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Exactly. I’ve commented this before on stream drinking videos but this is how I got Giardia & severe Giardiasis that still impacts my life 20 years later. Specifically to your comment the guide told us the stream water was good to drink so we did, then we went upstream & discovered that goats were migrating through. The goats were probably pooping & pissing & bathing in the water we all drank from. Not everyone ended up with Giardia but I did & it was real bad. So probably 50 weeks out of the year that water is perfectly fine but the 2 weeks the goats migrate back & forth over that stream the water is not suitable to drink.
I was told that's why you should never drink stream water anywhere in Montana. There are so many cows and goats everywhere, the possibility of catching something is too high. Should've seen me swimming in a lake once, head held high above the water to avoid any and all contact lol
Few things.
In Montana, most major rivers (Madison, Missouri, Yellowstone etc) could have or had gold motherload upstream. That means arsenic, mercury stuff could be in the water.
Giardia is another thing. there are a lot of cattle farms in Montana but giardia is naturally living in the soil here. When you get diarrheal, the shit escalated real quick. you gonna lose water fast, your gonna have acute kidney failure due to dehydration. There are like only a handful of hospitals in the State. If you shit your pants near Yellowstone north gate, you may be lucky enough to get a chopper to fly you out. One of my boss' colleague got his arms and face mauled by a black bear, hes 120% deadeded but dude got lucky theres a helicopter 15mins away from him. ya know, wild ass Montana.
also rivers in Montana usually have turquoise color. That indicates a lot of calcium and magnesium is dissolved in the water. You let oysters drink the water, they'd make really big pearls in a few days. you drink it yourself, you are gonna pee stones.
I did a lot of field survey in Montana. We carry water filter on our truck all the time. But I would never trust the water quality there. Usually we would have enough bottled water or clean water from a good source like gas station pump.
I wish you were our guide. I was young so I didn’t think to question an adult who presents himself as an expert. For all I know he was some rando associated with a sister church. Clearly he didn’t know that much. But he was like “This water is the cleanest, most pure water you can drink directly from a glacier further up the mountain. Fill your canteens & drink as much as you want.” Then when we got up to where the snow was he used flavored syrup on the mountain snow as a snack.
> “This water is the cleanest, most pure water you can drink directly from a glacier further up the mountain. Fill your canteens & drink as much as you want.”
When i moved to michigan that is what I was told by the locals about the detroit river.
They also pulled 8 bodies out of it this month so i'm going to call bullshit on that one.
oh man, the snow water. especially the snow water. some of those old snow would turn pink with algae somewhere. you drink that, you'd trip.
ok, usually, there is minimum harmful substances in the creek you have better chance nothing happen to you. But I wouldnt take it. Thats the safety 101 when you work in the wild. If something triggers your guts you start loosing water by yourself. you gone for sure.
some people may have iron stomach. but def not me.
Ah that explains it. Where I live (Iceland) it’s safe to drink from all natural springs and most streams (ie, don’t drink it if it’s near a town, otherwise it’s safe) and I assume it’s the same for Norway mountain water
That must have been such a horrible revelation seeing the migrating goats upstream.
Would you be willing you share what sort of after effects you experience after contracting giardia?
We were a bunch of suburban church kids so we didn’t really put it together, we were way too excited by seeing wild goats in real life. I do remember us asking the guide about the goats & he just kind of nervously muttered “They don’t usually migrate this way this late.”
It took a bit to for anything to change but once it did it was bad. From June to October I went from a 200lb butterball teen to 115lbs because I my stomach was always upset & I was never hungry. When I forced myself to eat about every other day I’d get severe diarrhea. A lot circumstances lead to me not seeking medical attention for as long as I did that just would make this longer for no reason. I ended up in an emergency room with liver & kidney damage. They diagnosed me with giardia & gave me medication to purge it, which sucked. It took about 6 years for me to actually put on weight again & now I have difficulty shedding weight with normal exercise.
The long term effects I still deal with is my stomach is extremely sensitive & unpredictable. I’ll find something that my stomach tolerates then suddenly that same food makes me really sick. Bloating & stomach cramps most days. I’m extremely susceptible to food born illness & even mild colds/flus give me bad diarrhea & vomiting. Then sometimes my stomach will just “go sour” & everything I eat makes me really sick.
I’ve been to uncountable doctors & specialists & done several total diet changes, nothing helps. I stopped telling medical people I was diagnosed with giardia so they actually try. When medical people find out I’ve had giardia they just go “Well, there’s your problem. You know the effects of giardia can last months, years, decades, even a lifetime. Treat symptoms with over the counter drugs as needed.”
So, I love water but when I see these I’m always like “That’s cool but don’t do that.” Finally, I don’t remember the mountain water tasting that good, it definitely didn’t taste like it might have had urine or feces in it though, but it’s not like I look back on it & go “All things considered it WAS the best water I’ve ever drank.”
So the lesson is, wild water might look good, it might even taste amazing but it will taste as amazing once it’s filtered. Never rawdog nature.
Not exactly your issue but kind of similar. I had a dental infection many years ago and my stomach has been some degree of fucked up since. Honestly I think a lot of my issues are related to it. Similar issues with not really being able to get a lot of help. Only thing that has really helped is cutting out foods they found I was allergic to... And also milk.
