Homestead mailing list

[Bunjov AT aol.com]

Jeez. Sent this to all my Property Owners members and forgot to include  
Homesteaders' list members.
Sandy
 
 
  
____________________________________
 From: Bunjov
To: SLYSPI
CC: ellen1950 AT earthlink.net, Butchfarrington,  Debifarrington, 
BrokenTailRanch, vasseura AT hughes.net, mojavehome AT gmail.com,  
ghancock AT bcsmechanical.com, 
diana40355 AT msn.com,  maureen.reilly AT sympatico.ca
Sent: 10/10/2008 2:58:26 P.M. Pacific Standard  Time
Subj: Nopales (no-pall'-es) - in today's  news!


Just an off-the-wall transmission to everyone - interesting stuff! From  the 
ACWA newsletter. Too bad, says I, that we are Mojave and prickly pear is  
Sonoran.
 
As an aside, my mother-in-law, bless her, used to use canned 'nopales'  the 
same as we use green beans - in omelets or served as a side dish with red  
chile sauce. When we were in Arizona, she cut the paddles herself and spent  
hours 
scraping off the thorns so she could cook the sliced  paddles for dinner.
 
Nopales are available in almost every market nowadays, in the Hispanic  foods 
aisle.
 
Just sharing.
Cool concept.
 
This is of particular concern to me because in past years, when 'labs'  have 
been busted out here, the contents are simply dumped into the sand, and -  
I'm 
assuming - the nastiness eventually works its way down into our  groundwater. 
I have asked law enforcement about this before, and gotten  no viable 
response.
 
Sandy
 
Cactus Goo Makes Water Safe
Jessica Marshall, Discovery News
 
Sept. 17, 2008 -- The slimy ooze inside  prickly pear cactuses that helps the 
plants store water in the desert can also  be used for scouring arsenic, 
bacteria and cloudiness out of rural drinking  water, according to research 
at the 
University of South Florida in  Tampa.
 
Biochemical engineer Norma Alcantar first learned of the _cactus's_ 
(http://reference.howstuffworks.com/cactus-encyclopedia.htm)  unique 
abilities from her 
grandmother, a native of  north central Mexico. There, the residual water 
from boiling the flat, _oval-shaped lobes of prickly pear_ 
(http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/08/17/cactus_pla.html)  for salads and 
other  dishes was used to 
clear up cloudy water drawn from the river before use for  cooking or 
drinking. 
"When you boil [the prickly pear], what is getting separated is mucilage,"  
Alcantar said. 
Mucilage is the clear, gooey, viscous liquid from within the cactus which  
helps to seal water inside the plant so it can survive desert-dry  
conditions. 
Alcantar began to study how the mucilage worked to clear cloudy water. She  
found that the mucilage binds to the dirt and causes the particles to  
coagulate, forming large enough clumps that they can settle out of the  
water. 
Then, she turned her attention to other water contaminants. The group's  more 
recent research has shown that the mucilage can also form a complex with  
_arsenic_ 
(http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/08/14/arsenic-bacteria-lake.html) , 
a carcinogenic water contaminant that can occur  naturally or from industrial 
or agricultural pollution. 
The arsenic-mucilage complex is large enough that it can be removed by  
drawing the water through a sand filter. 
"Sometimes we get 80 percent removal, and sometimes we get lower than 50  
percent removal," Alcantar said. "We don't yet know exactly what it is; we  
haven't found what are the exact best conditions for the mucilage [to get the 
 most 
arsenic removal]." 
What percentage removal is sufficient will depend on the amount of _arsenic 
in the water_ 
(http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/08/19/arsenic-diabetes.html)  
supply. 
Other ongoing research by Alcantar's team has shown that the mucilage can  
also kill bacteria in the water, solving another potential water quality  
problem. The mucilage either engulfs the bacteria and starves them, or it  
binds to 
the bacteria and causes them to settle out of the water. 
Mucilage consists of carbohydrates and sugars. The team is investigating  
exactly how these components interact with bacteria, arsenic and suspended  
particles. The evidence so far suggests that when arsenic binds to the 
sugars,  the 
number of charges on the particle changes, which changes its ability to  stay 
dissolved. Similar processes appear to be at work with the other  
contaminants. 
Alcantar estimates that one lobe of prickly pear would supply a family of  
five for about five weeks. Alcantar's team is still optimizing and developing 
 
the best system, but she envisions that each family would pass their water  
through a filter that would periodically be recharged with fresh mucilage 
from  
prickly pear grown at home or in the community. 
An advantage of the approach is that prickly pear is familiar to local  
communities, which her work suggests will help ease its acceptance by local  
people 
in Temamatla, Mexico, where she is working with families to design and  
_supply  filters_ (http://science.howstuffworks.com/h2o4.htm) . 
"Our survey showed that 97 percent of the community wanted to have a  filter, 
especially if it's based on something that they know and are  accustomed to," 
said Alcantar 
"There are a number of aspects to this project that I think are unique,"  
said Angela Lindner of the University of Florida in Gainesville. "She knows  
these communities so she understands the social aspects that are involved.  
She's 
keeping in mind that the one who is going to be making these filters is  
going 
to be the person who is drinking the water. That's rarely done in  
engineering design." 
 
____________________________________
Related Links: 
_How Stuff  Works: Water Purification_ 
(http://science.howstuffworks.com/h2o4.htm)  
_Discovery Earth Game_ 
(http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/project-earth/game/game.html)  
_Planet  Green_ (http://planetgreen.discovery.com/) 
 
 
  
____________________________________
 

 
 
 


    CREDITS DCL |  DISCOVERY SITES   VIDEO   SHOP   CUSTOMER SERVICE   
CORPORATE  







 
____________________________________
 New MapQuest Local shows what's happening at your destination. Dining,  
Movies, Events, News & more. _Try it out!  _ 
(http://local.mapquest.com/?ncid=emlcntnew00000002) 


**************New MapQuest Local shows what's happening at your destination.  
Dining, Movies, Events, News & more. Try it out 
(http://local.mapquest.com/?ncid=emlcntnew00000002)