Get the lead out By Curt Andersen News-Chronicle Some of Wisconsin's first settlers were the Welsh miners who came to the Mineral Point area to dig for lead. The area in the southwestern corner of Wisconsin is still pockmarked with pits of varying sizes where miners tried their luck and then moved on. As the story goes, because so many miners arrived at the beginning of a cold winter, they dug holes into the sides of hills and lived in the burrows like badgers, giving Wisconsin the nickname of the Badger State. Lead has been used as the main ingredient in fishing sinkers for hundreds of years. Lead has a very low melting temperature so it was fairly easy to process even in a frontier setting. A recent article in Wisconservation, the newsletter of the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation, by Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources spokeswoman Ruth Nissen, told of the effects of lead on wildlife. The focus of the article was about sinkers and weighted hooks that are lost or abandoned. Wildlife officials have been working on the lead issue for many years and it may be a good time to remind anglers why lead sinkers are dangerous to birds, animals, and their own health. Nissen commented on a study analyzing 222 dead loons found in 18 states. The study showed that an average 6 percent died from lead poisoning. In Minnesota the rate was 17 percent. In Michigan it was 24 percent over a 14-year period. Lead was found to be responsible as the cause of 44 percent of dead loons submitted to the Wildlife Clinic at Tufts University in Massachusetts. Numerous states are banning or considering the banning the sale and/or use of small lead sinkers. A bill was recently introduced in the Minnesota Senate that bans the sale or use of small lead weights 1 ounce or less. Small buckshot can be ingested with tiny plants and animal life, while the large sinkers can be picked up and used like small stones in the gizzard to grind down food particles. Stomach acid and the grinding process can dissolve the lead, allowing it to get into the bloodstream, and may kill a duck, goose, or a loon, the "Icon of Northern Wisconsin," for example, in as few as three days. One sinker is enough to be fatal. You can start to remedy this situation by recycling your lead sinkers at the junkyard. I already changed mine. Start your kids fishing with sinkers that are safe for them to use, and safe for wildlife. Alternatives to lead sinkers include tin, steel, bismuth, and tungsten-nickel alloy. They are available at sporting goods stores and bait stores like Bob's Bait in Green Bay. (Brass sinkers have some lead in them.) Your health and the health of your loved ones is at stake. By eating fish, ducks and geese, you are at the top of the food chain, so all of the toxins taken in by them accumulate in your body. Your kids and grandkids will suffer, as lead can cause learning disabilities. Thanks to irresponsible polluters like the paper industry and coal burning power plants, our fish and wildlife are already steeped in a host of poisons like PCBs and mercury. Lead sinkers add to the witch's brew. Make the move to nonlead sinkers. Andersen is a lifelong resident of the Green Bay area and a Navy veteran. He owns a small business and is an adjunct instructor at NWTC. He is vice president of the Clean Water Action Council. His column runs Wednesdays. Contact him via e-mail at [email protected]