Warnings of Lead in Venison Irk Hunters
By JAMES MacPHERSON



This image provided by Bismarck, N.D. physician and hunter Dr. William Cornatzer shows a 2007 CT scan taken of venison packages riddled with lead from high-powered bullets. Other states have joined North Dakota's warning that thousands of pounds of venison given to food pantries could be contaminated by lead from bullets. Hunting groups are calling it an overreaction. (AP Photo/Dr. William Cornatzer) (AP)

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Thousands of pounds of venison donated to food pantries this year has become a contentious gift in three states.

Officials in North Dakota, Minnesota and Iowa warn that the meat could be contaminated by lead from bullets. Hunting groups are calling it an overreaction.

"It's alarmist and not supported by any science," said Lawrence Keane, a vice president and lawyer for the Newton, Conn.-based National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association for the firearms and ammunition industry. "High quality protein is now taken out of the mouths of needy, hungry people."

North Dakota health officials on Wednesday told food pantries in the state to throw out donated venison, saying it may have lead fragments. Officials in Minnesota and Iowa followed with similar alerts, asking that venison in those states not be distributed.

Gov. John Hoeven said the alerts were issued as a precaution. He said the state has a "tremendous working relationship" with hunters, and the questions raised about venison are new.

Safari Club International's Sportsmen Against Hunger program donated 317,000 pounds of venison last year to the needy, said Doug Burdin, a lawyer for the Tucson, Ariz.-based group. The meat donated by hunters was enough for more than 1.2 million meals, he said.

"It's provided a lot of free meals to a lot of people," Burdin said. "Hunters are doing something they love and helping others at the same time. This is disheartening, and we certainly don't think this program should come to an end on the unscientific assessment that has occurred here."

Dr. William Cornatzer, a Bismarck physician and hunter, alerted health officials after he conducted his own tests on venison using a CT scanner and found lead in 60 percent of 100 samples. The North Dakota Health Department confirmed the results on at least five samples of venison destined for food pantries.

"This isn't just a food pantry problem. This is a nationwide problem," Cornatzer said Friday.

Hunters have alternatives to lead, he said. "I'm a big hunter. I've already purchased four boxes of copper bullets to next year," Cornatzer said.

The North Dakota Community Action Partnership distributed 17,000 pounds of venison from 381 donated deer after last year's hunting season, a number that has tripled since the program began in North Dakota in 2004, executive director Ann Pollert said. At least 4,000 pounds of venison were in food pantries in the state when the health department issued its warning, she said.

The state has about 45 food pantries, and surveys have shown a need for more than 70,000 pounds of venison annually, Poller said. She hopes people will donate other types of meat.

"Meat is so expensive," she said. "This is going to have an impact — it's a quality, lean meat protein source that we're losing."

Jason Foss, president of Minot-based Pheasants for the Future, said hunters from his group donated about 100 deer this year to the program. He believes the issue of lead-contaminated meat is "a little extreme at this point."

"Sportsmen have been shooting deer for hundreds of years with lead bullets with no problems," he said. "I hope this program keeps rolling along because so much good comes out of it."

This is the "foot in the door", be looking for all the lead bans next.

Agree. Lead sinkers/weigts for fishing have already banned in some places. Damn, I guess that eliminates firing depleted uranium rounds at game too...

quote:

Originally posted by Kamo Gari:
Damn, I guess that eliminates firing depleted uranium rounds at game too...

Well, I am going to keep doing it until someone confirms that it is, in fact, illegal.

I've already heard rumblings of no lead shot for all migratory birds. No one listens to common sense any more. It's all about fear. Everyone is running around afraid of everything all the time.

Alan

either that or Barnes has more political pull than we thought

quote:

Originally posted by Alan R. McDaniel, Jr.:
I've already heard rumblings of no lead shot for all migratory birds.
Alan

Rumblings? Hmm. Best to my knowledge, lead is, and has been banned for use in waterfowl, and has been for many years. Am I missing something?

Doves. Don't feel bad though, I miss them too!

Alan

Ah, got it. Never missed one, as I've never shot at one. As far as feeling bad, they're considered songbirds here, and we can't hunt them. I already feel badly enough!

Thanks,

KG

Song birds? I didn't know they could sing. I've heard them make a noise but if you want to hear a bird sing, a mocking bird will Whistle Dixie in circle around whatever a dove will do. You need to stand at a South Texas water hole at sundown in late September sometime. On a good day you can shoot 4 boxes of shells (or I can anyway) to get a limit of 12 birds.

