After the deluge: As Midwest floods recede, what's being washed into the groundwater?

[marmar]

from Grist Magazine's Gristmill blog:





After the deluge
As Midwest floods recede, what's being washed into the groundwater?
Posted by Tom Philpott at 8:36 PM on 16 Jun 2008



Things are grim in Iowa, arguably the epicenter of global industrial food production.

If Iowa were a nation, it would be the globe's second-largest corn producer, behind only China. The state leads the U.S. in the production of corn, hogs, and eggs, and ranks number two in soybeans.

In short, it's a rotten place for a massive, flood-inducing early-summer deluge. Of the state's 99 counties, 24 have been declared disaster areas by the federal government (the state has designated 83 counties disaster zones). Thirty-six thousand people have been displaced. Sixteen percent of the state's 25 million acres of farmland lies underwater. Already, 1.3 million acres of corn and 2 million acres of soybeans have been lost. In many areas, surviving crops are stunted and will likely produce subpar yields. (Numbers from Associated Press.)

In last week's Victual Reality column, I looked at how this calamity will affect eaters who rely on the global food system for sustenance -- i.e., almost everybody in the industrialized north, and most urban dwellers in the southern hemisphere. (Update: Corn futures flirted with $8/bushel Monday -- nearly double last year's price, which had more than doubled the previous year's.)

Now it's time to ask what it means for the Mississippi River. As Iowa's farmland got hammered by rain, massive amounts of agrichemicals leached from soils, flowing into streams and eventually the Mississippi. Then you've got the concentrated-animal feedlot operations (CAFOs) and their infamous manure lagoons.

The Mississippi is the source of drinking water for some 70 U.S. cities and towns, from the Upper Midwest to the Gulf of Mexico. Of course, the Mississippi drains into the Gulf, so what it carries with it has huge ecological implications for the Gulf itself.

How bad is it? Things remain too chaotic to get a precise picture, but early indications aren't encouraging. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/6/16/161928/494

[Acadia Blue]

1. After Katrina terrible things are in the water and the air. My allergist

sent patients to an ENT surgeon for biopsies of sinus and bronchial areas and they found fungus infections.
Also since the morons decided to burn the debries and are still burining the debries instead of putting them in the swamps to improve the swamps the air is and was full of whatever weird safe or unsafe things that burned.
Murphy oil contaminated so many homes that they had to buy them because the people could not live on those sites again.

I am sure it will be the same there but no as extensive. I feel very sad for all those people from that area who did not agree with the repuiblican "blame the Katrina victims," but for those who blamed us....its karma to you.

[acmavm]

2. But it's 'corporate' farming dammit. And in Amurika, anything

connected with 'corporate' America is just fine and dandy. Even if it means the collapse of the economy, poisoned people, homelessness, whatever.

Quit yer bitchin'.

:sarcasm:

[bluedawg12]

3. Where the f*ck is dimson in all of this? Globe trotting?

Fiddling while the MW drowns.