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EU Lead Ammunition Ban

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    From a NARGC FB post today.

    Just a quick follow on from last nights post on the impact the lead ban will have on the industry. It is a bit of an overreaction considering that our surveys are showing extremely low amounts in birds.

    The 3 Surveys that have been done in Ireland: ( Checking Waterbirds Gizzards for the presence of Lead Shot)

    (1) 1990 - NARGC Survey (Dr Douglas Butler) 913 Gizzards, 23 had ingested Lead Shot = 2.52% Prevalence.

    (2) 2019 - NARGC Survey, 1,194 Gizzards, 21 had ingested Lead Shot = 1.75% Prevalence

    (3) 2020 - NARGC Survey, 976 Gizzards, 2 had ingested Lead Shot = 0.2% Prevalence.

    Survey No1 was conducted by Dr Douglas Butler and published in the Naturalists Journal in 1990. Survey 2, 3, was facilitated by the NARGC, with an Independent Veterinary Laboratory doing the dissection and analysis, and reporting their findings.

    All three surveys clearly indicate this is not an issue in Ireland, and is in sharp contrast to the erroneous guesstimates in the ECHA / EC reports.

    We are continuing the gizzard surveys. Please keep your Duck Gizzards, Freeze them, label - date- species location, and we will arrange collection by your RGC later.

    Thanks for reading






    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    The serious exaggeration that 100k worth of lead is spread about the EU PA.

    That's what? two pellets per acre?

    //www.agriland.ie/farming-news/working-group-to-examine-impact-of-eu-lead-shot-ban/

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB


    Another article from all4shooters.com. This time it's relating to a US ban on lead in ammo and fishing weights under consideration by the US Fish & Wildlife Service. It has echoes of what's happening here but to a lesser extent.




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  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    Another article on the lead ban from the UK. Remember The science is SETTLED! [Like climate alarmism!] on lead is the main killer of all things waterfowl, and no one dares question such.🙄

    https://countrysquire.co.uk/2022/04/16/are-wwt-wary-of-science/

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,114 ✭✭✭Zxthinger


    Great insight to the settled science. Lol



  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB


    Here's a video from "English Shooting" on the lead ban from a UK point of view. Despite "Brexit", the UK is pretty much following an identical route to the EU with regards to the proposed lead ban. What he says is relevant to us all, ie: some of the wording he posts up on screen from UK REACH is pretty much word for word from EU REACH. There's nothing really new in it but it's worth a watch as an easy way to get brought up to speed on a few things if you haven't been following the issue so far.





  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB




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  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB


    The European Food Safety Authority delayed the hunting body FACE from accessing a report submitted to ECHA on the amounts of lead in game meat. By the time FACE had the report the public consultation period on the lead ban had ended.



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    Hardly surprising that...Did we expect fair play from the EU and their agendas?

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    The rot of the EU is still present in the UK with the lead ban

    https://www.all4shooters.com/en/hunting/passion/ban-on-lead-in-ammunition-in-the-uk/

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB


    They're also going after phasing out lead altogether in everything, in addition to banning lead in ammunition.




  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB




  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    And now the ol fool in the White House is trying this lead ban nonsense in the USA.Spot the similarities as with the EU. Dodgy science reports on both sides of the pond.


    A recent announcement by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), which operates within the U.S. Department of the Interior, should be of concern to all hunters, recreational shooters, and Second Amendment advocates.

    According to the Federal Register, the USFWS proposes to ban the use of lead ammunition and fishing tackle on certain federal lands by 2026. This ban on federal lands may well be a precursor to more widespread bans across the country.


    Please Contact the U.S. Department of the Interior and Oppose the Lead Ammunition Ban!

    The USFWS, in its own words, states, “Finally, the best available science, analyzed as part of this proposed rulemaking, indicates that lead ammunition and tackle may have negative impacts on both wildlife and human health…..”.

    The use of the word “may” rather than “does” should tell us what we need to know about the uncertain science backing up this decision.

