Water purity overkill?

Just got in a Katadyn Hiker Pro. Along with it, I order the Katadyn tablets also. My common sense is telling me doing both is just overkill for here in the states. The filter should be enough, right? Or, should I throw a tablet in as well?

I have the filter. It's going to get out everything down to .3 microns, so that's quite a bit.

The tabs will kill whatever is in there, no matter how small, but the dead stuff will still be in the water, along with silt, etc.

I prefer the filter. It's not as light, but I don't like lots of chemicals (ok, any chemicals) in my water.

YMMV.

Double treatment normally isn't necessary, unless you're downstream of human habitation. Other occasions for double treatment might be when the only water source for miles around contains dead animals or something equally tasty.

Since the chlorine dioxide tablets weigh so little, I always take several days' worth just in case something happens to my filter. I hate the taste, but it's better than aborting the trip!

That's basically what I do--always have a few tablets as a fallback, whether day hiking or backpacking. But I don't double-treat.

If I were forced to use really nasty source water I might consider it, but haven't run into that scenario.

Cheers,

Depends - I carry the tablets as a backup for the filter if it breaks, but there has been a time when filtering out of a large tub of water piped from a spring that I also threw in tablets, just because it looked really, really scummy.

I just take chlorine tablets. Yes, I have eaten a few bugs, chewy little things- maybe added a bit of protein to my diet. As for silt, you need a pre-filter if you are in a lot of silt, otherwise your regular filter becomes quickly plugged up. Some people get stomach upsets from glacial silt - I never have, but I seem to have an iron stomach. I take a coffee filter in my first aid kit, so if I ever get into a situation where I have to drink really cruddy water, I can filter it. I have never had to yet. The big issue with tablets only is that you have to wait minimally 1/2 hour and should weight 4 hours for your water. This requires a lot of planning. I have become used to it so it is not bothersome to me. If you are the type of person who must drink right away, then take the filter.

If you are double-treating, the filter takes care of the protozoan cysts (giardia and crypto) which is what chlorine dioxide needs 4 hours to zap. You therefore can cut your purification time to half an hour or less if you double-treat. However, the only reason for double-treating would be if viruses may be present, since the filter takes care of everything else.

I've found that my homemade gravity filter (described in the Make Your Own Gear section) is far lighter than the amount of extra water I'd have to carry for several hours waiting for the pills to work. The exception would be if I'm in an area that has sparse water sources, in which case I'd be carrying the extra water anyway. My big objection to the tablets, though, is the chlorine taste. I actually had to throw some water out last summer that I had treated because I couldn't stand it. BTW, I have problems with chlorinated city water, too!

Oregon Mouse,

I don't see your gravity filter listed in the myog section. Am I looking in the right place?

dj2

At the moment (may have changed by the time you look) it's the 6th item down on the menu under MYOG, titled "DIY Gravity Water Filter."

I've never gotten pictures posted and won't have time for weeks.

I usually just do one or the other. Recently I bought a new filter that has a 0.1 micron pore size. When I was looking through the company website, they were also showcasing another filter they have that has a .02 micron pore size, and can actually filter viruses. I might get that one some day.

Point Zero Two Filter

Actually, water is a chemical, Hydrogen Dioxide if I recall correctly from my high school chemistry class. Seriously, I agree, your liver or kidney has enough to do without having to deal with more toxins. I wonder if FDA approves of the chemicals used for water purification. I wrote Chlorx (sp?) once and they said only use it for emergencies, not for regular purification. Yet, if done properly it seems to me the Chlorine gas all gasses off and leaves nothing but water behind. (Any Chemists reading this? If so; Let me know if that is right).

You're on the right track anyway. Water, as we all know, is H2O. That means it has two hydrogens and one oxygen. Thus the chemical name is Dihydrogen Oxide.

Here is a good web site on chlorine dioxide.
http://www.lenntech.com/processes/disinfection/chemical/disinfectants-chlorine-dioxide.htm
Long story short, it readily decomposes once it reacts. Thus there is nothing left.

Bleach can (and likely will) produce NaCl (salt, laundry bleach ) or CaCl2 (calcium chloride, pool bleach), a different type of salt. Other undesireable by-products are also possible.
http://www.lenntech.com/processes/disinfection/chemical/disinfectants-sodium-hypochlorite.htm
Long story short, bleach can (not necessarily will) produce some undesireable by-products. Also, both sodium hypochlorite and chlorine do not deactivate Giardia Lambia and Cryptosporidium.

Check out this link for some more good information.
http://www.lenntech.com/processes/disinfection/chemical/disinfectants.htm

Thanks Perry.
The links to Lenntech were most informative. The one thing I didn't see explained very well is the time/temperature curve. Isn't an increase in temperature usually accompanied by an increase in the chemical reaction rate?
Here in the Pacific Northwest our stream water is often near 32°F. Which means we might have to wait much longer for the disinfection process to take place. It seems to me an increase of only 18°F (to 50°F) would be huge.

The general rule of thumb in chemistry is that every 10 degrees celcius (18 degrees F) doubles the reaction rate. There will be limits to this of course and different reactions can occur if the temperature is raised too far. Think of it as the difference between baking a cake and burning cake batter.

Check page 4-17 for a table on temperature versus treatment efficiency. 4-19 also has an interesting table.
http://www.epa.gov/ogwdw/mdbp/pdf/alter/chapt_4.pdf

The short version is, 30 minutes is likely more than enough time using the manufacturer recommended dosage for water temperatures one is likely to actually drink.

You can also call it Dihydrogen Monoxide. Here is a funny website about it.
DHMO facts

You got a great filter and the company stands behind them. I have used mine for many years. No need for any further treatment.

I never treat my water twice and depending on the situation I don't treat it at all. The industry would love you to believe that you always need to double or triple treat your water. That is not the case but it sure sells a lot of filters!!!

The "water treatment" industry (aka fear-mongering/selling products) in context is part of the larger movement towards the Nanny Nation we now sadly are becoming.

I'm not saying never treat water (in some cases you MUST treat water), but the whole subject is so overblown as to be preposterous, let alone "double treating" water. Good grief.

Some good reading here...

http://www.lightandmatter.com/article/hiking_water.html

The only time I would double treat water is downstream of cities and towns. Filters don't remove viruses, and if there is sewage (even treated) coming in, there are going to be unpleasant things like noroviruses in the water.

I've made LOTS of VERY bad decisions about drinking untreated water over many, many years.

Yet have always been perfectly fine.

In general, you don't need to treat water at all, if you are minimally smart about sources.

There is MUCH scientific/medical literature debunking typical backpackers' ideas about treating water, and really nothing that supports them.

It may very well be that you are in the lucky 50% of the population that is carrying giardia and completely lacking in symptoms.

Congrats. I know personally far too many people who have had confirmed cases to ever risk it, myself. I will always filter, particularly in waterways that the pack trains cross on a regular basis, or where cattle are grazed. Which is a huge portion of the central Sierra Nevada, and primarily where I hike.

May your faith in "research" prove to hold true.

Evil toxins in the body.... anti-biotic cactus enemas...etc. there is SO much folk-lore out there....and many specialists available to deal with these problems.

I've investigated the medical/science and public health literature, and the folklore just doesn't stand up to review.

The research doesn't stand up to first hand accounts.

I trust my friends. They have hospital records backing them. You can have your research.

I do not think individuals first hand accounts of having contracted a parasitic disease necessarily contradict the research. Even lab confirmed cases of a disease do not, and cannot confirm how the person contracted the parasite. It is very common to blame the water, but the more likely vector was another human, and that person was not necessarily in the backcountry with them.

