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Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other Kille

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Allan in NE

02-02-2005 09:11:40




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Mornin' Everyone,

I've never been a huge fan of using chemicals to farm with, but I guess at certain times they are necessary.

Always tried to be really careful when around the herbicides, even tried to stay clear away from the darned pesticides, if I could.

But, at around 1968 or thereabouts and up to about 1980, I started noticing a lot of the local farmers were dying of cancer. These guys were dropping like flies and they all were being killed by cancer.

Now, DDT was a big nasty and farmers used it a lot to control pests in the sugar beets and the potatoes, but I've always suspected that the really bad offender was from the fallout of the Nevada atomic testing that was going on back in the late 40s and early 50s.

This area lays downwind from these testing sites and it just seems odd that so many men in their 40s, 50s & 60s would be dropping like that and always from cancer.

I think these poor souls got more than they bargained for, for their labors. While they were out working their guts out in the fields, Uncle Sam was unwittingly poisoning them from the air.

When Mt. St. Helens erupted, eveything in western Nebraska turned white overnight, so stuff does travel with the winds.

Just a theory, anyone else notice this?

Allan

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Hugh MacKay

02-03-2005 22:26:15




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Allan: I think there have been many events that caused high numbers of deaths in certain areas. I'm not sure we have enough information to say exactly what the culpert was.

A classmate of mine from high school, was involved in farming most of his life. He used a lot of chemicals over the years as I did myself. About 1980 he developed cancer, doctors thought they beat it several times. It kept reoccuring, until it finally took him down in the mid 90s. Shortly before his death he confided to me, that he always blamed a specific chemical, that he had used and handled only once. I have forgotten the name of the chemical, so I'm not going to try and guess. It was a chemical I had never used. He claimed he knew within hours of using that chemical, he was in deep trouble. This is just the feelings of a very down to earth friend.

I lost a brother to Lou Gehrigs disease, have a cousin with a brain tumor (cant operate), both born in 1954. When these people were in their senior year at high school, my wife was one of their teachers. She tells me that in her years as a teacher, she has never seen a class loose so many members as those born in 1954, at that high school. Was this something they were exposed to in the womb, as infants, in high school lab, etc. Who will ever know for sure? And who really knows what our governments are playing with and when?

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scruffy

02-02-2005 18:02:32




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Seems to me that the only ones making good on the use of chemicals are the makers and peddlers. We still get less for a ton of grain than we did in the depression and we could pay for a new W6 with the earnings from 10 acres of rye in '45. How long would it take you to pay for a 40 hp. tractor today? How many acres? Has the promises and myths of higher yields really paid off? I think we could do much better farming 100 acres well and making a profit than a thousand and only being able to talk about the gross because the profits were only made by Monsanto. I am still paying my taxes and the raisin' the family mainly with the fruits of 8 hp. tractors. (but I am weird).

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Rauville

02-02-2005 17:41:40




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 Re: 1952 Fallout Map in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
third party image

Allan;
A lot of other people agree with you on the fallout theory. The map pictured is the estimated radioactive iodine fallout from just one series of tests from April - June 1952 (and there were numbers of other tests).



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CNKS

02-02-2005 13:30:31




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Alan, in spite of the rumors, half-truths, and full truths about pesticides, we know more about them than we did 30-40 years ago. The rules of use have changed, applicators are licensed, use and protective equipment are clearly stated on the label. Always wear at a charcoal mask. The cabs on the tractors help, but the filters should be clean, I imagine some fumes come in thru the air conditioning system, better to wear a mask in the cab also. In my research position back in the 70's and 80's, I sprayed all kinds of combinations on small plots, mixed them without gloves, dribbled it all over the place, then sprayed it without a mask with an IH 444 (no cab, of course), the spray drifted all over the place including on me. I was to dumb (more like stupid) to realize the consequences. Although I have no indication of cancer (never will, I hope), I am sensitized to certain chemicals, including one of the oldest around, 2,4-D. Rumored to cause cancer, but never proven -- just don't feel well afterwards, if I don't use a mask. Another is Lasso, a restricted use herbicide, I only have to look at that stuff, protected or not, the next day my eyes are puffy with double bags under them. One reason that herbicides are so expensive today is the chemical companies try to recover the cost of testing them, and assuring safety before they are allowed to be sold; so they are safe, if used properly. But, the other reason for the high cost is greed.

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Riverbend

02-02-2005 13:14:41




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Hey Allen,

I grow organic vegetables for a living and love a good pesticide. Two years ago they came out with Spinosad for potato bugs on organic farms. I tried it and the next morning it looked like it rained dead CPB. Its great stuff.

