View Full Version : Childhood training for unfiltered/untreated water
Skidsteer
03-07-2006, 19:29
This poll is for all folks(day-hikers, section-hikers, thru-hikers) who routinely drink unfiltered/treated water. I'll leave it to your discretion as to what qualifies as routinely, but I was thinking along the lines of more than 12 times per year. Thanks in advance and feel free to elaborate!
do u mean unfiltered/untreated? If that be the case I qualified for almost daily in my youth but pettered down to maybe a dozen times a year now.
Hammock Hanger
03-07-2006, 19:43
This poll is for all folks...
POLL??? Is there a poll here? Did I miss something?:-?
Skidsteer
03-07-2006, 19:47
do u mean unfiltered/untreated? If that be the case I qualified for almost daily in my youth but pettered down to maybe a dozen times a year now.
Yes,I mean unfiltered/untreated water.
Skidsteer
03-07-2006, 19:48
POLL??? Is there a poll here? Did I miss something?:-?
I thought I was previewing my post but apparently not. I hope it's fixed now.:) My apologies for the confusion.
I think you're onto something here. When we were living in Russia and having problems with the unclean water and food supplies, an older Frenchman commented that he thought Americans are prone to sickness when travelling because our food supply is "too clean."
Old Spice
03-07-2006, 22:54
I think you're onto something here. When we were living in Russia and having problems with the unclean water and food supplies, an older Frenchman commented that he thought Americans are prone to sickness when travelling because our food supply is "too clean."
I am no scientist, but there may be some truth in this. I did the "On the Road" thing for a few years and routinely dumpster-dived and drank untreated water while never really getting sick. I would love to get a well researched anwser on whether or not it is possible to build up your immune system this way.
BTW, I now purchase my food and drink Poland Spring. LoL.
I am no scientist, but there may be some truth in this. I did the "On the Road" thing for a few years and routinely dumpster-dived and drank untreated water while never really getting sick. I would love to get a well researched anwser on whether or not it is possible to build up your immune system this way. BTW, I now purchase my food and drink Poland Spring. LoL.
As a kid, we camped for 10 weeks every summer at a large national forest campground in the White Mountains and routinely drank from mountain streams.
For the past 43 years my home has been supplied by a drilled well, which until I finally got around to plugging a hole in the side of the well casing for years was routinely contaminated by surface water.
I have yet to have any symptoms that could be traced to contaminated water. I briefly thought I might as I came off my six month's walk in 1993, but eating more fiber seemed to have solved the problem.
Weary
Skidsteer
03-08-2006, 18:19
Hey all!
Thanks for the votes so far. A quick check of the tally so far and it seems as if the folks who have gotten sick from drinking unfiltered/untreated water are boycotting the poll. Or perhaps there just aren't any:-? . Anyway, please post your vote and comments either way. Thanks!
TJ aka Teej
03-08-2006, 18:38
Most stomach sickness attributed to 'untreated unfiltered water' is really caused by poor hygiene. Wash your hands after you poop and before you eat.
Most stomach sickness attributed to 'untreated unfiltered water' is really caused by poor hygiene. Wash your hands after you poop and before you eat.
Even more important, don't eat GORP or any other food from a plate or sack offered by another hiker without first asking that hiker if they had washed their hands after recently pooping.
It's my guess -- and OB's a few posts back -- that bugs you get from your own poop you already have. What you don't want is to eat some strange bugs from some stranger's poop that you haven't already been privy to.
Weary
TJ aka Teej
03-08-2006, 23:01
that you haven't already been privy to.
Very punny! :D
I chose:
"I grew up drinking city/municipal water and have gotten sick on the trail"
But I did not get sick due to drinking water on the trail.
Also, hasn't it been documented that too much anti-bacterial soap is bad for you and can make you more prone to illness? Goes along the same lines as this thread. Also to note is that when you get a flu shot, they are actually giving you a small dose of the flu so that your body begins creating defenses for it. Just some food for thought on how our bodies need illness to prevent more illness in the future.
I always have faithfully carred a water filter...and have used it only once, in SE Utah where a water hole was filled with donkey dung and was sort of yellow. After filtering the water was still yellow, but it wasn't chunky at all.
I am one of those people who drank well water/cistern water as a farm kid...and to my knowledge have never had a waterborne illness.
How about I grew up drinking water from a gravity-fed line and the end of the line was a spring at the top of the mountain. My parents' water still comes from that spring (totally untreated). They did update it though and covered the mouth with what's know in these parts as a spring box.