Lead contaminated soil and wildlife

I've got some heavily lead-contaminated areas, from my old  house's paint ending up in the soil.
Before I got the soil test results I hoped to grow some edible plants, now I plan to have a mix of annuals and  perennials  which will be attractive whilst feeding the wildlfe.
But should I, or will I poison everything?
From what Ive found out about lead, it has no effect on plants, but is very toxic to higher animals. 
It also seems that the further from the soil the plant mattter gets, the lower the toxicity eg: roots are dangerous, while pollen is much less so.
I can't find any information on lead's toxicity to insects and the potential (minute, since I haven't seen a bee in ages) that honey could be contaminated.
I plan to grow plants with edible seeds, nectar and pollen, but then I think about the leaf-eating insects and sparrows which will consume the inevitable self-sown lettuce...
This might read a bit over-the-top, but the test was over five times the maximum safe level. I definitely skewed the results toward 'lethal' by taking the majority of samples from around the dripline, but I'd like to base any action on the presumption that I'm dealing with  heavily lead-contaminated soil.
Does anyone have experience with this kind of thing? bear in mind, I'm not trying to get rid of the lead, I just don't want to make a great environment for the local birds and insects, then poison hem!

lead is dangerous to people and to wildlife and not so wild life.

generally it is suggested that the soil be removed and replaced..however..i'm kinda funny i would probably just plant the lead laden soil with something non edible..like ornamental shrubs and plants..that probably eventually would clean it up..

there are people on here that know more about which plants help to clean up contaminants..however..be careful of what you eat in lead areas.

we have an area of target range..i make sure no plants get planted there that produce crops..for that reason..it is a non food zone on our property..we have a dirt hill that catches the rounds so they aren't really over a large area..but we are certain to make sure no food crops are grown there

Yes, lead is dangerous to animals - I don't know about plants. They have banned the use of lead bullets in the range of endangered condors for this reason.

I changed the subject line a bit. To clarify: should I avoid growing flowering and seeding plants for birds and insects if my soil is lead contaminated?
I definately won't be growing edibles for humans.

Someone more well versed in biochemistry would be much better suited than I am to respond.  However, plants will accumulate lead and it is toxic to animals, so I would not recommend attempting to grow food for the wildlife in that soil.  Lead being a heavy metal, it cannot be broken down, only moved about.  If some plants are used to accumulate lead specifically in order to harvest and remove them from the property as a strategy for remediation (which is definitely something done by grassroots types in the know), you can count on those plants to send that lead up the food chain should animals eat them, and the results of bioaccumulation can be very difficult to get a handle on, with repercussions spreading through entire ecosystems in ways that are very hard to trace, often taking decades to spot and pin down.  In general, fruits and seeds are usually considered to be less likely to accumulate toxins, as plants tend to be a bit choosy about what they add to their reproductive parts, according to common lore, but special cases may well exist, so seek further knowledge on individual plants if you feel it is worth your while to explore further.  I'm not sure that knowledge even exists, btw, in formal science.  I wonder if anyone has any personal experiences with this.

No direct experience, but I would be interested in hearing the answers to the OP question, as well.

In the Farm City: Urban Farming book by Novella Carpenter, I believe she mentions a fellow urban farmer who dealt with contaminated ground by growing figs on it.  Apparently the fig fruits did not contain an appreciable level of lead, so this seems to agree with John Rushton's comments above.

The comments that fruit/seeds etc are considered 'safer' fit with my investigations.
I'm struggling to get information about birds and insects; research I've found mostly relates to humans and stock.

Many mushroom species are know to accumulate high levels of several heavy metals, namely cadmium, mercury and lead. You could potentially cultivate beneficial fungi in your problem areas for the purpose of bio-remediation (which is becoming more and more common these days)

Mushrooms are a good choice.

Since this threads is from 2010 maybe the OP can tell us what helped the most.

There are plants that help with contamination also.

Bracken ferns and sunflowers are the ones that come to mind.

I've been casting my own lead-bullets for reloading for about 30+ years now, refining thousands of pounds of lead over the years, and I myself used to be concerned about lead exposure/contamination.  

I've taken both urine and blood tests for lead exposure, which have always come up negative.

I would suggest you do the same.  That would help dispel overreaction to what turns out to be a non-issue.

Couldn't agree more with Michael. I needed a side gig one year so I sold lead ingots converted from wheel weights (read, lots of handling and sorting, plus standing over a cauldron that would hold 350# molten lead at a time). That year I sold about 26k lbs of lead, all cooked and every single piece touched by my bare hands. My wife, being the two of us who are more contentious about long term health things insisted that I get checked for lead exposure. So I had a blood test done with a laboratory. Zero detectable lead levels in my blood. I'm no scientist, and never played one in the movies, but from what I understand, lead dust is bad for you when taken into your lungs. This is why they harp on the lead paint so much because when touching up drywall or sanding drywall that was painted with lead based paint, you can inhale the tiny particles and pull them into your lungs. Lead in a solid state and not a dust does not seem to me to have the same danger associated with it. In another funny anecdotal story, as a child I fished like it was my job, mostly trout with rod and reel (fly fishing was for rich folks, i was there to get dinner). I kept a few hooks run through stiches in my hat, and a dozen or so small lead sinkers tucked in my cheek like someone would chewing tobacco. Probably thousands and thousands of hours spent that way.

Children and pregnant women are at a higher risk for lead exposure.

I was reading up on this a while back, since we have lead paint on parts of our buildings and I was also worried about soil contamination. As Rusty said, lead is dangerous when it’s in a state that is easily inhaled or ingested, not so much when it is just lying around on the ground. (The danger for lead shot and sinker is to bottom-feeding ducks and fish that swallow these bits of lead)

The current (2020s) understanding of best way to deal with lead contaminated soil is cover with compost, soil, and plants that you will not need to disturb. That way you won’t have lead dust blowing around, and while the lead will never disappear, it will get bound up in other chemicals/structures so as to pose less risk to humans and animals in the garden.  Better to plant an apple tree and ground cover there and not a potato patch!

When I looked at this some years ago, the consensus was that lead did not move into plant tissues significantly, but rather mechanically adhered to tubers and such. So, for example, peeling root veggies like potatoes or scrubbing them aggressively was a mitigating measure. (That was okay for me as an adult; I grew up in the era of leaded gasoline so any damage was likely done. If I was feeding little kids I would be a helluva lot more paranoid with good reason.)

I chose to dig out pockets of potentially contaminated soil against a century old barn that almost certainly dropped leaded paint. I used it as fill in locations where it would never, ever be used for gardens. I replaced it with the good stuff and grew happy tomatoes.

BUT: I'm poking around some of the newer research, and it looks like there are edible garden plants that do take up lead. This is concerning.

Douglas Alpenstock wrote:

BUT: I'm poking around some of the newer research, and it looks like there are edible garden plants that do take up lead. This is concerning.

Yes, I have seen the same. Leafy vegetables like kale as I recall.

Research from Brazil that correlates fertilizer use with increased heavy metals in kale and tomatoes:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35426028/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32647963/

I dealt with a couple of lead-contaminated properties as an environmental consulting engineer in the late 90s. At the time the understanding of lead was that it is toxic by ingestion. That means it injures you if it gets into your gut - not through your skin. Lead can be in dust and you can have post-nasal drip and that lead can get into your gut. or your could pick up lead from soil on your hands and transfer it to food. But if you clean everything and avoid soil dust, you should be safe from lead.

But it is really difficult to maintain that kind of vigilance. If you know there is a lead-contaminated area, the most cost effective solution is usually to simply cap it with clean soil.