With the ranks of those who oppose the aerial spreading of 1080 swelling exponentially, you may well be asking, why are folk so concerned about this poison? (Note, If you are new to 1080 poison read here for an overview). I’ve been following this issue for at least three years now & this widespread aerial distribution of 1080 into NZ’s environment for pest control is the issue that gets by far the most views and shares at EnvirowatchRangitikei. The article by Jenese James on the GrafBoys’ press release on 89 (dead & not tested) Kiwi has had 54K shares to date on facebook. Folk are outraged at what is coming to light and rightly so. I personally began researching the independent information about 1080 after watching the documentary by the GrafBoys called Poisoning Paradise. These two Kiwi guys were raised in the bush, they know their stuff. Their doco has won four international awards  (see here also) and yet … get this … NZ television will not play it here in our own country. They are assuming that we cannot listen & judge for ourselves? Does that not raise alarm bells for you? It should. That doco was the starting point that left me with enough question marks around the official line, to prompt me to look further than DoC’s own research. That is literal too, for the research DoC uses to justify the alleged safety of aerial distribution of 1080 in NZ is 70% in-house, writes Reihana Robinson in her book The Killing Nation.

So what is coming to light then? Does NZ’s Department of Conservation (DoC) not have our best interests at heart? The best interests of our native flora & fauna? Don’t they have all the right checks & balances in place? Do they not have a body of scientific data & research (including follow up data) justifying the use of this poison, that has been banned incidentally by most other countries on the planet? Well, as it turns out, no they don’t appear to have a sound, watertight body of scientific data that actually proves 1080 is both safe & achieving (after 60+ years) what it set out to do.

“… there is not a single scientifically credible study showing that aerial 1080 when used on the mainland is of net benefit to any species of New Zealand’s native fauna. Thus the upside for native species is entirely unproven, despite 15 years of increasingly desperate attempts by DoC to show one.” … Pat and Quinn Whiting-OKeefe, Scientists

DOC’S DUBIOUS ‘SUCCESS’ RATE WITH 1080 – $3.5 BILLION, A DECADE LATER AND NOT A SINGLE ENDANGERED BIRD SPECIES IN RECOVERY

In light of this, people are understandably worried about their food sources. If it’s touted as being ‘safe’, safe in our food, safe in water and so on, yet the science has any kind of question mark over it, then logically, folk will be concerned. I certainly am. The authorities should be practicing the precautionary principle:

“The precautionary principle is the concept that establishes it is better to avoid or mitigate an action or policy that has the plausible potential, based on scientific analysis, to result in major or irreversible negative consequences to the environment or public even if the consequences of that activity are not conclusively known, with the burden of proof that it is not harmful falling on those proposing the action. It is a major principle of international environmental law and is extended to other areas and jurisdictions as well.”  (New World Encylopedia)

Always I go back to the statements of the late Dr Peter Scanlon on this:

“Where are the cancer causing or carcinogenicity studies? … there aren’t any;

Where are the reproductive studies, particularly focusing on female eggs? … there aren’t any;

Where are the developmental studies, early exposure to brain, immune system? … there aren’t any;

Where are the long term chronic exposure studies looking at mitochondrial DNA content and mutation rates? there aren’t any.

There’s a lot of doubts about this substance, it’s dangerous.”

Should they not be stopping the use of aerially dropped 1080 until the studies are done as a US Biophysicist from Tufts University has suggested?

TWO MDS AND AN EXPERT ON MAORI MEDICINAL PLANTS DISCUSS THE TOXICITY OF 1080 IN OUR FOOD & OUR ENVIRONMENT

So not only is there concern about contamination of hunted animals, but contamination of the flora as well.

Not only is 1080 highly toxic to mammals, birds and insects- one scientist has even discovered that it is toxic to plants and so forests do not do so well after 1080 drops.   (interview with Clyde Graf) ourplanet.org 

Lest you think I’m scaremongering here, be assured, the safety data sheet for 1080 warns that it should not be dropped into any body of water.

