I when I use soap on vegies it's usually just a few drops of whatever dish detergent we're using on dishes. But unless I know I'm dealing with something really dirty I just use running water and rub things with my hands. The dish detergent is reserved for "suspects" and almost never for leafy greens. For leafy greens, from contaminated sources, I rinse and run them under clean running water and then soak them in a solution of about 15 drops of iodine to the quart of water. You can buy regular iodine in the store. It's cheap. In Mexico we used to purchase a product called Microdine. We still have a few bottles around the house. Justaguy, you are correct about the definition of gray water. That's what they called the water which was channeled downhill from Mexico City to farms often 100 miles away. But it was a well known fact that Mexico City's sewage treatment plants would often become overloaded and they would simply release a lot of gunk into the canals. Also, all along the way, wherever these canals passed, there were people and animals using them like a sewer as well as all sorts of other ways to introduce more contamination. So, though they called it "gray water" we all knew to treat it as much dirtier than that. Besides pathogens, there were sometimes some really bad pesticides in those waters. Farmers in the bajío are accustomed to "nuking" pests with heavy doses of pesticides, some of which cannot be sold in the USA or Europe. Often, when they finish spraying they simply dump the leftovers into the canal. My middle daughter, while trying to catch mosquito fish, once fell in a canal (waist deep) just after an adjacent farmer had dumped his leftovers. She had a violent internal reaction, just from skin contact, and we had to rush her to the hospital. Still, even when I visit down there, I am NOT afraid to eat vegetables. I simply wash them and, usually, I disinfect with iodine. I believe that Calliope has touched upon something relevant. The American public (at least) seems to be being conditioned to panic and stampede "upon command." When they do, they often surrender personal freedoms and shoulder substantially higher taxes. When we lived in Mexico and visited in the USA my kids used to repeat kind of a knock knock joke among themselves. One of them would tap the other and say "How do you scare an American?" The other would laugh and respond "Sneeze on them!" I firmly believe we need to educate ourselves and learn to take necessary precautions. But, for my part, whatever the media says gets read through the filters of 1) "What freedom do they hope to take away? 2) How are they trying to make me dependent upon big government (big brother)? 3) What industry are they hoping to destroy? and, I am more inclined to doubt the accuracy of these reports simply because their "hidden agendas" are so very thinly veiled. The East and West Coasts of the USA are good examples of progressive surrender of freedoms and personal responsibility in exchange for "protection" from perceived evils. It's getting ridiculous. I remember one time when we were visiting from Mexico and I found my (then) 6 year old son sitting glumly in his room. I asked him, "What's the matter?" He responded simply, "I want to go back to Mexico." I asked: "Aren't you enjoying all the great things here? Isn't it great to see your grandparents?" To this he simply replied: "I want to go back to Mexico. There's no freedom in the United States." Risk is part of the territory that comes with freedom. George Tahlequah, OK

I have been working with horses since 1964. My horses range in ages of 2 years old, 5 years old, 15 years old, 20 years old and up to 25 years old. In the past 5 years, hay producers in my area have turned to using poultry litter on their hay field as fertilizer because of costs. The square bale hay looks green and great, but my horses just sniff it and walk away. They waste it. They won't eat it. Each year, I have to return the hay and buy hay that was not produced with poultry litter. Thank goodness, most hay producers are being honest when I ask if they used poultry litter in the production of their hay. Last year, when I took 100 bales home from a hay producer that I had bought from previously that season, my horses would not eat the hay. I called the hay producer. He confirmed that he had distributed poultry litter in the production of that hay. When he looked in his notes and realized that I had requested non-poultry litter fertilized hay from the start, he came to our place and removed the 100 bales of poultry litter fertilized hay and replaced it with hay that did NOT get produced with poultry litter. My horses immediately started eating the hay that did NOT have poultry litter used in the production of it. So, here is my question. Has anyone experienced this problem with their horses? If so, what did you do? This has happened to me with 4 separate hay producers. I cannot find anything on the internet that explains this problem. I understand that it is a fairly new process, but surely, someone is recognizing the problem besides me!!! I got a response: "Be careful feeding this hay to your horses. Chickens spread salmonella. I myself, would never feed my horses this type of hay." Should I be concerned??? I got another response: "Not at all uncommon. A lot of horses don't like hog manure fertilized hay either. Not new at all. A lot of farmers use manure from chickens and hogs when the price of commercial fertilizer get high. In years past it was much more common. Guess what, if that's all they have to eat for a few days, they get over it, and eat it just fine." My reply was: Have you had the experience with horses not eating their hay?...and you continued to only give them that hay AND they started eating it??? If so, what problems did you observe? Any health issues? From my experience, this behavior of not eating their hay is not natural. I have been feeding my groups of horses for 48 years. This issue with my horses not eating the hay given them has only occurred since the poultry litter has been used as fertilizer, which has been in the last 5 years. I understand the farmers' need to keep down costs, but for the end result to be that the product not be used (wasted), that seems to defeat the purpose of growing the hay. I wonder what problems have occurred that have not been registered by some agency....where would one report this anyway? It is just not natural for my horses to refuse hay. This is a BIG problem for me. My experience is that the hay producers really don't want to hear this. Yet, to be honest, they need to know this. Here was the response: "Yes, I've had experience with hay fertilized with chicken, hog, and cattle manure. Sometime they eat it without a problems and other times, a couple of days of it alone, and they eat it just fine. The smell is usually the problem. If they get hungry, they will eat. Chicken is very high in nitrogen and bad about burning if applied to heavy. It should be composted for awhile before applying. The problems associated with e coli, etc, are usually not there if the application doesn't burn up the hay crop. Seldom do they apply any of these close to harvest time, which gives mother nature plenty of time to dispose of e coli, etc. Sun and rain, will do an excellent job of decomposing. It was used a lot around here, more so, a few years back, and never heard of any problems feeding the hay to horses. When the farmers used horses for tilling it was used extensively for horse hay." Does anyone have any advice on Hay fertilized with poultry manure and the possiblitity of Salmonella risk??? Thanks

"So would you use this compost on your vegetables if you had it?" I've only been vermicomposting since October but have already used what I've harvested two months ago to start our seeds in the garden. We don't bake all our eggshells before they get crushed and not all are store bought either, however all the locally purchased ones are washed in chlorinated water and have no "poop" on them and to tell the truth, I'm not in the least concerned, really. We rinse all our produce with chlorinated water before preparing and consuming. The bacterial numbers, if any survive at all, is going to be so small as to not represent a health threat. Actually meat preparation is a far greater likelihood to getting salmonella poisoning than from tainted vegetables grown in the garden. Now if we were to fertilize our vegetables directly with animal poop then that might be a bit scarier scenario.

Actually...I got it from a bad egg...literally...served to me in a restaurant...some 50 years ago. It put me in the hospital for a week. I can't ever remember being quite so sick and in so much abdominal pain that couldn't be dulled. It's an experience I never want to revisit so I'm super careful when I read about food recalls. I imagine, Mama, that your experience was similar...or perhaps worse. Thankfully, I haven't been struck with either of your above mentioned maladies. And I hope I never am. I subscribe to the FDA recall site....linked below. You might want to do the same. It's saved me a couple of times. I opted to be notified whenever there's a recall so I get an email at about the same time [sometimes before] the public is notified on the news. Take a look at the site, Mama. https://www.fda.gov/home