Lead contamination in meat.

[LongWayAround]

If you trim liberally around the wounds and spit out anything that seems solid, I think you're pretty well in the clear. It's not like a few grains of lead just auto dispersed through the entire animal.

I work with a guy who says things like "I don't want to feed lead to my family." That person hasn't shot a deer in about eight years. He's not feeding anything to his family.

 

[z987k]

If you trim liberally around the wounds and spit out anything that seems solid, I think you're pretty well in the clear. It's not like a few grains of lead just auto dispersed through the entire animal.

I work with a guy who says things like "I don't want to feed lead to my family." That person hasn't shot a deer in about eight years. He's not feeding anything to his family.

X rays show that fragments of lead generally end up feet from the wound. Most of the lead ingested is so small you'd only be able to see it on an xray.

No one is claiming anyone is getting chunks of visible lead in their food.

 

[PredatorSlayer]

I find that just about all the people that say it isn't an issue have absolutely no idea how lead toxicity works and what it's effects are.
It's really obvious they don't when they say something along the lines of people have been eating lead shot meat forever, or me and my family are fine.
You're creating a defense to an argument literally no one is making.

Animals shot with lead are killing no one. Making no one acutely sick. And there's no way you can possibly know if you or your family is fine unless you're getting blood tests done for lead. And even then, because you can't really have a baseline for what the intelligence of you or your child would have been or if you were genetically predisposed to a condition, it's really hard to say how much it harmed you.

Largely the issue is it makes you dumber and leads to neurological conditions over time(and other things). Long term low level lead exposure is terrible for any human. And your kids will never reach the potential they had. Kids are particularly vulnerable because first they absorb more than adults and second their brain is still developing. There is a direct relationship between levels of lead in the blood of children and IQ.

It's obviously not the end of the world to eat or feed your child game shot with lead. But it's a pretty bad idea to make any habit of it.

IDK man. Both of my kids have been eating lead shot game their entire lives. Both were 4.0 students and got mid 30’s on the ACT. Daughter is going to be an attorney and son wants to be a surgeon. Maybe people with dumb kids should stop trying to blame it on lead bullets and look in the mirror instead.

 

[z987k]

IDK man. Both of my kids have been eating lead shot game their entire lives. Both were 4.0 students and got mid 30’s on the ACT. Daughter is going to be an attorney and son wants to be a surgeon. Maybe people with dumb kids should stop trying to blame it on lead bullets and look in the mirror instead.

So you didn't understand anything I wrote then?

 

[KyleR1985]

X rays show that fragments of lead generally end up feet from the wound. Most of the lead ingested is so small you'd only be able to see it on an xray.

No one is claiming anyone is getting chunks of visible lead in their food.

Do we have links to the x ray images?

They seem to have been pretty careful in setting up for them. They make it a point to highlight only lead not already in the deer, and then to confirm that the lead they see is in fact from the bullets.

I’m just trying to figure out how lead ends up on one end of a deer, when it started on the other, and it doesn’t leave a blodshot trail. For it to move theough tissue it has to have velocity. And enough velocity to push it through is going to tear tissue and cause bleeding. This would be hard not to notice if you’re paying attention.

This strikes me as “lowest common denominator” concerns. If you’re not super smart, not paying attention, don’t focus and try hard when butchering meat, or you send it to a butcher you know won’t care, then it can become a concern. Like mentioned, we can’t currently run the counterfactual, so the conservative play is to avoid feeding this meat to high risk people(kids).

the cost of a blood test for lead levels seems to be inexpensive. Seems easy enough to self police here: shoot deer where your bullets hit as little edible meat as possible. Cut away bloodshot meat. Pay attention for fragment wound channels into any edible meat. Give you and your family a blood test for lead levels annually or semi annually. There’s a known threshold for causing big problems. And a lower threshold for maybe causing problems. Do what you think is best if you see lead levels rising to a level that causes you concern.

Or shoot non lead bullets or shop at the grocery store. It’s 2024. You have lots of options of how to screw yourself and your kids up. And even more options to monitor your progress.

 

[HingleMcCringleberry]

I find that just about all the people that say it isn't an issue have absolutely no idea how lead toxicity works and what it's effects are.
It's really obvious they don't when they say something along the lines of people have been eating lead shot meat forever, or me and my family are fine.

