Should You Panic If It's Not Organic?

Photo: Ken McCown

It's not like you hit the grocery store thinking: mmm, what kind of yummy pesticides do I want on my produce today? If you're like me, you might actually prefer to fill your cart with wholesome, natural, organic fruits and vegetables. You want those fruits and veggies to be ripe, unwilted, locally grown, in-season, not full of bugs and worms, untainted by salmonella or e coli, and reasonably priced. Oh, and you'd like Alice Waters or Jamie Oliver to stop by your house and cook it all up for you, while you have a cocktail or two with your bff's Rachel Maddow, Ricky Gervais, Ellen Degeneris, John Stewart, Emma Thompson, George Clooney, and Michelle Obama.

Make Mine a Double, Willya Crabby? Been a Tough Week.

Okay, I'll admit, we're talking pure fantasy... that part about the reasonably priced organic produce.

So let's say, hypothetically, that there may be a few fruits and vegetables that have made their way into your kitchen that are not organic. Even worse, what if some of these items appear on the Environmental Working Group's dreaded list of most pesticide-laden produce, dubbed "The Dirty Dozen?"


How big a deal is it?  Well, I was just alerted to a study that may have some relevance.

Pesticide Researchers say: Screw Organic, the Regular Stuff is Just Fine!

A study of dietary exposure to pesticide residue in the Journal of Toxicology took aim at the EWG's Dirty Dozen list, criticizing their methodology and disputing their findings.


The researchers concluded that:

(1) Exposures to the pesticides on the "Dirty Dozen" list posed negligible risks to consumers; (2) eating organic versions of the "Dirty Dozen" didn't appreciably reduce risk; and (3) the methodology used by the EWG lacked scientific credibility.

For example, the study said that exposure to the pesticides on apples, which were number one on the 2011 Dirty Dozen list, were "well below levels of toxicological concern, with relative exposures between 20,000 and 28 million times lower than levels that do not harm laboratory animals." Even better, for 3 others of the tainted twelve, blueberries, cherries, and kale – the pesticide exposure was over 30 million times lower than those that cause no observable adverse effects in lab animals. (Bell peppers, on the other hand, were the worst at 49.5 times lower).

But Wait Crabby, Where Did You Find This Study?

Why in an email sent from the completely unbiased source, the "Let's Convince Folks That Processed Food and Agribusiness are Totally Awesome So We Can All Make A Crapload of Money Council" the International Food Information Council! How do we know we can trust them? Well, another conveniently highlighted newsletter article was entitled: "Is Industry Funded Research Trustworthy?" And while the article doesn't actually ever answer that question, by mentioning it in an article title you can be reassured that they're all over it! So no worries.

Shouldn't I Trust The Environmental Working Group More than Food Industry Apologists?

Hell, I don't know; they both have their own axes to grind. The EWG are the same folks who think the sunscreen my dermatologist urges me to use will poison me, and listening to them is always depressing. I'd prefer they be wrong, so I can go about my business like ordinary Americans, cheerfully oblivious to all the environmental dangers that may surround me.

Problem is, I'm not an scientist, so when advocacy agendas clash and both sides cite scientific research, I need actual experts to weigh in. Anyone got one handy? There were things about the Toxicology Journal article that sounded vaguely suspicious to me, like using a "probabilistic modeling approach to estimate exposures." Or this sentence: "Residue findings considered as nondetections were assigned a value of zero...rather than using the much more conservative approach of considering nondetectable residues as being to one-half of the detection limits." But again--what the heck do I know?

So Are You Going To Start Buying A Lot More Produce That's Treated with Pesticides?

No way! Not only because I don't want ANY pesticides if I can avoid them, but because I want to support the stores and suppliers that don't use them. Perhaps if there was more of a market, prices would go down! But I think when organic isn't available, and I'm contemplating a tasty looking carton of fresh ripe conventionally grown blueberries, they have a much better chance of ending up in my grocery cart after reading the above toxicology study, even if I don't entirely understand it.

What about you guys--do you try to buy organic when you can? Or the heck with that, who would you invite to your celebrity BFF cocktail party?

Mosquitoes? Yikes! DEET vs Alternatives

[By Crabby]

Photo by trebol-a

I Have Nothing Against Most Bugs

I generally have a "no-kill" policy when it comes to insects. When I'm outside and they annoy me, I shoo them away or go inside. When they manage to get inside, I try to relocate them to the great outdoors. (Or sometimes I'm too lazy and I just leave them, knowing that Someone Else will probably come by and kill them later--but at least I'm not the personal agent of their destruction).

But mosquitoes? Whole different story! I hate mosquitoes. No gentle shooing, no Insect Relocation program. It's all kill, kill, kill, buh-bye.

Yet for someone who hates mosquitoes, I do practically nothing to keep them away from me. I spent most of my life in areas where they're not a huge problem, only an occasional nuisance, so it's taken me a while to "get it."

But now I live somewhere they like to hang out, and I finally understand: Sometimes one really, truly needs to spray on some sort of foul substance to keep from being eaten alive.

