Dear  Five Doves,

In response to the health question the recommendations by other Five Doves are good.  The other benefit to walking outside is the moderate exposure to the sun which is important in the process of using Vit D in forming bone.  One word of caution--if you are taking other vitamins you should be careful not to take them within two hours after taking calcium (or ingesting milk and milk products) because the calcium molecule is large and will impede the absorption of other nutrients.  Just guessing but I wonder that although the correlation is not mentioned that that might possibly be the value underlying the prohibition of mixing meat with milk in Judaism (unbeknownst to them?).

Also most people have to watch what kind of preparation of calcium they take.  Oyster shell calcium (so noted on the bottle) is hard on the stomach and is suspected of possibly containing trace amounts of arsenic!  To be effective most people should probably take at least 500 mg per day and some medical sources say that taking the calium is optimum in the fight against bone density loss if taken before the age of forty (not to say it is not effective when taken after forty).  Calcium supplementation can also cause constipation in some people.  Of course dairy products are high in calcium as well as greens (spinach, mustard greens, collard greens, kale etc) and the greens would also provide iron and fiber.

Linda