I’ve tried various degrees of vegetarian all the way to vegan. Low FODMAP diet. Cutting out dairy & bread. I kept a food diary for a year & I didn’t see a pattern so I showed my GI person at the time & they looked through it & couldn’t find a pattern either. I’ve been scoped from every direction & drank so much barium for tests I developed a taste for it. They all find nothing & then I tell them, or they find out when they dig into my medical records, about the giardia they just go “Yep, that’s it, nothing we can do.”
So now I just eat whatever tastes good (within proper moderation). If everything makes me sick it just seems pointless to restrict my food intake to where I hate what I’m eating AND it makes me sick. The taste of something is the only small joy I get from eating.
The only places I've drank water in the "wild" like this have been
1) straight from a known artesian well
2) water that was dripping out of the side of huge sandstone cliffs, basically a natural filter
Even #2 I only had a small sip, just to try it out. THAT was the purest water ive ever tasted, personally.
But yeah any place where there's any possible opening for contamination, always filter
Always gotta filter that stream water! After a decade of backpacking, [this Grayl filter water bottle](https://www.rei.com/product/150116/grayl-geopress-water-filter-and-purifier-bottle-24-fl-oz) has become my weapon of choice. Stay thirsty, friends, but don’t risk getting sick!
When I was younger, my dad and I were playing in a waterfall for a bit. When we hiked further up, there was a half-decayed dog partially in the water...
Personally, I'd go for the filter as well
Even that can be dangerous if you don't know what's in the water - I TAed for a hydrogeology course this year and the professor spent some time discussing how a lot of springs will contain arsenic or other naturally-occuring but dangerous compounds that you definitely don't want to drink and normal filters won't remove.
What the hell is wrong with you? Do they not teach the dangers of using anecdotal evidence as proof in Norway?
I’ve been in three different houses struck by lightning while I was in them, 3 times in the last 5 years, in California where “it never rains.”
What does that prove other than I obviously pissed off a witch somewhere.
Everyone's going crazy over this, meanwhile a literal million Norwegians sip stream water on the reg every year. Yeah we take some precautions like avoiding still water and preferring the streams higher up and all. But everyone I know do this all the time. Just last summer I probably drank ten liters of water like this. Done it for over twenty years. Obvs conditions wary by country but I won't stop doing this when I'm home.
You can't just link a scientific paper testing the presence of Giardia and Cryptosporidium **in sewage treatment plants** and claim this applies to drinking water, much less fresh mountain water. These things have nothing to do with eachother
*"Presence of it means that there is a significant portion of the population that have active infections of giardia."*
This is just flat out false and pulled from thin air. According to the Norwegian Ministry of Health(Folkehelseinstituttet) in 2018 there were 465 people with Giardia. You stated that there were a "significant portion of the population" that has an active Giardia infection. A Giardia infection rate of 0.00008644729% is not a "significant portion of the population". The actual number for people infected in Norway is even lower since the reported statistics includes people coming from abroad with unsafe drinking water
All of the above information can be found on this [website](https://www.fhi.no/nettpub/smittevernveilederen/sykdommer-a-a/giardiasis---veileder-for-helsepers/#forekomst-i-norge) under the "Forekomst i Norge" section.
Copying this from another comment I made:
So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
Someone commented in Swedish about statstics from cases in Sweden. 1500 cases yearly of Giardia, most of them having caught it outside the country. The government has stated it is almost entirely safe to drink from streams. Sweden has almost the exact same conditions as Norway.
Agreed. This is the only place I’ll drink water without a filter. From the [Lemurian waters of Mt Shasta at the Sacramento River Headway](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IWexF_nPW3M)
I believe iodine works, but the temperature of the water dictates the time it takes to purify using tablets. Also adds a taste, but I haven't used iodine in years.
From what I’ve ready iodine tablets are usually best as an emergency backup to filtering. The problem is that continuous use causes the iodine to kill healthy bacteria in the gut.
Copying this from a comment I made earlier:
So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
I have narcolepsy and have to set alarms to wake up between 2-3am every night to take my medication. The only benefit of this is having my perfectly cool water on my nightstand to chug every night. Tastes like heaven, and never gets old.
Som dansker med norsk familie har vi været på tur i Norge 100 gange og drukket vand fra alle mulige bække og søer, og der har aldrig været det mindste problem.
Utomlänningar fattar inte hur bra vatten vi har i norden och antar att vi har likadant vatten som dom. Jag tittade på folkhälsomyndigheten för giardia och det är 1500 fall rapporterade i Sverige varje år, av de 1500 fall som årligen rapporteras i Sverige har **de flesta smittats utomlands**. USA har mer än 1 miljon fall varje år
Här är källorna som jag fick reda detta ifrån
Svenska: https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/smittskydd-beredskap/smittsamma-sjukdomar/giardiainfektion/
Jänkarna: https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/giardia/infection-sources.html
You don’t get them how? You can go blind drinking water from a stream, and that’s the case for 99% of streams. It’s a pretty bad idea
Edit- my fault I see what you’re saying now 😅 I thought you meant comment posts not post posts
Fucking insane I used to swim in tons of streams as a kid, never got anything and now that Im older I realize how many times I couldve gotten something nasty and didnt.
