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Condors Are Being Driven To Extinction By Lead Poisoning (from ammo)
PlanetSave ^ | June 26, 2012 | Nathan

Posted on 06/26/2012 5:44:18 AM PDT by Zakeet

New research from environmental toxicologists at the University of California, Santa Cruz, shows that California condors are exposed to harmful levels of lead regularly. The main source of this being from ingesting lead ammunition. This continual exposure to lead is preventing the condor’s recovery — if it wasn’t for condor recovery programs, this issue would have already led to the bird’s extinction.

The new findings are reported in a paper to be published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Study author Myra Finkelstein, a research toxicologist at UC Santa Cruz, said that the research makes it clear that without a permanent solution to the problem of lead poisoning, “the condor population can only be sustained through intensive and costly management efforts.”

“We will never have a self-sustaining wild condor population if we don’t solve this problem,” she said. “Currently, California condors are tagged and monitored, trapped twice a year for blood tests, and when necessary treated for lead poisoning in veterinary hospitals, and they still die from lead poisoning on a regular basis.”

(Excerpt) Read more at planetsave.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: banglist; constitution; democrats; ecofascism; envirofascism; environment; greenfraud; junkscience; secondamendment
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To: Zakeet
No one talks about the 70 golden eagles that are killed outside Oakland, California by wind turbines (aka bird wackers)every year. I would pose the question of how many nesting pairs of this endangered and majestic raptor does it take to replace these chopped birds. The Sierra Club and their liberal connections in Congress are mute on this subject.
21 posted on 06/26/2012 6:07:38 AM PDT by barnrat
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To: Hodar
The lead in ammo is solid, it’s not a powder, it’s not a liquid - it’s a solid mass that will pass through the gut and be expelled along with other indigestable matter. Just like lead in solder, it’s chemically bound - it’s not a free radical.

You are using facts, logic, and reason.

The disingenuous liberals hope to fool the uneducated masses with lies and half truths and you are spoiling their story.

22 posted on 06/26/2012 6:08:16 AM PDT by OldMissileer
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To: bossmechanic

I think the condors are sucking the wheel weights off tires.
Probably the tires on the researcher’s vehicles. I submit California researchers are causing condor lead poisoning.
Ban California researchers and see if the problem doesn’t go away. Bet my hypothesis is as statistically sound as theirs.


23 posted on 06/26/2012 6:08:57 AM PDT by bossmechanic (If all else fails, hit it with a hammer)
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To: bossmechanic
According to the article, the lead in birds traces back to ammo. But if you eliminate the ammo and the birds still get leaded, seems to me something in the initial hypothesis is wrong.

Silly rabbit, no amount of contrary evidence can EVER disprove a liberal hypothesis, only show that their powers and jurisdiction aren't widespread enough or that enforcement hasn't been draconian enough.

24 posted on 06/26/2012 6:09:08 AM PDT by Still Thinking (Freedom is NOT a loophole!)
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To: Zakeet

And yet all the other vulture species are doing fine. Hmmmm, what is that I smell?


25 posted on 06/26/2012 6:09:51 AM PDT by Double Tap
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To: Double Tap

The econut windmills chop these critters (and all sorts of other birds and bats) into bloody bits every hour. Just what do these aholes have to say about that? I think LIB moonbats chew on lead-paint window sills as a hobby.


26 posted on 06/26/2012 6:13:05 AM PDT by hal ogen (First Amendment or Reeducation Camp?)
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To: Zakeet

This is obviously bull crap without evidence that the lead is actually being consumed by the birds.

An unbiased environmental survey of the condor habitat would need to be done, and find actual evidence of lead-contaminated carrion that is prevalent enough to cause these effects, compared to other lead sources in the habitat.

Of course, we’d also need evidence that the condors were actually feeding on this carrion. And that this consumption was measurable affecting their lead levels. And that the elevated lead levels were measurably affecting their health.

But the BIG missing link in the chain of causation is the existence of lead-contaminated carrion in the condor habitat.


27 posted on 06/26/2012 6:15:28 AM PDT by Atlas Sneezed (Hold My Beer and Watch This!)
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To: Zakeet
“We will never have a self-sustaining wild condor population if we don’t solve this problem,” And the reason I care is.........................?

They come out with this same old BS every few years. I'm surprised that there's one bird left in the sky over America..........

28 posted on 06/26/2012 6:16:16 AM PDT by basil
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To: Zakeet

Humans being driven to extinction from the green agenda and UN agenda 21

There, fixed it!


29 posted on 06/26/2012 6:17:05 AM PDT by paratrooper82 (We are kicking Ass in Afghanistan, soon we will be home to kick some more Asses in Congress!)
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To: Zakeet

An Fw 200 Condor driven to extinction by lead poisoning.

