Craig, I'll take one more shot, then you can join Keith in the "over and done with" pile . . . and continue to search for what amounts to your Holy Grail: a wildlife scientist who says that the lead ban on waterfowl is junk science. You'd think there'd be one out there, given not only the federal lead shot ban on waterfowl (and on all federal Waterfowl Production Areas), but numerous state wildlife agency bans on lead shot around wetlands, even when hunting upland game (like pheasants). Can't believe that somebody, somewhere didn't smell a rat and blow the whistle.
Must be lots of folks not doing such a hot job of lopping off the part that looks shot with big things, when over 50% of those ground venison packets showed lead fragments. Unless there's maybe a conspiracy among the butchers that process a lot of venison to leave the lead in there. Or perhaps put lead in there. Maybe they're working hand in hand with terrorists or something, trying to poison us. Obviously, lead in any meat is bad. Doesn't keep me from eating the birds I shoot, but I'm really careful about not swallowing the pellets. I don't think lead in wild game is a HUGE problem for humans, but I don't intend to go down to my reloading table and sprinkle #8's on my toast for breakfast either. But you're missing the point. Lead showing up in ground venison is a problem for people who hunt deer not so much because of its impact on those who consume the meat, but because it clearly shows how fragments can be ingested by eagles (and other critters scavenging deer, and other shot and unrecovered game--except we don't worry much about the other scavengers). Always good to sound the alarm about a potential problem, Craig. The lead in eagles issue is not going to go away just by ignoring it. Trust me on this one. It cropped up when I did my lead shot articles 6 years ago, and it's still with us today. And given the fact that eagle numbers are increasing, we're likely to hear more about it. "Head in sand" makes it hard to face a problem.
I have no interest in doing a study on lead in eagles. I don't shoot eagles. It does not appear that eagles are ingesting the stuff with which I hunt (lead shot). And especially given that we no longer shoot ducks and geese with lead, it's much more likely that eagles are going to be scavenging something very large that was shot with lead (like a deer) than a crippled pheasant that flies off to die in the tall grass. So take some eagles, feed them meat laced with lead fragments similar to that revealed in the ND study and see what happens. Does it pass through their digestive systems? Does it result in an increase in blood lead levels? Doubt anyone will do that. Alternatively, try to prove that the lead fragments that show up in eagles do NOT come from bullets. Otherwise, based on the fact that we no longer shoot lead at waterfowl because ingesting it has been determined to cause massive deaths, we're looking at the possibility of switching to nontox bullets because eagles are dying from lead poisoning, with the possible source being bullet fragments. But I think, unlike the federal ban on lead for waterfowl, it would have to be a state by state thing because the critters we shoot with lead bullets aren't migratory birds. In any case, it's a potential problem. Best taken on by someone with better scientific credentials than either you, Keith, or me.
Last edited by L. Brown; 02/02/16 09:22 AM.