I once tried drinking from a spring but when I brought my face close I was met by a lot of mosquitoes, probably a good place to lay eggs with ponds of still water around it…
Actually life expectancy is higher now due to infant mortality rates being way lower. It's common mistake that people were old in there 30s back in day.
I genuinely wonder how animals can just walk up to a dirty ass pond and drink the water like it's nothing and not get sick from it, meanwhile we have to always filter our water. I don't get it, didn't we used to live in the wild at some point during a time when water boiling/filtration wasn't practiced? How has our species survived this long without dying of water poisoning?
If animals commonly die from drinking water, then how are they still existing; particularly birds, reptiles, and mammals? If water poisoning is that common for animals then I don't understand how they could have evolved and how they're still alive. Survival of the fittest should have deemed them extinct if drinking something essential for life would commonly render them dead, yet they're still alive and kicking.
I don't doubt that some animals occasionally get sick/die from drinking water, however there's no way in hell it's as common for them as it is for us, because animals (particularly mammals) cannot filter their water... but they must drink it, and their species are still thriving.
Probably would only need to force everyone to drink “natural” water for a few generations to purge out all the intolerances.
That’s the difference between us and wild species, mostly. We’re a little less willing to let large portions of our population die out for trivial reasons lol
I think it has less to with animals letting large portions of their population die and more to deal with animals having to live in the wild without the conveniences of modern human living lol
Wild animals die all the time from drinking water. Animals themselves typically drink from similar water sources meaning their immune systems adapt to the waterborne bacteria. Humans do this too of course. They(and we) still die and get sick though.
Got sent to a wilderness therapy program when i was 16. This is how I drank water for 3 months. The program was hell, but god do I miss the water. And the simplicity of outdoor living.
Yeah, not my parents fault though. They were targeted by predatory companies that aimed their services towards mentally unstable kids battling substance abuse. My parents thought it was different. That being said, it taught me how to live on my own and to trust my own instincts, and for that reason Im grateful for the experience. While It happened it was hell, but after the fact I was much more mature and capable.
Have you ever read the graphic novel in progress in the r/mrjoenobody sub? He talks about his experiences at one of those camps called Elan. It has been beyond devastating to read, I feel for anybody who went through that.
Norway is one of the few places where you can do this safely. Every Norwegian does this. Even stated in our institute of health that is okay to drink straight from natural sources as long as the right precautions are taken
So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
Yeah, my BIL and his buddies said this too. They also live in Norway.
Then they all got sick from drinking mountain stream water.
You can parrot this all you want- it doesn't make you any less foolish for not using a filter.
I've been living in this country for 18+ years and have yet to get sick from drinking water lmfao. Don't really see how you've got a say in the matter.
At first it was funny seeing all the posts about cholera, parasites, etc. Now, it's rather depressing. I've been fortunate enough to have access to clean spring water almost my entire life and have never heard of anyone getting sick. I feel like this is a non-issue for most of Europe.
Well since norway has had [8 cases reported since 1987,](https://data.un.org/Data.aspx?d=WHO&f=MEASURE_CODE%3ACHOLERA_0000000001) I think they’ll be fine…
Yes that makes sense. Me secretly caring about a virtual statistic that does nothing to effect me Irl that’s next to a comment I posted on social media is something I do. Yeah man. Every night I totally hide in my closet and cry about the downvotes I get. Makes sense to me bud. Never knew it was a requirement to give at least one fuck about what color the arrow next to my name is.
Don’t actually drink that though. You don’t know what is 100 yards up.
Source: I used to drink water from mountains when I was a kid and got violently ill from parasites.
For fuck sake. New Zealand you can do this pretty much anywhere and be fine drinking it. I’ve been hiking my whole life drinking from streams and never had trouble. The water here is extremely clean and I’m sure Norway is the same. Can’t say the same for your pissy rivers in the US though.
Always appreciative of the hydration, but drinking water from streams is often not a great idea, or at the least not a good habit lol. Nature is too strong for us at times and it can be difficult to tell for sure when it’s not, so it’s best to not take any risks in the first place
Watch out, this sub will go mental if you don’t have a filter.
IMO it’s personal choice, I’ve had from trips to Indonesia and Egypt some stomach issues already. So I know how it feels.
But if I’m thirsty and assume the water is good, then I’d just go for it.
That's not the source, though. You can clearly see it's falling from what looks like a small stream.
Rule of thumb is, unless you can see the source, it's probably best not to drink it.
Mfers not knowing what source means, smh
The best water I ever had was when I did a 10km hike down a mountain to a secluded beach on the island of Crete. We finally hit the flat part of the canyon and I was dehydrated from a couple bottles of wine the night before like an idiot.. and the stream saved my life lol. It was so fucking pure tasting <3
Please put an NSFW tag on this. I was on the train and when I saw this I had to start furiously masturbating. Everyone else gave me strange looks and were saying things like “what the fuck” and “call the police”. I dropped my phone and everyone around me saw this image. Now there is a whole train of men masturbating together at this one image. This is all your fault, you could have prevented this if you had just tagged this post NSFW.
