Update: Bottled Water is Polluted!

Yes, a new report released today by the Environmental Working Group, says bottled water is no cleaner than regular tap water…and most is downright polluted ...with Wal-Mart’s ‘Sam’s Choice’ leading the pack in contaminants. Ten popular brands were tested and found to containe 38 chemical pollutants altogether, with an average of eight contaminants in each brand.

Unlike tap water, which is regularly tested and results made public, the bottled water industry is not mandated to disclose their results…if any testing is done at all. Bottled water is not held to the same safety standard as tap water; all the beautiful images of high mountain streams and cool, deep springs doesn’t make it safer; nor do prices 1,900 times tap water. Instead, bottled water can contain disinfection byproducts, fertilizer residue and pain medication…not to mention the chemicals the plastic bottle off-gases into it. Chemicals such as phthalates or Bisphenol A, both with carcinogenic effects and now linked to obesity by triggering fat-cell activity.

To read the full EWG Report click here.

It would be so much healthier to put a charcoal-filter on your tap water and re-fill your own hard-plastic water bottle for the road. Do it; our land-fills are choking on throw-away bottles and our seas are filling up with garbage!

Click that last link or this one to discover two new 'continents' in the middle of our ocean (shown above) ...made entirely of plastic; 100,000,000 tons of it.

Consider this an update to my blog entry: Don't Flush Your Drugs!, More on Water Wars, and Bottle Your Own! Yeah, you could say I'm a little concerned about the water I drink.

More:

• WebMD


• National Geographic’s: The Green Guide
  
• Natural Resources Defense Council
  
• NRDC’s 1999 results of 4-year study
  
• NRDC on marketing
  
• Sustainablog; older but good
  
• Drinking water scorecard for your area
  

Every Litter-bit Hurts

Awhile ago Birdwatcher’s Digest published a piece regarding the surgery necessary on a California condor chick. It seems it was full of garbage people leave where they drop it. That just galls me; hiking anywhere and finding bottle caps, broken glass, pens, lighters, etc. Trash is more than dangerous.

From this single condor chick was removed:

• 4 bottle caps and a screw top,
• 3 electrical fittings,
• 5 washers,
• 13 22-caliber shell-casings,
• 1 38-caliber shell-casing,
• a shotgun-shell,
• several pieces of plastic bags,
• about a quarter cup of broken glass,
• a similar amount of broken plastic,
• a few small pieces of fabric,
• 4 small stones,
• a metal bracket,
• a piece of wire,
• and a few small pieces of rubber.

Read the full article here.

Trash tossed or absent-mindedly left behind is more than just unsightly. Trash, especially plastic, can entrap or suffocate mammals, birds, and fish. Small pieces can look like food and be ingested causing harm or death to the animal that eats it. Thousands of birds, fish, turtles and mammals die each year from entanglement in debris. Common items like six-pack rings, fishing line and strapping bands are mistaken for food. Numerous species ingest plastic, which causes them to feel full and die of starvation or poisoning.

Albatross photo: Cynthia Vanderlip, including more info

Remains of an adult Albatross with gut full of plastic (below). Notice the wide variety of bottle caps in this one. With smaller animals, more damage is done by smaller pieces. The plastic goes down the gullet quite easily. But since it is not digested, as in the original plan for all life, it gets stuck before exiting the stomach. There it sits to block the entry and digestion of legitimate food. Even the tiniest of pieces can cause blockages.

Probably the most disgusting thing I’ve read in some time is so absolutely shocking I can’t even talk. Go read it and let me know what you think. Good lord, if this is how our oceans look, imagine what our skies are going to be before too long. Sheeshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh... Who knew?

More on Water Wars

On the Bob Edwards Radio Show: Weekend Edition (09-21-08), I heard his piece regarding the documentary Flow: For Love of Water, which includes a sometimes halarious discussion with the filmmaker on the rediculous prices people will pay for bottled water, as well as more information regarding Nestlé’s work in the ‘water department’. Sincronycities abound yet again: an update to post ‘Bottle Your Own!’…cool! You can read about Edward’s interview with the filmaker here, and download the podcast here.

The average American uses 150 gallons of water per day. In the developing world, people are lucky to find five gallons and that water is often contaminated. The United Nations estimates that dirty drinking water kills about 500 children each day. Water is now the third largest industry in the world, right behind electricity and oil. But can anyone really own water? That's the question Salina investigates in her piece.


The award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st Century - The World Water Crisis. Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world's dwindling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel.

Interviews with scientists and activists intelligently reveal the rapidly building crisis, at both the global and human scale, and the film introduces many of the governmental and corporate culprits behind the water grab, while begging the question "CAN ANYONE REALLY OWN WATER?"