    It is no secret that many on the Anti-gun Left want to ban lead ammunition. In 2014, the U.S. District Court of Appeals dismissed an effort by anti-hunting groups to ban traditional lead ammunition and announced that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) “lacked statutory authority to regulate bullets and shot” under the Toxic Substances Control Act.

    However, anti-gun and anti-hunting groups did not give up!

    WHAT IS REALLY HAPPENING is the Biden administration is caving to demands from the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) to ban lead ammunition because these groups are opposed to the American traditions of hunting and recreational shooting. 

    Let’s look at some facts.

    EFFECTS ON PEOPLE 

    In 2008, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the North Dakota Health Department issued a joint study assessing the blood levels of participants who consumed and did not consume meat from wild game.

    This study showed that the participants who ate wild game had a very slightly higher lead blood level compared to people who did not consume wild game. However, that number was not statistically significant, meaning it did not show a real scientific effect. A similar study by the Wisconsin Department of Health and Human Services showed lead poisoning doesn’t result “from ingestion of lead bullet fragments in large game animals.” In other words, the lead is coming from other environmental sources besides ammunition.

    EFFECTS ON WILD ANIMALS


    The problem we face is that those who want to ban lead ammunition make the misguided assertion that the use of lead ammunition in hunting causes lead poisoning in wildlife species across widespread areas.

    However, the science they present to support their allegations is suspect.

    Many studies on the impacts of lead from hunting have involved questionable sample sizes, cherry-picked data to incriminate lead ammunition, and the exclusion of unfavorable data that contradicts an anti-lead hypothesis.

    Some researchers have even been sued in court for withholding “original” data that might contradict an anti-lead ammunition position.

    As activist researchers manipulate the scientific process to find evidence against lead ammunition, they often ignore the presence of numerous non-ammunition lead sources that are common in the environment. These sources can include such items as lead-based paint, gasoline, pesticides, galvanized screws, nuts, bolts, washers, and many other items.

    All of the aforementioned items have been shown to be available and attractive to California condors. Condors are a species often pointed to by anti-lead advocates as threatened by lead because condors feed on the carcasses of harvested big game animals. These non-ammunition items containing lead have appeared in condor nests, their digestive tracts, and in the digestive tracts of their fledglings.

    Activists and researchers advocating for lead bans consistently overlook such alternative environmental sources.

    In 2007, California passed legislation when supporters claimed that condors were being poisoned by lead ammunition, and these proponents assured the public that poisoning would stop if hunters stopped using lead ammunition. Fifteen years later, California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s records show a 99% compliance rate by hunters with the lead ammunition ban. However, the incidence of lead exposure and poisoning in condors remains static and has even increased slightly since the lead-banning legislation went into effect.

    California’s lead ammunition ban has been a colossal failure and proves that alternative sources of lead poisoning cannot be ignored.

    Every year, new science emerges that suggests a connection between lead poisoning in wildlife and alternative sources of lead in the environment. In short, we just don’t have strong evidence to prove that lead ammunition is harming wildlife because there are so many lead sources in our ecosystems.

    ECONOMIC IMPACT

    After California’s ban on lead ammunition for hunting, Southwick Associates determined the lead ban was expected to force over 36 percent of licensed hunters to stop hunting. Of course, this also helps to further the goal of every anti-gunner in the gunban movement. They want to demonize firearms and discourage as many Americans as possible from learning to use and enjoy firearms, as protected under the Second Amendment.

    Europe faces a lead ban throughout all European Union Countries. Studies by the European Shooting Sports Forum and the European Federation for Hunting and Conservation suggest 25% of hunters would stop hunting outright, and over 30% of all European hunters would drastically reduce their activities, under a complete lead ammunition ban.

    America’s Centuries-Old Hunting Tradition Will Suffer if Lead Ammunition is Banned

    In America, according to some sources, a complete switch from lead ammunition would result in 30,000 people losing their jobs and a $4.9 billion hit to the United States Gross Domestic Product. Further, we could expect drastic ammunition price increases followed by ammunition shortages. Some studies have suggested 10-20 times increases in ammunition costs due to a lead ban.