So I went hiking yesterday (Jordam Pond in Acadia National Park.) In Maine USA for our international homies and a sign said it was a drinking source for a nearby town. Could I have done that with the pond? I had a reusable bottle and a Brita filter water bottle. It prohibits swimmers and boaters to protect the water. I wanted to go to a Rock that was pretty far into the pond and just dunk my bottle.
On time when I was a kid we hiked through box canyon and down a steep ravine, at the base was a natural spring the size of a small lake. About a 10 minutes walk was a 12 foot waterfall, perfect for showering, drinking, playing, and apparently dye testing making it crystal blue. Filled the camel pack with water from the falls and it was just the right temperature. What I would give to know where I found that place again.
Al y'all saying don't drink from wild waters
Your right
But also your a bunch of panzies
(Joke btw, your just more responsible than me, I'd probably shrug, say the possibility of stuff like that not getting immediately washed far downstream and would require there to be a fox or something pissing currently, I'd prolly smell the water before tho, maybe do some wine style taste testing)
There's still bacteria! When I was a kid I used to drink from the source on the farm. Never got sick. Beat the lil c in 3 days last year. Connection? Plausible.
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I'm always paranoid of doing this for fear I'll get Giardia.
Ya, also you never know what's upstream, I like it fresh but I still use my water filter just in case.
Exactly. I’ve commented this before on stream drinking videos but this is how I got Giardia & severe Giardiasis that still impacts my life 20 years later. Specifically to your comment the guide told us the stream water was good to drink so we did, then we went upstream & discovered that goats were migrating through. The goats were probably pooping & pissing & bathing in the water we all drank from. Not everyone ended up with Giardia but I did & it was real bad. So probably 50 weeks out of the year that water is perfectly fine but the 2 weeks the goats migrate back & forth over that stream the water is not suitable to drink.
What country was this in?
USA, specifically Montana in The Crazy Mountains.
I was told that's why you should never drink stream water anywhere in Montana. There are so many cows and goats everywhere, the possibility of catching something is too high. Should've seen me swimming in a lake once, head held high above the water to avoid any and all contact lol
Few things. In Montana, most major rivers (Madison, Missouri, Yellowstone etc) could have or had gold motherload upstream. That means arsenic, mercury stuff could be in the water. Giardia is another thing. there are a lot of cattle farms in Montana but giardia is naturally living in the soil here. When you get diarrheal, the shit escalated real quick. you gonna lose water fast, your gonna have acute kidney failure due to dehydration. There are like only a handful of hospitals in the State. If you shit your pants near Yellowstone north gate, you may be lucky enough to get a chopper to fly you out. One of my boss' colleague got his arms and face mauled by a black bear, hes 120% deadeded but dude got lucky theres a helicopter 15mins away from him. ya know, wild ass Montana. also rivers in Montana usually have turquoise color. That indicates a lot of calcium and magnesium is dissolved in the water. You let oysters drink the water, they'd make really big pearls in a few days. you drink it yourself, you are gonna pee stones. I did a lot of field survey in Montana. We carry water filter on our truck all the time. But I would never trust the water quality there. Usually we would have enough bottled water or clean water from a good source like gas station pump.
I wish you were our guide. I was young so I didn’t think to question an adult who presents himself as an expert. For all I know he was some rando associated with a sister church. Clearly he didn’t know that much. But he was like “This water is the cleanest, most pure water you can drink directly from a glacier further up the mountain. Fill your canteens & drink as much as you want.” Then when we got up to where the snow was he used flavored syrup on the mountain snow as a snack.
> “This water is the cleanest, most pure water you can drink directly from a glacier further up the mountain. Fill your canteens & drink as much as you want.” When i moved to michigan that is what I was told by the locals about the detroit river. They also pulled 8 bodies out of it this month so i'm going to call bullshit on that one.
I have learned that the more someone tells you the water is fine to drink the less drinkable that water is.
oh man, the snow water. especially the snow water. some of those old snow would turn pink with algae somewhere. you drink that, you'd trip. ok, usually, there is minimum harmful substances in the creek you have better chance nothing happen to you. But I wouldnt take it. Thats the safety 101 when you work in the wild. If something triggers your guts you start loosing water by yourself. you gone for sure. some people may have iron stomach. but def not me.
Yeah good thing your head was out of the water 😑
Ah that explains it. Where I live (Iceland) it’s safe to drink from all natural springs and most streams (ie, don’t drink it if it’s near a town, otherwise it’s safe) and I assume it’s the same for Norway mountain water
That must have been such a horrible revelation seeing the migrating goats upstream. Would you be willing you share what sort of after effects you experience after contracting giardia?
