The humble hedgehog is the gardener’s best friend. They will chew up dozens of snails and slugs as they go about their wanderings of a night. They make the use of poisonous slug pellets unnecessary, which is a good thing, as slug pellets are very toxic things and will poison not only the slugs in your garden, but also hedgehogs and birds which might eat the slugs. Slug pellets could also possibly affect the person distributing the poison, and eventually, the slug poison will reach waterways, contributing to the chemical hazards of our environment.
In my experience, commercial slug pellets are hazardous to the health: even a neighbour’s slug poison will affect sensitive people, as the vapours, which are emitted for weeks after laying on the ground, and which are deleterious to the immune system, will drift on the air. These fumes have a very corrosive action on the nervous system and will give you candida type illnesses.
I recently saw an article in a local Dunedin newspaper which was promoting the trapping of hedgehogs, with bait and traps being provided. “Do your bit for the community – put a trap down to help eradicate hedgehogs’ was the message.
My guess is that something like 1080, or brodifacoum, is in the bait.
Since reading that article about a month ago, which encouraged householders to get on board with the campaign to eradicate hedgehogs, a friend in Sawyer’s Bay, Port Chalmers, has found several dead hedgehogs in her garden. This is the first time since they moved there, 6-7 years ago, that she has found dead hedgehogs in her garden. My friend’s garden is an organic paradise, friend to hedgehogs and birds alike.
Where does this desire to kill harmless creatures come from? New Zealand does have a culture of violence and abuse which ranges down the whole social system, and over-reaches onto environment issues. The old pioneering ‘die-hard’ attitude makes New Zealand an easy target for pesticide companies to manipulate us as a nation into boosting their sales. Much advertising money is spent ensuring that government agencies, and others such as Forest and Bird Society, swallow the bait and support pest eradication campaigns engineered by these big profiteers, the chemical giants. For years now, Forest and Bird Society have supported the 1080 and brodifacoum poisoning of parks and forests nationwide, something which I find very bewildering, since these chemicals are KNOWN to kill the very birds they endeavour to protect. The poison gets into our waterways, which is another problem, as then fish get contaminated too.
A couple of years ago, after 1080 warnings came that parks and reserves were to be ‘treated’ with 1080 in my area, I found within the week, one dead seagull and one dead duck on the rugby field near the reserve, and a wood pigeon dead just up and road, 100 yards away. When I walked up Te Aroha mountain 4-5 years ago, there was not one bird to be seen or heard. We were warned at the bottom of the walk that 1080 had been distributed. All was still and silent.
And now, these chemical giants, through the support of government agencies, are brain-washing the public into believing that they are helping their communities by laying poison, supplied by the authorities, to kill pests, even hedgehogs, in their own gardens.
One rationale given by NZ environment ‘authorities’ is that hedgehogs eat kiwi eggs, which is why we should kill all hedgehogs, they say. But seriously, where can you find a kiwi egg around cities and towns, or even in the country? I have never ever seen a kiwi in the bush. Massey University say that dogs are the worst threat to kiwi. But do we then eradicate all dogs because of the kiwi cause? How ridiculous is that?
Sure, hedgehogs could be baited near sanctuaries such as the Orokanui Reserve in Dunedin, which would protect any kiwi living there. They do that anyway, with special pest-proof fences and the like. But it is surely not necessary to kill all hedgehogs all over New Zealand?
Now that glyphosate products such as RoundUp are on the way out, having been proven to be cancer-causing, the chemical giants are looking to hook the public into a new devious scheme. After all, they have been advertising glyphosate-RoundUp for 30 years or more as a ‘biodegradable’ product, something which was proven to be a lie. In a court case 2-3 years ago, Monsanto was ordered to remove the biodegradable claim from all their packaging and marketing.
Meanwhile, all the farmers I know argued with me, convinced that RoundUp was perfectly safe, because they believed Monsanto’s claim. I always knew this herbicide was very toxic, as it affected me badly when I came into contact with it, or smelt it after it had been sprayed. Candida sickness was always the result, with dizziness, poor memory, bone pains, blurry vision, and other symptoms. So – 30 years ago, I was arguing the point to no avail about glyphosate-RoundUp being hazardous to the health.
And yet, even now, despite many countries having banned glyphosate, in New Zealand we STILL have to put up with RoundUp or similar herbicides being widely sprayed on agriculture land, on almost all roadsides, all over the railway system, and around parks and reserves.
