[cake_crumb]

"I'm all for hammering on the Greens and totalitarianism, but that and most other pesticides are simply unneccessary and mostly toxic to humans. Somebody educate me"

Not humans. It's toxic to some species of birds. When the banning campaign was ongoing, it was said to be toxic to all species and to humans. Later, it turned out that the effect on humans is negligable, but birds ARE still affected.

The part about the DDT ban causing so much starvation is true. Mostly locusts. On the other hand, extremely beneficial birds were becoming extinct, because their eggshells were soft, and the embryos killed due to squishing. The birds are safe now, and I for one hate to lose them....BUT there has been no other effective pesticide to replace it, and research is greatly hampered due to the insane, ever growning blob of worldwide regulations which sprang from that one successful battle.

The article could have been better written.

[cake_crumb]

Uh....make that successful battle from the ENVIRONAZI perspective. I've noticed a HEAVY presence of the morality police since the fall of Baghdad....people have noticed it's the beginning of another election cycle.

[narby]

extremely beneficial birds were becoming extinct, because their eggshells were soft, and the embryos killed due to squishing.

I've read that this "fragile egg shell" effect was from a single study in the early 60's where they were testing DDT toxicity on birds by feeding DDT laced feed to ducks. The ducks didn't have any toxic reaction to reasonable levels of DDT, but their eggs were fragile.

It turns out that the analysis methods available in that day required the researchers to feed them calcium free feed, while the control group had normal calcium feed. Naturaly, their eggs were fragile, but initially this wasn't the object of the study, so the difference calcium in feed was not noticed.

Observation of broken raptor egg shells in the wild were seen as proof (go looking for something, and you'll probably find it). However, there is a normal rate of egg breakage, and apparently there were no studies that proved the egg breakage rate was any higher than "normal". They did find DDT in the eggs, if I remember right, but that is hardly surprising, and not proof that it was the cause of the fragility.

Some bird populations did decline in areas of high farm DDT use. But this is undoubtedly because DDT killed their food source, not because of DDT toxicity in the birds themselves.

I hope the article I read on this was accurate. It does none of us any good to spout controversial stuff like this, if it is not factual. However, this seems right in line with the what I've observed of the Green movement. They don't give a tinkers D@mn about people, or even about the environment. They just use it for power, and for a profession, except for the majority "useful idiot" crowd that supports them.

[Carry_Okie]

Not humans. It's toxic to some species of birds. When the banning campaign was ongoing, it was said to be toxic to all species and to humans. Later, it turned out that the effect on humans is negligable, but birds ARE still affected.

Oh they're affected all righty, but not the way you think. DDT kills parasites (such as lice) that are a threat to birds. The parasites spread disease and induce pneumonia.

Here are Audubon society bird counts before and after the mass production and use of huge amounts of DDT.

Audubon Society
Christmas Bird Count Data
1941 (2,331 Observers)
vs. 1960 (8,928 Observers)
Species	Count			Count/Observer		Ratio/Observer
	1941	1960		1941	1960		1960/1941
Eagle	197	891		0.08	0.10		1.18
Gull	124,470	635,642		53.40	71.20		1.33
Raven	667	2,669		0.29	0.30		1.04
Crow	185,519	250,307		79.59	28.04		0.35
Quail	2,060	10,276		0.88	1.15		1.30
Pheasant	6,839	19,731		2.93	2.21		0.75
Mounring Dove	7,411	72,958		3.18	8.17		2.57
Swallow	14,347	242,303		6.15	27.14		4.41
Grebe	2,501	27,826		1.07	3.12		2.90
Pelican	4,450	10,562		1.91	1.18		0.62
Cormorant	3,246	27,162		1.39	3.04		2.18
Heron	2,254	16,253		0.97	1.82		1.88
Egret	1,469	16,800		0.63	1.88		2.99
Swan	18,554	33,994		7.96	3.81		0.48
Goose	182,820	696,777		78.43	78.04		1.00
Ducks	2,137,093	2,739,517		916.81	306.85		0.33
Balckbird	137,502	20,552,375		58.99	2,302.01		39.02
Grackle	24,937	12,570,458		10.70	1,407.98		131.61
Cowbird	40,019	3,286,314		17.17	368.09		21.44
Chickadee	21,330	55,906		9.15	6.26		0.68
Titmouse	5,038	18,268		2.16	2.05		0.95
Nuthatch	4,214	13,439		1.81	1.51		0.83
Robin	19,616	928,639		8.42	104.01		12.36
English Sparrow	53,335	358,769		22.88	40.18		1.76
Bluebird	3,742	6,903		1.61	0.77		0.48
Starling	211,836	8,673,095		90.88	971.45		10.69
Sources:	42nd Christmas Bird Count			Audubon Magazine, 1942
	61st Christmas Bird Count			Audubon Field Notes, 15, 1961

Thanks to Dr. J. Gordon Edwards, Professor Emeritus of Entomology at San Jose State University, for providing this information.

The problem is that when there is so much money to be made controlling access to resources, those with the money to invest will use the power to regulate the economy in the name of protecting the environment to make a very tidy profit. As long as the opinion of a democratic majority is capable of controlling the use of private property, those investors will invest heavily in controlling that public opinion. They will find and publicize purveyors of opinion friendly to their interests. Enter Rachel Carlson, whose lies were used to foist the largest single act of mass murder in the twentieth century.

Wouldn't you prefer an honest way to manage the environment?