Can we survive toxic sewage sludge?

The key danger of monitoring the practice of open land disposal of toxic sewage sludge in our forests and on our farms and rangelands is the sludge itself. All sewage sludge is toxic; it is toxic waste. Toxic by definition means: Containing poison or being poisonous; capable of causing death or serious debilitation; extremely harsh, malicious or harmful.

This past week it took seven days to recover from an eight hour trek through the Snoqualmie Forest sludgelands, rather than the usual two days, while imaging the mess, plotting the landscape and making videos of the dead things. You’d think there would be a clear clue in the vision of masses of dead insects in the syrupy sludge puddles atop the forest-disposed sewage sludge, but I often get taken by the horrific scenes, rather than considering the consequences. Another missed clue is that my boots and clothes rot away quite quickly in the process. What’s in that stuff? What are the gasses emanating from these toxic sewage sludge disposal sites?

A fine person sent a card of caring this week, with a colorful image based on a young student’s drawing of someone on a bike, but now with protective mask, gloves and boots added, and now the message is clear - protect thyself, brother, when treading in the wastes of others.

 

The typical opening scene of a forest-disposed sewage sludge site is the pristine surrounding forest itself, just before you get there, with vibrant trees, understory and ground cover. These untreated tree farm buffer areas are healthy and filled with life in any season, including in the soils below. This is what occludes the disposed toxic sewage sludge, which will remain there perhaps for years, continuing to deliver its toxic load, as does a slow-release drug. The slow drip of death.

This site, in an eastern King County, WA, Snoqualmie Forest, sewage sludge dumping site, tells the tale so well:

 

The forest on the way in is brilliant and healthy, …

 

… with functional understory and ground cover of lichens, mosses and fungi, plus all of the unseen life forms below.

 

The Notice Sign tells us that a ‘fertilizer replacement’ or ‘soil amendment’ has been applied, and that ‘wood yields will be improved,’ and that ‘wildlife habitat will be improved.’ Not true at all, none of it; this is an open land sewage sludge disposal site, and no more.

 

When it rains, the sludge runoff and leachates flow down the trails …

 

… and into sludge puddles, until either taken into the ground or flushed farther downhill into wetlands and streams that flow to rivers and beyond.

 

Mysterious gasses, never analyzed, emerge from the fetid sludge puddles along the way, likely as major contributors to Greenhous Gas Emissions. What are those bubbles?

 

In true form, the sludge throughout the forest is contaminated with ‘Physical’ or ‘Manufactured Inerts,’ …

 

… meaning ‘those personal things' that were not screened out of the raw sewage, …

 

… and that now have opportunity to foul the forest soils and waters, …

 

… Including with some curious red plastic things.

 

While most forest fungi in a healthy forest are inhibited from their natural functions when exposed to sewage sludge, some of these toxin-tolerant fungi appear to thrive, even when associated with blue plastic garbage on a bed of sludge …

 

… the Usual Suspects are signaled by the toxic waste to thrive and reproduce, amongst the dead mosses.

 

Most of these sludge toxin tolerant fungi are actually growing on woody debris under the soil or sludge, …

 

… but the appearance of some of the wood decomposers is that they may be even healthier when exposed to toxic sludge. What’s that about?

 

Some of these Basidiomycetes thrive, although nearly buried in the toxic waste.

 

There is a specialized environment for all life forms, and a specialized life form for each niche environment.

 

We continue to encounter these same few species of toxin-tolerant fungi, such as Hypholoma fasciculare, on decaying wood, well sludged, and they merit our attention…

 

... most especially our Mycena spp., growing on rotted wood on the sludged forest floor.