But it's so icky! It's worse than even than evil sunscreen.


Is DEET the answer? Wait, what was the question?

I've always heard DEET was the only thing that really worked. And despite years of experts reassuring me that there was nothing to worry about unless one was particularly chemically sensitive (nope--just emotionally) I've never really trusted the stuff.

It burns through synthetic fabrics and plastics, right? How scary is that?

Well, Scientific American recently ran an article on DEET that mentioned annoying side effects like skin irritation, numb or burning lips, nausea, headaches, dizziness and difficulty concentrating, blah blah blah... but then went on to say something about "diffuse brain cell death," and that managed to get my attention.

Brain cell death? Um, no thanks. I'd like to hang on to the precious few brain cells I have. Or if I'm gonna kill them, I'd at least like to use something more fun, like tequila. I'm not wasting brain cells on DEET.

But thankfully, the article also challenged the "DEET is the only effective insect-killer" notion I'd heard so often. They said that in recent years, the alternatives have gotten much better. They recommended two in particular: picaridin and oil of lemon eucalyptus. To quote:

"Picaridin, long used to repel mosquitoes in other parts of the world, is now available in the U.S. under the Cutter Advanced brand name. Oil of lemon eucalyptus, which is derived from eucalyptus leaves and is the only plant-based active ingredient for insect repellents approved by the CDC, is available in several different forms, including Repel Lemon Eucalyptus, OFF! Botanicals, and Fight Bite Plant-Based Insect Repellent."

Cool! Oil of lemon eucalyptus sounds kinda pleasant, doesn't it? Almost like something you'd pay to be dunked in at the spa. Or the manicurist...

"But Madge, Mosquito Repellent???"
"Relax, You're Soaking In It."

Other Botanical Alternatives:

The Scientific American article mentions a couple other places to get safer mosquito repellent recommendations, (here too), but Google had different ideas.

Google thought we should all be using Catnip to repel mosquitoes.

Turns out, previous research suggested catnip oil might have promise, but alas, even people who sell catnip for a living said: Nope; it doesn't work very well.

Plus, it can actually attract pests.

Photo by donnjmck

Yeah, those too, but they specifically mention bees and fire ants.

Anyway, does anyone else dislike both mosquitoes and the methods used to repel them? Any thoughts or suggestions? Anyone tried the Picaridin or the Oil of lemon eucalyptus?

When do You Buy Organic?

Do you buy organic every time you shop for produce?

Some people do, and that's awesome. But Crabby tends to be a bit hit or miss about it. It's easier when she's at the Farmer's Market, buying local organic produce that was picked that day and looks and smells fresh and lovely. (Or even the farmer's market stuff that's not officially certified organic but is nonetheless grown without pesticides. Crabby doesn't think her kindly neighborhood vendors are lying to her about that).

Buying organic, however, can be tougher at the Big Chain Grocery stores. Sometimes the offerings are limited. Often what they do have is very expensive and old and wilty and scraggly because so few shoppers frequent that section. It's always tempting to stick with the big bright pyramids of perky-looking and attractively priced fruit and vegetables in the regular section, bypassing entirely the sad little clumps of pricey organic fare off in the corner.

But who wants to eat pesticides?

Crabby really doesn't. Even if sometimes she manages to "forget" that the regular produce she's throwing in her cart could be contaminated with all kinds of evil chemicals that no amount of scrubbing will remove.

Help is here, however! If you can't buy organic all the time, there's a handy guide available that rates the best and worst produce in terms of pesticide content. You can apparently reduce your pesticide exposure by about 90% by going organic on the 12 worst items.

And here's an additional important tip: Print that sucker out and put it on your refrigerator! Seriously. Crabby has seen these sorts of lists before and always thinks she will remember which foods are really bad, but when she gets to the store she never does. Take that info from your fridge when you're making a shopping list and put a little "O" by the high priority organic stuff--because that's where you want to spend your organic budget.

Who knows, perhaps if we all stop buying non-organic versions of the Worst Offenders, produce suppliers and supermarkets will get the message and offer more and cheaper organic produce!

(OK, Crabby won't hold her breath on that one. The readership of Cranky Fitness is not that big. It will be quite a while before we can influence the selections on offer at your favorite grocery store. But hell, we're working' on it.)

So, enough with the yapping, lets bring on the list!

Note: a much more attractive, suitable-for-refrigerator-display PDF file is available for free from the Environmental Working Group; also they have a way bigger compilation of pesticide data at their site too. But in the meantime...

Pesticide-Laden Fruits and Vegetables to Avoid:

• Peaches
• Apples
• Sweet Bell Peppers
• Celery
• Nectarines
• Strawberries
• Cherries
• Lettuce
• Grapes (Imported)
• Pears
• Spinach
• Potatoes

The "Good" (Less Contaminated) Produce:

• Onions
• Avocado
• Sweet Corn - Frozen
• Pineapples
• Mango
• Sweet Peas - Frozen
• Asparagus
• Kiwi
• Bananas
• Cabbage
• Broccoli
• Eggplant

So how often do you folks buy organic produce?