Water is now a 400-billion dollar global industry, third behind electricity and oil. The documentary also covers the issues of bottled water versus tap water and the case of the enormous water bottler Nestle versus the citizens of Michigan. Nestle pumps hundreds of gallons of water a minute out of the ground in west central Michigan, does not pay for it and is making, according to the film, an estimated 1.8 million dollars a day in profits off that free water. To read Nestlé’s press release about Flow, click here.

Also from Edward's blog:

Many experts believe that water will become the oil
of the 21st century – a valuable commodity and the object of deadly wars. Clean, fresh water is becoming more and more scarce, while it also becomes more and more polluted. We literally cannot live without it
and people will do any-thing and give everything to obtain it.

• To learn about positive steps you can take,
  click here.


• To see if Flow is playing near you, click here.


• To see the trailer for the film, click here.


• To read the article that inspired Irena Salina to make this documentary, click here.

What does this mean to birds? Birds all over the world are the “canaries in the mine-shaft”: small, live, detectors of something-gone-wrong. The caged birds were kept in mineshafts to let miners know when the air they were breathing had become poison…for whatever reason. When the birds exhibited distress…it was cause to leave the mineshaft! The quality of our water is so reflected by the birds who use it. The draining of wetlands or the lack of habitat is not the only problem…we are poisoning our water and the birds are suffering; again, they are harbingers of what is poisoning us. We must clean up our water!
More on this soon…

Is It Safe to Feed the Birds?

I run into this question a lot. Either as “I don’t believe in feeding birds”…for reasons about interfering with habitat and/or migration, I think. Or, that with the threat of Bird Flu hanging over us; why court trouble? I’ll respond to this question in three parts: habitat, migration and human safety.

Let me start by saying good bird habitat is shrinking right along with all habitat. We think of forest as habitat and that it is only being depleted in tropical countries. However, considering that we are loosing hundreds of acres of forest and croplands per state, per day, to development…and add to that global warming which is creating havoc with weather and temperature which in turn creates havoc with what grows where…and to that add the results of pollution and poisoning of waterways, bodies of water and the earth and air that all living things depend upon…and you will understand why birds are declining. It is for that simple reason that I feed birds.

So many birds migrate; some traveling thousands of miles, sometimes over multiple continents; to get to breeding areas. Considering that they must find food and rest along the way…I rather enjoy the idea that I am helping the birds by feeding them. I keep my yard planted with native plants; it has been discovered native (natural) plants have more nutrition (nectar) than do those bred for beauty. I use no herbicides or insecticides and use natural fertilizers. I keep birdbaths and small ponds clean and free of ice, and I offer seed, suet, and nectar and sometimes nuts and fruit. At the height of summer, I slow down on the free meals and at the height of winter I increase the number of feeders times three or more. And I have a view far more interesting than the television set.

In my mind, we owe birds for the damage we’ve done removing their habitat; for ruining their water and depleting their natural foodstuffs. Birds are not just pretty beings; we need them for so much more than just entertainment. Birds are necessary for seed distribution and pollination; insect and invertebrate control; mouse and other such pest control, scavenging and keeping forests, rivers and parks clean. I think we owe ‘em. (and no, they won’t suffer if you go on vacation and don’t feed them for a few weeks).

Regarding the idea that feeding wild birds will cause them to stop migrating is an urban myth. Birds begin and quit migrating when weather changes. It has been discovered birds are moving migration sites some 40 miles north…due to climate change. That would be why we have some birds staying in Florida or along the Gulf of Mexico instead of moving for the winter to Central or South America. Nor will feeding wild birds make them lazy.

As far as bird flu goes…while it has been confirmed that wild birds are in part responsible for the spread of bird flu, it is from association with kept birds that humans become infected. Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Audubon Society, all agree it is quite safe to feed wild birds.

I feed wild birds. I am comfortable that not everybody wants to do so. I love it that some folks ensure their yards include bird-friendly plants; plants that feed the birds and offer them places to rest or nest. That’s plenty good enough for me! Just watch those chemical poisons, please; and keep in mind it travels by wind and water…ever deeper and right into our waterways. Heard about dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico? Chemical fertilizer is considered the prime cause of dead zones around the world…it’s not something that only happens somewhere else. And it starts in each of our own backyards.

Cornell offers a wealth of information regarding birds and feeding birds, and Audubon includes similar information, as well as a really good FAQ page.

Feeding waterfowl seems to be a whole different ballgame, however. Most people feed bread and cheap bread at that. Bread, pop-corn, chips; all have little to no nutritional value. It also encourages the congregation of ducks to the point that water and shores and walkways become fouled with feces. Bread in water encourages algae, which choke out the life in water when overabundant. You’ve seen it happen. Please, don’t feed wild ducks!

All photos on this post from the free Wikipedia.