permaculture

[Keith Johnson <keithdj@mindspring.com>]

On the subject of nitrogen, I want to point you all to a sobering article on 
the subject
in the March-April issue of World Watch magazine. It's called Nitrogen: The 
Other Cycle.
Some quotes:

Total human release of N (fertilizer, N-fixing crops, fossil fuels, biomass 
burning,
wetland drainage, land clearing) 210 million tons annually. Total natural 
fixed-N
production - 140 million tons annually (terrestrial sources only; marine 
sources have not
yet been reliable estimated)

Nitrate contamination can cause methemoglobinemiaor "blue-baby syndrome", a 
form of infant
poisoning in which the blood's ability to transport oxygen is greatly 
reduced, sometimes
to the point of death.
Keith

Keith Johnson wrote:

> Another cause of SIDS has been linked to high nitrates in baby food if I've 
> heard
> right. Nitrates become carcinogenic nitrites in the digestive tract. I'll 
> track down a
> story about this that I think I read in Acres USA.
> Keith
>
> Yaya Balinci wrote:
>
> > My take on this is one comment and several questions. We have SIDS (cott
> > death, actually sudden infant death syndrome) here in the U.S. as well, 
> > and
> > probably no sheep skins are in use here. Most are atributed to positioning
> > and bed clothes now.
> > JimB