30 posted on 06/26/2012 6:22:58 AM PDT by central_va ( I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: Hodar
"The lead in ammo is solid, it’s not a powder, it’s not a liquid - it’s a solid mass that will pass through the gut and be expelled along with other indigestable matter. Just like lead in solder, it’s chemically bound - it’s not a free radical."

Unfortunately not true. The digestive tract of all birds/animals contains fairly srong hydrochloric acid. "Some" of the lead WILL dissolve and be ingested. In addition, birds have "crops" which grind the ingested food with small stones that they swallow. This abrasive action will put "some" of the lead into the form of small particles that WILL dissolve under the action of said hydrochloric acid (and other enzymes).

Don't forget....diet of predators has to digest BONE fragments (basically calcium phosphate). Lead, like calcium, forms a doubly charged ion, and so will tend to follow the same biochemical paths as calcium.

All that said, I "still" think the "study" is bogus. The probability of condors (very small population) ingesting solid bullets is so small to be negligible.

Remember the story of the lynx hairs.

31 posted on 06/26/2012 6:27:14 AM PDT by Wonder Warthog
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To: Zakeet
more than a passing resemblance between "Rat Face" holder and the condor.


32 posted on 06/26/2012 6:30:26 AM PDT by ImJustAnotherOkie (zerogottago)
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To: Zakeet

It probably has nothing to do with the amount of lead in fish. I wonder what condors eat (besides spent ammunition).


33 posted on 06/26/2012 6:30:25 AM PDT by Tenacious 1 (The Click-&-Paste Media exists & works in Utopia Province, riding unicorns to work.)
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To: Mr Rogers
Guess I need to start breeding condors and selling them to gun ranges...

Need a partner? Based on the research in this article, it would seem a lucrative proposition.

34 posted on 06/26/2012 6:31:35 AM PDT by Tenacious 1 (The Click-&-Paste Media exists & works in Utopia Province, riding unicorns to work.)
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To: Zakeet

I would love to see the research on this as I don’t believe it.

Metallic lead (99.999% of the lead ingested) is expended immediately in animals.

The volume of lead ingested would have to be present in the majority of animals eaten in order to get these levels of lead in the system, and I do not for a minute beleive that the majority of animals eaten have lead in them.

If this is the case, and I suspect that it is not, there is probably another source for lead oxide, which is the main culprit.


35 posted on 06/26/2012 6:32:10 AM PDT by buffaloguy
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To: Zakeet

Gosh, so Fast and Furious won’t be available to “brainwash Americans against guns*”, so now shooters are causing wildfires in Colorado and Utah, and poisoning condors in California.

Hunters don’t leave behind lead-infested carcases, so this is bull.

OTOH Mitt Romney “hunts rodents”, so maybe it’s him?

*Eric Holder said he needs to brainwash Americans against guns


36 posted on 06/26/2012 6:33:26 AM PDT by DBrow
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To: bossmechanic
I think the condors are sucking the wheel weights off tires. Probably the tires on the researcher’s vehicles. I submit California researchers are causing condor lead poisoning. Ban California researchers and see if the problem doesn’t go away. Bet my hypothesis is as statistically sound as theirs.

I appreciate your fine use of liberal logic. By any chance do you work for a certain advertising agency that also represents a certain cable programming/Dish company?

37 posted on 06/26/2012 6:36:04 AM PDT by Tenacious 1 (The Click-&-Paste Media exists & works in Utopia Province, riding unicorns to work.)
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
All these boneheads really know is that there are increased levels of lead in the birds. They hypothesize the rest:
“Condors are opportunistic scavengers, feeding primarily on the carcasses of large mammals such as deer. They can ingest fragments of lead bullets from feeding on carcasses or gut piles of animals shot by hunters."

So they imply that hunters go out, shoot the deer and leave the carcass.
Even after field dressing an animal, generally the viscera is buried.
They would have people believe animals are shot and left - which gives us insight as to their own ethics.

38 posted on 06/26/2012 6:36:33 AM PDT by grobdriver (Proud Member, Party of NO! Nobama, No Way, No How!)
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To: Zakeet

University of Santa Cruz researchers/scientists - no need to read past that part. I have seen more B.S. studies from that intellectual sink-hole than I can remember.


39 posted on 06/26/2012 6:40:42 AM PDT by Bronco_Buster_FweetHyagh (I cling to guns and religion.)
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To: Zakeet
Where is the corresponding number of dead buzzards/vultures or are buzzards too smart to eat lead?
40 posted on 06/26/2012 6:41:01 AM PDT by IMR 4350
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