🚀 go-pugleaf

At 03:02 PM 2/10/98 EST, C  wrote:
>Gators Found With Low Hormone Levels
>Monday, February 9, 1998; 12:42 p.m. EST

My comment:

Low level hormones in alligators, weakening their resistance to disease,
etc., in addition to chemicals in water, may also be related to interaction
effects of chemicals and super nutrients from agriculture.  I am familiar
with the Lake Okeechobee area and other areas of Florida.  There is
agricultural runoff, which is not only contains pesticides but also
synthetic fertilizers (and likely herbicides).  All of these substances
interact.  In humans, they are having the same effect in the U.S.  It is
estimated that as much as 50% of the U.S. population is now chemically
sensitive to one degree or another.

Further, those areas of Florida mentioned below now have smog, ground level
ozone, etc. from automobile traffic, and the effluent from autos, which also
interacts with the other chemicals.

Claire Gilbert
>
>LAKE OKEECHOBEE, Fla. (AP) -- Researchers have found young
>alligators along Lake Okeechobee's northern shore have very low
>levels of hormones controlling reproduction, growth and resistance
>to disease.
>
>``Our results raise a very large red flag,'' said Louis F.
>Guillette Jr. of the University of Florida.
>
>``Something is clearly causing dramatic changes in the environment
>for these alligators,'' he said. ``But are pesticides or some other
>contaminants doing the damage? Or have there been changes in the
>alligators' food supply or some other environmental conditions?''
>
>The answers may shed light on whether there's a health hazard for
>people, too. Like humans, alligators have a long life span and are
>at the top of their food chain.
>
>``We just don't know enough yet,'' said federal biologist Franklin
>Percival.
>
>Researchers saw similar problems in alligators in Lake Apopka after
>a 1980 spill of difocol, a pesticide containing significant amounts
>of DDT and related compounds. The lake's alligator populations
>plunged as the percentage of successful hatchings fell from 54
>percent in 1983 to less than 4 percent in 1988.
>
>Guillette and his fellow researchers chose Lake Okeechobee this
>time because it had had no known major chemical spills and
>alligator hatch rates there are generally 40 percent to 50 percent.
>They also studied hormone levels in alligators at Woodruff National
>Wildlife Refuge near DeLand, where 80 percent to 90 percent of
>gator eggs hatch successfully.
>
>Their research, to be published in the March issue of the journal
>Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, indicated that hormone
>levels in the reptiles correspond with fertility rates.
>
>``What worries me is that we're still looking at the impacts caused
>by old chemicals like DDT,'' Guillette said. ``And while we're
>studying them individually, there's no good information about what
>happens when all these old and new chemicals are combined.
>
>``That's something for everybody to think about. Because every time
>you drink a glass of water, you're drinking a mixture of thousands
>of chemicals.''
>
Blazing Tattles
Email: <blazing@igc.apc.org>
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