Information
from Past Shows
June
Beautiful but deadly . .
emerald ash borer.
June 29, 2008
WCPT listeners new to my program may not be aware of my philosophy regarding lawns, which can be summed up in the phrase: “When in doubt, rip it out.”
However, I know that many of you LOVE your lawns to the point of obsession, meaning that you would rather give up your kids than your 4-Step Program. And that raises a good point, which is that turf grass isn’t in itself so bad. Grass is just a plant, after all. It’s what we put on it and how we think about it that causes all the trouble.Which is why I’m a fan of Paul Tukey and his organization, SafeLawns.org. He’s attempting to transform the landscapes of America from chemical dependency to organic freedom, one lawn at a time. In fact, he’s taken that mission to Washington, D.C., where SafeLawns is attempting to transform the National Mall with Organic techniques.
Entrepreneur Carol Brewer is trying to take that even one step further in Chicago. She knows that when you hire a lawn care service, even thought they might use organic techniques, they’re probably still contributing to global warming by using internal combustion engines like lawn mowers. That’s why she started MowTown, Chicago’s first and only 100% eco-friendly lawn mowing service.Not only does MowTown provide organic services, they take it one step further by using NO POWER EQUIPMENT. Yep, that’s right, they use PUSH mowers. Which means that you’ll never have to worry about hearing a leaf blower when they visit your yard. They even use bicycles and trailers to transport their mowers. Brewer admits that it’s a challenge, even for typical Chicago-sized lots, which are relatively small. But it’s one that she’s willing to take on in an effort to reduce the carbon footprint that is left by lawn owners all over the city.
If you want more information about organic lawn care:
Safer Pest Control Project (This link contains organic lawn care tips, plus a pdf of local organic lawn care companies)
Finally, if you want to know about the REAL cost of lawn care mania, check out this link that I received from Openlands:
Lawn Care Costs (It's a PDF.)
We knew this day would come. And it has with a vengeance.The Emerald Ash Borer has arrived in Chicago. Like gypsy moths, Japanese beetles and the Asian Long-Horned beetle before it, EAB is on a mission of destruction. In this case, the city’s 96,000 ash trees are at risk.
The Morton Arboretum’s Edith Makra has been following the destructive path of this tiny insect and educating people about it for several years. Truly, it’s been less than a decade since the devastation of ash trees in Michigan, Ohio, Ontario and elsewhere became apparent. More than twenty million ash trees have already been lost in the Midwest and many more are likely to follow.
In the past few months, EAB was discovered to have arrived in various suburbs around Chicago, the latest being Naperville. And then, about two weeks ago, the City of Chicago was added to the list, as noted in the Chicago Tribune.
City of Chicago Senior Forester John Lough is one of the people on the front lines of the battle against the insect. He’s teaming with TreeKeepers (I'm TreeKeeper #417) from the Openlands Project, to teach them how to identify EAB and infested trees. The first training session is Tuesday, July 8, 7 p.m., at the North Park Village Nature center, 5801 N. Pulaski. TreeKeepers are the general public are welcomed. For more information call Jim DeHorne at 773/282-5374.Meanwhile, here are some links with comprehensive Emerald Ash Borer info:
The Morton Arboretum
City of Chicago
June 22, 2008
To help launch my new two-hour format, I'm bringing in my Chicago Master Gardener buddies MaryAnne Spinner and Chris Kelsey, who not only have the best hair in horticulture but are a couple of the brains behind the Cook County Master Gardeners Electronic Plant Clinic. Just click on the link if you have a gardening question, and the Master Gardeners will get back to you within a matter of days.) MaryAnne and Chris have been helping me answer gardening questions for years now, and they really know what they're talking about, which makes me look better than I have any right to look.
The Master Gardeners program is important in so many ways you don't want to get me started. And it is one of the programs that was endangered this year when funding was withheld for the Illinois Extension Services. If you want to find out what that was all about and why the issue is not yet completly resolved, click here. That's one of the stories we're keeping a close eye on.
If you're a gardener, you're obsessed with bugs, and I use that to mean everything from beetles to bees to spiders to slugs. The problem is, many of us just aren't sure how to tell the "good" bugs from the "bad" bugs. That's why I'm talking to Jessica Walliser, who has put together an easy-to-use book called "Good Bug, Bad Bug: Who's Who, What They Do, and How to Manage Them Organically." This handy field guide will keep you from squashing (or, heaven forbid, nuking) the wrong bug at the wrong time. For more information about Jessica, go to theorganicgardeners.com.
I'll also be talking to Elizabeth Hoffman, of West End Florist and Garden Center in Evanston, which is celebrating its 100th anniversary this week!
The greenhouse at 3800 Old Glenview Road was built by Mathias Hoffman in 1908. Since then the Hoffman family has been growing perennials, roses, mums, succulents and more for their clients. They have a full garden center store, in addition to their floral department. It has been a great century of filling lives with flowers. An Open House from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, June 28 th , will feature food, fun, music and more. There will be a planting table for children to plant their own begonia to grow at home, as well as free children's games. For the adults, there will be door prizes all day long. Their summer tropical plant sale will begin at the open house and continue until July 19 th .
I'll be there on Saturday to help celebrate one family's contribution to the community.
