Re: Salt

["Tom Miller" <tommyam at hotmail_com>]

On 9/10/02, Sam (Samuel.Hopkins at marconi_com) posted:

>Salt water fish have a lower salt concentration in their body than the
>surrounding ocean. Because of this salt enters their body to equalize. 
> >They are built so that they can excrete high levels of salt through 
> >their urine and through their gills. This is how they get rid of salt.

>The reasons humans die when they drink sea water is because the body >can 
>only excrete urine with a concentration of 2% salt. Sea water is at a 
>concentration of 3% salt. So as you drink sea water you add 1% salt to your 
>body because you can only get rid of 2% of it via your urine. I would think 
>that fresh water plants are built the same way.

A sort-of off topic to overall discussion, but relevant to this post - if 
you find yourself in a dire lost-at-sea scenario and are dying of thirst, 
you can get fresh (well, less salty anyway) water from the inside of fish.  
Because of lower salt concentrations, you can actually obtain a little water 
to survive from the meat and eyes of fish.  I haven't had a chance to test 
this survival tactic in the field, but if anyone else has, let me know.  
Makes perfect sense, though, based on the previous posts.

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