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What do you people think about just drinking straight out of a river or stream?

6K views 41 replies 31 participants last post by  NotTooProudToHide 
#1 · (Edited)
Just went on a 24 hour hike/camp with a neighbour I have known for a short period of time. Also, he brought his kids, and I brought my kids too. To my horror he did not bring any water, just empty bottles and said he was just going to drink out of the river and streams, and fill his bottles from the river. Which he did, and did not boil it. He told his kids this was fine and they drank the water. He filled up from at least two streams and one river.

One of the first things I was taught in the army was, no matter how clean you are told, or think the river is, you ALWAYS boil water before you drink it. Or decontaminate it some other way. You don't know what's in it. There could be a dead carcass upstream, or animals crapping in the water, or humans for that matter.

He thought I was crazy taking water with me, and I think he took offence I did not take him at his word that all the water was so clean.
There was no way, me and my children were just going to drink out of some river or stream, without boiling it first. I think it is quite irresponsible teaching your kids that's fine to do that. It was a 24 hour hike/camp, not a life or death situation.

What do you good people think?
 
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#4 ·
Exactly what I was thinking. I wasn't going to push the issue and try to persuade him otherwise. He is very stubborn and he was not going to change his mind.
I did think it was funny that he categorically said it's clean, and you will never get sick from this water. How could he possibly know that for sure? Just cause he has drank from it many times before, does not mean he will never get sick from it.
 
#5 ·
I used to tear around in the high Sierra for a week or so, never took water with me. Face down in the crick, hold your breath and drink, but haven't done that in decades. One day a few years back I was setting up a sluice box in a creek at about 9,000 feet in Wyoming, working a gold claim. Nice, clean, cold, fresh snow melt, high altitude water. A smoker at the time, it took all morning to move enough rocks to get some water into the sluice, as it was kind of low. Took a break and watched the water running, classified a bucketful of material, ran it through, and the wind changed, and the most god awful stench of a dead cow elk only fifty feet away on a gravel bar, hidden in the willows. Upstream, if I had had a drink of that water, yucko. I filter it all. Always.
 
#7 ·
Very well said Sir.

I can completely understand starting a fire the hard way, with a bow and drill, or building a shelter. Something like that, when you are out with the kids for a 24hr camp. There's a reason for something like that, practice makes perfect.
There seems no reason to drink out of a stream or river without boiling. You don't need to practice filling a bottle straight from a river and drinking it.

When I said there could possibly be a dead carcass or something in the water upstream, he said, "it only takes a few meters for the water to filter the harmful stuff away, water is amazing stuff" I knew there was no point in saying any more.
The guy was genuinely annoyed that I did not take his word as gospel. I wont be going anywhere with this neighbour again. Very reckless, and very stubborn. It's a shame his kids will learn all these potentially harmful habits.
 
#9 ·
Not recommending it. There is a difference in people. Those of us that do not live in a city never have treated water. Our systems are use to water that may not go well with our friends in the city.
 
#10 · (Edited)
If there is any chance that an animal crapped in it, don't drink straight from it.

From what I've read, you can develop a tolerance toward the two common parasites found in un-sterilized water, cryptosporidim and giardia.
Building that tolerance is unpleasant, but possible.

What your neighbor did was risky, but not likely life-threatening.
When I was young, I found a very small stream running down a granite outcropping, and drank from it. I suffered no ill effects.
I would never risk that again unless my life depended on it, however.

Next time, take a few Sawyer minis. They screw directly to most water bottles and don't add any additional steps/time to Capt. Risky's water collection process.

Or, you could take W. C. Fields' approach to water. "Never touch the stuff—very unhealthy. Fish f___ in it.”
 
#27 ·
I made sure my kids new boiling was the way to go. He had a life straw with him, just never used it.
I have no idea what he was trying to prove. One day he will get sick, or worse still, his kids will get sick.
As much as I hate the trots, it's more the nastier parasites I was worried about. Some of those things can ruin your life, or even kill you. All for what? being lazy to use a life straw or boil the water.
 
#18 ·
Back in the old days in the tip of the mitt during deer season the were plenty of cold water spring feed streams back in the woods. We would dig a hole in the shallow stream and let the sand settle then fill our jugs for drinking water, coffee and wash water. Nobody ever got sick. What did the early explorers and Indians do? Do you think they boiled? No they didn't. Did they have fancy filters and life straws? No they didn't. Would I do it now 40 years later with all the pollution people have caused in the last 40 years no not any more.
 
#19 · (Edited)
What did the early explorers and Indians do? Do you think they boiled? No they didn't. Did they have fancy filters and life straws? No they didn't.
Well, from what I understand, if you grow up drinking "naturally" your body builds up resistance to the microbes in the water. I also don't doubt the early folks had more experience in where to drink & how to collect the water. Also, what was the life expectancy back then?
 
#26 ·
A friend lived in Hebron CT, had a well, made ice cubes from the water.

I had them in a Coke one day and got sick from it,

he had the well water tested, it was loaded with fertilizer from the upper field rain runoff.

It was a shallow well dug around 1850.

Friend had a artesian well dropped in, down about 800 feet IIRC.

Another friend ended up with Giardia while training with SF in the Rockies,

they tried to get rid of it with Flagyl, it almost killed him, but the bugs did.
 
#30 ·
If he truly believes 'just a few meters and the water will filter itself,' hand him a glass of water directly from the sewer. After all, I'm sure it's been more than 'just a few meters' so it should be OK to gulp down.
 
#31 ·
Not even the fur trappers in the 1840 would do that as they knew they could get sick from Beaver Fever. They picked one stream to kill all the beavers on completely so they could use that water and not get sick.

Amebiasis: caused by protozoa. Campylobacteriosis: caused by bacteria. Cholera: caused by bacteria. Cryptosporidiosis: caused by protozoa. Giardiasis: caused by protozoa. Hepatitis: caused by a virus. Shigellosis: caused by bacteria. Are all possible .

I have camped in some real remote areas and although thee were no people for several hundred miles there were still caribou in the area thus caribou poo and a couple dead animals in the river.

Too many easy and cheap ways to make water safe - simple Life Straw solves so many potential problems.
 
#32 ·
Just went on a 24 hour hike/camp with a neighbour I have known for a short period of time. Also, he brought his kids, and I brought my kids too. To my horror he did not bring any water, just empty bottles and said he was just going to drink out of the river and streams, and fill his bottles from the river. Which he did, and did not boil it. He told his kids this was fine and they drank the water. He filled up from at least two streams and one river.

One of the first things I was taught in the army was, no matter how clean you are told, or think the river is, you ALWAYS boil water before you drink it. Or decontaminate it some other way. You don't know what's in it. There could be a dead carcass upstream, or animals crapping in the water, or humans for that matter.

He thought I was crazy taking water with me, and I think he took offence I did not take him at his word that all the water was so clean.
There was no way, me and my children were just going to drink out of some river or stream, without boiling it first. I think it is quite irresponsible teaching your kids that's fine to do that. It was a 24 hour hike/camp, not a life or death situation.

What do you good people think?
Thinking somebody forgot to join Boy Scouts back in the good old days.
https://www.clorox.com/dr-laundry/disaster-preparedness-purifying-water/
 
#36 ·
When I was a kid I used to drink water out of a creek that wasn't much more than a drainage ditch. Never a problem. I was a hundred miles north of the Arctic circle in Alaska hunting and we drank water that bubbled up out of the ground and got buckets full to drink out of the squirrel river but we couldn't drink out of a little feeder stream because it was contaminated with beaver poop! So much for civilization ruining the water!


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