June 15, 2008
It's hard to find anyone who has been more involved in getting and keeping Chicago green than Commissioner of the Chicago Department of the Environment Suzanne Malec-McKenna. After we celebrated the beginning of the blue cart program, Suzanne and I went on to talk about permeable paving to make the city's alleys greener and an improved hazardous waste disposal program, among other things.
To see some of the many wonderful city projects, click on the DOE website.
June 8, 2008
It’s no secret that the Bush Administration has not been a friend to science. Time after time, whether regarding climate change, mercury emissions, reproductive health, lead poisoning in children, workplace safety or nuclear weapons, the administration has done everything in its power to manipulate, if not downright suppress, scientific fact in favor of political spin.
Even knowing this, I was shocked when I learned, just a couple of months ago, that the administration had begun emptying and closing down the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s network of technical libraries. And this had begun in 2006!
Obviously, I missed the story. But it’s not as though it was front page news, either.
Fortunately, there are people who have been vigilant against what can only be described as Bush’s scorched earth policy regarding the dissemination of scientific information.
The woman who told me about the EPA libraries is, predictably, a librarian, and passed along a link to the American Library Association, which has been alarmed about the situation. Here’s how the ALA described it on their website:“The $2 million cut initially proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and included in Bush's budget proposals for fiscal year (FY) 2007 would reduce the 35-year-old EPA Library Network's budget by 80 percent and force closure of at least some regional libraries. EPA administrators have repeatedly alleged that these closings will not affect access to the important environmental and scientific collections and data sets since online functions will meet the needs of the EPA staff, researchers, and the public.”
I talked to one EPA staffer who said that the reorganization of the libraries would result in so-called “Centers for Excellence,” where information would be easier to access for citizens. The staffer told me that the move was a stroke of marketing genius. After all, he said, “Who’s against ‘Centers for Excellence?” Welcome to 1984, kids.
Another watchdog group has been the not-for-profit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. Executive Director Jeff Ruch says they’ve been following this story from day one. In fact, you can follow that progression in a series of their press releases written over the past year and a half.
A group that has an obvious interest in what happens to the libraries is the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE). John O’Grady is the Treasurer of the AFGE National Council 238, which represents more than 600,000 Federal and D.C. government workers nationwide and overseas. He’s also President of AFGE Local 704, which covers workers in Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. O’Grady, too is concerned about the lasting effects of the cuts, and passed along information that 1) details Congress's involvment in the issue, 2) outlines that the EPA is an agency in crisis and 3) exposes EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson for the government tool he is.
Congress did act, in its omnibus legislation in December, to restore funding to the EPA libraries. But it may be too late. It’s possible that documents have been destroyed or irrevocably lost. And, in reopening the closed libraires, the EPA is acting like a petulant child (a speciality of our President and his administration), grudgingly allocating a fraction of the space that they occupied before the cuts. And in the case of the Chicago office, which serves the entire six state Great Lakes Region, the re-opened library will be in a vacant reception area on the 16th floor of a federal building and will be only slightly larger than the typical men’s restroom in that same building.
Even more troubling, the EPA is issuing a series of edicts placing virtually every aspect of library operations under centralized control of a political appointee.
These moral bankrupts will finally leave office in January. This is their science legacy:
June 1, 2008
When I was a kid I wanted to be a priest, a baseball player or an astronaut. Hmm. I'm sensing some kind of disconnect here. Anyway, like most boys, I wasn't good enough to be either a baseball player or a priest. And when I got to college and I thought I would study astronomy, I realized just how much MATH was involved. Sheesh! I thought it was about looking at stars.
Anyway, because I know how hard science is and for a zillion other reasons, it's thrilling to have a real, live astronaut on the show. Chicago native Dr. Mae C. Jemison was the first woman of color to go into space, as the science mission specialist on the space shuttle Endeavour in 1992. However, her life since she left NASA in 1993 is at least as impressive, as she is the founder and president of two technology companies, a professor at Cornell University, an author, and the recipient of numerous awards.
Not only that, but she appeared on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Now that's awesome.
Dr. Jemison is in town to participate in World Environment Day, a global celebration of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) at the Chicago Botanic Garden on Thursday, June 5. At that event, an exhibition of the International Children's Painting Competition, sponsored by Bayer Corporation, will be unveiled for the first time. The theme is "Climate Change: Actions We Can Take Now To Reduce Our Negative Impact."
More than 700 entries were received in North America alone, and thousands throughout the world. Dr. Jemison, who is the founder of the international science camp, The Earth We Share, is meeting with about 400 local elementary school student for an interactive session.
She's fighting the good fight--getting kids to understand that science and math are cool, so they end up in laboratories and not on radio, like you know who.
I'm not sure whether I'm going to have to put on a tux again, but I'm Emceeing another benefit on Tuesday, June 10. This one is for yet another worthy organization (there are so many of them, aren't there?). It's called Growing Home and its mission is to provide job training and create employment opportunities for homeless and low-income people in Chicago within the context of a non-profit organic agriculture business.
Harry Rhodes is the Executive Director, and while he'd love to have you show up at the benefit, he says that you can also support Growing Home by buying their organically grown products at the Chicago Green City Market, through their CSA, direct from their farm, and by visiting the restaurants they supply with produce.
By the way, I'm only the Emcee at the benefit. The main attraction and keynote speaker is Art Smith, who just happens to be Oprah's chef. You're heard of her, right? She's one of those people who doesn't need a last name. You can get more information about the festivities HERE.