Forest & Bird Say 1080’s as Safe to Eat as a Packet of Crisps … and DoC Says it’s Deadly to Dogs?
1080 poisoned trout risk much greater than first declared says researcher – fishermen BEWARE
TROUT MASS-POISONED IN NEW ZEALAND-DOC warned fishermen in 2014 not to eat their catch
Family face permanent disablity after eating wild pig 17/11/17

Take for instance the recent poisoning of the family in Putaruru in the Waikato. This family, after beginning a meal of wild pork, fell instantly ill and had to be rushed to hospital by ambulance. The scenario that followed is revealing indeed regarding the apparent cover up that is going on with regard to testing possible victims of 1080 poisoning. A Doctor suspected 1080 as the source of the problem early in the piece as records showed when they were finally released after some of the usual foot dragging that seems to be characteristic of any request by the public for official documentation around  possible 1080 poisoning. The family could not even access their own records! Not only did the hospital fail to test for 1080 within the required time frame, the fact that the patients were literally tied to their beds because of the violent convulsions characteristic of 1080 poisoning, was never mentioned in the media.

The ongoing mantra from mainstream media on this was ‘botulism’.

Update from a Neuroscientist on the Waikato family poisoned by wild boar meat .. the anomalies surrounding the official diagnosis

You can read about this whole shocking debacle at the 1080 page, ‘Suspected 1080 Poisoning Cases’. Please read the evidence there if you at all hunt or fish for food. And if you are a tourist, it is better in my opinion, not to drink from the streams as many have been observed doing. Observers have described how tourists are sometimes not even aware of the purpose of 1080 drops going on right over their heads. So much for public warnings.

Invariably what I am seeing in the reports, articles and general chat by eye witnesses is that the toxicity of 1080 is totally downplayed. It is even being taught in children’s school texts that 1080 is ‘not very dangerous’ to humans. This is a substance that is banned in most countries. That kills all breathing organisms from insect life to worms, right up to larger animals such as horses. And yet we are supposed to believe it specifically targets pests? How ever is that possible? Another miracle from NZ’s Department of Conservation? Read Dr Meriel Watts’ exposé of that theory.

Banned in most countries & classified by WHO as ‘Highly Hazardous’… 1080 is a broad-spectrum poison that kills ALL oxygen-breathing animals and organisms – Dr Meriel Watts

Then we heard this year from research by the Graf Brothers that the authorities have changed the rules to allow the dropping of 1080 into our waterways without a Regional Council consent. They can now effectively bypass the pesky Resource Management Act. And dropping it they are. Prior to this, it was ending up in waterways anyway as witnesses have shown with their many photographs posted online. The late Bill Benfield’s research revealed that a drop in the Hunua Ranges, home of Auckland’s town water supply, saw the water filters filled with 1080 pellets! Seriously. In addition, there is NO antidote! It is undetectable as the cause of death if tests are not done early enough.

To date there are no known epidemiological studies that have been carried out in relation to 1080 and potential adverse health effects on humans.
… NZ Ministry of Health 2008

The Startling Truth: “No known epidemiological studies for potential adverse health effects of 1080 on humans” … and yet DOC continues to drop it into our waterways

Then there is the risk to outdoors people who simply walk or hike. Over the past three years I’ve seen various reports of folk out picnicking, out tramping or simply enjoying the scenery, rained down on by 1080 pellets.

Government Rains “1080 Hailstones” On Visiting Anglers – Welcome to Paradise Down Under
THREE years on, two women alleging 1080 poisoning while picnicking STILL waiting for answers from NZ Health

Two women fell ill after this kind of scenario while innocently out for a picnic. Nobody will of course admit to any link between their illness & exposure to 1080. The most upsetting of all the examples of this has been that of the young US woman who died following a tramp in the Queenstown area. Her Doctor suspected 1080 poisoning & tried to bring about an investigation into that. Her heart was sent for testing as to the cause of her cardiac rest and unbelievably the NZ lab lost her heart. Seriously. They lost her heart! Dr Charlie Baycroft a retired MD, recently warned the public that if anybody dies from 1080 poison nobody will know. He was threatened with prosecution by the Ministry of Health for publicly advising folk how to go about getting tested if they feared poisoning.