Some of the current research says that pesticides and herbicides are more likely to ruin the unborn. To make it more complicated, it is usually some herbicide, nitrate (nitrite ?), and an insecticide that was the most effective in causing birth defects. Try>Link

Above ground nuclear testing was and is a bad idea. Somebody in the physics department at Georgetown doesn't think that plutonium is 'the worlds most toxic element' i.e Link

Greg

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Sand Flat Bob

02-02-2005 10:39:48




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Allen, I looked into the atomic fallout once in detail. I have had two relatives die from over exposure to radioactivity and wondered how big a dose I got, living close to Dodge City Kansas when the testing was going on. Even though this was down wind to the normal wind flows, the winds when the major testing was going on, blew the radioactive stuff into northern New Mexico and Colorado. If you were in Nebraska then, doubt if that was the main problem with cancer. But I totally agree that insecticides killed many farmers. The best thing that has happened is outlawing most of them and the enclosed cabs on tractors and orther machines. That has saved many more lives than the Doctors ever have.

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RustyFarmall

02-02-2005 09:52:45




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Allan, I totally agree with your theory. Abnormally high rate of cancer related deaths in this part of farming country also. I read somewhere that the people responsible for the testing knew that the fallout would settle across the great plains, but the population was so low in our part of the country compared to the east coast etc.that they reasoned it wouldn't make much difference. Fewer people means fewer deaths.

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Roy Shields

02-02-2005 09:46:02




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Allan, I live almost in the middle of Illinois, and in the early 80's three farm people within a square mile of us died of cancer. We theorized it was something in the water, although nothing was ever proven. Everyone thought it was more than a coincidence.



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Cue P.

02-02-2005 09:27:01




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Allan in NE, 02-02-2005 09:11:40  
Being from New England i cant speak of the midwest but i've never been convinced that any one factor can be blamed for cancer. Based on 40 years worth of studies it certainly seems atomic fallout is to blame in and around testing areas. As for pesticides who knows? The fellow i worked for at an apple orchard here used all the bad stuff - DDT, Lead arsenate, etc etc and without the respiratory and personal protection equipment we have today...he just recently died in his 90s. Of course i never knew him to smoke or drink either. Yet my 85 year old neighbor is still going strong and she's smoked for at least 70 of those years. So who knows.

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sammy the RED

02-02-2005 11:13:12




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Cue P., 02-02-2005 09:27:01  
I was talking to a neighbor last year. He said he quit smoking 21 years ago. Just up and quit, cold turkey !

He died last summer at age 102 years 6 months.
That means he quit when he was 81 years old !



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gravy

02-02-2005 09:50:32




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to Cue P., 02-02-2005 09:27:01  
Well, the highest cancer rates in the nation are in New Jersey and Delaware. Guess what else is concentrated in New Jersey and Delaware: chemical companies...



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steveormary

02-02-2005 10:20:39




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to gravy, 02-02-2005 09:50:32  
Allan;

Dont know what to say about all that. After a serious auto accident I was diagnosed with Parkinsons disease. I think it was caused by the accident. However,two neuroligists think it was farm chemicals. Probably some of both. I seem to be holding my own and the PD isnt too bad yet.

So how many of the farmers or chemical workers in your area have PD.

steveormary



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paul

02-02-2005 11:09:31




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to steveormary, 02-02-2005 10:20:39  
Friend of my sister got PD at about 55. He & his wife were in a bad car accident, icy roads, hit a bridge about 7-10 years be4. He worked at an auto store, like a NAPA...

---.Paul



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steveormary

02-02-2005 17:12:08




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to paul, 02-02-2005 11:09:31  
paul, In my case I dont think it was chemicals altho I worked a liquid fertalizer dock for about 2 months.

But the auto accident and a fall onto a concrete floor a few months later were more likely to bring on the PD.

steveormary



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steveormary

02-02-2005 17:12:04




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to paul, 02-02-2005 11:09:31  
paul, In my case I dont think it was chemicals altho I worked a liquid fertalizer dock for about 2 months.

But the auto accident and a fall onto a concrete floor a few months later were more likely to bring on the PD.

steveormary



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steveormary

02-02-2005 17:10:09




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 Re: Speaking of Herbicides, Pesticides and other K in reply to paul, 02-02-2005 11:09:31  
paul, In my case I dont think it was chemicals altho I worked a liquid fertalizer dock for about 2 months.

But the auto accident and a fall onto a concrete floor a few months later were more likely to bring on the PD.

steveormary



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