🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov16.103117.21992@infodev.cam.ac.uk>, rf@cl.cam.ac.uk (Robin Fairbairns) writes:
|> In article <BxH3wG.Dqw@javelin.sim.es.com>, rspeirs@javelin.sim.es.com (Ron Speirs) writes:
|> |>[...]
|> |>
|> |> I heard this story MANY years ago from my High School chemistry teacher.
|> |> He said that they used
|> |>           Dioctyl Sodium Sulfosuccinate
|> |> which according to a recent chemical catalog is now more "properly" called:
|> |>           Bis(2-ethylhexyl)sulfosuccinate Sodium Salt
|> |>           C20 H37 Na O7 S
|> |> I believe that this is the active ingredient in a medicine called "Colace",
|> |> which is a stool softener.  Ask a pharmacist.
|> 
|> If this is indeed true, one should see drowning ducks at any sewage
|> settling plant.  Any decent-sized metropolis must perforce include
|> quite a lot of people with constipation at any one time.

Believe me, it _is_ true. I have done work on cleaning up after oil
leakages in the sea, and have had the opportunity to see the effect 
on sea-birds up close. The oil dissolves the fat that keep the feathers
together, and enables the birds to stay afloat. It also takes away the
protection against cold that the feathers offer. In other words, if
they don't drown, they freeze to death from the cold water. Believe me,
it is _not_ a pretty or amusing sight.

BTW, can anyone confirm what someone told me that this effect is
actually permanent? I heard that once this fat was dissolved, it
didn't return, so that the bird, even with proper care, was unable
to regain it's ability to swim and to stand cold water.
-- 
    ___   ___
__  |__)   |    Bjoern Tore Sund (BT)   Quote: "Nothing!"
    |__)   |    bjornts@ii.uib.no              - Marvin