    CLOSING

    While the impacts of lead on humans and wildlife should continue to be studied, there is little scientific evidence to suggest a widespread lead ban is necessary or justified.

    Because of a lack of strong scientific evidence to support a lead ban and the disastrous consequences of such action, the federal government has no scientific justification to ban lead ammunition at this time. 

    Please contact the U.S. Department of the Interior. Tell them you are writing to oppose the National Lead Ammunition Ban proposed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.



    Mark Jones

    Certified Wildlife Biologist®

    National Director, Hunter Outreach

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    Another excellent article from the UK Countrysquire online magazine. Longish cup of coffee read.

    COUNTRY SQUIRE MAGAZINE

    The Truth About Lead Shot

    countrysquiremagazine

    Aug 12

    BY BRIAN D DUNN

    Since the 1980’s a growing political attack on lead as used for shooting sports ammunition has been subject to a massive effort across a very wide base of conspirators driven mainly by animal protectionists backed by Mr Blair’s New Labour government and amazingly evidence exists of Country Sports Representative bodies being implicated as contributors towards the campaign to secure a total ban on the use of lead as ammunition.

    Politically driven, the public has been subject to a propaganda campaign ranging from the dangers to children coming into contact with paint containing trace elements of lead, the lead weights ban imposed on anglers in 1986 because it was claimed swans were dying from lead poisoning, to poultry egg production being affected by clay shooting ground lead contamination, and a growing campaign against eating lead shot game meat to which the Food Standards Agency, (FSA) a public-funded body, made its contribution in a public statement in October 2012 that:

     “Pregnant women, or mothers with babies, should not eat lead shot game meat”

    All of which can be proven to be misleading and duplicitous.

    In 1637 Charles II granted a Royal Charter for the establishment of The London Proof House whose priority purpose was to inspect and proof test all guns before they were made available through sale to the British public, as a Health and Safety Service. That charter contained a clear and unequivocal operating statement that the material used for proof testing must be lead. A stipulation which remains unchanged 377 years later to this day. As a result, every gun sold in Great Britain is obliged to have passed through proof testing, whether English proof or, as in recent times (since 2006) the higher-pressure standard of CIP Continental proof, which legally applies only to guns imported from Europe.

    As a result of the 1637 Royal Charter, all guns sold to the public are obliged to be used with ammunition compliant with the safety pressures to which the gun has passed through proof and to which it has been officially proof-marked to be safe to use.

    Despite CIP-proofed guns being made available following the 1999 lead ban imposed for shooting of any wildfowl or wader, more than 95% of guns currently in constant use are only legally able to use ammunition which complies with English Proof Standards which have been tested and marked safe using lead test loads.

    Where does this leave the several lead alternatives which have been offered for sale ‘over the counter’ to Wildfowlers since the 1999 lead shot ban?

    Mr Swift as Chief Executive Officer of BASC (WAGBI) made a public statement to members in 1998 that any lead alternative would be required to meet 4 priority conditions before it could be accepted for use in English proofed shotguns.

    • SAFE in all English Proofed shotguns.


    • EFFECTIVE as a ballistic material for cleanly killing live quarry.
    • AFFORDABLE compared with the then current price of lead ammunition.
    • ENVIRONMENTALLY acceptable to the countryside and humans.

    To date no lead alternative has met all 4 criteria and some meet none.

    Steelshot is simply not effective but is the cheapest alternative although costing at least x4 the price of lead ammunition. It is unsafe in English proofed guns unless protected by massive plastic wads, is used with very little choke, but it has been proven in Europe to cause serious environmental damage to trees and herbage. Used on live quarry it penetrates, breaks blood vessels, causes little ‘shock’ trauma, but kills from causing internal bleed not instant death, which does happen up to hours after initial injury, usually on feeding grounds inland from coastal roosting grounds.

    So, how poisonous is lead?

