There is a large drainage discharge pipe right below the Water Works (Aqua Co.) that flows into the Shenango river. Usually it's just discharging a steady flow of fairly clear water. I always thought it was just a storm drain runoff pipe. Never really thought much about it. One night after midnight while fishing this pipe starts flowing water about twice it's normal flow and stunk really bad ! I asked a few people about it and was told it's pumped up water from the sewerage plant about a mile downriver! I'm not saying it's illegal or unsafe and I'm still not sure about it's source, but bad stinky water flowing twice the normal flow after midnight into the river makes one suspicious !  

there are pipes like that all over the tail end of the Beaver River and signs saying that if the water smells or has unusual debris in it to call the phone number on the sign. 

In '70-'71, I was stationed at Davisville, R.I., and in New England, apparently many people liked to eat swordfish, but it was no longer available in restaurants due to them finding large concentrations of PCBs in the fish. If they knew about stuff like this way back when, you'd a thought it would have been forefront in the news media everywhere, but I don't remember hearin' about it then. My first introduction to PCB contaminated fish was in the late '70s or early '80s which I read about in IN-FISHERMAN magazine, as they were doin' quite a few articles on Great Lakes fishing for Salmonids. Even then, the recommendation was to cut off all the belly fat and the back straps where the highest concentration of PCBs would be, and limit your fish intake to no more than 3 times per week. Hell, we still have that on the Allegheny below lock 4 down to the Point. I don't live on local caught fish, but I ain't dead yet.

Emitch I've not heard of numbers of deaths attributed to eating fish contaminated with PCBs and the way the chemical is found in just about every fish around the world, I gotta wonder, has any agency ever looked for evidence that a natural substance in fish, mimics PCBs. Dam try saying that three times with your eyes closed.

Than again, if the agency's were aware of such a possibility would they want to expose their bogeyman?

I'm with the Capt and others who want to know about water supplies were PCBs (the actual manmade chemical) is known to be in the mud!

Also, the chemical was used in circuit boards, capacitors, ballast and, all kinds of other electric components commonly found in our households.

I cited a report that says PCBs can be inhaled and be even more concentrated than found in fish.

Who didn't have TV's, Radios, Hi-Fi's, fluorescent lights (ballast) and other electric paraphelnia growing up prior (and may still have) to 1979 when the chemical was outlawed?

Nuts now I went and done scared myself.

ICE NUT
In fact the fish you buy at store is many times worse.Vietnamese shrimp,Gulf shrimp and fish farms. Farm raised fish is the worst as far a pollution goes.There really isn't an agency to monitor them and if there was do you think a government agency would do a good job of monitoring the industry Really

Eat wild caught alaskan salmon,, its a better product  and available locally    i jus had wild caught chum tonite  its not as good as sockeye  but its still better than farm raised atlantic wich is everywhere

Come to think of it, it may not have been PCBs in the swordfish. Could'a been mercury. Either way, bad stuff.

So, how does this affect the beaver river?? shenango + mahoning=beaver and the mahoning has had a worse reputation for pollution than the shenango historically.

It surely can't help any water down stream.
 
The Great Lakes have had warnings on fish eating for as long back as I can remember . Basically eat one meal per month and child bearing women and under age children eat none ! Especially pregnant women ...eat none ! They don't publicize it near as much for fear of scaring off tourism , charter customers, and regular fishermen. It's printed steady in the fishing books of all Great Lake states, but they make it out to be almost nothing of a warning. 
 
The scary part is after awhile we all become immune to these warnings and we justify it using lots of excuses or comparisons. Fact is Mercury ,Mirex ,and PCB s are all deadly chemical compounds and yes they are in our fish, but we make the choice to eat or not to eat. Sad as it is it seems these chemicals never go away even decades later.    

ShenangoEyes
So, how does this affect the beaver river?? shenango + mahoning=beaver and the mahoning has had a worse reputation for pollution than the shenango historically.

 cant be good but the Beaver has always been polluted, it's definitely cleaned up though since 40+ years ago when industry was more prevalent. I never saw redhorse suckers(river, golden, etc) as a kid and they are  in the river pretty strong now. Redhorse are like canaries in the coalmine. 
 
The Beaver River is basically the butthole of the entire watershed in NE Ohio/NW PA. Berlin Lake, Mosquito, Meander, Milton, MJ Kirwan lakes in Ohio all effect it along with the Mahoning in Ohio. Arthur, Pymatuming, Shenango lakes in PA and all the creeks and rivers that connect to it. The Connie is likely still way worse than the Shenango River. Connequenessing was named the most polluted waterway on this side of the state 7-8 years ago. 2nd worst overall behind the Schuylkill 
 
Never ate a fish out the Beaver and never will but many people do, at least below the last dam where walleye and crappie are found
 
http://waterlandlife.org/80/shenango-river

Yeah, I'm very familiar with the whole area. Live outside of new castle, and work in shippingport. I was asking more of a question of why hasn't the fish commission included or mentioned the beaver as well. Its not like there's a real separation in the river until beaver falls.