I don't know how far North they migrate. I used to frequent Wilton, Conn. back in the 70's and I don't ever recall seeing a dove. Of course I usually went at Christmas and sometimes in Spring and Summer. I guess by September all the doves are gone from up there.

Alan

quote:

...This image provided by Bismarck, N.D. physician and hunter Dr. William Cornatzer shows a 2007 CT scan taken of venison packages riddled with lead from high-powered bullets. ...

If that was real, I'd probably weigh a bit over 10,000 pounds. I would suspect it is tiny "bone chips" from trimming too close and tossing it in the grinder.

Or something the Anti-Hunters dreamed up to create another era of the weekly scare. Surely you all remember when Moscow bill and algore were in office, EVERY WEEK there was a "new" health scare. From Popcorn to Milk, now BOGUS Lead in Venison.

Good Hunting to you all - with good old LEAD Bullets!

Yeah, the little boost for "lead free" bullets was kinda timely. Another reason why I won't use the damn things.
Bottom line is, how long has the programs been going on? How much meat has been distributed? How many people have died from lead poisoning?
What is lost if the hunters say "screw it, I'll eat it myself" because of some chicken little or someone with a (not too) hidden agenda starts laying down astringent rules about how the game is taken.

quote:

If that was real, I'd probably weigh a bit over 10,000 pounds. I would suspect it is tiny "bone chips" from trimming too close and tossing it in the grinder.

It's most likely real, like it or not. It's easy to try to dismiss this issue but it's not gonna go away.

There's a conference on the subject of lead based ammo coming up in May,

Ingestion Of Spent Lead Ammunition :Implications For Wildlife And Humans

The below pic is from a study done to determine the extent of fragmentation of lead cored bullets in deer.



Read the study and view the pics here, it's a PDF file and it's big.

Bullet Fragmentation Study: Supplementary Data

No worries about lead in meat when you bowhunt.

quote:

Originally posted by Doc:
No worries about lead in meat when you bowhunt.

I don't worry anyway and I shoot a bit of game with handguns and hard cast bullets

quote:

Originally posted by Kamo Gari:

quote:

Originally posted by Alan R. McDaniel, Jr.:
I've already heard rumblings of no lead shot for all migratory birds.
Alan

Rumblings? Hmm. Best to my knowledge, lead is, and has been banned for use in waterfowl, and has been for many years. Am I missing something?

It's not just waterfowl, species like Mourning Dove, whitewings, etc. are migratory birds also

this is no different than other scares, because the so called doctor did not tell how much you must injest. White bread will kill you if you eat enough--catch is that you must eat a tractor trailer load daily for 30 days.

This kind of pseudo-science has been used to institute a lead ammunition ban here in California for Condor preservation. There has been the ingestion of wild game shot with lead for several hundred years and no showing that either people or the other animals that consumed them had elevated levels of lead from the ammunition.

Even though no Condors were shown to have died from ingesting fragments of ammunition, the bill passed and was signed into law.

The alarmist agenda is clearly to incrementally ban firearms through the removal of ammunition. Once it becomes prohibitively expensive to shoot, the gun control will be complete.

Vote with your wallet and your ballot this year.

quote:

Originally posted by Skinner.:
...The below pic is from a study done to determine the extent of fragmentation of lead cored bullets in deer....Read the study and view the pics here, it's a PDF file and it's big. ...

Hey Skinner, I've no desire to argue with you. If you believe it, best of luck to you.

I can see where they would try to use it in their arguments, but I feel sure it can be shown to be a bunch of bologna.

The flick of what they "claim to be" spent Lead could be Bone Fragments, Acorn fragments, corn fragments, etc., any kind of secondary missile fragments created by Bullet Impact.

The only Bullet I can think of that would have a chance of fragmenting ,like shown in the flick, would be a Varmint Grenade by Barnes where the Core is "Sintered metal" and compressed to form the Core. It is "designed" to work just as the flick shows, but is for small varmints.

Good Hunting with the tried and true - Lead Bullets.

quote:

Hey Skinner, I've no desire to argue with you.

Hot Core, feel free to argue all you desire. In fact, I'll start it off.

quote:

The only Bullet I can think of that would have a chance of fragmenting ,like shown in the flick, would be a Varmint Grenade by Barnes

Bullshit. Thin jacketed factory bullets don't fragment ? I think that's the primary problem. The off the shelf 'promo' ammo that the majority of hunters use because it's on sale and available.