    Lead is a natural element extracted from the earth and processed from ore into an inert metal. It has been used widely by man for centuries because of its malleability and acid protective properties also as ammunition for more than 350 years, because of its weight to volume characteristics and its ability to distort on impact thereby spreading its full energy delivery in the most trauma shock-and-penetration effective manner, making it the finest/safest/most effective ballistic ammunition used over 350 years for achieving clean and humane kills of live quarry.

    Once killed by lead ammunition, game meat has been safely consumed in enormous quantities by the public, worldwide, for centuries.

    During New Labour’s thirteen years in Government, it conducted a multi £million (£150m) investigation to establish how many human deaths have been attributed to ingestion of lead shot from game meat. Its research, which was intensive, thorough, and very costly, found not a single death recorded.

    The facts about lead are really a matter of scientific record.

    Until either chemically contaminated or elevated in temperature to very high levels, lead is an inert metal and not poisonous. As its volume to weight ratio is second only to materials such as pure tungsten or mercury, pieces of spent lead shot in common shot sizes because of its “heavy weight” will pass through the digestive systems of both wildlife and humans so quickly that no chance of chemical contamination can occur. And even the grinding action of a bird’s gizzards which mixes shot with grit, as is common practice with game birds and pigeons, merely reduces lead shot to smaller pieces of inert metal which still pass through the intestinal system so fast (x3 hourly defecation is the norm in a mallard) that ‘creation’ of injurious “lead poisoning” remains an impossibility.

    Yet amongst the common staples of human diet, potatoes, cereal and tap water will deliver annually up to 40 times the amount of ingested lead that a shooting season’s eating of normal quantities of game meat could deliver to the human ingestion system.

    In October of 2013 a significant restaurant chain based in Birmingham but with businesses throughout the whole country, withdrew its game pie from its published menus. When questioned why, the Company Statement sent to all restaurants and required to be quoted, was that “Game meat contains poisonous lead”. Other establishments have since followed, ignorant of the science.

    The 1986 “attack” on anglers’ use of lead weights for fishing was based on swan deaths ‘claimed’ to have been caused by swans ingesting lead weights picked up from the bottom of lakes and waterways. No conclusive forensic analysis was performed to establish beyond any reasonable doubt that lead weight ingestion was in fact the true cause of any significant swan deaths but legislation was nevertheless enacted and certain sizes of lead fishing weights #6 to 1 ounce were subject to a total ban.

    Anglers do not throw away lead weights, making the incidence of any lead fishing weights discarded into water frequented by wildfowl completely unfounded as a means of poisoning swans or any other waterfowl.

    Subsequently, and after the great publicity campaign had died away, swans were still found to be dying, and properly conducted autopsies were carried out on the mostly summer period swan deaths, which proved that botulism was the cause of death.

    The infectious toxin Clostridium Botulinum which causes botulism, is commonly found in soils and particularly in the mud of lake and waterway bottoms which becomes revealed during summers when winter rainfall has been low and depleted summer water levels allow both swans and ducks to reach and “dibble” in the mud bottoms while searching for invertebrate food items, thereby extensively exposing both ducks and swans to botulism. In January 2014 a warning was issued to mothers of babies not to feed them honey or honey content products because honey contains Clostridium Botulinum and can cause fatal botulism in babies.

    From 1975 to 1980 the highly acclaimed and well-regarded US Fish and Game Wildlife Service carried out a science-based research project in which it proved beyond any reasonable doubt that mallard ducks’ ingestion of lead shot caused neither terminal nor ill effects over the entire normal 5-year life cycle of these waterfowl. However, their findings were never widely published because a federal ministerial threat was delivered to the effect that bald and golden eagles were endangered and had to be protected from lead rifle bullets used to shoot deer where lead remained as trace elements in the bullet entry tracts and that was claimed to be imparting fatal poisoning (unproven) to eagles which feed on ‘abandoned’ carcass carrion.

