Rob MacDonald wrote: > > Personally, I try to avoid drinking water that may be contaminated with > fecal matter. I don't care how it is filtered or chemically doctored. Well, there is no such surface water, unless you use some criterion such as "below 40 counts per 100 mL of fecal coliform." Every surface source of water is exposed to fecal contamination, albeit from insects, as a starter. What saves us is that our immune systems (and the bacteria indigenous to our guts) overwhelm the tiny amounts of pathogenic stuff in "pure" water. I bet I consumed a few giardia cysts in the 25 years (1966 - 1991) I did **not** filter surface water when I backpacked. However, never contracted the disease. Do filter now. > (In Terrace, BC, where we can still drink the water straight off the > hillside, although we probably shouldn't.) The outfitter I use in the Charlottes makes the same claim about water off the uninhabited parts of Moresby Island, and I bet he's right -- probably a few microbes from bird poop, squirrel poop, bear poop, etc., but with the typical high flow -- such as you have in Terrace -- never affect the human gut, which is **swarming** with the bacteria we need for digestion, etc. After all, none of us is bacteriologically sterile, are we? Yeah, we are swarming with little creatures, **inside us!** I know, more than Gypsykayak wanted to know ... -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR host to a wide variety of very classy bacteria -- but no designer strains, AFAIK *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Jan 25 2000 - 19:12:30 PST
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