Could this Healthy 23 Year Old’s Cardiac Arrest Have Been Caused by Exposure to 1080? … We Will Never Know Because Incredibly, the NZ Lab Lost Her Heart!

Are you beginning to feel uneasy at all about our wild food sources?

I read a comment just the other day by a woman who has stopped taking her children to a recreational/scenic area where she’s noticed signs up saying it’s been treated with 1080.  I spoke recently with a university lecturer on the poisoning program, he has noticed a proliferation of poison signs when he goes into the bush. This is a common comment from tourists and locals. Poisoning signs everywhere. There are 65 dogs die each year from 1080 poisoning a NZ site called Pause for a Cause reports. Then there are the ongoing and endless reports of farmers whose stock have succumbed to death by 1080.  Dr Meriel Watts in her book ‘The Poisoning of New Zealand’ (1994) of a South Island farmer who lost 570 sheep in a bungled drop, with sheep still dying six months later. To make things even worse, they die a long slow horrific death that, says a veterinarian, is like two days worth of electrocution. The NZ authorities changed the animal welfare act to allow this. To top it off, adding insult to injury, they are forced to lie about this in the paperwork should they desire compensation for their losses. Hobson’s choice.

Then there is the apparent lack of regard for public safety around the handling & storage of 1080 including disposal of leftover 1080. That’s another whole issue by itself.

POISON JUST LYING AROUND IN THE BUSH ALARMS OVERSEAS VISITOR – IN SAME AREA THE PIG THAT POISONED THE PUTARARU FAMILY CAME FROM
Second incident of 1080 dump found on Stewart Island

Then there was the Whitianga debacle. The attendance by one concerned man at the scene of the unloading of 1080 in the CBD of Whitianga with no public warnings or signage out as legally required, a man who was subsequently assaulted by a security guard, was himself charged with assault, the case eventually dismissed but leaving him with more than $22K in court costs. If you were at all conspiratorial you might think a clear message was being sent to the public. You can read about that at these links. Then in Levin a Horizons storage facility where 1080 was stored caught fire, with apparently no public warnings in place. I observed myself, comments on social media by a man who had noticed symptoms of illness following that fire. He lived in the vicinity. His conversation around the effects cut abruptly short I noticed.

More recently we’ve had revelations on lack of safety with 1080, by an ex employee of Horizons. Diluted solutions of 1080 were sprayed all over the Palmerston North landfill by a contractor surprised that he was allowed to do this. What of the leachate from that dump? What of public in the vicinity of the spraying? What of the earth it was sprayed onto? Of nearby water sources/streams/ditches and so forth?

ERMA’s Agency warned that “No studies have been conducted using standard international guidelines to assess the route and rate of degradation of 1080 in soil. The rate of such degradation under New Zealand conditions is uncertain.”And regarding water: ”Overall, the relevance of the aquatic plant/water studies to the degradation of 1080 in water in NZ is not clear.” … Dr Jo Pollard (BSc (Hons, PhD)

You can read about that at this link:
Shocking revelations on 1080 from a former Horizons employee

And yes there is more that folk are concerned about.

The birds. Frequently we are reading comments by people who note there is no birdsong … no birds in the bush. Folk who have lived long enough to remember how things used to be, like an 82 year old gentleman recently who said the Kiwi, Kereru, Kea, Weka & Tui had all disappeared from where he lived on the West Coast. Reports also come from people who aren’t even anti 1080 or even aware of these drops. Tourists. One I read commented that since their last trip to NZ in the ’70s the birds were noticeably scarce. The GrafBoys & others have posted videos online following 1080 drops & illustrated the lack of birdsong. Listen below.

Below a blogger comments about Lake Matheson in the South Island: