Month: July 2010

Piscataway Park

early fourthAn ANS walk through several sections of Piscataway Park began with this stop at Piscataway Creek. The trip yielded lots of nice dragonflies and butterflies and some good birds: Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) (adult and immature), Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) (patrolling but not catching any fish), quick looks at a Louisiana Waterthrush (Seiurus motocilla), a cooperative pair of Blue Grosbeaks (Giuraca caerulea). Buttonbush proved to be a good spot for finding butterflies. New ones to my very short list: Zebra Swallowtail (Eurytides marcellus), black-morph Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus), Juniper Hairstreak (Callophrys gryneus), Least Skipper (Ancyloxypha numitor).

On deck: 5

on deck: 5The August Wilson is on the shelf because I really need to catch up my familiarity with his work; the Neil Simon and Nicky Silver (alphabetical order buddies) are for a post that is gestating. The TriQuarterly volumes are the penultimate in the series; my “hometown” literary journal is slated to go online-only after #137. Nathanael West is a re-read of much-loved snark: cold comfort food, if you will. The Guy Davenport replaces a copy of this collection lost in last winter’s snowmelt floods.

Less good than harm?

A recent Earthtalk column summarizes research by Aiello et al. that calls into question the practice of adding triclosan as an antibacterial ingredient to consumer products. The literature review, published in Clinical Infectious Diseases, asked two questions: (1) Does triclosan, in the typical consumer formulations (0.2-0.3% by weight), do anything more towards preventing infectious disease than ordinary soap? (2) Does triclosan contribute to the emergence of bacteria that can tolerate the chemical, and can this tolerance jump species? The answer to (1), per “Consumer Antibacterial Soaps: Effective or Just Risky?”, is no, while the evidence for (2) is less clear. The research team found evidence from lab-based studies of antibiotic cross-resistance, but field studies did not provide equally strong support for the claim.

It’s worth noting that we’re talking about the concentrations used in over-the-counter soaps and hand sanitizers, not the 1% and more used in surgical scrubs. (Shockingly, how much triclosan can be added to soap is not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration.) In other words, there’s enough of the stuff in your soap that it may be making staph and strep stronger, but not enough to kill the bugs. Deader than they are, that is, by just washing your hands.

Triclosan seems to be in everything these days. As hard as it is to read a food product label to find out whether it’s got wheat (and is therefore verboten for someone with celiac sprue), it’s equally hard to find out about triclosan in products from the health and beauty aids aisle. Leta found triclosan in a container of shaving gel. Fortunately, some manufacturers, like Method, are now labeling their soaps as triclosan-free.

The least offensive solution

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman Chuck Underwood describes an audacious plan: in response to the Gulf of Mexico oil cock-up, the agency will translocate several hundred sea turtle nests across the Florida panhandle, with hopes that the hatchlings will find a home in Atlantic Ocean waters.

“We have a lot of partners involved that normally would not all necessarily agree on something,” Underwood says. “But the general consensus is this is at least an opportunity to try to do something in a situation that has been less than ideal for wildlife.”