    The case against lead ammunition was being blamed for eagle deaths again despite no scientific based proof ever being established. This “threat” to the US Wildlife Service was to the effect that a federal injunction would be drawn up that would involve the US Fish and Game Wildlife Service in an horrendously costly legal battle, which even if they won, their expenses and time required to devote to the case would be so injurious that “they would be best advised” to conceal their “distracting” 5 year scientific research finding into lead ingestion by mallard.

    In 2010 DEFRA under the Blair New Labour government founded the Lead Ammunition Group (LAG) formed around a committee of so called “Representative” interests having both opinion and concerns about any detrimental effects which might be able to be laid at the door of lead ammunition.

    LAG’s final report was published in 2016 after massive delays. Members of the committee ranged from high profile animal protectionists to people who the shooting community have a right to expect to honestly represent science-based fact. Under the Chairmanship of former CEO of BASC Mr. John Swift, nothing remotely approaching any fair or science-based case against lead ammunition has been able to be formulated. Yet, singular public statements by Dr Deborah Pain condemning without any proof whatsoever, the use of lead shot for sporting purposes, has also been supported in TV interviews by her colleagues from the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust - a body founded, grown, and operated into a fair-minded national research “treasure” by Sir Peter Scott, one of our most respected, knowledgeable and acknowledged wildfowler / environmentalists.

    Put simply and honestly there has, and never can be, a case against lead ammunition which is able to withstand scientific scrutiny into it being a “proven” lethal poison to humans, wildlife or the environment.

    The 1999 ban on use of lead shot for wildfowl and wader shooting was never based on scientific fact, but purely on political pressure against both the public ownership of sporting arms (guns) and the enormously powerful lobby from the voting public supported animal protection lobbyists. Subsequently the EU has resurrected the 1930’s case - pursued by Adolf Hitler - that public ownership of any variety of gun must be banned. As the British shooting public, we have been unmercifully attacked by protectionists and failed by our very own country sports representative bodies.

    I reach the following 5 inescapable conclusions:

    1. None of the Membership Representative Bodies within the British Shooting Community presented an effective defence of British Shooting Sports against the 1999 ban on use of lead shot for waterfowl shooting.

    2. In 1986 None of the Membership Representative Bodies within the British Shooting Community had the foresight/ motivation to challenge the erroneous legal case being brought by the Animal Protectionist lobby against anglers lead weights causing significant deaths of swans, whereby ‘split shot’ from #6 to 1-ounce weights were made illegal.

    3. The major membership bodies at the time comprised:

    •     *BASC (WAGBI)


    •     *British Fieldsports Society (BFS), shortly to become The Countryside Alliance
    •     *CPSA
    •     *NGO was not formed until 1997 after deciding that Gamekeepers were not effectively represented through being a “Section” within the BASC.
    •     *BDS British Deer Society.

    None, individually or collectively, challenged either the fundamental case against lead angling weights being toxic, or the obvious ramifications of any lead shot being accused of being toxic and causing the death of wildlife, or its potential knock-on effects on humans eating lead shot meat.

    4. In 1998, BASC, against the proposed threat to lead shot being legally banned for shooting of any wildfowl or wader, announced that any “nontoxic” alternative to lead shot must meet FOUR CRITERIA before it could be accepted by the British Shooting Community. Since the 1999 ban on lead shot none of the several “alternatives” to lead shot have met all 4 criteria, one, steel, the cheapest meets none and the most expensive/effective has been proven in America to be carcinogenic even from merely handling by humans. In the 15 years since the lead ban for wildfowl, BASC has neither challenged the basis of proof on which the 1999 law was founded. Neither has BASC sought to address the shortcomings of the “nontoxic” alternatives, and most blatant of all the inability of steel shot in English proofed guns to be safe or effective. Is there an underlying reason for BASC’s acquiescence in not challenging either the basic case or the suitability of the so-called lead “alternatives”?

