confused on water treatment

Y

yoz's friend

Joined
Jun 30, 2001
Messages
1,751
do you have to both filter and chemically treat water before its safe to drink? i was thinking of getting a katadyn flter but ive been reading it doesnt take all the harmfull things out. and them ive read the same thing about chemically treating the water. ive also read that iodine is harmful to put in your water. what is the proper way to treat wild water.
 
You can also pre-filter it thru a bandana and then boil it.
 
filtering removes sediments and smaller particles (depends on the micron of the filter).

chlorine will kill bacterias (leptospirosis etc)

whatever is in potable aqua and the like kills giardia and crypto-spiridium.

so filter your water then treat it for giardia and crypto...bases covered.


or just boil it :p
 
so its filter and boil? when you read the stuff on the katadyn website ithey make it sound like their filter does it all.
 
which model filter do you have?

i think filters have to be around 1micron to catch giardia and crypto....

i have a katadyn (the grey one) and i still treat my water with potable aqua
 
it looks like they use a .3 micron filter...id still boil or treat...if it was a moving stream maybe id take a chance...loose stools in the woods are no fun and can lead to dehydration.
 
the one i was looking at is the katadyn pocket. it seems to have good reviews. i belive it filter down to .02 micron
 
Filters should be 0.3 microns or finer to catch cysts and bacteria.
They can't catch viruses, which are too small.
They do catch the cysts like giardia and crypto.

Iodine kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria and giardia (if water is above 20 C)
Chlorine kills/ deactivates viruses and bacteria.
Chlorine Dioxide kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria, giardia and crypto.

Bringing water to a rolling boil wipes them all out.

None of them will take out pesticides or heavy metals. Yes, some filters contain a small amount of activated carbon, but this will only deal with minor stuff and is more to improve taste than anything. It will not take out the big nasties.

Not all water sources are contaminated, despite what people say. If you can see on a map that a creek only begins 100m up the ridge from where you are and there is no housing on the ridge, chances are it's clean.
However, many have runoff from housing or other nasties best avoided. Check your map to see what's upstream. Collect water from side creeks if possible.

It's up to you to decide how manky you think the water is likely to be. And of course it doesn't hurt to go overkill and boil everything. But yes, filter and tabs will kill all the bad guys!

Also, read the following article, which describes the possibility that the main culprit of giardia is the outdoors in not the water...
http://www.imrisk.com/ultragiardia.htm

Hope this helps!
 
beef said:
Filters should be 0.3 microns or finer to catch cysts and bacteria.
They can't catch viruses, which are too small.
They do catch the cysts like giardia and crypto.

Iodine kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria and giardia (if water is above 20 C)
Chlorine kills/ deactivates viruses and bacteria.
Chlorine Dioxide kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria, giardia and crypto.

Bringing water to a rolling boil wipes them all out.

None of them will take out pesticides or heavy metals. Yes, some filters contain a small amount of activated carbon, but this will only deal with minor stuff and is more to improve taste than anything. It will not take out the big nasties.

Not all water sources are contaminated, despite what people say. If you can see on a map that a creek only begins 100m up the ridge from where you are and there is no housing on the ridge, chances are it's clean.
However, many have runoff from housing or other nasties best avoided. Check your map to see what's upstream. Collect water from side creeks if possible.

It's up to you to decide how manky you think the water is likely to be. And of course it doesn't hurt to go overkill and boil everything. But yes, filter and tabs will kill all the bad guys!

Also, read the following article, which describes the possibility that the main culprit of giardia is the outdoors in not the water...
http://www.imrisk.com/ultragiardia.htm

Hope this helps!
Click to expand...

Good advice. Anything less is accepting some level of risk...which is okay as long as people are aware of it.
 
beef said:
Filters should be 0.3 microns or finer to catch cysts and bacteria.
They can't catch viruses, which are too small.
They do catch the cysts like giardia and crypto.

Iodine kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria and giardia (if water is above 20 C)
Chlorine kills/ deactivates viruses and bacteria.
Chlorine Dioxide kills/ deactivates viruses, bacteria, giardia and crypto.

Bringing water to a rolling boil wipes them all out.

None of them will take out pesticides or heavy metals. Yes, some filters contain a small amount of activated carbon, but this will only deal with minor stuff and is more to improve taste than anything. It will not take out the big nasties.

