quantities 
of tin. The chemical species of tin were not identified in the 
present study. 
The data obtained in the present study yielded reasonable 
recovery from spiked samples. The method of additions was used 
successfully to alleviate matrix interference. Thus, the values 
obtained for tin are regarded with confidence, even though they 
are high. 
98 