Bees have been very scarce this year. On an average day, I might see one or two bees in my garden. There was just one day when I counted around 30 bees. But then, they disappeared. Herbicides such as glyphosate, still being used in NZ, is a bee-killer as well as a weedkiller. ( Microwaves from cell-phone towers and other transmitters are also hazardous to bees and all living creatures – we should beware of smart meters on electricity boxes, cell-phone transmitters, and certainly, the new 5G roll-out coming soon)
I witnessed, about 8 weeks ago, a group of young men in a marshy area just south of Palmerston, spraying what was probably RoundUp all over the marsh, which is connected to the estuary. No poison, glyphosate-RoundUp, or anything else, should ever be put near waterways, and certainly not actually IN them.
It is surely time to ban all toxic herbicides, pesticides and insecticides. We are a now a dying planet and should be respecting and caring for all forms of life.
Tag: glyphosphate
Dog Dies From Lymphoma Six Months After Eating RoundUp Spray
The young dog of a friend of the family’s has recently died of lymphoma. The dog was not old – around six years.
Six months ago, the man of the house sprayed RoundUp on their grass verges and roundabout the garden. The dog went over and ate some of the grass which had been sprayed. It became sick – not just regurgitating the grass, which cats and dogs like to do to clean out their stomachs, but was clearly feeling unwell. He remained sick and was not his usual self for many days. So they took him to the vet, who said there was nothing wrong with a dog eating grass sprayed with RoundUp, and that he would be OK. But he was not OK.
Six months later, the wee dog was dead from lymphoma cancer.
I wrote a post a few years ago about the dangers of pets and children playing or wandering through sprayed areas of grass. Pet owners need to be careful, I said, not to take their dogs walking through parks which have been sprayed. Nor should they be let loose to run through poisoned areas.
Cats are even more at risk, as they roam far and wide at night, and are likely to be exposed to toxic herbicides or weedkillers, and pesticides, on their travels. One assumes that awareness is growing regarding herbicides and pesticides affecting the health of humans, pets and planet. But the use of herbicides and pesticides seems to be increasing to that of former years.
RoundUp glyphosate, and pesticides such as 1080 and brodifacoum, are being used more than ever all over the country, to the detriment of our health, and especially to the health of children. They will surely be reducing longevity of children, pets and adults who become exposed to these poisons on a regular basis.
Food Glyphosate Levels From RoundUp Increased 500 Times Since 1994
Environment and Health
RoundUp, which contains glyphosate, is not biodegradable. Interesting, I think, that Monsanto had to be taken to court a couple of years ago, to get them to remove their false claim of ‘biodegradable’ from the packaging of their RoundUp weedkiller.
RoundUp weedkiller, and Monsanto’s related RoundUp Ready seeds and plants, are a multi-billion dollar industry. For over 20 years, they have marketed their RoundUp weedkiller as ‘biodegradable’, happily duping farmers, agriculturalists, city councils, governments, and the general public about the safety of RoundUp, which contains glyphosate, an ingredient which WHO, World Health Organization, last year declared is a ‘probable cause of cancer’.
Some organic farmers use RoundUp, which misleads people into thinking RoundUp must be OK. But RoundUp and glyphosate are not safe, and should never be used in the organic industry, if at all. How can this be, that organic producers can use glyphosate weedkiller? Well – Monsanto has cleverly convinced governments everywhere that a small amount of glyphosate is acceptable, which is why some organic farmers can call their stuff organic: as long as they make sure that they are within the so-called ‘safe’ range, then they can call their stuff organic, when in fact it is not at all.
I heard the tail end of a documentary on Radio New Zealand about a month ago. They reported that German scientists have found that levels of glyphosate, the active ingredient in the weedkiller called RoundUp, have increased 500 times since 1994,
1994 was the year that Monsanto introduced their ‘RoundUp Ready’, genetically modified seeds, to the agriculture industry. RoundUp Ready seeds are patented seeds, which means you have to buy them, and these patented seeds are designed to withstand any amount of glyphosate-containing RoundUp. This means that the farmer, or grower, can spray any amount of glyphosate-containing weedkiller over these genetically modified seeds, or growing plants, and the weedkiller will not kill the genetically modified seeds or plants, but it will kill everything else that grows around the RoundUp Ready plants.