Never found just a shredded copper jacket in a deer or feral hog ? Those bullets do not stay together. Add in higher velocities and is it so surprising that there's fragmentation ?

As per jacketed lead core bullets not fragmenting, I used Sierra Blitz, Hornady SX and Calhoon DHP's on bobcats and coyotes for years specifically because they would fragment inside the body cavity and not exit and harm the saleable pelt.

quote:

I feel sure it can be shown to be a bunch of bologna.

But are you prepared to be wrong ? When the reality is that prior to these studies nobody really looked at bullet fragmentation in game with any technology.

Now we're forced to and we won't like the results.

Think about this a bit.

Just remember guys--------no use in DIEING HEALTHY !!!!!!!

Hipshoot

I'm far more afraid of being run over by a Toyota Prius while I'm crossing the street ...

isn't it just a little bit coincidental that:
1. The Dr who took 100 one-pound packs of venison and then had it CT'ed is a board member of the Peregrin Fund and said fund is in large part responsible for banning lead bullets in condor range
2. said Doc is a skin doc and not into toxicology or epidemiology.
3. That the peregrin Fund is sponsoring a symposium this spring on lead fragments in game
4. said Doc found over 60 percent rate of contamination while State of ND found it, if memory serves, at less than 30. (and rate of contamination had no quantifiers ie ppm
5. Nothing of recovery of pieces-- I know i know, it says they could be microscopic and almost liquid-- really? Some of the photos show rather large pieces of something.
Enough-- let's find out what, when and how much. Until then we may as well listen to al jezerra.

If the deer are shot in the heart lung region I hardly see how lead fragments could show up with any regularity in ALL of the meat. I think it's all just more BS.

Alan

quote:

Enough-- let's find out what, when and how much.

That's what I'm tellin ya', problem is we probably won't like the results. And there will be many more studies resulting from this. And it's not just the results from Dr. Cornatzer that are evidenced here, similar findings are completely independent of his.

quote:

The North Dakota Health Department confirmed the results on at least five samples of venison destined for food pantries.

IA, NB, WI, & MT stated they'd test donated venison as well.

As a physician, I have never heard of a documented case of lead poisoning from eating large game animals. Anyone else ever heard of such?

Lead poisoning from schrapnel or bullets from war wounds very rarely happens. Even folks with large numbers of shotgun pellets in their bodies almost never get lead poisoning.
Ingested METALLIC lead (as in bullets or shot) very rarely causes any increase in serum lead levels. Poisonous lead is usually lead that has formed a salt,an oxide, an acetate or other organic compound.
http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/l/lead_poisoning/causes.htm
http://www.faqs.org/health/Sick-V3/Lead-Poisoning.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning

So, I guess all those upland game birds shot every year don't have a little bit of lead residue in them as well? THe residues are probably so small in consumed meat it would take some exceptional situations to become fatal. Ever look at the LD50s for things we consume on a regular daily basis and don't think twice about it i.e. caffeine, nicotine, etc.

We butcher our own deer and elk. We trim all blood-shot meat off and it goes in the trash. Wouldn't that remove most if not all the lead? That and I use bonded bullets.

-Steve

Much worse than any imagined danger of lead poisoning is the real danger of breaking a tooth on shot in game birds. I eat mainly venison as a red meat, and can remember only once ever biting into a chunk of lead. I have removed a few pieces of jacketing while cooking stuff.

It's not about lead. It's about guns and gun control and banning guns. Stop trying to talk sense about lead. You're pissing up a rope. The gun control freaks and extremists will stop at nothing, cannot stoop too low, and will tell any lie to anyone to get what they want.

And that is a firearms ban.(period)

Alan

Okay class, can we say "outcome driven research"? It's just another end run by the gun grabbers.
I have been hunting for over 50 years and while I haven't recovered too many bullets, none, absolutely none have performed like that explosion pictured. The lead core would fold back along itself into the classic mushroom more or less and any bullet particles that were lost were in the blood shot meat along the wound channel. Even hitting bone, the bullet fragments and bone shards would be in meat that you wouldn't process.

quote:

Originally posted by analog_peninsula:
I'm far more afraid of being run over by a Toyota Prius while I'm crossing the street ...

The major concern here would be "car failure"... You'd probably just end up wounded, running all the way home just to die a horrible death days or weeks later ...

Ken....

