July 29, 2002 Posted: 05:15:09 AM PDT
By
Melanie Turner BEE Staff Writer at http://www.modbee.com/
A natural spring in a narrow canyon on Paul Mason's mountainous property in Stanislaus County once provided water for his family and local wildlife.
It was 1975 when he first caught a whiff of the spring while riding on a motorcycle on Del Puerto Canyon Road.
"I ran into a river of cold air coming out of a canyon," he said. "It was almost scary, 'cause on a motorcycle you can really feel it."
Little did he know he'd be pumping thousands of gallons of water from the spring years later. Today, it is bottled under the Noah's California Spring Water label by the 7UP bottler in Modesto and sold to hundreds of people.
And little did he know all the attention the spring would get for being so rich in magnesium, a mineral people often don't get enough of in their diets.
Mason, who owns and manages Adobe Springs Water Co., said the average bottled water in this country has less than 3 milligrams per liter of magnesium, but his water has 110.
Magnesium helps maintain muscle and nerve function and keeps heart rhythm steady and bones strong. It is found in foods such as dark-green leafy vegetables, whole grains and nuts.
Researchers say over-processing foods and the use of phosphates in sodas have led to mineral deficiencies.
Liz Applegate, a professor of nutrition at the University of California at Davis, said the recommended dose of magnesium for adults is 400 milligrams a day and most Americans fall short by 70 percent to 90 percent.
"A lot of bottled waters don't have much of anything" in the way of minerals, she said.
Meanwhile, some people are giving Mason's spring water rave reviews.
Health journalist Bill Sardi recently published a book, "In Search of the World's Best Water." He claims the world's healthiest water might come from Adobe Springs near Modesto. The reason: It's unusually rich in magnesium.
On a Web site, "Mineral Waters of the World," Adobe Springs is rated as "excellent." Anyone can rate the waters on the site, created by Paul Geiser. A Swiss banker, Geiser keeps the list in an attempt to create the largest database of bottled waters in the world.
Of 1,456 waters on his site, the average magnesium content is 38 milligrams per liter, Geiser wrote in an e-mail.
Other people are concerned enough about their magnesium intake that they are paying more in shipping costs for Adobe Springs than for the water itself.
One customer in Washington buys more than 20 cases at a time, said Tony J. Varni, operations manager at 7UP Bottling Co.
About 100 people, mostly from out of state, order the water online, he said. "Lots of them are told they need magnesium in their diets."
They pay $25 a case, about $15 of it for shipping, he added.
Dorothy Riegel of Illinois ordered 12 cases in May, paying more than $300.
"I have a magnesium deficiency. My body kicks it out as fast as I put it in, rather than storing it as most people do," she said.
Her son found the mineral-rich water on the Web four years ago, and she's been drinking it since. Riegel said it's made "a great big difference."
She said she took magnesium injections for six years to prevent spasms of her arteries and veins but has not needed the shots since she began drinking the water.
Mason bought the land with the spring in the early 1980s. He was looking for an escape from the Bay Area. A real estate agent led him to a fixer-upper on 40 acres.
"Darn if it wasn't the same place that I had stopped at eight years before," he said.
Mason fixed the place up, got married and started a family. There was just a small hole in the ground from which water was pumped for his family.
"We capture it about six feet underground," he said.
Later Mason dug a bigger hole and built a shed over the spot where the water surfaces. He also filters and treats it with ultraviolet light in a further attempt to purify it.
Mason had the water tested in 1991 and trucked his first load to Modesto in 1992.
"We didn't know what we had," he said.
Mason has not sat by quietly with his mineral-rich spring. In fact, he sued the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in an attempt to establish a standard for magnesium levels in bottled drinking water, but the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the case in 1998. Mason appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined late last year to hear the case.
Now he wants to rally people for a class-action suit, saying people who drink the average bottled water and suffer from heart attacks deserve to be compensated.
"I think it's the same as asbestos or a defective car," Mason said. "This is defective water."
He believes the magnesium-rich water could save lives.
Today, Mason ships one truckload a day to Modesto, though the operation is capable of shipping 17 loads a day. But so far, the demand just isn't there.
Adobe Springs operates at a loss, he said. Gross sales total $75,000 a year, less than his expenses, he said. When he was younger he worked in construction and bought some properties that he now rents out. That income allows him to keep the spring going.
"I believe in what I'm doing," he said.