Water concerns..??

[louise22]

I'm From the UK and about 8 hours away from where I stay, there are reports on the news about parasites in tap water making people ill. My birds get tap water, it's also all I drink as bottled water tastes and fells horrible to me but I am now worried about giving it to my birds. Should I change to bottled water or filtering..?? If bottled, what one is better for them..?? If filtering, which one..?? I have used filtered water before but it left a black residue on the bottom of the bowl so was put off using it at that point

 

[GaleriaGila]

Yipes!

I saw that info, too. Scary.

Maybe ask a vet?
These are mostly US but maybe you could find something international, or even email a vet? I will do this with my avian vet. Better safe than sorry?
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In my opinion, any of the vets listed here should be better than a regular vet.
International contacts, too.

 

[hiriki]

Hmmmmmmmmm... scary. Things like at-home pitcher filters filter out minerals, but... I don't think they would filter out parasites. That's definitely not what they were made for.

First of all, I would check where your local water source is, because as much as it may freak you out to be so close to an area having this issue, it's not relevant to you if your city gets your water from an entirely different place. For instance, I live only 45 minutes from Chicago, but Chicago's water comes from the nearby Lake Michigan whereas my water comes from a river. Granted... it is a river that technically feeds into Lake Michigan, so this may not be the best example, but I'm also less than an hour from Chicago and if I was 8 hours away I think it would be more likely for it to be two entirely separate water sources.

But, I also would understand if seeing something like this in the news in your country makes you skeptical/distrusting of the UK's water filtration and monitoring regulations, to be honest. So even if there's no real reason to suspect the SAME parasites are in your water, I'd understand if you don't want tap anymore.

The only water filtration system I know of that would remove parasites is reverse osmosis. Reverse osmosis filtration systems are... well. My impression was that they aren't cheap but I googled it just now and google is telling me anywhere from $300 on the low end to $1500 on the high end. That's lower than I thought... not super cheap though. The benefits would be that you could continue drinking tap water with no worries, and it would eventually pay for itself when you take into account buying water bottles or jugs...

If you buy water bottles/jugs, just don't get distilled. Both "spring" water and purified water are fine. I think spring water has better taste though.