    5. The whole history of the last 30 years of the failed defence of British Shooting Sports by its member funded representative bodies is littered with inadequate representation and acquiescence in the face of serious long term damaging attack, a failure to either commission or conduct adequate research into the claimed toxicity of lead ammunition, and this despite BASC having a Director of Research in place for the whole duration of the 20 year period in question, while the Game Conservancy Trust (funded to carry out research by the shooting community since the 1940’s) has never entered into a scientific research program to prove whether lead ammunition represents a significant danger.

    The biggest failure of all British country sports’ representative bodies, has been their failure to amalgamate under a single federated body as a collective representative VOICE with which to confront any potentially injurious and unfounded attacks made against any element of British Country Sports, especially by the highly organised and politicised animal protection bodies whose disproportionate influence over politicians has grown to become the only voice listened to when any matters concerning the British Countryside are under discussion.

    Now is the time to change. It is not too late. Let the Countryside now fight back hard.

    Brian D Dunn is a retired management consultant from the Chilterns. An experienced foreshore wildfowler (Holkham) for 25 years, Clay Competitor to World Championships FITASC and 4x County Champion / Winning County Team Member, having also experienced 35 years of Driven Pheasant / Partridge shooting on prestige estates from Hall Barn 25 years, Highclere Castle, Beaulieu, Yattendon, etc, and 24 consecutive Seasons in a Hampshire Syndicate, Brian knows his field sports.

    References:

    (i) Angling Trades Association (ATA) Warns Against using Illegal Lead Fishing Weights.

    (ii) Wikipedia PROOF MARKS page 3. Proof Testing in C.I.P. regulated countries

    (iii) Worshipful Company of Gunmakers, A History page 8. Ref Royal Charter 1637.

    Manner of Proof: - With good and sufficient gunpowder the weight of a bullet of lead sizeable to every several gun according to the bore of the piece

    (iv) Angling Trust: - What Science based, Peer Reviewed proof of anglers split lead shot used as weights, has been found to cause significant deaths of waterfowl and in particular swans? None

    (v) Camden BRI: - Clostridium Botulinum causing botulism and infecting humans, and wildlife as a commonly found toxic organism in soil/mud especially in lake and waterway bottoms.

    (vi) BASC, W&WT, CA, DEFRA, LAG: - What proof, none exists of science-based, Peer-Reviewed Research that spent lead ammunition has been proven to be the significant cause of waterfowl mortality, none can be accessed as Indisputable record?

    (vii) US Fish & Game Wildlife Service: - Scientific Research, Peer Reviewed and available on record exists as proof that between 1975 and 1980 a 5-year study of 2 Control Groups of mallard ducks established that lead shot ingestion caused neither terminal or debilitating injury to either “lead shot fed” Control Group or a naturally feeding Control Group.

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 607 ✭✭✭MakersMark


    I ve a few hundred rounds of Sako gamepro that will last me for an awful long time of hunting.


    Any ban that doesn't reimburse me for the cost of these will be ignored.



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



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  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    While not directly news on the lead ban.It does question,as we should the motives and political ideals behind these scientists. Science can now be divided into two fields ." Political science" iE "science" that is made to fit an agenda , where contrarian facts are ignored and dissent of the methodology is suppressed and those who question are de-platformed, and "real science" where science is still factual based and changes as the evidence produced and researched dictates.

    COUNTRY SQUIRE MAGAZINE

    The Determined Drive to Ban Lead Shot

    countrysquiremagazine

    Sep 13

    BY MARK CRUDGINTON

    Lead shot is the only viable projectile that can be used to humanely kill birds and animals in the UK. Other metals such as “steel “, copper, bismuth, zinc, tin etc can be used but not one of them can hold a candle to the efficiency and lethality of the lead projectile. However, lead is a divisive subject, mainly due to the enormous pollution apparently caused by all of us driving motor vehicles powered by petrol with tetraethyl lead as an anti-knock additive as well as the very many ions of lead added to paints etc over hundreds of years. These ions/compounds are recognised as highly poisonous

    Recently a small, niche magazine with a metropolitan leaning called “The Week” published an editorial comment titled “Avoid pheasants shot with lead”. In the article the author quoted Professor Rhys Green of Cambridge University giving the impression that Professor Green’s “research” and dire warning at the conclusion of the piece that “the government follow through on proposals made last year to ban lead ammunition outright”.