Some believe the earth is flat, trusting similarly to subjective "experience."

Gastro-intestinal complaints are extremely common. Disease-causing levels of bad buggies in back-country water are not.

See for example Robert Rockwell + Giardia or Derlett + Sierra, etc.

Well that's a giant weight off my mind.

Hey everybody, watch for all my water treatment stuff over on the gear for sale forum.

Cheers,

I tend to trust research more than anecdotal stories.

Notion that technology can preserve health is correct, yet very widely misunderstood.

Wilderness water purification is prime example of this misunderstanding.

Parallel is with so-called nutritional supplements, a zillion-dollar retail industry.

These pills are ingested at astounding, alarming rate which is very profitable for their manufacturers and retailers.

Medical literature clearly suggests this stuff is at best useless, and frequently very harmful.

Anybody looking at relevant research, ought to doubt decades-old hysteria regarding drinking water

DELETED

Yup.

Haven't ever treated backcountry water in Montana... ever.

But I have treated water elsewhere.

Yes, I've had Giardia (Missouri Farm Stream) and Hep-A (India) from water sources. Neither of those were what I'd call the backcountry, and neither were BP trips. Giardia is nothing compared with Hep A.

Truth is, both times I got sick I KNEW I shouldn't drink the water untreated. In India my treatment tabs got separated with my backpack in Kuwait and I got tired of drinking Campa Cola.

The backcountry water hysteria is silly in my view, but to each his own hike.

In over 37 years of backcountry travel I've never gotten sick from water, including a 1000 mile AT hike. Probably treated water twice on that walk. Doubt I've treated water more than 15-20 times in 37 years.

To each their own...If you feel safer treating water, then treat water. If not then dont. In my experience there are very few hard and fast rules when it comes to backpacking (LNT, food storage, etc. being the exceptions). Everyone has their own philosophy toward best practices. In my case I rarely treat water but here in the Southern Appalachian's there are more springs than you can shake a stick at so "good, clean" water is abundant. They key, like so many others have said, is source choice. Fresh mountain spring water is probably gonna be better than stinking cow pond water whether filtered, chemically treated, or nothing at all.

An editorial a few years ago, in a peer-reviewed medical journal, argued that scientists should point out that, based on evidence, hand-washing, rather than filtering water, is best means to avoid gastro-intestinal complaints related to backcountry travel.

On the other hand, a certain, fairly high percentage of the total population, in a given year, will invariably suffer minor problems; mostly they are home in bed. A much smaller number will be overtaken, unfortunately, while camping.

Given incubation period of these "problems," most of these campers actually got the bug at home.

I'd rather be at home and get it from handling change at the local convenience store. But is basically like catching a head-cold. Stuff happens.

Some say taking many vitamins while regularly visiting your chiropractor or herbal enema specialist, can also help.

I think this bears repeating, and is something I've read more than once.

The lack of personal hygiene in the backcountry often is the "culprit", not un-filtered water.

Members of the local swiftwater team have all been treated for giardia, some of them more than once. (you can't filter the river to make it safe to recover the kid...) They've pulled kayakers, boaters, swimmers, etc out of waterways all the way up to 8,000 feet.

Members of the SAR team have been treated once or twice over their careers as volunteer rescuers.

Still tabulating the members of my own hiking group who've had it. Apparently it occurs in dogs regularly enough that the vet recognized and treated one case in a group member's hiking pooch. I told one old fella who lives in the foothills and has a lifetime of hiking in the mountains that people think they don't need to filter or treat their water up there - he gave me the biggest WTF double take.

What do researchers do? Sample the water. Maybe a couple times? One pool in the river? Not enough to get a good idea of what's really going on. Show me a study that spans a good long time, repeatedly samples various locations on the river, throughout the year, and you might have something worthwhile. Some little study that doesn't do a thorough job ain't cutting it. Cause there's plenty of locals that think you all are nuts. Being sick isn't worth it.

You do your thing in the Central Sierra, don't say I didn't warn you....

There are nearly 100 million cases of intestinal infectious diseases annually in the United States, according to Garthright, Archer and Kvenberg, three researchers with
Food and Drug Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, Washington, DC.

Is about a third of total population.

A third of the people I know who rode bicycles last year had intestinal infections during this period.

Therefore: bicycle-riding causes intestinal infections. I know this with utter certainty, because I've ridden a bicycle for many years!


p.s. I've never ridden a bicycle in Antarctica, nor, unlike my terribly obese aunt, paid for penguin cruise nor guides there etc. Perhaps gastro-intestinal complaints on these trips are also common due to high number of people riding bicycles.

These were all verified cases of ONE infectious disease. Giardia.

Get it straight.

Though it's possible hygiene had something to do with some cases, that's not the case with the swiftwater team, or with the SAR team. Swiftwater folks drive or fly to the scene, get in the water, and cannot help but ingest it - there is no backpacking or associated behavior involved. Same with my hiking group - we backpack 1% of the time, cases identified were veteran backpackers who reported histories of having at least one doctor or hospital visit and being diagnosed with giardia, many are reformed solo hikers who now understand that group hiking is safer or just want company on the trail. We warn each other.

Water treatment is mandatory now for all our SAR volunteers.

[redacted]

Back to water treatment--or not--it's risk management. Period. 1. Evaluate your risk. 2. Respond accordingly.

Nothing else to it. The humble among us will acknowledge that #1 is the tricky bit.

Cheers,

From the "old news" Rockwell article
Quote:
Ask the average outdoors person about Giardia lamblia or giardiasis, and they have certainly heard about it. Almost always, however, they are considerably misinformed about both the organism’s prevalence in wilderness water, and the seriousness of the disease if contracted.
With the advent of the Internet, the amount of information one can easily find on the subject is voluminous. Unfortunately, most of it is flawed in important aspects, being unsubstantiated, anecdotal, or merely quoting other unsubstantiated and anecdotal articles. Official sources, such as many informational publications put out by the US government, are not immune to this criticism.

This paper is the result of a critical distillation of relevant articles, retaining only those from scholarly, peer-reviewed, or otherwise professional and trustworthy sources.

One conclusion of this paper is that you can indeed contract giardiasis on visits to the Sierra Nevada, but it won’t be from the water. So drink freely and confidently: Proper personal hygiene is far more important in avoiding giardiasis than treating the water.

First, an excerpt written by a highly regarded wilderness physician:
“In recent years, frantic alarms about the perils of giardiasis have aroused exaggerated concern about this infestation. Government agencies, particularly the United States Park Service and the National Forest Service, have filtered hundreds of gallons of water from wilderness streams, found one or two organisms (far less than enough to be infective), and erected garish signs proclaiming the water ‘hazardous.”
And another, by researchers who surveyed the health departments in all 50 states and scanned the medical literature looking for evidence that giardiasis is a significant threat to outdoor folk:

Neither health department surveillance nor the medical literature supports the widely held perception that giardiasis is a significant risk to backpackers in the United States. In some respects, this situation resembles (the threat to beachgoers of a) shark attack: an extraordinarily rare event to which the public and press have seemingly devoted inappropriate attention.

You really need to check the source and the date of what you read on the internet. There's an horrendous amount of material out there from spurious sources or which is outdated. This is particularly true of health related material! I personally prefer to rely on the Centers for Disease Control literature on water purity issues.

