For Release November 6, 2001

AGRI-VIEWS
by Chuck Otte, Geary County Extension Agent

As humans, we have incredible senses. But we also tend to be very visually oriented. And why not? Our eyes are incredible. Even for those of us needing glasses, our eyes are far superior to any still or video camera available! Because of our incredible eyesight, our other senses tend to take second place.

Have you ever thought about improving and learning more about your senses of smell, taste, touch or hearing? Or did you even know that you could train your senses? We do it with our vision all the time. Or do you even make any effort to protect your senses?

As a lifelong birdwatcher my sense of hearing is very important to me. Birdwatchers are very dependent on bird songs to help them locate birds and often to identify the species of birds we are watching. Most birds don’t even need to be seen to be identified. Calls and vocalizations are often more than adequate to determine species and sometimes calls are the only way to differentiate two similar looking species.

Yet hearing is often the most abused sense that we have. As a middle aged male I have noticed that I am starting to experience a little age related hearing loss. I don’t want to lose any hearing capability, yet I know it will happen. I also know that I can slow down the hearing loss by protecting my hearing.

Hearing protection is easy and quite cheap. You can get a good set of ear plugs for just a few dollars at any hardware store. These ear plugs insert into the ear and once you get used to them, you don’t even notice they are in. I see people running power equipment all the time with no hearing protection. When asked why, the response is usually something like, you get used to it afterwhile. The reason you get used to it is because the nerves get stunned and desensitized. If you keep that up for any length of time, you will soon experience permanent hearing loss.

Anytime I am working around powered equipment, I wear hearing protection. If I’m mowing the lawn, I have in my ear plugs. If I’m running a chain saw or even a power saw, I have in my ear plugs. A weed eater or leaf blower operator should definitely have hearing protection. These small pieces of equipment crank out a lot of noise.

Sound is measured in decibels. The decibel scale is one of those scales that may not make perfect sense. An increase of ten decibels is considered to be a doubling of the sound intensity. A noise level of 80 decibels is twice as loud as 70 decibels. A sound level of 90 decibels is twice as loud as 80 decibels or four times as loud as 70. Once you get past about 85 decibels you can start to have hearing damage with prolonged exposure. Just about any kind of powered lawn equipment is going to be over 85 decibels.

At a sound level of 90 decibels, four hours of constant exposure will start to cause problems. I have a small, fairly quiet shop vacuum at my office. The sound level of this vacuum three feet away when it is running is 92 decibels. The safe period at 100 decibels is only one hour. Many lawnmowers and other yard equipment are 100 decibels and up.

The next step is to have your hearing checked and don’t be afraid to acknowledge a hearing loss and take steps to correct it. Set the ego aside and make up your mind that it’s okay to hear better again! Next week: Hearing Nature Around You.

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