Benefits of Vickery Seaplant Minerals

Nutrition Facts Charts

 Coastal peoples all over the world have prized seaweed as a source of valuable nutrients, primarily minerals, for millennia In northern California, where

the inland native peoples used to trade their most  precious possessions for a bag of dried seaweed laboriously carried on someone's back  from the coast.

Knowledge of the tonic and healing powers of seaweed was passed down among coastal  peoples from generation to generation. Much of their knowledge is in the process of  being confirmed by modern scientific analysis. And demographic studieshave shown  that people who regularly incorporate edible seaweeds into their diets have fewer  problems from mineral depletion and live longer than other peoples.1

Sea vegetables contain 10 to 20 times the minerals and vitamins of land vegetables.Gram for gram, they are higher in vitamins and minerals than any other class of food.2  The minerals are available in chelated, colloidal forms that make them

especially available to the bodies of humans and animals, a concept known as

bioavailability All  sea vegetables contain significant amounts of protein, sometimes as much as 48%. Sea  plants are also a rich sources of both soluble and insoluble dietary fiber.3 The large  brown seaweeds known as the  kelps contain alginic acid. Studies have shown that alginic acid removes heavy metals and  radioactive isotopes from the digestive tract, as well as strontium 90 from the bones.

Sea vegetables have traditionally been used in Asia to treat heart disease,  hypertension, cancer, and thyroid problems. Modern researchers are trying to understand  the physiological mechanisms by which seaweed can be used to successfully treat these  diseases, with some promising results. One especially exciting theory proposes that  consumption of Laminaria (kombu) explains the low breast cancer rate in  post-menopausal Japanese women.5 Much more will be learned in future years as the  study of these wondrous plants from the sea continues.

Vitamins

Seaweeds contain vitamins A, B, C, and E.6  Moreover, many seaweeds contain what  appears to be vitamin B-12, a vitamin normally found only in animal products. Avoiding  B-12 deficiency has traditionally posed a problem for people on raw foods, vegan,  macrobiotic, and vegetarian diets, but seaweed just might solve the

problem. The  source of the B-12 in seaweed remains a mystery (is it made by bacteria living on the  surface or in the water?), and researchers wonder if it is not really B-12 but an analogue  something that resembles B-12 but cannot be utilized by the human  body.7 Dr. Norman Cousens is    quite convinced that the B-12 in seaweed is  bio-available,8 and the experience of some long-term vegan/vegetarians seems to  confirm that view.9

Minerals

 The mineral content of sea vegetables is extraordinary, and is probably at the root of  most of their healing properties. Several of the theories put forth to explain the ability  of seaweed to reduce heart disease and hypertension are based in the high mineral  content of seaweed, particularly potassium, calcium, sodium, and chloride.

In the words  of Shep Erhart, author of Sea Vegetable Celebration, Every second of every day your  body depends on minerals to generate billions of tiny electric impulses throughout your  nervous system. Your heart would stop,

your muscles would freeze, and your brain  would black out if these minerals were not available in just the right amounts and the  right form. The minerals in seaweeds are in colloidal form, meaning they retain their  molecular identity while remaining in liquid suspension. Colloids are very small in size  and are easilyabsorbed by the body’s cells. Plants convert metallic minerals, which can be toxic, into colloids with a natural, negative electric charge. Negatively charged minerals have been shown to increase the transport and bioavailability of other foods  and supplements.10

 Minerals that are attached to other substances such as amino acids are also more  bioavailable. These are call chelated (key-lated) minerals, from the Greek word for claw.  Seaweeds provide all of the 56 minerals and trace minerals required for your body’s  physiological functions in chelated, colloidal forms.

Most enzymatic functions depend on  minute amounts of bioavailable trace minerals. The major minerals are instrumental in all kinds of life-sustaining activities in your body: magnesium is crucial in calcium  absorption, iodine in thyroid function, iron in blood oxygen exchange, and chromium in  blood sugar regulation. All of these functions are facilitated by the presence of  chelated, colloidal minerals. 11 The minerals in sea vegetables are more important to humans and animals today than  ever. The 1997 edition of Food Composition Handbook shows a 50% decline in the  vitamin and mineral content of foods since the last survey done in 1975. This decline  suggests a steady deterioration in soil, air, and water quality, as well as reduced seed  vitality, that is depleting minerals and other inorganic compounds from our food 12

Minerals in Relation to Tofu, Beans, and Grains

Tofu, beans, and grains contain a substance called phytic acid which blocks the

absorption of minerals. With beans and grains you can mitigate this problem by

soaking  them for 18 hours before cooking. The soaking activates the seed embryo,

which  neutralizes the phytic acid. Alternatively, you can add seaweed to your pot

of grain or  beans, which makes more minerals available and ensures that some will

be absorbed.

1 Erhart, Shep and Cerier, Leslie, Sea Vegetable Celebration, Book Publishing

Company,  Summertown, TN, 2001, p. 22

2 Cousens, Gabriel, Conscious Eating, Essene Vision Books, Patagonia, AZ, 1992,

3 Erhart and Cerier, 25-274 Erhart and Cerier, 30.

5 Erhart and Cerier, 29.\ 6 Cousens, 484

7 Erhart and Cerier, 24-258 Cousens, 484

9 Erhart and Cerier, 25

10 Erhart and Cerier, 27-28.\par

11 Erhart and Cerier, 21-22.\par

12 Jack, Alex, Let Food Be Thy Medicine, One Peaceful World Newsletter, 1999,

SeaPlantMinerals.com

SuperNutrientCorporationUSA.com 

Typical Analysis         

850      mg kelp (Laminaria digitata)

             mg/850