Sandia, your posts might be a little more believable if you'd list some specific reputable medical sources for your information! I'm certainly not hearing what you say from the medical sources I know and trust! I haven't seen a single scientific article listed in your posts, just "medical literature says...." What specific medical literature?

My concern here is sending beginners (who have no experience in evaluating their risk) out on the trail thinking they can safely drink any water without treatment!

sandia means this article here This is the oft cited article on the other side that I have seen.

I freely admit that I now usually treat my drinking water. However, I put on a couple of thousand miles with my family in the Sierra Nevada and Mt. Lassen from 1966 through 1979 without treatment generally speaking. If we had any doubt, we boiled the water. But this was rare in the Sierra and usually we just chose wisely. Giardia was around before I was born...so what was the difference between then and now? The amount of human traffic in the mountains is possibly the only major difference.

The author of this article is a mountaineer. His degrees are in physics and aeronautical engineering, not biology, medicine or public health. This is not a scientific article published in a peer-reviewed journal and is therefore a suspect source!

I would like to check all his medical journal sources (note that over half the references in the article are not peer-reviewed scientific sources!) before recommending that anyone, especially a beginner, leave the filter or chemicals at home!

The author states that he has never gotten sick--that's fine. He's probably acquired immunity somewhere--he admits in his article that a lot of people don't get symptoms or get only mild ones. On the other hand, I've known several people with giardiasis (verified by lab tests) who were really careful with their hygiene and their water sources, and whose incubation period definitely dated to the few instances on their backpacking trips when they didn't treat their water, who have been miserable for months! I've never gotten sick either (and never treated my water until the late 1980's), but I presume I'm immune too. Unfortunately there are too many people out there not following proper sanitary procedures (unfortunately quite visibly evident in more popular areas!), and plenty of evidence that wildlife, as well as domestic livestock, can carry giardia.

Please remember that a lot of beginners who are not qualified to evaluate water sources read this forum! Plus, how much evaluating can you do without exploring a stream to its sources? I've seen several cases of dead animals in the creek a mile or two upstream!

There is enough scientific evidence of contamination problems out there that I would never advise a beginner not to treat his/her water. For those with more experience, go ahead and take the risk if you want. But please don't advise beginning backpackers that they shouldn't treat their water!

IMHO, we have a clear responsibility to the newcomers here!

I don't think anyone in this thread has resorted to "frantic alarms about the perils of giardiasis" nor have they "aroused exaggerated concern about this infestation".

Whenever I see such highly colored language being used, it tells me that the author sees his position as adversarial, and it serves as a red flag, indicating that whatever information follows will be selected entirely on the basis of how well it substantiates the author's conclusions.

Giardiasis is not fatal. It is possible to be infected but asymptomatic. High concentrations of cysts may be very localized and infrequent. And statistically speaking, it is possible to drink untreated water from the High Sierra on a very regular basis for multiple decades and never suffer from it. All that is true.

It is also true that a nasty bout of giardiasis is extremely unpleasant and anyone who suffers through one bout of it will wish never to do so again as long as they live, whereas treatment is not especially difficult or expensive, and helps eliminate one's exposure to those infrequent high concentrations they might run across in a local water source.

Given both sides of the issue, choosing to treat is a perfectly rational choice, even without "frantic alarm" or "exaggerated concern." Not treating is also a perfectly acceptable choice, but it would be wrong to call it a choice that has no risk associated with it whatsoever, just as it would be wrong to raise "frantic alarms" over it.

Or, as one physician told me, giardiasis won't kill you, it will just make you wish it did!

Excellent post, aimless!

Good post, aimless.

Giardia has been known literally since the invention of the microscope by van Leeuwenhoek, in the 17th century. It wasn't recognized as a human pathogen until the 20th century. Today, it's still difficult and expensive to reliably diagnose, via one of these options:

-Enteroscopy
-Stool antigen test to check for Giardia
-Stool ova and parasites exam
-String test (rarely performed)

I don't know how definitive these tests are nor what the false positive rates might be. Some people respond badly to treatment, and doing so as a cautionary measure based on symptoms w/o diagnosis carries some risk.

Giardia is but one waterborne pathogen. There's crypto, which is more dangerous and not widely considered treatable. I'm more wary of bacteria than either cyst, myself, and then there are viruses. They aren't a widespread concern in North America but nevertheless, there have been outbreaks, such as norovirus in the Grand Canyon (the NPS has a report for anybody curious).

Water treatment tech has become so easy it's simply not much of a bother to take the extra step with any source you have even a sliver of doubt about. If the concern instead is you might be lining the pockets of unscrupulous, fear-mongering, parasitic marketeers, then use somebody else's. If the concern is recovering the several hours one might have expended treating water that didn't require treatment ("opportunity cost" from another thread!) then consider chemical or gravity systems that are hands-off.

What's not kosher, in my book, is counseling others to abandon accepted backcountry practices based on one's own belief system. Assume just one in fifty water sources is contaminated. Now tell me which one it is, so I can be sure to have treatment handy. See how that might not work?

Cheers,

I'd also like to point out, as one of the "senior" generation, that the current backcountry practices of treating water didn't start until the late 1970's, when a lot of folk started getting giardiasis or similar illnesses after backcountry trips. Studies, especially by state fish and game departments, showed widespread giardia contamination in backcountry waters being spread by wildlife in the water (which most likely caught it from domestic animals or from humans not practicing proper sanitation). In other words, the idea of treating water didn't start out of the blue because some commercial outfits were exploiting the idea! In fact, filters for treating backcountry water didn't show up until several years after the above studies were first publicized. Back then it was a choice between iodine (which in my case resulted in a horrible allergic reaction!), chlorine bleach or boiling. It has since been proven that iodine and chlorine bleach (as opposed to chlorine dioxide) are not very effective in killing protozoan cysts.

The standard water test is only for coliform bacteria, but that started increasing in backcountry sources at the same time! The coliform bacteria count is an indicator of how much the water is polluted. They can make you sick, too!

Not trying to take a side one way or the other OregonMouse, but you did ask Sandia to provide proper references for his/her claim. Can you now back-up your claims with references?

I am obviously not OM, but I emailed a professor at Paul Smith's college in the Adirondacks after reading his paper about water quality in the Adirondacks. His paper focused on the effects of acid rain. I asked if he has personally or knows of a study of Adirondack waters and biological contamination in regards to cysts, bacteria, etc... This expert was unaware of any study ever conducted regarding biological contamination of the Adirondack waters. However the DEC still recommends treating, assuming contamination without any evidence. The professor did say that the the results of a study would be fascinating to see if one would ever happen.

Also, when the study tests one pool in one waterway, once, it doesn't paint a complete picture. These are organisms - they wax and wane, move, die off, grow again, propagate under certain conditions and disappear under others. The waterways are constantly fluctuating in flow, temperature, chemistry, etc. in tiny ways.... The system is changing all the time. To claim any waterway free and safe is ridiculous. It might be today. It might be tomorrow. No way to conclusively stake up a sign and say "drink! be healthy!"

I am posting to provide information - I don't care about theories and I'm sorry my information offends sandia, but one person's insistence that treating water is unnecessary just offends all sensibility. No person or entity can possibly expect to be correct on this point. The CDC, the park service, the forest service and the state parks will all tell you - it's not a guarantee that the water is clean. And they are correct. Sometimes they will tell you with certainty that it IS NOT clean, and DO NOT drink without treating. The water along the Ohlone Wilderness trail (cattle range! eeeew!) is all accompanied by signs next to each faucet to not drink it without treating it. Yosemite does not post a SAR person at the top of Nevada Falls on summer afternoons with a big ol' Katadyn filter and a five gallon bucket for no good reason - tourists who get there will dip their nalgenes and bottles into the Merced, which tested positive and is probably still positive, off and on, for e. coli. If you spend any time hiking upstream there, you'll see bunches of nekkid tourists in the water. Filter the water!