    Well, I was perplexed.

    Why does a “City” based political magazine choose to make such an editorial comment? “The Week” states its reason for existence as:

    “The Week is for readers who want to know what's going on in the world, without having to read several daily newspapers – let alone and the endless cycle of rolling TV news and digital media.”

    Should a Cambridge Professor be listened to let alone be given any credence, especially when he states that of 8 pheasant carcasses examined they found small pieces of lead in the flesh despite not making it clear if there was any evidence this would be harmful to those who ate such pheasants? Professor Green is a zoologist not a toxicologist - he has been attempting with his colleagues Debbie Pain, Ruth Cromie and Julia Newth to get lead in ammunition banned for the best part of 20 years and they have been dogged to the point of tunnel vision in their quest.

    Over the last few years, I have contacted and asked most of the aforementioned for the actual scientific evidence they possess which persuades them to pursue their course with such vigour. Rhys Green kindly sent me papers he was party to, however when I questioned the evidential worth of these papers and asked for real evidence he replied saying,

    “This correspondence is now closed.”

    Dr Debbie Pain refused to engage. To date not one of them have been able to provide any hard scientific proof such as Lead isotope marker data, that was until this year when Dr Julia Newth replied to a request with this startling revelation:

    “We and many other scientists believe that it is reasonable to suggest that lead shot is the most likely source of poisoning when poisoned birds have lead shot (usually multiple in our experience) in their digestive tracts, particularly when there is no other obvious source of lead exposure to birds in the environment that they occupy.”

    Does this mean that all the talk from such educated biologists and zoologists is actually based on suggestion and assumption???

    I asked Dr Newth why the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, for whom she works, had not used Lead isotope marker testing to exactly determine the source of lead in wildfowl they found suffering from lead poisoning, considering there are very many sources of lead in the UK environment. Her reply indicated that the tests were too expensive for the WWT to use. I immediately offered to raise money to pay for such research; Dr Newth appeared to not even consult her colleagues or the management of the WWT, she just replied stating such testing would be a “waste of our charitable time”.

    This statement astounded me, this scientist had admitted she and her colleagues could only guess at the cause of lead poisoning in wildfowl yet when someone offered to help further her research and help provide actual proof – Truth - she refused that help.

    Could it be that the group of scientists who are using all their powers to get the use of lead ammunition banned have an ulterior motive? Debbie Pain and Ruth Cromie are stated to be “friends of Wild Justice, an organisation determined to end Field sports in the UK. I can find no statements from any of the protagonists that they support or have an interest in Field sports, so I suppose it is reasonable to suggest therefore that the four of them are actually engaged in a politically motivated “hatchet “job on Field sports and shooting in general. If they were truly independent scientists they would seek to use all the evidence at their disposal.

    The WWT is a charity and there are rules about using the assets of that charity for political purposes. It is reasonable to suggest that the Charity Commission and lawyers from field sports look into the work done by WWT scientists to attempt to ban lead in ammunition; at whether they have fulfilled the criteria of those working or acting for a charity.

    It also seems to me imperative that Professor Green (affiliate to RSPB, whose vice chairman is Chris Packham, founding member of Wild Justice), Dr Debbie Pain (WWT), Ruth Cromie (WWT) and Dr Julia Newth (WWT) come clean and actually admit the reasons for doggedly pursuing a ban on lead in ammunition.

    What actual evidence do they have to show spent lead ammunition is a proven threat to Wildfowl or, in Professor Green’s case, to humans as well?