So the plant keeps on growing, whilst any amount of glyphosate weedkiller, known as RoundUp, or – new name change to dupe the public -G360, which still contains glyphosate, is sprayed on regularly to kill the weeds. This glyphosate-containing weedkiller is absorbed into the plant. As the plant keeps on growing, it absorbs some of the glyphosate weedkiller each time a spraying occurs. Then WE GET TO EAT IT.
So, no wonder that glyphosate levels in our food is up 500 times since 1994, when RoundUp Ready seeds were first marketed by Monsanto.
And no wonder that asthma and other breathing problems, plus eczema, arthritis, candida related sicknesses such as cancer, depression and nervous diseases, such as multiple sclerosis and parkinsons, are all increasing rapidly.
I am currently living in the wild west of New Zealand spraying culture in Dunedin. Hundreds of miles of country roads are sprayed regularly with tonnes and tonnes of weedkiller. Maybe the council is not using glyphosate anymore, I do not know, but the effect on our health is still disastrous. Last year, I took photos of one of the town’s water reservoirs, which had been sprayed right around with weedkiller, with the adjoining road heavily polluted with sprayed, dead grass which you could see for miles down the road.
Dunedin is a very small city, so the country is very close to us, no matter where you live here.
It is obvous that my grandsons are being affected by the spraying. Each time a massive spraying occurs, they succumb to asthma-like illness. I notice that many old people get pneumonia, severe flu, or other illnesses after sprayings occur.
1080 pesticide is another problem to our health. This affects the nervous system very dramatically, which is not a surprise, since it kills wildlife by destroying their nervous systems. Large areas of land have been poisoned with 1080 in Dunedin over the past few months, which I am sure caused much lung disease, depression and heart troubles in our community. I became very ill with a mysterious nervous condition, resulting in extreme weakness, when the nature reserve only a few doors down was dosed with 1080 recently.
It is such a shame that New Zealand ‘Forest And Bird Society’, and, I think, even the ‘Green Party’, endorse the use of 1080 pesticide. They have no idea about the damage being done to all wildlife, and our water and food chain, through use of 1080, but keep a romantic idea of preserving the native bush and birds without any sense of reality.
Shop-Bought Comfrey Is Ruined Medicinally, And Is Inedible
Natural Remedy Gone Wrong
The old, traditional comfrey with a broad leaf was a great healer, and it was edible. Recently, I have tried eating a shop-bought, genetically modified comfrey, which I now have in my garden, adding a small leaf of it to a mound of silver-beet, just as I used to do in the old days. It gave me a mild stomach-ache for several days.
This new comfrey is dry, compared to the old, healing comfrey, which dripped with silica-rich mucilage when you broke off a stem. Modern comfrey has almost no silica-containing mucilage.
Shop-bought comfrey is recommended by plant shops as a companion plant to fruit trees, especially apple trees, and for this purpose, modern comfrey will still be useful, since the roots help break up clay soils, and bring up nutrients for the apple roots to feed on. Shop-bought comfrey is still not as good for this purpose as the tradional comfrey, though, because of the devitalized nature of this modern comfrey.
In the 1990’s, traditional, healing comfrey was banned in New Zealand and all over the western world where the reign of the big agri-chemical companies over agriculture was taking off. These giants began to get governments on board with this comfrey ban, and also their campaign for promoting Round-Up, which contains glyphosate, a probable cancer-causer, according to WHO. Councils all over the world have been encouraged to erradicate comfrey, and use this toxic herbicide, which, conveniently for Monsanto, works alongside their genetically modified plants and seeds without destroying them.
I heard on Radio NZ National news two weeks ago that the amount of glyphosate found in our foods has increased 500 times since 1994, which was when Monsanto’s RoundUp-Ready seeds were introduced into agriculture.
The reason comfrey was banned, our health authorities said, was that comfrey had caused cancer in pigs, due to the high allantoin content, a cell-proliferant. I wonder – did the researchers feed only comfrey to pigs over several months in order to make them sick? Or did they invent this pig cancer as a reason to rid the world of one of its most powerful healing remedies?
This allantoin, which has been removed in genetically modified comfrey, is the magic ingredient in traditional comfrey which made comfrey an excellent remedy for burns, abrasions, bruises, intestinal irritations, cancer, arthritis, asthma, or just about any complaint you could think of.
Traditional comfrey is also very high in silica, which is another great healing agent.
But modern, shop-bought comfrey was genetically modified to deliberately remove the healing allantoin, and also the high silica content, a project which I am sure the pharmaceutical companies would have supported. Nowadays, medicinal comfrey can only be bought through medical-pharmaceutical channels.