There is no way to predict what's upstream of you. No way to know who did what in the water minutes ago. No way to count the deer, llamas, goats, cows, horses and mules that marched through it with poop-covered hooves. You just don't know and until they make a very light and effective way to test it, you will NEVER know for sure what is in the water.

What do I know? That many of my fellow SAR folk treat it as an occupational hazard - you might get giardia. Shrug. Yeah, it's not life threatening, really. It's a darn nuisance. Me, I would much rather spend my sick time (same as vacation time for me) backpacking than suffering projectile evacuation from both ends and taking antibiotics that screw up my digestive tract further. (UGH.)

So, yes. I will tell you to treat the water in the central Sierra Nevada, absolutely. It would be potentially cruel to not say so - do I want my friends to go through this sort of thing? Not on your life. I like 'em. So I loan them my filter when they don't have one.

Undue concern about safety of back country drinking water is traced to the Federal "Safe Drinking Water Act" of `1970s.

This law mandated that surface water used for public water supplies be filtered unless special exemptions were obtained.

Dutiful federal employees, naturally, obeyed their direct boss, and advised backpackers accordingly in national forests, BLM and NP properties, without regard to any known risk.

Rockwell, it is true, has Ph.D in physics. He admirably distilled a great deal of science for the lay reader, and cites something like 60 sources, many of them peer-reviewed articles in medical and public health journals.

If you can deal with statistical analysis and jargon, find direct links to many of these studies in the source list at end of Wikipedia article titled "Wilderness Diarrhea."

Among these scientists, Derlet is a particular authority on measurement and has been widely quoted in lay press. Zell, and also S.C. Welch and Timothy Welch (separate works by unaffilated authors) are worthy of attention. I also like TP Gardiner and D.R. Hill's joint work on the Long Trail in Vermont.

These are many of your basic scientific sources that are available beyond Ye Olde Woodsy Woodsman's sage advise.

Personally I filter main-stem, valley river water. In back country, I'd avoid livestock and seek tributary brooks, but filtering is, based on available evidence, "water purity overkill" and it clutters the backpack.

The SDWA covers water systems, not undeveloped open water sources, so looking to it for a rationale behind warnings to the public regarding the safety of drinking directly from lakes and rivers is going to be an empty pursuit. This is not a "big gummint overreach" to paraphrase certain of my inlaws.

The 1986 reauthorization did widen the SDWA's reach to include small and seasonal water systems not originally covered and has certainly led to the closure of a lot of small water systems. But that's a separate and unrelated topic.

I'm still waiting for specific literature citations from peer-reviewed scientific journals, not mountaineers or wikipedia, which contradict the guidelines for backcountry water treatment published by the Centers for Disease Control. I do have enough statistical background to understand the scientific studies. Should I run into trouble, I have a son-in-law who is head ER physician at a California hospital and is also a backpacker. He stands by the CDC guidelines, BTW.

In the absence of overwhelming scientific evidence--supported by specific citations of many articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals--to the contrary, which nobody here has yet presented, I will continue to trust the CDC guidelines, my physicians and my veterinarians rather than the unsupported personal opinions to the contrary expressed in this thread. I will continue to treat my--and my dog's--drinking water and will strongly advise others to do the same.

I will agree with OM on this, sandia, to the extent that you keep saying 'this is science and not just my opinion'.

Rockwell, it is true, has Ph.D in physics. He admirably distilled a great deal of science for the lay reader, and cites something like 60 sources, many of them peer-reviewed articles in medical and public health journals.

Rockwell's point of view may be drawn from a variety of studies in peer-reviewed literature, but unless his own conclusions and methods were peer-reviewed, then it is still just his opinion. That's how real science works.

I do think your own experience is valuable and definitely worth sharing, as personal anecdotal evidence for other people to evaluate. It's just your repeated claim that it is more than that which I think is unwarranted.

Science actually does draw tentative conclusions by testing hypotheses via data collection. Meta analysis is especially valuable in this regard, and one such analysis was reviewed by Rockwell.

Sufficient curiosity motivated me to look up Dr. Rockwell's many citations, most of which are available on line.

Without curiosity one cannot learn.

Failing all that, to repeat again, direct links to a fair number of these articles are embedded within the source list at bottom of Wikipedia article on "Wilderness Acquired Diarrhea."

You go to Google and type "Wilderness Acquired Diarrhea" and "Wikipedia."

Click on this item and scroll to bottom of window until you encounter section titled "Footnotes." Certain text in this section will be highlighted in a DIFFERENT COLOR. If you click on this highlighted text, in many cases you will be directed to SOURCES for the article. I recommend Zell, Welch Derlet & etc., as mentioned above.

Thanks, aimless, you said it better--and in a lot less words--than I did!

Sandia, for your information, most university professors will not accept wikipedia as a reference, and with good reason. The articles there are only as good as the generally anonymous people who contribute them, whose expertise in the areas about which they write is completely unverified.

The whole problem with non-peer-reviewed articles is that the authors can pick and choose their sources without anyone's being the wiser. It has happened with peer review, too, but it's a lot harder to get away with.

If you are utterly unwilling to actually read the many relevant, reputable and peer-reviewed articles which are easily available, and you entirely discount a credible summary of the science (by Dr. Rockwell) then obviously, you prefer uninformed prejudice and whatever you perceive that your friends may believe.

This stance is unfortunately, much a part of the Human condition. You cannot be personally faulted.

I thought I recognized the language in the quote talking about overreaction by Federal agencies, and, indeed, it is from the 4th edition of Medicine for Mountaineering, by Dr. James Wilkerson.

That was 1992, and his very fine volume is now in a sixth edition. Beginning on page 63 is a very thorough, reasonably objective discussion of treatment systems, and their pros and cons. The 1992 material is absent, but on page 63, at the beginning of his discussion, you will find the following, "In recent years widespread microbial contamination of backcountry water sources in the United States has been recognized. The single cell Cryptosporidium parasite is essentially ubiquitous......"

Wilkerson, an emergency room physician in 1992 quote, was presumably citing available research, much as Dr. Rockwell has accomplished in a far more comprehensive and up-to-date manner.

Presently, there are at least a half-dozen EASILY AVAILABLE and statistically reliable investigations that are directly relevant to back country drinking water.

There are other studies that are statistically less reliable, and many, many others that place this research in a much larger context of drinking water safety.

Familiarity with a number of these studies is the barest threshold for the most minimally informed opinion on back country water safety.

I would suggest starting with the meta analysis of many previous studies by Timothy E. Welch. It's called "Risk of giardiasis from consumption of wilderness water in North America: a systematic review of epidemiologic data" Reading this analysis will expose you to ALL of the most reliable research as of a few years ago, because it statistically analyzes various existing studies.

Among Robert Derlet's persistent and long-term field work on topic is "High Sierra Water: What is in the H20?" See also other works by Derlet.

If you are particularly interested in various disease other than giardiasis, see "Campylobacter enteritis from untreated water in the Rocky Mountains" by Taylor, McDermott, Little, et al.