    Science is evidence-led and if these four anti-musketeers have no substantial evidence and are merely using a reasonable suggestion for the most likely cause of lead poisoning they are grossly letting down the very birds they are trying to protect, namely wildfowl as there could be other more serious sources of harm that the 4 scientists are choosing to ignore in their myopic determination to create circumstances where Fieldsports and especially shooting cannot be conducted within an ethical framework. Those same Fieldsports - the proponents of which founded the RSPCA, RSPB, and WWT - have conserved the majority of wild and rural spaces in the UK both for the successors of those same Fieldsports enthusiasts but also for the public to enjoy these beautiful “Jewels” of our country.

    I sent the following challenge to Professor Green and “The Week” (to date, no response from either):

    I challenge Professor Green to provide scientific proof, published in your “magazine " to answer the following questions: 

    Has it been proven that anybody in UK has ever been diagnosed of lead poisoning as a result of eating game shot with lead, in say the last 100 years ?

    How many people in the UK are diagnosed with lead poisoning every year in the UK over say the last 50 years?

    Are there any other sources of lead in any foods available to the UK public or is it only available through game shot with Lead?

    What lead isotope marker data studies has Prof Green instigated to prove the specific source of lead in any human or animal/bird in the UK?

    Is it safe to eat any meat or vegetables containing minute pieces of any metals?

    I do not expect to hear answers. Ideologues do not care for facts or truth. Their bedfellows at Wild Justice are campaigners not scientists. Lightweights in their field.

    That these scientists ally for ideological reasons with campaigners should make you angry but do not waste your anger.

    Instead put some money towards the 3 brave souls from this magazine fighting Chris Packham in the High Court https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/the-packham-3-defamation-defen/

    Mark Crudgington is a 2nd generation gunmaker, at large in Wiltshire. His company George Gibbs Ltd is nearing its 200th birthday. A passionate shot, angler, deer stalker and natural sceptic.

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 166 ✭✭GooseB


    From the same author as the article posted by Grizzly45 previously.




  • Registered Users Posts: 551 ✭✭✭Asus1


    I've said it before if lead was killing all these wildfowl surly the public would be seeing some sort of pileup of dead birds along areas where they congregrate.

    Lead ban is not for human safety either,if you read the above piece and the author informs you how many die from alcohol each year versus the zero who've died from lead poisoning since the 1980s.Also smoking does horrible damage but the EU have not looked to ban something they know causes cancers and other diseases.

    Clearly the lead ban is the first step to make shooting unaffordable for the average person they then begin adding little restrictions here and there before finally just banning civilian ownership of firearms.Maybe I'm talking nonsense but it feels like it's heading that way.



  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    This is St Mary's church in Kilkenny.

    This entire extension to it is covered totally in LEAD sheeting!!!

    Lead according to many different scientific groups in any shape&form is DANGEROUS!!! And should not be used, or as little as possible in modern life

    This creation was apparently sponsored and paid for by the OPW with your tax money.

    As this is lead,it will eventually leach or abrade in the wind and weather off into the ground and groundwater around the building, unless regularly painted and preserved to prevent such. This is probably also SOFT lead to be worked into such panels, unlike HARD lead, which is chemically treated in our shotgun shells or bullets.

    If this building ever catches fire, lead melts at a very low heat temp compared to other metals, and the toxic fumes from such a fire will spread, depending on wind direction, over Kilkenny or further afield. Lead fumes are THE most toxic component of any type of lead.


    And people are concerned about our minuscule amount of lead spread in the environment for shooting?

    PS Whoever did this leadwork.It is a magnificent bit of craftsmanship...So kudos there!



    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 11,758 ✭✭✭✭BattleCorp




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  • Registered Users Posts: 14,934 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    Union law should always be interpreted proportionately and in accordance with the objectives of the relevant legislation, in this case the objective of the restriction, the protection of birds. The definition of wetlands must therefore also be interpreted in this manner” 

    Intresting point also of major revelance to any firearms legislation introduced here in Ireland under an "EU directive...Nuthin we can do about it lads!" answer from our lot in the Dail.

    Yeah,I can see this one being well enforced and policed here by NPWS and AGS alright.🙄

    Also, it's questionable whether this can actually stand as a directive,as there are at least 3 EU challenges to this that have not been decided yet .

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



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