Word: ddt
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Loaded Worms. Early elm-saving sprays used DDT, and as Marine Biologist Rachel Carson recounted with telling effect in her bestseller, Silent Spring, the insecticide got into the soil and was absorbed by earthworms. When robins ate the worms, they died in large numbers. Quickly the notion spread through suburban folklore that any kind of spraying is deadly to all birds, even to squirrels, raccoons and other appealing mammals. Organized resistance to spraying began to appear. In Downers Grove, near Chicago, bird enthusiasts ran a loud campaign. They talked about "birdkill" and hinted that insecticides cause cancer in humans. They...
Though both sides wallow in emotion, the facts seem to be that some kinds of spraying do reduce temporarily the local population of some kinds of birds. This is partly because spraying cuts the insect food supply, but when DDT is used in large quantities, it may also kill birds directly. When it gets into the soil, it may kill birds via contaminated earthworms for several years...
...fall or in early spring before the buds swell. At those times, few birds are around to be damaged, and when the bark beetles start flying in April from diseased to healthy elms, they are killed by the long-lasting poison. Another help would be substitution of methoxychlor for DDT. Methoxychlor is more expensive, but it kills bark beetles just as well, and it is only 10% as toxic as DDT to birds and other wildlife...
...silent spring crept over London, right into the House of Lords, where they were debating the dangers of pesticides and toxic chemicals. In the U.S., declared Lord Douglas of Barloch, practically every meal contained some DDT. Labor Peer Lord Edward Shackleton, 51, son of famed explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton, couldn't have agreed more. Why, there was a cannibal in Polynesia, said he, "who no longer allows his tribe to eat Americans. Their fat is contaminated. We have about two parts per million of DDT in our bodies, Americans about eleven parts per million." His Lordship's conclusion...
...suburban bird populations. The robins live on earthworms (that is why they are plentiful in the suburbs, where worm-bearing lawns abound), which concentrate insecticides without being damaged themselves. When the robins eat these insecticide-full worms, they die. The slaughter may continue for several years, until the DDT in the soil has disintegrated...