So you didn't understand anything I wrote then?

Nope, we're all too stupid from the lead exposure.


So for all the super cautious copper bullet people, what type of ppe are you wearing when you shoot your firearms? Since there are toxins in the primers, certainly you don't want to be exposed to those lead particles.

 

[Short Track]

How about buck shot for deer. Parts of Michigan is buck shot for deer. Talk about lead...

 

[z987k]

How about buck shot for deer. Parts of Michigan is buck shot for deer. Talk about lead...

You can get 00 and 000 in steel, tungsten and bismuth.

If I were required to use buckshot for deer, I'd use tungsten. It's crazy expensive for shot shells but you're going to shoot 1? Maybe 2? It'd really extend your range as well.

 

[Str8shooter]

If you are legitimately curious about the subject, talk to a toxicologist, ornithologists or anyone who actually studies the effects of lead on humans and non humans. Additionally there are numerous studies that have documented elevated blood lead concentrations in families that hunt and eat game shot with lead compared to those that do not. The prognosticating and BS on this forum on this subject is not representative of the existing knowledge base about the harmful effects of lead and lead consumption. This community has a ton of awesome intel on gear, hunting techniques and other helpful experience sharing however, toxicology and eco-toxicity experts we are not. The health risks from consuming animals killed with lead bullets are well-documented, primarily due to the toxic nature of lead and its persistence in the environment and biological systems. Bismuth shot for upland and waterfowl, tungsten shot for turkey and copper bullets for big game are now widely available, increasingly affordable and highly effective (despite the occasional N=1 anecdotes of "bullet failures" from folks standing over dead animals...). If you are a new hunter or someone who has some skepticism or a friends dads who think copper bullets suck (the first gen copper bullets weren't awesome) go check out any African hunting forums, Barnes bullets facebook groups and even nuggets in Rokslide which are replete with examples of the efficacy of copper bullets.

Lastly, google is your friend.
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0,29&q=Lead+ammunition+consumption+wild+game+&btnG=

 

[OXN939]

How about buck shot for deer.

Lower velocity projectiles like buckshot or round balls out of a trad muzzleloader present far less of a lead toxicity issue as long as you don't consume meat from the immediate wound channel. Modern centerfire rifles that are doing over 2K FPS impact velocity are really how you get the "starry sky" x ray phenomenon.

Daughter is going to be an attorney and son wants to be a surgeon. Maybe people with dumb kids should stop trying to blame it on lead bullets and look in the mirror instead.

A comparison I'd draw to this is the radium girls- the worst of the damage happens long before there are any noticeable symptoms. You'd also really have to lean into lead poisoning to effect someone so severely that it actually limits their professional opportunities, much more likely would be any of the other downstream effects like ADHD, kidney damage, reproductive harm or insomnia.

Older but interesting article I came across recently. Kid ended up having some pretty serious health issues down the line.

Source of Boy's Mysterious Lead Poisoning Was in an Unlikely Place

An 8-year-old boy in Australia had high levels of lead, a toxic metal, in his blood for more than two years for unexplained reasons, until doctors found lead pellets in his body, trapped in an unlikely place, according to a new report of his case.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[PredatorSlayer]

Lower velocity projectiles like buckshot or round balls out of a trad muzzleloader present far less of a lead toxicity issue as long as you don't consume meat from the immediate wound channel. Modern centerfire rifles that are doing over 2K FPS impact velocity are really how you get the "starry sky" x ray phenomenon.



A comparison I'd draw to this is the radium girls- the worst of the damage happens long before there are any noticeable symptoms. You'd also really have to lean into lead poisoning to effect someone so severely that it actually limits their professional opportunities, much more likely would be any of the other downstream effects like ADHD, kidney damage, reproductive harm or insomnia.

Older but interesting article I came across recently. Kid ended up having some pretty serious health issues down the line.