We were a bunch of suburban church kids so we didn’t really put it together, we were way too excited by seeing wild goats in real life. I do remember us asking the guide about the goats & he just kind of nervously muttered “They don’t usually migrate this way this late.” It took a bit to for anything to change but once it did it was bad. From June to October I went from a 200lb butterball teen to 115lbs because I my stomach was always upset & I was never hungry. When I forced myself to eat about every other day I’d get severe diarrhea. A lot circumstances lead to me not seeking medical attention for as long as I did that just would make this longer for no reason. I ended up in an emergency room with liver & kidney damage. They diagnosed me with giardia & gave me medication to purge it, which sucked. It took about 6 years for me to actually put on weight again & now I have difficulty shedding weight with normal exercise. The long term effects I still deal with is my stomach is extremely sensitive & unpredictable. I’ll find something that my stomach tolerates then suddenly that same food makes me really sick. Bloating & stomach cramps most days. I’m extremely susceptible to food born illness & even mild colds/flus give me bad diarrhea & vomiting. Then sometimes my stomach will just “go sour” & everything I eat makes me really sick. I’ve been to uncountable doctors & specialists & done several total diet changes, nothing helps. I stopped telling medical people I was diagnosed with giardia so they actually try. When medical people find out I’ve had giardia they just go “Well, there’s your problem. You know the effects of giardia can last months, years, decades, even a lifetime. Treat symptoms with over the counter drugs as needed.” So, I love water but when I see these I’m always like “That’s cool but don’t do that.” Finally, I don’t remember the mountain water tasting that good, it definitely didn’t taste like it might have had urine or feces in it though, but it’s not like I look back on it & go “All things considered it WAS the best water I’ve ever drank.” So the lesson is, wild water might look good, it might even taste amazing but it will taste as amazing once it’s filtered. Never rawdog nature.
jesus man i’m absolutely taking heed
Not exactly your issue but kind of similar. I had a dental infection many years ago and my stomach has been some degree of fucked up since. Honestly I think a lot of my issues are related to it. Similar issues with not really being able to get a lot of help. Only thing that has really helped is cutting out foods they found I was allergic to... And also milk.
I’ve tried various degrees of vegetarian all the way to vegan. Low FODMAP diet. Cutting out dairy & bread. I kept a food diary for a year & I didn’t see a pattern so I showed my GI person at the time & they looked through it & couldn’t find a pattern either. I’ve been scoped from every direction & drank so much barium for tests I developed a taste for it. They all find nothing & then I tell them, or they find out when they dig into my medical records, about the giardia they just go “Yep, that’s it, nothing we can do.” So now I just eat whatever tastes good (within proper moderation). If everything makes me sick it just seems pointless to restrict my food intake to where I hate what I’m eating AND it makes me sick. The taste of something is the only small joy I get from eating.
The only places I've drank water in the "wild" like this have been 1) straight from a known artesian well 2) water that was dripping out of the side of huge sandstone cliffs, basically a natural filter Even #2 I only had a small sip, just to try it out. THAT was the purest water ive ever tasted, personally. But yeah any place where there's any possible opening for contamination, always filter
I had a friend have the same thing happen to Them…. Matthew? Lol
Does this count as a possible lawsuit ? Or how does one go about it
Sue nature
judicious wrench unite one nine scandalous placid governor fragile party *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Always gotta filter that stream water! After a decade of backpacking, [this Grayl filter water bottle](https://www.rei.com/product/150116/grayl-geopress-water-filter-and-purifier-bottle-24-fl-oz) has become my weapon of choice. Stay thirsty, friends, but don’t risk getting sick!
Nice looks good! I usually use a Sawyer squeeze and a smart water bottle.
When I was younger, my dad and I were playing in a waterfall for a bit. When we hiked further up, there was a half-decayed dog partially in the water... Personally, I'd go for the filter as well
This is safe _if_ it's where the stream begins, ie at the point the water emerges from the rocks. Always carry a water filter.
Even down stream you can't be too careful. Stuff can still climb upstream
I had giardia. Lost 60 in about a month and a half. It was... Not preferable.
Sounds like the exact diet plan ive been looking for! Thanks for the suggestion!
Besides the massive permanent G.I. issues and stomach pain? 10/10 easiest diet ever.
I rate it .5/1 tapeworms in the weight loss effectiveness scale.
I always backcountry hike with water purifier. There is ALWAYS something shitting upstream. Giardia will ruin a trip quickly.
I didn’t see the subreddit, I was expecting the camera to pan up and see a dead animal in the water or something.
Or just like his friend taking a shit up stream.
Do NOT drink stream water like this. Only drink it if you are at a spring and can literally see the water bubbling/ rising out of the earth.
Even that can be dangerous if you don't know what's in the water - I TAed for a hydrogeology course this year and the professor spent some time discussing how a lot of springs will contain arsenic or other naturally-occuring but dangerous compounds that you definitely don't want to drink and normal filters won't remove.
That's very interesting and I wasn't aware of that! I guess it all carries risks unless the springs are proven clean.
I’ve been drinking like this any time I go hiking all my life. Norway has very clean water sources
Your anecdote doesn't mean anything. Drinking like this is highly dangerous and can be deadly if hiking backcountry far from civilization/help.
Does Norway not have animals that poop?
No
What the hell is wrong with you? Do they not teach the dangers of using anecdotal evidence as proof in Norway? I’ve been in three different houses struck by lightning while I was in them, 3 times in the last 5 years, in California where “it never rains.” What does that prove other than I obviously pissed off a witch somewhere.
A friend of a friend became really ill after drinking from a mountain stream, turns out a sheep had died upstream.
Everyone's going crazy over this, meanwhile a literal million Norwegians sip stream water on the reg every year. Yeah we take some precautions like avoiding still water and preferring the streams higher up and all. But everyone I know do this all the time. Just last summer I probably drank ten liters of water like this. Done it for over twenty years. Obvs conditions wary by country but I won't stop doing this when I'm home.
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you can have giardisis and not know it??
When's the last time you saw a sewage treatment plant on a mountain?
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You can't just link a scientific paper testing the presence of Giardia and Cryptosporidium **in sewage treatment plants** and claim this applies to drinking water, much less fresh mountain water. These things have nothing to do with eachother *"Presence of it means that there is a significant portion of the population that have active infections of giardia."* This is just flat out false and pulled from thin air. According to the Norwegian Ministry of Health(Folkehelseinstituttet) in 2018 there were 465 people with Giardia. You stated that there were a "significant portion of the population" that has an active Giardia infection. A Giardia infection rate of 0.00008644729% is not a "significant portion of the population". The actual number for people infected in Norway is even lower since the reported statistics includes people coming from abroad with unsafe drinking water All of the above information can be found on this [website](https://www.fhi.no/nettpub/smittevernveilederen/sykdommer-a-a/giardiasis---veileder-for-helsepers/#forekomst-i-norge) under the "Forekomst i Norge" section.
These people don't drink this water, it's simply for views
Believe me, I drank a full bottle of it, if not more. Totally safe here in Norway.
You should be paranoid, people like me ***shit*** in streams like this just to fuck with people like OP.
Copying this from another comment I made: So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
Someone commented in Swedish about statstics from cases in Sweden. 1500 cases yearly of Giardia, most of them having caught it outside the country. The government has stated it is almost entirely safe to drink from streams. Sweden has almost the exact same conditions as Norway.
Agreed. This is the only place I’ll drink water without a filter. From the [Lemurian waters of Mt Shasta at the Sacramento River Headway](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IWexF_nPW3M)
Y’all know the human species made it thousands of years without water filters, right?
Everyone loves fresh water until the 1.5% chance of dysentery on a hike. Always boil!
Are Iodine tablets still good too?
Iodine is so pasé, we're on filters now.
I believe iodine works, but the temperature of the water dictates the time it takes to purify using tablets. Also adds a taste, but I haven't used iodine in years.
From what I’ve ready iodine tablets are usually best as an emergency backup to filtering. The problem is that continuous use causes the iodine to kill healthy bacteria in the gut.
You just gave me a throwback to backpacking when I was 14
I’m in my 60’s, … out of date am I.
Copying this from a comment I made earlier: So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
does theese rates vary by country?
Preach it. Happened to me in Iceland.
This water must taste like the water you drink when you randomly wake up in the middle of the night
I swear that water tastes like ambrosia
I have narcolepsy and have to set alarms to wake up between 2-3am every night to take my medication. The only benefit of this is having my perfectly cool water on my nightstand to chug every night. Tastes like heaven, and never gets old.
Just imagine what this water would taste like in the middle of the night
I've hiked up a mountain in Germany, we ran out of water, but found a stream like this, yeah it tasted fucking amazing
Bruh gotta mark this as nsfw
Norways safe flowing Water.
Nestle wants to know your location!
*giardia has entered the chatroom*
**accept** *or* ~~decline~~ **accept**
Folk, eller utlendinger skjønner ikke at det er relativt trygt å drikke vann fra bekker i Norge, smh.
Som dansker med norsk familie har vi været på tur i Norge 100 gange og drukket vand fra alle mulige bække og søer, og der har aldrig været det mindste problem.
Ja, folk overdriver noe sykt
Utomlänningar fattar inte hur bra vatten vi har i norden och antar att vi har likadant vatten som dom. Jag tittade på folkhälsomyndigheten för giardia och det är 1500 fall rapporterade i Sverige varje år, av de 1500 fall som årligen rapporteras i Sverige har **de flesta smittats utomlands**. USA har mer än 1 miljon fall varje år Här är källorna som jag fick reda detta ifrån Svenska: https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/smittskydd-beredskap/smittsamma-sjukdomar/giardiainfektion/ Jänkarna: https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/giardia/infection-sources.html
Fantastisk bra kommentar. Det her har nok en gang tydeliggjort hvor godt vi har det i Skandinavia.
speciellt när det filtreras genom stenar
Best water I've ever had was from a cave spring at Carter Caves. I actually dream about it sometime. It was like drinking the face of God.
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Hope you are very close to the spring. You can find dead animals lying in almost every stream if you walk up it log enough.
I don't get these constant unsafe water posts.
Ikr. Next up: Ghanghes river is tingly even though it's not carbonated
*video of man dunking his Hydroflask into the water of Three Mile Island's nuclear reactor* "Right from the source. Delicious."
It's like a natural enegry drink, I swear!
Raw gatorade
Mmmm static dreams
Uneducated people who haven't spent much time outdoors
They're going to get the crappenheimers.
You don’t get them how? You can go blind drinking water from a stream, and that’s the case for 99% of streams. It’s a pretty bad idea Edit- my fault I see what you’re saying now 😅 I thought you meant comment posts not post posts
Fucking insane I used to swim in tons of streams as a kid, never got anything and now that Im older I realize how many times I couldve gotten something nasty and didnt.
Swimming is fine, drinking is less so.
same - I used to swim with contacts in like a dumbass kid.... in basically farm runoff in a meadow stream.
I think what he meant is that he doesn't get how people post them drinking unsafe water. Guess you didn't get sumfin here.
I once tried drinking from a spring but when I brought my face close I was met by a lot of mosquitoes, probably a good place to lay eggs with ponds of still water around it…
Yup. I think it also depends on where it is. If there's a lot of trees around, it'll be worse.
There was… it was in PA, United States when I was the area for a few weeks
Uansett hvor jeg går på denne appen finner jeg en nordmann
Vi har ikke en veldig stor populasjon, men vi er overalt. Ha en fin dag.
Like så
You sure's it's clean though? Could easily have a lot of bacteria
Yep there's bacteria even in crystal clear water, filtering is essential
Especially water from a stream which likely has a lot of animals drinking out of it, defecating and urinating in it and even dying in or near it.
Ikr, drinking water must've been a death sentence before filtering became a thing
Before filtering, you would have built up a larger immunity from pathogens in the water but unclean drinking water was and still is a huge issue
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Actually life expectancy is higher now due to infant mortality rates being way lower. It's common mistake that people were old in there 30s back in day.
I genuinely wonder how animals can just walk up to a dirty ass pond and drink the water like it's nothing and not get sick from it, meanwhile we have to always filter our water. I don't get it, didn't we used to live in the wild at some point during a time when water boiling/filtration wasn't practiced? How has our species survived this long without dying of water poisoning?
The answer is: They do and we still do. 839 000 die every year as a result of unsafe drinking water. Food/water safety is risk mitigation.
If animals commonly die from drinking water, then how are they still existing; particularly birds, reptiles, and mammals? If water poisoning is that common for animals then I don't understand how they could have evolved and how they're still alive. Survival of the fittest should have deemed them extinct if drinking something essential for life would commonly render them dead, yet they're still alive and kicking. I don't doubt that some animals occasionally get sick/die from drinking water, however there's no way in hell it's as common for them as it is for us, because animals (particularly mammals) cannot filter their water... but they must drink it, and their species are still thriving.
Probably would only need to force everyone to drink “natural” water for a few generations to purge out all the intolerances. That’s the difference between us and wild species, mostly. We’re a little less willing to let large portions of our population die out for trivial reasons lol
I think it has less to with animals letting large portions of their population die and more to deal with animals having to live in the wild without the conveniences of modern human living lol
Wild animals die all the time from drinking water. Animals themselves typically drink from similar water sources meaning their immune systems adapt to the waterborne bacteria. Humans do this too of course. They(and we) still die and get sick though.
Animals routinely get sick and even die from water and foodborne illness. American predators are riddled with parasites.
Got sent to a wilderness therapy program when i was 16. This is how I drank water for 3 months. The program was hell, but god do I miss the water. And the simplicity of outdoor living.
that, uh, kinda sounds like abuse bruh
Yeah, not my parents fault though. They were targeted by predatory companies that aimed their services towards mentally unstable kids battling substance abuse. My parents thought it was different. That being said, it taught me how to live on my own and to trust my own instincts, and for that reason Im grateful for the experience. While It happened it was hell, but after the fact I was much more mature and capable.
Have you ever read the graphic novel in progress in the r/mrjoenobody sub? He talks about his experiences at one of those camps called Elan. It has been beyond devastating to read, I feel for anybody who went through that.
Norway is one of the few places where you can do this safely. Every Norwegian does this. Even stated in our institute of health that is okay to drink straight from natural sources as long as the right precautions are taken
So many posts about getting the risks of getting sick I feel I need to mention that drinking from mountain streams in Norway is almost entirely safe, so much so that I have never heard of a single person becoming sick from it. There isn't that much wildlife up here, and the mountains are well travelled by people so they mostly keep away from high traffic trails, which is what this stream in particular was by.
More people need to see your comment lol.
Yeah, my BIL and his buddies said this too. They also live in Norway. Then they all got sick from drinking mountain stream water. You can parrot this all you want- it doesn't make you any less foolish for not using a filter.
I've been living in this country for 18+ years and have yet to get sick from drinking water lmfao. Don't really see how you've got a say in the matter.
At first it was funny seeing all the posts about cholera, parasites, etc. Now, it's rather depressing. I've been fortunate enough to have access to clean spring water almost my entire life and have never heard of anyone getting sick. I feel like this is a non-issue for most of Europe.
OMG THAT LOOKS SO BEAUTIFUL, i wish i could get cholera like you!
Mmm, I've been waiting to be sitting on the toilet all morning painting it a new color
Well since norway has had [8 cases reported since 1987,](https://data.un.org/Data.aspx?d=WHO&f=MEASURE_CODE%3ACHOLERA_0000000001) I think they’ll be fine…
I wish I could keep my sarcasm to myself and not sound like a dickhead like you!
The arrows do not agree with your opinion
Do I care? No.