S.C. Zell, Sorenson et al. showed how a notorious outbreak of back-country disease proved to be utterly misleading non-sequiter. "Cyst acquisition rate for Giardia lamblia in backcountry travelers to Desolation Wilderness, Lake Tahoe"


Gardiner & Hill found no correlation of water treatment and avoidance of intestinal disease among long-distance hikers in Vermont: "Illness and injury among long-distance hikers on the Long Trail, Vermont"

There are at least several others that I am missing and some are very significant.

Try googling those few titles for a start if you want to be informed.

Or just read Rockwell's summary. It gives a very reliable overview.

If you can't handle this stuff, then you may as well say that you got sick because your neighbor is a witch.

Wow, what an amazing amount of hand-wringing over water... given the level of overreaction represented here, I'm surprised some of you venture past your doorways.

And no my opinion has not been peer-reviewed.

I have nowhere stated that I am at all (utterly or otherwise ) unwilling to read such articles. Following standard scientific method, however, I do not accept information provided from non-peer-reviewed sources, such as the Rockwell article and anything in wikipedia.

On the contrary, I am quite willing, able and happy to read articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals that contradict established medical advice (as summarized by the CDC guidelines I cited above), but you haven't listed any for me to read!

So far you have given me a reference (no link) to wikipedia, a completely unreliable source, and another poster (not you) has provided a link to the Rockwell article, which is also not a scientifically reliable source in that it was neither peer-reviewed nor published in a scientific journal. You have provided only vague references (not bibliographic citations or links) to articles which you state are cited in those two unreliable (from a scientific viewpoint) sources.

Please provide the evidence, in the form of a bibliography of or links to those "many relevant, reputable and peer-reviewed articles" you mention, so I can read them for myself and discuss them with my physician/backpacker son-in-law. He would like to read them, too, but again only peer-reviewed sources published in reputable scientific journals.

I'd really love to go back to drinking water directly from the source, as I did when I was young! Treating water is a big nuisance, and if it's really unnecessary for the health of either my grandchildren or me, I will certainly stop doing it. Please provide the overwhelming scientific evidence that it would be safe for me to do this!

Edit, later: in a post you made while I was typing this one (and doing a few other items such as eating dinner and letting my dog out), you did mention authors and titles of several articles, but not where they can be found. Please provide the complete source. Thank you!

Brad, it's not a lot of fuss over water; it's the health of readers of this forum and their families that is at stake here. Without overwhelming scientific--and yes, peer-reviewed--evidence to the contrary, I have to stick with established medical advice, like it or not. I really want to see that evidence, and so does my son-in-law, if Sandia will only provide it.

Fend for yourself.

I've offered at least a couple of easy options for investigation:

A) click on links embedded in Wikipedia source list, which will lead you (in many cases) to titles and authors I have mentioned (and other material).


Or B) do as I did, and google the titles mentioned in Rockwell's source list (or google the titles and authors I've culled for availability).

Rockwell, as scientist and scholar of long and at least reasonable standing himself, provides us with a comprehensive list of citations; many of which are peer-reviewed scientific articles and some of which are merely solid stuff from good sources.

Many of his key citations can be easily Googled, and moreover, are directly linked to, on Wikipedia's source list.

You can either dismiss Rockwell as a crank based your private world view, or (more reasonably) accept him as an authority based on his extensive and credible citations (which include 60 or more sources).

Your final option is to do what I did initially, which is to neither dismiss nor accept his thesis. This option requires actually reading as much as possible from the citations he provides.

But this costs the greatest amount of personal time and effort and thought.

And if you already know what you think, based on your decades-long, eye-witness experience of microbes in Antarctica, or what-not, then why bother?

I was just musing about how many liters of water I could have brought to a rolling boil by the heat generated by an innocuous question about double treatment of water - remember the OP?

Frankly, the tone here is unnecessarily acerbic and confrontational. I am sure most of us are comfortable with our practices and will continue them. It is definitely a good idea to be somewhat conservative when making statements for general public consumption. But what a relief to have a Real Scientist in our midst......

The problem with all the articles is they only address Giardia.

Generally I go upstream from trails to get water, but no matter how far I go, there could be a dead animal in the water around the next bend. Or there could be drainage from an area where a lot of animals poop.

The one constant I've seen since the 60's has been to purify water. We never actually did it in the 60's, but there weren't as many people around then.

In the 70's I started hearing about Giardia in Colorado. It has been a constant since then unlike a lot of the other scares that have come and gone. I don't know if Giardia even exists or if it has a big chance of making me sick. But I figure if I drink enough water from streams, I'll probably run across something that would eventually make me sick. Filtering is such an easy precaution to take.

Even if there were no germs in the water, there are many times I use the filter to get water I wouldn't otherwise be able to get. Such as hollows in a rock after rain. So it's not like I'm carrying any extra weight.

I put it in the category of wearing a motorcycle helmet. The chances of one ever protecting me from injury are very slim. Problem is, I don't know which time on the bike I'll need one.

Gosh, please make it stop. . .

I'm just saying I know 20 people (up from 14 due to the association with the swiftwater technicians) who have pieces of paper from a doctor telling them they have had giardia. Pretty sure those weren't peer reviewed, either, but somehow I look at it as though it must be relevant to me somehow, since we hike in the same areas.

I would have mentioned all the other people who have told me about the crazy stomach issues they had after backpacking trips, but they didn't bother getting a doctor into the mix, getting labs done, getting meds.... Might have been the Mountain House.

I think most of the hand wringing is really about someone who can't see the trees, just the library. And can't seem to comprehend what science is. But, I'm sure he won't get sick. It's the power of the mind....

I am sorry OM, I love what you bring to this forum, but you are just being stubborn on this issue. Sandia did not use a wikipedia reference. What is not typically accepted in universities is directly referencing Wikipedia articles. What Sandia said was at the bottom of the article is a concise list of references with links. Just because this list happens to hosted on Wikipedia does not somehow make uncitable. Why would you want him to recreate the list here (which would not include links)? I am beginning to conclude you are just being obtuse. Here is the list for you:

