Pacific Spirit Marine Institute
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. Plastic doesn’t pollute, people pollute?
It’s no surprise that a member of the American Plastics Council was quoted in 2004 saying the reason plastic is everywhere is because it’s such a good material that does so much so well.
Plastic does do so many things so well. One of the things we are finding out it does so well is cause Testicular Dysgenesis Syndrome (TDS) which has been increasing daily. Plastics that contain Phthalates can migrate into the foods they come into contact with and be ingested and absorbed into our systems.
The chemical BPA, Bisphenol A, which has been used in the manufacturing of some plastics since the 1950’s is now being shown to cause ‘gender confusion’.
BPA has been found to actually pass from generation to generation in utero. This is a topic of conversation best left to other forums, but cosider the fact that there may be less gender confusion in underdeveloped countries where less plastic has been used customarily in every aspect of life for generations.
We have now been exposed to so much plastic that we are urinating the stuff!
Why would anyone be surprised to find there is a bundle of trash, estimated to weigh 3.5 MILLION tons of trash floating in the Pacific Ocean. 80% of this heap, larger than twice the size of Texas, is made up from plastic debris. Debris that is blown washed and flooded out to sea.
Tons of plastic that doesn’t find its way into land fills finds it way to the coastlines and is carried out to see into a giant vortex of currents.
Shame on you, shame on me. Shame on all of us.
We are being told at this point cleaning this mess up isn’t an option. Continuing to live as though there is no tomorrow, and letting the petroleum and plastics industry continue to dictate our futures isn’t an option.
Not anymore.
Labels: BPA, Bisphenol, Ocean, Ocean Habitat, Phthalates, Plastic, Trash, Urine, ecosystems
© 2009, Pacific Spirit Marine Institute.
3.5 MILLION tons of trash floating in the Pacific Ocean!
Monday, October 1, 2007
Yes, urine. Human urine.
The department of Environmental Science at the University of Kuopio, Finland has conducted a study on 3 ways to grow cabbage.
Applying industrial fertilizers
Applying non-fertilizer treatments
Applying human urine
Insect damage was lower in the urine-fertilized plots than in the industrial-fertilized cabbage plots. As one might imagine the non-fertilized cabbage had the greatest pest damage. Cabbage, like anything else is more susceptible to attack when in a weaker state. The moral to that story would be ‘take your vitamines’.
Their results showed that human urine used to fertilize the cabbage produced the same fine results as the industrial fertilizer. They have also determined the cabbage grown with the use of urine did not post any ’significant hyeienic threats’.
I’m not sure what significant hygienic threats constitues, but as of this moment my idea of hygienic doesn’t include anything with urine; human or otherwise.
After finding no significant hygienic threats, I guess, the next logical step would be to taste the cabbage.
You go first!
No, let’s give it to Mikey, he’ll eat anything; even sauerkraut.
All 3 groups of cabbage, when turned into sauerkraut were similar in taste and contained virtually the same level of glucosinolates.
The human urine/cabbage study came after the same group tried urine on cucumbers. Yikes!
The cucumbers actually grew better after being fertilized with the urine. One might think because cucumbers contain so much more water than cabbage they might retain a, ahem, tell-tale-hint of urine use. There was a taste difference, but the tasters didn’t find the difference ‘unpleasant’. They determined all samples were equally good tasting.
For now, I’ll believe the very organic form of fertilizer is better for the environment. I’m not sure I’m ready for that kind of ‘better’, not just yet anyway. Besides cucumbers make me burp, and cabbage…let’s just say I wouldn’t want to eat it while on a first date!
Photo thanks J. Holopainen/Univ. of Kuopio
Cabbage Chemistry. Abstract available at http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/
jafcau/asap/abs/jf0717891.html
Cucumber Abstract available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2005.11.024
Labels: Finland, Organic fertilizer, Urine, cabbage
© 2009, Pacific Spirit Marine Institute.
Yum! Sauerkraut and Urine? Yikes!
