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To Filter or Not to Filter? That is the question.


tomcat

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So .. do you filter your water when you're in the cascades? Iodine tablets?

 

I have never once brought a filter in the cascades dating back to 1987. I have used a filter on two occasions in situations where the only drinking water was a stagnant pool and my climbing partner happened to have a filter with him. I have also never had giharrdia. So, am I lucky?

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only 40% of people will ever develop giardia symptoms. the rest of us can carry it with no ill effects, and we dont need filters. after watching various partners drink out of creeks i drank out of, then gt ill, i guess i am in the lucky 60% bigdrink.gif or all the alcohol killed off the bugs

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Hiking around in the Sierras we never filtered the water, just drank out of the streams. It wasn't until the Cascades that I started using iodine and I assumed that only the water in the Cascades was tainted but I've since been told that I was just very lucky. I guess I have a strong constitution. smile.gif

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Hiking around in the Sierras we never filtered the water, just drank out of the streams.

Chris, I too used to backpack in the Sierra range. I usually drank without filtering. I used to try to "evaluate" the water source and decide whether to treat with iodine or not. Then I realized that you can't tell where your water has been unless you watch it come out of the ground, or melt from a snow field. Now I always treat, or filter. The PUR filters are so fast that one filter can be shared between four-six people on a climb. I just say, "you carry the stove, I have the filter". grin.gif

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Trask, if you've ever been treated for giardiasis, you'll know that the cure is almost worse than the disease. Standard treatment is metronidazole, which is an antibiotic used to treat gram-negative, anaerobic and protozoal infections. It's been around a very long time. It makes you nauseous. So picture this: diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, gas, flatulence... not nice!

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Maybe I'm in that 40 percentile that Dru was talking about. Or maybe it's the beer.

 

http://www.bsa-troop237.org/prevent/pages/ghiar.html

 

"the EPA says 80% of all water in the wild contains this protozoan, typically in streams and lakes, but even in the snow you might melt. Giardia protozoa spends part of their life cycle in the intestines of mammals. Think of all the mammals that poop in the water, directly or indirectly: the marmot on the boulder surrounded by snow, the pica scurrying around the rocks with a stream flowing under, the beaver that fouls the stream, the horse or mule that stops at each stream crossing to relieve, the infected Homo Sapian who did not wash his/her hands before preparing food."

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Maybe I'm naive but I thought giharrdia emanated from water sources frequented by beavers...
Beavers usually get the rap for spreading Giardia (some people call it Beaver Fever), but William Bemrick, a University of Minnesota researcher, said beavers are blamed far too often. He cited studies on muskrats that showed them to carry even more cysts than beavers that lived nearby. Bemrick also pointed out that infected humans do more than their share of spreading the disease. Three-hundred million cysts may be present in one milligram of human feces, Bemrick wrote, and these cysts can survive for a month in cool water.
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Trask, if you've ever been treated for giardiasis, you'll know that the cure is almost worse than the disease. Standard treatment is metronidazole, which is an antibiotic used to treat gram-negative, anaerobic and protozoal infections. It's been around a very long time. It makes you nauseous. So picture this: diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, gas, flatulence... not nice!

 

Yeah! But it's dirt cheap!!! bigdrink.gifcantfocus.gif

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Then I started looking above tree line, saw all those climbers taking a leak...filter away! rockband.gif

 

I guess it was too hard to read my comments

Observe the source and you can either pill it or make an educated guess about the source. Meaning if it's sub alpine think about where it comes from animals and humans and all. If you dont know what I mean then just carry a damn filter or pills.

then.

 

We can all view your mental power is lacking. Just carry a filter at all times. smirk.gif

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never tried drunken climbing, but skiing and drinking definitely go well together - instant courage in a bottle.

 

As for the little nasty bugs, a packet of gatorade and a little pill is all I ever use, and I haven't had any problems - but that could just be luck so far.

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