^ a b c d Zell SC (1992). "Epidemiology of Wilderness-acquired Diarrhea: Implications for Prevention and Treatment". J Wilderness Med 3 (3): 241–9.
^ a b c Welch TR (2004). "Evidence-based medicine in the wilderness: the safety of backcountry water". Wilderness & Environmental Medicine 15 (4): 235–7. doi:10.1580/1080-6032(2004)015[0235:EMITWT]2.0.CO;2. PMID 15636372.
^ a b Hargreaves JS (2006). "Laboratory evaluation of the 3-bowl system used for washing-up eating utensils in the field". Wilderness Environ Med 17 (2): 94–102. doi:10.1580/PR17-05.1. PMID 16805145. "Diarrhea is a common illness of wilderness travelers, occurring in about one third of expedition participants and participants on wilderness recreation courses. The incidence of diarrhea may be as high as 74% on adventure trips. …Wilderness diarrhea is not caused solely by waterborne pathogens, … poor hygiene, with fecal-oral transmission, is also a contributing factor"
^ a b c d e f g Boulware DR (2004). "Influence of Hygiene on Gastrointestinal Illness Among Wilderness Backpackers". J Travel Med 11 (1): 27–33. PMID 14769284.
^ Welch TP (2000). "Risk of giardiasis from consumption of wilderness water in North America: a systematic review of epidemiologic data". International Journal of Infectious Diseases 4 (2): 100–3. doi:10.1016/S1201-9712(00)90102-4. PMID 10737847. Archived version April 20, 2010
^ a b c Rockwell, Robert L. (2003). "Giardia Lamblia and Giardiasis With Particular Attention to the Sierra Nevada" (PDF). Peak Climbing Section, Loma Prieta Chapter, Sierra Club. Archived from the original on 2008-10-16.
^ a b c d Backer, Howard (1992). "Wilderness acquired diarrhea (editorial)" (PDF). Journal of Wilderness Medicine 3: 237–240.
^ Derlet, Robert W. (April 2004). "High Sierra Water: What is in the H20?". Yosemite Association. Archived from the original on 2007-10-12.
^ (Backer 2007, p. 1371)
^ (Backer 2007, p. 1369)
^ Prepared by Federal-Provincial-Territorial Committee on Drinking Water of the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Committee on Health and the Environment (2004) (2004). "Protozoa: Giardia and Cryptosporidium". Guidelines for Canadian Drinking Water Quality: Supporting Documentation. Health Canada. Retrieved 2008-08-07.
^ Dickens DL, DuPont HL, Johnson PC (June 1985). "Survival of bacterial enteropathogens in the ice of popular drinks". JAMA 253 (21): 3141–3. doi:10.1001/jama.253.21.3141. PMID 3889393.
^ Backer H (2000). "In search of the perfect water treatment method" (PDF). Wilderness Environ Med 11 (1): 1–4. PMID 10731899.
^ Gerba C, Rose J (1990). "Viruses in Source and Drinking Water". In McFeters, Gordon A. ed.. Drinking water microbiology: progress and recent developments. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. pp. 380–99. ISBN 0-387-97162-9.
^ White, George W. (1992). The handbook of chlorination and alternative disinfectants (3rd ed.). New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold. ISBN 0-442-00693-4.
^ (Backer 2007, p. 1374)
^ a b CDC Division of Parasitic Diseases (2004). "CDC Fact sheet: Giardiasis". Centers for Disease Control. Retrieved 2008-10-13.
^ a b National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases (2008-04-16). ""Crypto" - Cryptosporiodosis". Centers for Disease Control. Retrieved 2008-10-13.
^ a b c Boulware DR, Forgey WW, Martin WJ 2nd (2003). "Medical Risks of Wilderness Hiking". Am J Med 114 (4): 288–93. doi:10.1016/S0002-9343(02)01494-8. PMID 12681456.
^ Scallan, E. J.; A. Banerjee, S. E. Majowicz et al. (2002). "Prevalence of Diarrhea in the Community in Australia, Canada, Ireland and the United States" (PDF). CDC. Retrieved 2008-10-15.
^ Garthright WE, Archer DL, Kvenberg JE (1988). "Estimates of incidence and costs of intestinal infectious diseases in the United States". Public Health Rep 103 (2): 107–15. PMC 1477958. PMID 3128825.
^ Brody, Jane E. (2008-10-15). "HEALTH: Diagnostics; Test Unmasks a Parasitic Disease". New York Times (New York Times Company). Retrieved 2008-10-15.
^ Hlavsa, Michele C.; John C. Watson, Michael J. Beach (2005-01-28). "Giardiasis Surveillance --- United States, 1998--2002". Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved 2008-10-15.
^ Sanders JW, Frenck RW, Putnam SD, et al. (August 2007). "Azithromycin and loperamide are comparable to levofloxacin and loperamide for the treatment of traveler's diarrhea in United States military personnel in Turkey". Clin. Infect. Dis. 45 (3): 294–301. doi:10.1086/519264. PMID 18688944.
^ (Backer 2007, pp. 1368–417)
^ Johnson, Mark (2003). The Ultimate Desert Handbook : A Manual for Desert Hikers, Campers and Travelers. International Marine/Ragged Mountain Press. p. 46. ISBN 0-07-139303-X.
^ Backer H (February 2002). "Water disinfection for international and wilderness travelers". Clin. Infect. Dis. 34 (3): 355–64. doi:10.1086/324747. PMID 11774083.
^ (Backer 2007, p. 1411)
^ "Steripen - Proven Technology". Hydro-Photon, Inc.. 2008. Retrieved 2008-10-14.
^ "Steripen - Microbiological Testing". Hydro-Photon, Inc.. 2008. Retrieved 2008-10-14.
^ "Household Water Treatment Options in Developing Countries: Solar Disinfection (SODIS)". Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 2008-01. Retrieved 2010-07-31.
^ a b (Backer 2007, pp. 1373–4)
^ Gardner TB, Hill DR (2002). "Illness and injury among long-distance hikers on the Long Trail, Vermont". Wilderness & environmental medicine 13 (2): 131–4. PMID 12092966.
^ McIntosh, Scott E.; Drew Leemon, Joshua Visitacion, et al. (2007). "Medical incidents and evacuations on wilderness expeditions" (PDF). Wilderness and Environmental Medicine 18 (4): 298–304. doi:10.1580/07-WEME-OR-093R1.1. PMID 18076301.
^ Taylor, D. N.; K. T. McDermott, J. R. Little et al. (1983). "Campylobacter enteritis from untreated water in the Rocky Mountains". Ann Intern Med 99 (1): 38–40. PMID 6859722. Retrieved 2008-10-16.
^ a b Zell SC, Sorenson SK (1993). "Cyst acquisition rate for Giardia lamblia in backcountry travelers to Desolation Wilderness, Lake Tahoe" (PDF). Journal of Wilderness Medicine 4 (2): 147–54.
^ Welch TP (2000). "Risk of giardiasis from consumption of wilderness water in North America: a systematic review of epidemiologic data". International Journal of Infectious Diseases 4 (2): 100–3. doi:10.1016/S1201-9712(00)90102-4. PMID 10737847.
^ Derlet, Robert W.; James Carlson (>=2003). "Sierra Nevada Water: Is it safe to drink? - Analysis of Yosemite National Park Wilderness water for Coliform and Pathologic Bacteria". SierraNevadaWild.gov. Sierra Wilderness Education Project. Retrieved 2008-10-15.
^ Derlet RW (2008). "Backpacking in Yosemite and Kings Canyon National Parks and neighboring wilderness areas: how safe is the water to drink?". Journal of travel medicine 15 (4): 209–15. doi:10.1111/j.1708-8305.2008.00201.x. PMID 18666919. Lay summary (May 2008).
^ Derlet, Robert W. (April 2004). "High Sierra Water: What is in the H20?". Yosemite Association.
^ (Backer 2007, p. 1372)

And I will remind you, you have yet to back up any of your claims with peer reviewed scientific literature. The CDC may in general be very good about using science to come to their recommendations, however they are not a scientific source. They are a government agency and their conclusions are political (even if they happen to be backed by sound science).

I agree oldranger... I guess I am guilty of the same

My opinion on the issue is water treatment is much like having a first aide kit. I asked a while back what people have used the FAK for and several people much more experienced than me said they have never used it. The problem with leaving it at home is it could become life threatening if you don't have it.

I think the chance of getting sick in the high country from drinking well selected untreated water is minimal, however getting severe diarrhea out there is potentially life threatening. It is probably bad public policy to tell people not to treat their water, however I think it is also bad public policy to over-blow the threat. You could scare some people into treating their water... you could also scare some people into becoming so fearful of untreated water that they literally die of dehydration before they would sip out of a stream.

I always treat back-country water, but I don't think it is necessary to have back-up methods if my treatment technique (filtering) fails.

I always filter. If I lost or broke my filter (or had it stolen as happened to one fella I loaned mine to one day) I would just drink. I have been out of my mind dehydrated before, not because I was afraid of the water but because I was so out of it it just did not enter my mind to stop at one of the streams and take a drink.

