Comments on: Brits Concerned about Radioactive Sheep?

By: Antice

Antice — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 05:45:14 +0000

They grow in regular patches. but fertilizing those is not something that people will allow. firstly the good ones only grow in areas that are untouched. their choice of biotope is very picky. and any interference causes the mushrooms to die off. it’s one of those mushrooms nobody have been able to cultivate because nobody despite a lot of effort and money has been able to figure out what this particular species needs to survive.
these factors means that farmers that own these forests are very protective and will not harvest trees around the best areas. but actually preserve them by keeping them secret if possible.
there is no chance to confuse these with toxic ones. it’s the number one safe mushroom and it’s a very popular one. it’s even sold in stores in years of plenty. this year has had a record harvest tho and i think some of it has even been exported abroad.
When it comes to gourmet foods nobody is going to bother with any potential radioactivity that is really not that significant. despite bellona’s best efforts at obfuscating and lying. you wont find any doctors advising against eating these mushrooms.

By: drbuzz0

drbuzz0 — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 22:27:18 +0000

That is very interesting. I have to admit I’m not very familiar with the practice of going somewhere to pick mushrooms. In the United States (where I live) there are a lot of wild mushrooms. There are a few species that are eatable. They compose a relatively small portion of the wild mushroom population. The rest are toxic, many are deadly even in one small dose. They are notoriously difficult to tell apart, as some species look very much alike and some are found growing together, so even if a species is eatable, there may be stems or fragments from other species mixed in.

Therefore, where I am from, nobody would dare eat a wild mushroom unless they were a botanist and even they might be weary of it.

I would not worry too much about a few kantarells containing enough Cs-137 to cause much harm. Just like sheep, it clears the bodies of humans fairly rapidly as well. If you want to reduce the amount of Cs-137 in mushrooms or plants, there is an easy way to do it. Cesium is chemically similar to potassium and this is one reason why it is absorbed by organisms. If there are any well known places for the gathering of mushrooms, simply treat these areas with a good dose of potassium fertilizer. This will reduce the uptake of the Cs-137.

Of course, if the mushrooms are scattered around the hills in random places, that might not be possible. I don’t know, but if they occur regularly in patches, it might be a good solution.

The levels may be higher than normal, but I doubt they’d be high enough to get overly concerned. So I would not get too worked up about it. Also, like sheep, it does clear the human body fairly quickly

By: antice

antice — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 20:10:24 +0000

I live in one of the affected areas in Norway. we were hit a lot harder than britain and even today there is a measurable increase in the background radiation in this area. it’s not high enough to be of any real concern tho. however it does accumulate in mushrooms and subsequently into sheep.
Cesium is chemically measured in the sheep’s milk when evaluating whither to say it’s safe or not. 14 days with downfeeding is more than enough to remove 95%+ of all the cesium the sheep has taken on during it’s summer feeding in the mountains and forests. years with lots of mushrooms paradoxically tend to concentrate the cesium in the sheep and even tho the overall activity in these areas is just slightly elevated the accumulation resulting from this will cause the amounts to exceed the allowed limits for human consumption.. ironically. people come from far away to come pick those mushrooms. Prime quality kantarells are a big part of the local diet, and you know… nobody checks those before tucking in.

By: DV82XL

DV82XL — Tue, 19 May 2009 21:41:54 +0000

VADIM said:

The truth is every stone is measured individually and is effective based on the last 25 years of experiments with the stones, as far as getting it inside your body there is also a water stone that you can put in your water to “energize” it and then drink it, there are plenty of studies shown here – http://radiationhormesis.com/?page_id=25

While some of the referenced articles seem to be legitimate studies on hormesis, the idea that “healing stones’ are of any value is not supported by any of this research. I am afraid that these are just a quack product with no proven benefit.

For example you cannot “energize” water by soaking these stones in it, this is nonsense.

It is hard enough to convince the general public that radiation hormesis is a real phenomenon, it is not helped by the appearance of charlatans and mountebanks pushing ineffectual products.

