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Condors and Other Wildlife
Scientific studies have reached a consensus: lead poisoning is the biggest threat facing the successful recovery of the California condor. Since 1997, 13 condors from the California population have been confirmed or strongly suspected to have died after ingesting lead. When testing occurs, the majority of free-flying birds are measured with elevated blood lead levels, most above what the Center for Disease Control recommends as the maximum threshold for human children. Over 30 birds have required emergency treatment of lead poisoning.
In Arizona, there have been 12 cases of condors dying from lead exposure, and 31 birds needing emergency chelation treatment
Scientific studies have documented that the primary source of lead is from spent ammunition that remains in carcasses after they are shot. When a lead rifle bullet traveling at almost 3 times the speed of sound strikes animal tissue, it quickly begins to expand and loses hundreds of tiny pieces as it continues its journey. The entrails and areas that are trimmed away and left behind are often contaminated with these lead fragments. Because condors feed on carrion, are group feeders, and even small amounts of lead can sicken or kill a condor, condors are more frequently exposed to lead bullet hazards than most wildlife. However, lead poisoning through ingestion of spent lead bullet and shell shot has been demonstrated as being a serious factor for many other wildlife species too, including golden eagles, bald eagles, and turkey vultures.
Human Health Concerns
Studies are increasingly showing that lead fragments can also be found in wild game meat processed for human consumption, even though best attempts are made in the field to remove sections that are within the bullet wound channel.
A recent study that was conducted and will soon be published, examined the prevalence of lead bullet fragments in packaged venison. Thirty different white-tailed deer were harvested using lead rifle bullets and then given to 30 different game meat processors, with the instructions of processing the animals using customary practices and providing the researchers packages containing steaks and ground meat. These packages were then randomly selected and x-rayed to see how many contained lead bullet fragments. Of the 324 randomly selected packages of ground venison, 34% contained metal fragments; some packages contained as many a 168 separate pieces. Further analysis positively identified the metal as 93% lead and 7 % copper. This demonstrates that while the results are preliminary and much further study needs to be done to better assess risks to humans, it appears that the if lead bullets are used, odds are high that you will ingest lead particles in ground meat.
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