If giardia was the outcome, I would not suffer until at home where I could worship the porcelain in private.

I think BZH sums up this entire issue spot on in his last post, but I'll chime in anyway...

I drink water straight from springs here all the time, and I've never got sick.

Now that you know that you still don't know near enough to find a good source of water here unless you've had some teaching and experience.

You can't tell someone that the water along the AT is safe to drink and do them any good. You teach them how to find water that is likely to be safe, and how to make water safe that might not be otherwise.

So I'm not at all swift to ignore the personal experiences of Lori, or OM, or OM's son, because I know they wouldn't offer them if they didn't believe they were relevant to the conversation at hand.

I am sure that Lori has taught many newbies how to source good water, what not to use, and why, and how to treat water to make it safe.

Teach and learn is what we all try to do here.

Tye, my condolences to your thread.

Filtering has become, undeniably, a prevailing cultural practice; a norm of the subculture of U.S. backpackers.

Yet there is sufficient evidence to suggest that the practice is not a useful means of avoiding disease.

A comparable fact is that more than half the U.S. population consume dietary supplements, in spite of adequate research showing clearly, that healthy adults get no benefit from these products.

Back-country water filtering in U.S is a cultural and behavioral fact that is now best viewed, academically at least, through the science of anthropology, independently from medicine or public health.

(I freely offer this as an idea for your next brilliant, useless graduate research thesis at Moo U!)

Lab cultures are not subjective. Having been hospitalized myself, I agree with Lori.

In one, concise sentence, what is your recommendation for U.S. backpackers?

Don't know about sandia, by my philosophy is very simple.
"No one ever got sick from treating their water."

Oh, and Tye, my sympathies about your thread too.

It's probably going to have something to do with hygiene.

Problem is, none of the 20 people I know have hygiene issues. Swiftwater team does not backpack. SAR team are all self sufficient, and when we base camp, volunteers serve food to us with gloved hands. Most of the casual backpackers I know were career solo hikers who were not prone to poor hygiene issues - you know they know better when they mention that as ruled out of their situation.

I'll stick with my original position.

Flattery will get you everywhere.....

I should add that most of us venture outdoors and utilize untreated water sources while seeking recreation and enjoyment and not necessarily to provide data for testable hypotheses. Faced with potential really bad consequences, even at a low probability, it is worthwhile to take simple measures that will greatly lessen the consequences. The same reasoning causes us to carry FAKs, PLBs, and other items useful in the rare emergency situation.

Me, I am a knuckle dragging, mammoth hunting caveman who still prefers to boil his water. Back in the old days, I drank from many a spring and babbling brook with nary a consequence - but the woods were mostly empty then.

I'd rather spend a few minutes dealing with a filter than risk dealing with a stomach bug for days.

Sandia,

I don't think this is a group that has much personal bias. I've looked through the old posts of the more experienced backpackers here and I've seen a gradual shift in their ideas as they got more experience. In some cases, their advice is the complete opposite of what it was last year.

In your case, you are focused solely on Giardia as a source of the intestional distress. Let's say there are 10 bugs that cause intestional distress. I consider any study that declares water "safe" because of the absence of just one of these bugs is flawed.

In my opinion, I have two choices. I can carry a filter or I can carry more toilet paper. I prefer the filter.

Who was it that said, "we pack our fears."?

One thing is for certain, we are all spread out across the country/world. Each of the areas we frequent has differing levels of human impact. Front country is different than backountry. Intensive use areas are different than wilderness areas. Areas with (more) stagnant surface water are different than areas with spring fed sources. A major river with frequent swimmers/boaters is different than an off trail stream. All of these differences play a role in the probability of contaminated water and other safety issues. The question of "overkill" is thus dependent on the area and the specific situation. This is true for all risks. Most of us experienced folk have enough experience and knowledge to understand when to (and not to) take calculated risks. It is my opinion that the fear of most things in the backcountry by the public at-large is overblown. But for the newbies, this is good. They will take the precautions until they gain the experience and knowledge to reduce those fears to match the reality of the specific trip conditions. Unfortunately, what happens is the newbies will take extra precautions for low-risk possibilities at the expense of taking precautions for the higher risk possibilities.

I am doing a big (50 people so far signed up) potluck and presentation for newbies in our group who want to backpack. I am going to set up a white board and develop a list of their concerns and fears, and then my top 10 concerns, regarding backpacking.

I think I can predict that the lists will be radically different - I bet you animals will be at the top of their list. Depending on how much reading they've done and whether they took REI courses, they might list waterbourne pathogens.

I already know that my list will have clean water pretty far down on the concerns - since I have plenty of information on that matter, both experiential and the information other experienced hikers in my area have provided to me. (Animals will probably be grouped together on #10.)

Lori,

This is a great topic. Maybe it should be a separate one. Here is my list.

1. Running out of coffee.
2. Running out of water. (Closely related to 1)
3. Not bringing my coffee cup.
4. Running out of fuel for stove
5. Having 2 lighters break (so I bring 3.)
6. Losing my car keys
7. Completing miles before afternoon thunderstorms

Added: I totally forgot my biggest fear. Having to pee in the middle of the night and having the zipper get stuck all the way up on my mummy sleeping bag. So I never zip it all the way up.

It may sound like a trite list. It's not that other things aren't more important. They are just taken care of. I've found most problems look a lot better after I make a hot cup of coffee.

Gershon,

I love it!

1. Running out of water, I start with 3 liters - I've tried to cut down since it is so heavy, but I get "twitchy" thinking about having less.

2. Moose - this is site specific obviously.

3. Broken bones - I often hike by myself.

4. Other people - stupid I know, but Alaska has one of the highest violent crimes against women numbers.

5. forest fires - I've seen one, and that was more than enough - terrifying

6. Getting seriously wet - again sorta site specific, but if I get wet and my synthetic bag is soaked and it gets really cold...

7. Running out of caffeine - more the stupid resulting headache.

MODERATOR'S NOTE:

Some of the opinions on this thread have been argued warmly and stated strongly, and I chose to preserve them intact for now, because they make reasonable points, even if they make them a bit provocatively. However, I have just deleted a few posts from this thread that were getting rather too close to the start of a flame war, along with a post which quoted from those posts.

Just a reminder to keep it calm and keep it civil. That's all. Carry on.

CDC Info on Giardiasis
...

According to the info provided there giardia is found in throughout the nation and there are about 20,000 cases reported each year.

Backpackers among the risk groups for giardiasis.

Filtering water is one of the three ways consistently recommended for backpackers to prevent it when drinking water taken from outdoor sources.

There are references with links to sources for that here too.

Been watching this this thread, but didn't really want to get caught up in the confrontations. Thanks, Aimless.

My experience: I made a very bad misjudgement years ago and got caught without water. I did not treat in those days but carried mil surplus halizone for emergencies. Found a beaver meadow I knew I shouldn't drink from (though I had never heard of giardia), then discovered the pills were years out of date. Decided the dehydration was more dangerous, and drank anyway. Exactly ten days later in New York City, it hit me. Doctor couldn't figure it out (and not knowing about the beaver, I failed to tell him). About three weeks later, the doc decided the situation was life threatening and sent me to the hospital. Minutes before I was to leave for the hospital, doc called with confirmed diagnosis and perscription. Hours later I was ok, just needed rest and fluids. This was 1968, before everybody knew about giardia.