This is why I sell so many specialty metal detector probes to clients. It might not find the tiniest of fragments (mostly due to casual searching by the user) but it will detect even small pellets, as many Deer get "shot gunned" every year. Not only lead, but copper jacket fragments are found too.
LDK

to the anti's...

Its an ongoing thing, some folks just need a full time job! How have I lasted all these years without all this wonderful advise from the liberal, CS left! It was funny for many years, but its not anymore, it will effect the up and coming generation to a greater degree, the poor bastards will be afraid to drink water or eat meat I fear! and we will run out of gas and the caribou will over populate and die off, and on and on, oh well.

quote:

How have I lasted all these years without all this wonderful advise from the liberal,

Chronic low-level lead poisoning from ingesting or inhaling small quantities of lead over time doesn't kill, but among other things it can certainly affect one's brain functions. 'Nough said.

on a more serious note:

Coincidental that this topic came up here because I just finished an article for the NSSF's Range Report magazine about an indoor smallbore rifle range in Delta Junction, AK.

Turns out the entire high-school rifle team and all the adult volunteers had elevated lead levels in their blood. Several of them were close to OSHA's "no work" standards.

The amusing thing is how they found out about it. Seems one of the adult volunteers has a 1-yr. old son who showed abnormal lead levels during a routine blood check. The conclusion for the cause: his dad regularly swept the floor at the range, and the infant likes to chew on his dad's shoes. When the dad and teenage son who competes on the rifle team also tested dangerously high, blood tests were ordered for everyone involved.

And one major change they made was mandating that everyone wash their hands before they leave the range with a special soap that cuts lead and other metals. Reason: it's not good to eat with dirty, lead-laden hands.

At this time, most of the problems have been corrected and three of the kids will be competing at the USA Junior Olympic Championship in Colorado Springs this month. -TONY

Dunno guys...

As a doc, I've seen a lot of CT scans that have stuff like that in them. The radiologists call it artifact. Most commonly it seems to be found in older scanners, but everything will show this sometime. I was told its related to crystalline refraction by one radiologist also- so if we are dealing with frozen meat, who knows.

I won't say it can't be lead. However, they will need to prove by some other method that it is lead. From the look of it, they could take the most "contaminated" pack and digest it chemically and get an assay. Compare it to some meat from the same animal that shows no fragments and this could prove something.

It continually amazes me how little my colleagues know about science, despite taking all these impressive classes.

Damn all these years all of us Shoshone county boys thought our higher lead levels were from bunker hill mining company..

Considering all the years I've crimped splitshot and countless other lead weights with my teeth while fishing, in addition to eating God knows how much lead in critters, I guess I'm just better off going to bed and waiting for death to come.

Or I could just have a nightcap. Mmm. Decisions, decisions...

quote:

Originally posted by crbutler:
Dunno guys...

As a doc, I've seen a lot of CT scans that have stuff like that in them. The radiologists call it artifact. Most commonly it seems to be found in older scanners, but everything will show this sometime. I was told its related to crystalline refraction by one radiologist also- so if we are dealing with frozen meat, who knows. ...

Hey Doc, I think you nailed it. I'd done as Skinner suggested and "thought about it", which led me to believe the Second Flick was of Sand, dirt. etc. in the hair of the unskinned carcass.

But I believe you figured it out correctly.
-----

When what appears to be factual go against common sense, the facts are normally Bogus.

Good Hunting and "clean" 1-shot (Lead Core Bullet) Kills.

I think I would want to know what very small particles of lead looked like on a CT. Maybe a few atoms lights up like what the photo shows and maybe the concentration of lead represented by the photo is down in the low parts per billion range.

When a cup & core mushrooms properly going through meat the weight shed by the bullet is in the 30-50 per cent range. There are Xray photos of gelatin blocks that make it look like the lead left in the block is mostly in very fine particles. Particles that appear so fine as to be imperceptible to touch or feel. If that's true then if the Ct can indeed light up with extremely small lead particles (quite probable), then there are a lot of questions to be answered.

If those lights on the photo represent micro particles then we need to know how much lead total is there. Lead in food is not good. micro particles of lead in food can become organic lead much more readily than larger chunks of metallic lead.

It is perfectly conceivable to me that the lead in the 20+ one pound packages in the photo might be no more than a microgram or two which would be a concentration down in the low parts per billion.

One would expect metallic lead to look dramatically different in a CT or MRI or Xray than tissue or organic compounds. Without someone doing the work to tell me what that picture shows It falls into the category of interesting but not very useful.