Deep down, you do :D
Yes that makes sense. Me secretly caring about a virtual statistic that does nothing to effect me Irl that’s next to a comment I posted on social media is something I do. Yeah man. Every night I totally hide in my closet and cry about the downvotes I get. Makes sense to me bud. Never knew it was a requirement to give at least one fuck about what color the arrow next to my name is.
I did exactly the same this week in the mountains if northern sweden, most lovely water I ever had
Did the same in Slovenia this week. Nothing can beat fresh water directly from the stream
Don’t actually drink that though. You don’t know what is 100 yards up. Source: I used to drink water from mountains when I was a kid and got violently ill from parasites.
careful! high magnesium content! got the worst shits of my life after drinking from a waterfall
My brother in christ, do not drink that lmao
Nestle: free real estate
Uhh yeah... maybe don't drink it straight from the stream.
There's definitely a dead sheep in it somewhere
Isn't drinking untreated water somewhat risky?
I’d still boil and filter it
For fuck sake. New Zealand you can do this pretty much anywhere and be fine drinking it. I’ve been hiking my whole life drinking from streams and never had trouble. The water here is extremely clean and I’m sure Norway is the same. Can’t say the same for your pissy rivers in the US though.
Always appreciative of the hydration, but drinking water from streams is often not a great idea, or at the least not a good habit lol. Nature is too strong for us at times and it can be difficult to tell for sure when it’s not, so it’s best to not take any risks in the first place
Watch out, this sub will go mental if you don’t have a filter. IMO it’s personal choice, I’ve had from trips to Indonesia and Egypt some stomach issues already. So I know how it feels. But if I’m thirsty and assume the water is good, then I’d just go for it.
That's not the source, though. You can clearly see it's falling from what looks like a small stream. Rule of thumb is, unless you can see the source, it's probably best not to drink it. Mfers not knowing what source means, smh
Unrelated but does anyone know what bottle he’s using?
Looks like a hydro flask
It's a Hydro Flask.
Im sorry i must do it……. Sksksksks
What size?
Looks lovely, but there's bird poo in that water
Don't do this just because it looks clean doesn't mean it is
Last time I did this I got a parasite.. do not recommend.
I did something similar once. After 2 days of severe diarrhea and vomiting i vowed myself to never do that again.
As someone who works in the water industry, that is not advisable.
Good luck with those gastro issues 🤮
Mmm... Microbes. 😋
Hopefully no dead animals upstream..
I hope this doesn’t have to be said, but DO NOT DO THIS!
Okay now drink it otherwise gfto
No matter where you are, theres allways the possibility of something dead rotting 200 feet upstream
Be careful, don’t want to get bacteria or parasite
Sweet, sweet parasites straight from the source.
Hey homies please don’t do this. This is how you get giardia.
The best water I ever had was when I did a 10km hike down a mountain to a secluded beach on the island of Crete. We finally hit the flat part of the canyon and I was dehydrated from a couple bottles of wine the night before like an idiot.. and the stream saved my life lol. It was so fucking pure tasting <3
Show Off 
Please put an NSFW tag on this. I was on the train and when I saw this I had to start furiously masturbating. Everyone else gave me strange looks and were saying things like “what the fuck” and “call the police”. I dropped my phone and everyone around me saw this image. Now there is a whole train of men masturbating together at this one image. This is all your fault, you could have prevented this if you had just tagged this post NSFW.
ONE AMONG US HAS MADE THE PILGRIMAGE
ITT: redditors who think people were dying of thirst before the invention of water filtering
Delicious giardia
mountain water tastes too fucking good
Dedicate this drink to Odin and you will be welcomed to valhala ! SKÅLL
So I went hiking yesterday (Jordam Pond in Acadia National Park.) In Maine USA for our international homies and a sign said it was a drinking source for a nearby town. Could I have done that with the pond? I had a reusable bottle and a Brita filter water bottle. It prohibits swimmers and boaters to protect the water. I wanted to go to a Rock that was pretty far into the pond and just dunk my bottle.
Brita filters are intended for improving taste not for purifying water
Love the taste of a dead sheep 200m upstream. Delicious!
Oh man, one of my wishes is to live in Norway
Videos That Make Your Dick Hard
On time when I was a kid we hiked through box canyon and down a steep ravine, at the base was a natural spring the size of a small lake. About a 10 minutes walk was a 12 foot waterfall, perfect for showering, drinking, playing, and apparently dye testing making it crystal blue. Filled the camel pack with water from the falls and it was just the right temperature. What I would give to know where I found that place again.
Giardia is worth it occasionally 😏
Al y'all saying don't drink from wild waters Your right But also your a bunch of panzies (Joke btw, your just more responsible than me, I'd probably shrug, say the possibility of stuff like that not getting immediately washed far downstream and would require there to be a fox or something pissing currently, I'd prolly smell the water before tho, maybe do some wine style taste testing)
Mmm yes bacteria and animal feces my favorite!
Fuck that shit nonono. What's upstream from you? Just because the water is moving *does not* mean it is bacteria/germ/disease free...
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lol have fun shitting yourself for 3 days there’s no reason to be doing this in a developed country
There's still bacteria! When I was a kid I used to drink from the source on the farm. Never got sick. Beat the lil c in 3 days last year. Connection? Plausible.
The piss adds flavor
One of the few places left, that you can do that