Not all water sources are contaminated, despite what people say. If you can see on a map that a creek only begins 100m up the ridge from where you are and there is no housing on the ridge, chances are it's clean.
However, many have runoff from housing or other nasties best avoided. Check your map to see what's upstream. Collect water from side creeks if possible.

It's up to you to decide how manky you think the water is likely to be. And of course it doesn't hurt to go overkill and boil everything. But yes, filter and tabs will kill all the bad guys!

Also, read the following article, which describes the possibility that the main culprit of giardia is the outdoors in not the water...
http://www.imrisk.com/ultragiardia.htm

Hope this helps!
Click to expand...

How does drinking filtered water from a good camping filter compare to drinking unfiltered water from my well at home? I understand the earth acts as an effective filter, but does it also eliminate viruses? Or is it that the deep (250foot) well wouldn't normally be exposed to viruses in the first place, like open water would? We probably all experienced drinking stream water from our hands as kids with no problems. I now know this was probably reckless, and we were lucky. Now I want to be safe, but not crazy safe. It just strikes me that filtered AND chemical treatment seems overkill (pardon the pun). When practical, I will drink boiled water. But can't I feel relatively comfortable with drinking EITHER filtered or chem. treated water? If I was inclined to eliminate ALL risks, I probably shouldn't be playing in the woods with sharp stuff- skill or no skill (of course I'm in the no-skill category). William
 
Yoz>

The ONLY time I've ever filtered water is if it has some kind of matter in it: dirt, sediment, etc...and then I've only run it through a bandana.

You don't have to filter your water before you boil it.

I really like Aqua Mira for a chemical treatment. But Potable Aqua is my second fave.

Beef is dead on about the boiling. You only have to bring it to a boil, by 212 degrees F you've killed all the organisms in it-- of course Beef also mentioned the exceptions; which is why you should always look upstream a ways from where you're about to drink to see if there are dead animals, junk, spew pipes, etc...; and cup some in your hands and smell it to see if has a strong Alkaline, chemical, sour, oily, etc... smell , which are pretty good indicators of stuff that boiling and neutralizing won't take care of. Dead plant areas surrounding the banks of the place you're about to drink from is usually a good sign of toxins in the water.

A guy once cut an old tour bus fuel tank open and poured it into a small stream by our barn (where a buddy and I used to catch minnows for fishing and where people bathed their horses from in the summer) without us knowing it. You could smell and see the little diesel rainbows for about three days. It killed every fish in the stream almost immediately.
Once the smell left and the dead fish washed away you couldn't tell the water had been polluted...unless you looked at the plants on the bank that were yellow and brown when all the others were green and healthy. You could also smell it if you cupped some in your hands and brought it to your nose.


william o.>>


It's not about being "crazy safe" in an OCD sense of the word. It's about mitigating risk in making a bad situation worse, or a fun situation into a shitstorm of agony.

I don't know how your well is set up, but many wells will neutralize water through the process of bringing it into the house through the pumps and salt bins, etc...But in the 1800's that's part of how Cholera and other such diseases were so rampant: open wells and contaminated water.

Neutralizing your water when you're out in the woods, hiking, whatever, and need to procure some water from a ground source (I'm using the term loosely) should always be "practical". You can feel comfortable doing a handstand in goat pee toxified peanut butter...but that doesn't mean it's safe to eat. Know what I mean?
 
Last edited:
When backpacking in the White Mountains I use an MSR Mini Works. I don't add any chemicals.
 
I prefer the quality I get from filtering, and in my area that's enough. For large amounts of water, boiling is my main method, for dish washing and the like. I carry chemicals for times when the filter would be too bulky and boiling isn't convenient. It all depends on what you are having to get rid of. where I am its primarily crypto and giardia, then e.coli. not really worried about viruses. But if I was farther south, or filtering urban water, I'd be taking other measures.
 
Aside from Hanta virus in the Western states, what viral threats are being referred to here?

I filter with my katadyn Hiker on multiday trips. On day hikes when I don't want to bring my filter, I'll carry some purification tablets. I always have a way to boil water with me as well.
 
asfik hanta must be breathed in, and aside from that, it is a rather fragile virus. sunlight kills it quickly.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top