I still treat relatively little water, though as civilization gets closer, that percentage has been increasing. I'm far less confident, and advise most people, in most places, to be prepared to treat (or boil) most or all of their water. I know from experience that much of it is ok, as several here have correctly noted, but the price of guessing wrong is just too high (though a mitigating factor today is that most doctors are familiar with giardia in the areas where it is common).

Just for giggles, the first time I thru-hiked the AT, some hikers noted that a traveler's check for $25 (the price then for a perscription of flagel) was lighter than filters or chemicals. Yeah, sure.

Incidentally, why, on a board devoted to lightweight backpacking, does the very minimal weight of treatment/filtration outweigh the common sense of "better safe than sorry"?

Oh, can't resist the current direction of this thread: yeah,running out of caffiene (coffee or tea) is probably one of my worst fears. And yes, Heather, after all these years in the woods, the only critter that has even threatened to attack me was a big, angry, bull moose.

best, jcp

I was chased by an armadillo once.

Hmmm... I don't have 10 concerns, but here's what I do have...

1) Other people (I think the Ozarks have one of the highest percentages of people who hike without a clue)

2) A tree or big branch falling on me.

3) Falling and breaking a bone.

4) Twisting an ankle.

Of those four, only the first has happened, and it's mucked up more than a few trips.

That's about it. I finally gave up and started bringing "Taster's Choice" singles and they're light and small and cheap enough to bring plenty extra, so I don't worry about coffee as much anymore

Although not a concern, I do get a little disconcerted that I haven't stumbled upon any lost treasure or alien spaceships or any of that other cool stuff that happens to real explorers like Indiana Jones.

I had an encounter with a moose once too. And I chased and caught an armadillo once. In both of those cases I was pretty stupid, but escaped mostly unscathed despite of it.

Because I cannot resist--name that film!

A moose once bit my sister...
No realli! She was Karving her initials on the moose with the sharpened end of an interspace toothbrush given her by Svenge - her brother-in-law - an Oslo dentist and star of many Norwegian movies...
Mynd you, moose bites Kan be pretti nasti...

Cheers,

In the interest of thread drift; my biggest fears.

1) cottonmouths. This is my numero uno, man I hate thaaat snake!

2) Moose. That is one mean herbivore. One lucky friend drove up to Alaska in his Ford truck one summer. Somewhere in the southern half of the state, he turned a corner and there was a moose in the road. And it just stood there. So he honked at it, and apparently it took offense to this action because shortly after it proceeded to beat the heck out of the front of the truck using its head. When it apparently felt it had shown the intruder what for, it trotted off quite happy with itself leaving my buddy with a leaking radiator.

3) Traveling with dogs in wolf country.

4) Getting stuck behind a mule train.

5) My daughter is learning how to drive...and I am in the passenger seat while this is happening. Note it's only #5 cause really, I'm just sort of nervous about this.


Bill once described his close encounter with a moose here. If I remember right, it was the moose that came out the worse for it. You don't spit into the wind, pull the mask off the lone ranger, and you don't mess with Bill!

Suddenly I like the atmosphere in here a whole lot better, so I'll come back and muse a bit.

Yes, I sometimes worry about people. Had a scary encounter with guys carrying guns one time late at night in Harriman Park. But Bill, my encounters with scary people in the woods in the Ozarks involved guys doing funny things with barrels, fire and old Ford radiators. But that was in the 1940s in a dry county.

Like Bill I have gone to the little coffee packets, and pretty much always have a couple of spares in my shirt pocket. Talk about packing my fears!

On the original subject, one factor is folklore for sure. Thru hiking I've heard rather often, "yeah, I've got giardia. Must been that water yesterday." There's enough e.coli around that it may well have been the water, but it ain't giardia, unless they drank bad water eight or ten days ago.

But there's another likely culprit close at hand, so to speak I also recommend to those whose skin will take it to carry enough hand sanitizer that they can use it liberally several times a day. Besides, it's double duty, starts fires as well (especially when combined with magnesium tent stakes). wow.

best jcp

Our entire group was driven back up the trail by a grouse, once. She was pretty upset with us for some unknown reason...

Things I worry about most:

1. Might have to carry that newbie's gear for him. Generally only happens on group trips with the bigger meetup, where folks do not understand what they don't know about themselves and only sign up for "destination" trips, instead of just doing something short.

2. Dehydration. Well, I don't worry about it a lot anymore. But it's probably the last thing I want to have happen to myself. Trip planning and getting updated info on water sources in areas where that can be tricky do away with most of the concern.

3. Stupid little granite pebbles. They hide on granite slab. Barked up my hand when I stepped on one on a slight sloping slab, had an itchy scab there for days after. Could have meant a fracture or something if it'd been steeper. Really, this is a category - clumsy things that could lead to injury that might keep me from hiking out. Leaving a trip plan with someone and having people with me are the just-in-case with a heaping helping of "watch where I step" to do the job.

4. Some nights I sleep like a baby - some nights I just can't. So I have a few mp3 meditation and relaxation tracks on my phone. Comes in handy when you are surrounded by snoring and need to block it out.

5. I keep getting these really annoying holes in my nylon pants. I finally popped for some 5.11 taclites for my leisure backpacking - they should handle sitting on granite with less wear.

hmmmm.... getting harder....

6. Some trips I worry a little about my car, because there was glass at the trailhead. Nothing's happened yet. I keep the car pretty clean.

7. Sometimes I think I might be in danger of hiking too much. Then I come to my senses.

8. There's this guy in the group... well. I just don't hike with him, so now I'm just adding things for the sake of getting to ten.

9. Hangnails.

10. I stepped on a rattlesnake once. All the others got off the trail when I asked them to, and so did the bears I met. When I came across the lion tracks I talked to the lion politely asking him to let me hike on without getting into it with him, and he stayed out of sight and I kept hiking - no harm, no foul. The scorpion I nearly squished didn't sting me before moving into the hole. One of the trout I caught once thrashed around and I got stuck by the hook. Then there was that really nasty infection from the tick bite... but it went away with antibiotics.

That's about it.

Back to the original point about Giardia. Bill, the CDC reference you gave did a very good job pointing out that most cases of Giardia occur in places other than backpacking. Day care centers, public swimming pools, recreational water areas etc. I think backpacking was about 5th on the list.

I recall in the 70's when the Giardia problem started. Backpackers in Colorado were warned to treat their water. Then it spread all over and most people now treat or filter their water. It seems to be working pretty well because not many backpackers get it.

Since we're all from different parts of the country/world, hiking in different locales with thousands of different water sources, and since we're all willing to assume different levels of risk, it's really impossible to throw out any kind of blanket statement about water treatment. It's like arguing over which tent is best. Futile at best. If the OP had asked a question like "I'll be camping at XXX Lake this weekend and I was wondering if I need to treat my water", this discussion would be a little less like nailing Jello to the wall.

Three subjects to avoid while talking at parties: religion, politics and water treatment.

Anyway, which firearm should I take to the Sierra with me this weekend? The revolver or the shotgun?

Silly, the giardia laser, of course!

The revolver. You can use it to coerce another backpacker into filtering your water for you.

ETA: Note to self - next time a thread needs to die, tell a joke in bad taste....

Excellent. Thanks. A number of opinions, thoughts, experiences, research, etc. have been used to "flesh-out" several approaches to water treatment. I think Trailrunner's comment here puts well the discussion into perspective. It seems not much more can be said and it's time to put it to rest.

By the way, what started out as a potential Light Gear Topic actually evolved - rather quickly - into a health and safety topic. Thus, I'm moving it to the appropriate forum.

thanks again,

packlite