Modern, genetically modified comfrey is marketed as an improved species because it does not self-seed and spread. which the old comfrey was inclined to do. although, really, it never was a problem in my gardens.
Soil and Health did an article on this subject of this genetically modified comfrey in the early 2000’s, when suddenly we found that comfrey was available once more in the plant shops. They found that the allantoin had been removed, and that the silica content had been greatly reduced.
Banning comfrey was a very clever move, in order to gain the market for a comfrey which people were duped into believing was still a healing plant, and one which now would not spread. But modern comfrey has sadly been ruined as far as any medicinal use goes.
Banning comfrey for a few years, and getting government agencies to destroy any comfrey growing in wild places, and forbidding people to have it in their gardens, meant that the old, traditional, healing comfrey died out, leaving the market path open for whatever clever and unscrupulous agriculture corporation was responsible, to introduce their ‘better’ variety of comfrey. and make us pay for it.
I also suspect, and I really hope I am wrong, that the genetically modified comfrey has been bred to cross-pollinate with natural, traditional comfrey and dominate it, so that the new plant will be the genetically modified variety. I was sure I had traditional comfrey in my garden, but now all the plants look the same. They are a genetically modified variety.
I would advise not to eat comfrey any more, unless you are sure you have the tradional, broad-leafed, healing comfrey. I am sure that the agri-companies have stepped up an ingredient in genetically modified comfrey to make it inedible.
And as far as using shop-bought comfrey as a healing herb, I think you might just as well use grass. Although the agri-chemical companies have been tampering with this also for many years.
Glyphosate Ban In Europe Still To Be Fought June 2016
Natural Health and Agriculture At Risk Because of Monsanto’s Glyphosate:
Avaaz need our help to continue the battle against Monsanto’s glyphosate, which is marketed as ‘RoundUp’ by Monsanto.
Glyphosate-containing ‘RoundUp’ is probably Monsanto’s main money earner. It has for many years been falsely marketed as a ‘safe’ weedkiller, or herbicide. Farmers and householders, and town and city councils all over the western world widely use glyphosate weedkillers, believing that it does no harm.
But WHO, World Health Organization, last year in May, 2015, declared that glyphosate ‘probably’ causes cancer. After all these years of governments ignoring the issue, it is really something for WHO to hint at the danger to health.
In my experience, glyphosate poisons also disturb the natural intestinal flora of humans and animals alike, leading to conditions such as candida, or yeast infection, and excacerbating conditions such as arthritis depression and obesity.
Glyphosate is destroying flora and fauna all over the world: It helps to kill off bees and other insects and spiders which are important in the natural scheme of things for the pollination of plants. A ban on Monsanto’s glyphosate poison will help save our bees.
Glyphosate will eventually kill off everything except the Monsanto-made genetically engineered seeds, which means the planet will potentially be over-run with Monsanto’s genetically modified crops to the exclusion of everything else.
Monsanto’s glyphosate-containing RoundUp poison will eventuate in Monsanto, and other major agricultural companies, dominating the agriculture of the world. Only their genetically modified seeds, known by Monsanto as ‘RoundUp Ready’ crops will survive, and we will have to pay to grow any of these crops. We will not be allowed to use any old seeds we have around, but will have to pay for the seed giants’ patented seeds.
Wild herbs and flowers are already at risk because of glyphosate RoundUp weedkiller. Already, these plants which can cure disease, such as dandelions, plantains, self-heal and comfrey, are being destroyed on our waysides and even in our lawns and parks.
Healing through natural herbal medicine will be a thing of the past, and people will be even more reliant on pharmaceutical drugs than they are now.
People’s health will suffer if glyphosate is not banned for good: Glyphosate gets into our organs and pollutes our bodies, making us less resistant to diseases. It is also a likely cause of obesity.
No heritage plants or trees will be available – the chemical and seed giants will make us pay for their patented seeds and fruit trees too. And the quality of these new hybrid plants and seeds will most likely be inferior to our older type, more disease-resistant plants and seeds.
Food sources should not be owned by anybody. – Food and water are basic human rights of all mankind, and it is deplorable that these chemical and seed companies are working towards controlling humankind and profiting by making them dependent upon their system of agriculture.
Donate if you can, to Avaaz, who are actively working towards a world ban on Monsanto’s glyphosate-containing herbicide.
Please help us to spread the word and send the following link to friends: https://secure.avaaz.org/en/