Source of Boy's Mysterious Lead Poisoning Was in an Unlikely Place

An 8-year-old boy in Australia had high levels of lead, a toxic metal, in his blood for more than two years for unexplained reasons, until doctors found lead pellets in his body, trapped in an unlikely place, according to a new report of his case.

www.nbcnews.com

The problem is many of our parents and grandparents grew up eating lead shot meat without any of that BS. One of my grandpas was an executive at a large company and the other a doctor. I haven’t trusted TV networks since COVID. Its all fake news.

This lead poisoning stuff is straight from states like california and mono bullet manufacturers like the Hammer Bullet Dbag who are pushing agendas.

 

[OXN939]

This lead poisoning stuff is straight from states like california and mono bullet manufacturers like the Hammer Bullet Dbag who are pushing agendas.

Guess you answered my question from the other thread

Completely agreed that there is nothing with less credibility than mainstream news. Doesn't mean I'm serving my family carcinogens in protest. Little close to this dude for my taste

 

[PredatorSlayer]

Guess you answered my question from the other thread

Completely agreed that there is nothing with less credibility than mainstream news. Doesn't mean I'm serving my family carcinogens in protest. Little close to this dude for my taste

You do realize that copper poisoning is a thing, right? Sounds like you should just buy all your food from Whole Foods.

 

[z987k]

You do realize that copper poisoning is a thing, right? Sounds like you should just buy all your food from Whole Foods.

It is. Are you aware what the LD50 for it is vs lead?

Do you know what the LD50 is for water? Oxygen? Both also toxic in the right dose. Everything is.
It's a non-sequitur because literally no one is talking about those amounts of lead, so idk why you'd bring that up for copper.

Do you know what long term exposure to low levels of copper does to humans?

 

[Short Track]

Do you know what long term exposure to low levels of copper do to humans?

nearly every house has copper pipes.

 

[z987k]

Guess you answered my question from the other thread

Completely agreed that there is nothing with less credibility than mainstream news. Doesn't mean I'm serving my family carcinogens in protest. Little close to this dude for my taste

There are people that are/were very upset when the government stepped in and stopped a company from advertising and selling chlorine bleach to drink as a cure for literally everything.
There are people that are upset that you can't buy bitter almonds to eat.(if you're not familiar, about 10 of them is a lethal does in an average human and they look exactly the same as sweet(edible) almonds).

It does not surprise me at all that there are people that would actually want lead in their food.

I'm very much on the side of let people do what they want. Including drink bleach, eat very small amounts of lead or build rockets to see if the earth is flat. It's really better for the rest of us that they do.

But I would much prefer the choice to be informed as best as possible. I don't think that most people actually understand the lead issue. As very much evidenced by the consistent and repeated I'm fine and my family is fine refrain. If they understood the issue at all, they'd know that they cannot possibly know that to be true.

 

[Sadie]

I read of a test done several years ago. Blood tested people who did not eat harvested game and people that did. Results were the ones that ate wild game had no lead or lower lead than the others. Probably different environments such as city vs rural would be my guess. This came shortly after I read that some state had disposed of tons of donated venison after finding some lead in it.

 

[Slickhill]

Not discounting, but not fully trusting, studies that show increased lead levels for people eating game killed with lead bullets.

But as stated above having generations of family eating lead killed game as a staple and having Great Grands who lived to 80,92,80,91,90, & 98. Grandparents living to 86 and 88, and two still going in their 90’s. Plus aunts and uncles making it to anywhere from their mid 80’s to 102. Immediate family still alive and healthy, working, hunting, camping, recreating from their 60’s through 70’s. Kids that are honor students with 0 health issues outside of the occasional sniffle. Personally working in an industry with way higher than normal potential exposure to lead than the average American and the one time I went to the Dr and had a panel done my levels of everything were described as perfect.

What is there to gain in this case? The potential to live to 200? What are we doing differently than the studies?

BTW the coyote, hawk, and buzzard population concerns me not at all.

 

[Wannabebowhuntr]

I’ve never worried about lead poisoning from game, but if I did much gun hunting seems like it could be easy enough to try and avoid. I will say I shot a deer with my bow this year and have been spitting out lead shot from my ground meat, so there’s only so much you can do lol.

 

[Pony Soldier]

I think the easiest way to avoid lead is don't live in a house built before 1970. (Lead paint).

Second best - don't go east of Dickenson, North Dakota.