By: VADIM

VADIM — Tue, 19 May 2009 14:07:00 +0000

drbuzz0 said:

While I agree that the theory behind radioation hormesis is sound, I am not so sure about that website. I’m not so sure I’d be encouraging people to expose themselves to radiation from sources like minerals, especially without metering. This is not just a radiation concern, but has to do with heavy metal toxicity.

The other thing: I really doubt that hormesis is going to lead to any noticable acute effects, and I am unaware of any studies that have shown this to be the case either.

Exposure to a certain level of radiation may improve general health down the road, but will it relief any condition you have in the short term? I tend to doubt that.

Also I do not believe that radiation hormesis would be best applied through the ingestion of radioactive substances.

That would cause much higher doses to some tissues than others, based on the absorption rate and it might turn out to be a bit unpredictable.

The truth is every stone is measured individually and is effective based on the last 25 years of experiments with the stones, as far as getting it inside your body there is also a water stone that you can put in your water to “energize” it and then drink it, there are plenty of studies shown here – http://radiationhormesis.com/?page_id=25

By: drbuzz0

drbuzz0 — Tue, 19 May 2009 08:32:10 +0000

VADIM said:

This article is very accurate and it is demonstrated here radiationhormesis.com

While I agree that the theory behind radioation hormesis is sound, I am not so sure about that website. I’m not so sure I’d be encouraging people to expose themselves to radiation from sources like minerals, especially without metering. This is not just a radiation concern, but has to do with heavy metal toxicity.

The other thing: I really doubt that hormesis is going to lead to any noticable acute effects, and I am unaware of any studies that have shown this to be the case either. Exposure to a certain level of radiation may improve general health down the road, but will it relief any condition you have in the short term? I tend to doubt that.

Also I do not believe that radiation hormesis would be best applied through the ingestion of radioactive substances. That would cause much higher doses to some tissues than others, based on the absorption rate and it might turn out to be a bit unpredictable.

By: DV82XL

DV82XL — Tue, 19 May 2009 03:57:56 +0000

VADIM said:

This article is very accurate and it is demonstrated here radiationhormesis.com

During the 1960’s and 1970’s, about 40 articles per year described hormesis. In 1963, the AEC repeatedly confirmed lower mortality in guinea pigs, rats and mice irradiated at low dose. In 1964, the cows exposed to about 150 rads after the Trinity A-Bomb test in 1946 were quietly euthanized because of extreme old age. This trend continues. It was found that there was decreased cancer mortality in government nuclear facility workers in Canada, the UK, and the US. Whether exposed in uranium mines or processing plants, laboratories, or nuclear power plants—and whether the exposure was to uranium, plutonium, thorium or radium, so long as the dose was 50 times background (chronic) or, 50 rad acute, workers were healthier than those in the general population, mainly due to lower cancer incidence. Decreased cancer mortality, decreased leukemia rate, decreased infant mortality rate and increased lifespan in atomic bomb survivors from both Hiroshima and Nagasaki who received 1.2 rad. was found and a 20% lower cancer death rate in Idaho, Colorado and New Mexico, which have background radiation of 0.72 rad/yr compared with Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama with 0.22 rad/yr was also reported. There were many other similar examples as a quick look through the literature will reveal.

By: VADIM

VADIM — Tue, 19 May 2009 03:37:52 +0000

This article is very accurate and it is demonstrated here radiationhormesis.com

By: gman

gman — Mon, 18 May 2009 18:54:54 +0000

It’s “radio nuclides,” not “radio nucleotides.”

By: drbuzz0

drbuzz0 — Sun, 17 May 2009 07:51:34 +0000

It is possible that they could be realated to Sellafield / Windscale.

Any Cs-137 in the enviornment, with the exception of extremely tiny amounts due to cosmic rays or spontanious fission, is the result of one of the following:

- Chernobyl
- Atmospheric nuclear tests by the US/Soviet Union/British/Chinese/French
- Other smaller containment losses (Windscale, a few minor ones at Hanford in the early years, several Soviet incidents)
- The release of a Cs-137 source, possibly intentionally for the purpose of evaluating its spread.

So it could be that the source is something other than Chernobyl.

But in any of these cases, we need to keep in mind that the equipment we have these days can measure something like Cs-137 down to the most ridiculously minute levels.