Earth Day is a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth’s environment. It was founded by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in held on April 22, 1970. Earth Day is celebrated in spring in the Northern Hemisphere and autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. Many communities celebrate Earth Week, an entire week of activities focused on environmental issues. The first Earth Week originated in Philadelphia in 1970 (starting April 16 and culminating on Earth Day, April 22.)  Earth Day Network, a group that wishes to become the coordinator of Earth Day globally, asserts that Earth Day is now observed on April 22 on virtually every country on Earth.

In honor of Earth Day, pick five changes that you can personally make this year that will help the environment.  Big or small, anything you choose to do in a positive direction to help our one and only planet Earth will make a difference.  And remember to reduce, reuse and recycle!

The most common usage of spring cleaning refers to the yearly act of cleaning a house from top to bottom which would take place in the first warm days of the year typically in spring, hence the name. However it has also come to be synonymous with any kind of heavy duty cleaning or organizing enterprise. A person who gets their affairs in order before an audit or inspection could be said to be doing some spring cleaning.

Green cleaning is a term that describes a growing trend in favor of using cleaning methods with environmentally-friendly ingredients and chemicals to preserve human health and environmental quality. Green cleaning techniques and products avoid the use of chemically-reactive and toxic cleaning products which contain various toxic chemicals, some of which emit volatile organic compounds (VOCs) causing respiratory and dermatological problems among other adverse effects. Green cleaning can also describe the way residential and industrial cleaning products are manufactured, packaged and distributed. If the manufacturing process is environmentally-friendly and the products are biodegradable, then the term “green” or “eco-friendly” may apply.

Harmful chemicals are prevalent not only in general consumer cleaning products but also in foods, cosmetics, home construction, clothing and many industries. In the average American home, around 63 synthetic chemical products can be found. This equates to approximately 10 gallons of hazardous chemicals.  By using more ecologically-friendly products, including green cleaning formulations and products, consumers may be able to reduce human health risks by reducing exposure to these and other harmful chemicals.
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So when you are working on your Green Spring Cleaning, you may want to donate your excess to charity.  There is a website called excessaccess.com that matches you to local charities that will come and pick up your donations and the website will give you a receipt that can be used at tax time.  Also if you go on to the EPA.gov website and click on ecycling they will advise you on how to recycle those old computers and cell phones.

For Green Spring Cleaning your home office,  think paperless and go to Billeo.com that will let you download a software tool that stores all your passwords and connects you to your vendors that you pay online. 

If you have baby clothes or baby items that you want to trade or give away to others who need them, go to zwaggle.com where you can join a “swapmeet” where you get points for your trade to use for other things you need.

Here on Green Earth Friend we have a recycling widget where you plug in your item and zip code and it will tell you where you can bring your item to be recycled.  Check it out at the end of the far right column on this website.

Good luck to everyone with your Green Spring Cleaning and I hope all these tips help everyone to keep their spring cleaning eco-friendly and green.

Despite all the bad news, good strides have been taken recently to slow the decline. For one thing, the EPA will be lifting the restrictions against using formic acid as a pesticide against varroa mites starting in 2010. This will give beekeepers a new tool in their arsenal that the varroa mites have no current resistance to. For another thing, scientists have recently found attractants for varroa mites that are so heady to them that they will detach from their hosts to pursue it, which opens up a whole world of bait traps. As you may be aware, varroa mites have been a major cause of colony loss for beekeepers for the past few decades. In addition, an Israeli company recently made a breakthrough in vaccinating bees against the Israel Acute Paralysis Virus, although it will still be a few years before their product makes it to market.

In addition to the strides being made toward helping beekeepers deal with varroa mites, there is also the work being done to educate the public to both the necessity and plight of honey bees. The majority of the public now knows that honey bees are responsible for approximately 1/3rd of the total food supply through their pollination efforts, as well as being vital to the cotton textile industry; so it’s very important to keep honey bees around. This is leading more people to call beekeepers when a swarm of honey bees land in their yards rather than simply spraying them with pesticides. It’s also causing many people to make use of plants that are useful to bees in their landscaping.

Together, these efforts are vastly improving the outlook of honey bees; but in the meantime to make up for the loss of colonies here in the US, more than 20% of all US honey bees are now imported yearly from Australia where they do not yet have varroa mites. Starting in February, over 500,000 colonies of honey bees begin arriving at the San Francisco International Airport where they will either be picked up by, or domestically shipped to beekeepers that arrive in droves for California almond pollination season.

So it seems that for now at least, honey bees are not in immediate danger of going extinct in the U.S., but it’s a catch 22, because the only reason the decline has stabilized is that people have been worried enough to take steps to help the bees. When the action stops, the bees will start sliding into decline once more. So we must remain vigilant, for as Albert Einstein once said, if honey bees go extinct, society will follow within four years.

Europe attempted to reassert its international leadership in the fight against global warming today, offering to slash its greenhouse gas emissions by up to 95% by 2050 and by 30% by 2020 if a climate change pact is sealed in Copenhagen in six weeks’ time.

“This should be seen as a clear message to the world,” said Andreas Carlgren, the Swedish environment minister who chaired the Luxembourg meeting. “We expect to reach an agreement in Copenhagen,” he added, after environment ministers from 27 countries finalised a common EU negotiating position. But his optimism contrasted with the increasing doubts around the world enough time remains to deliver a binding agreement in Copenhagen. The EU also still has to settle disputes over the EU’s carbon trading scheme and how the developing world will be paid to cope with the impacts of global warming.

The EU negotiating position offers to slash greenhouse gas emissions by between 80-95% by 2050 and to deepen cuts from 20 to 30% by 2020 if other world powers sign up for similar action. The ministers said they also reached accord on tough action on deforestation and agreed that aviation would have to cut its emissions by 10% by 2020 compared with 2005 levels and shipping by 20%.

However, reluctance from the big players – the US, China, and India – to unveil targets or specific figures for a climate change pact, the EU was divided over tactics ahead of the UN conference in Copenhagen in December.

Germany and Italy were reluctant to name a figure publicly so early, believing this could weaken the European bargaining position.

“I’ve heard arguments about tactics,” said Stavros Dimas, the European commissioner for the environment. “But by telling the decision now, we encourage other countries to come with their proposals. We don’t gain anything by not reaching a decision.”

Britain, Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands supported this view, believing that Europe had more to gain from playing pioneer and seizing the leadership in the run-up to Copenhagen.

“Environment ministers are determined that the EU maintains its leadership position on climate change in order to promote an ambitious deal at Copenhagen,” said Ed Miliband, the UK energy and climate change secretary.

Carlgren said Warsaw’s proposal for changes to the ETS, which Poland thinks unfairly penalises its coal-dependent economy, was “unacceptable” to many members. Dimas added that without a breakthrough, there could be a “collapse” of the ETS, which the Europeans see as the vanguard of a potential worldwide carbon cap-and-trade system.

Leaders will meet at a summit in Brussels next week to hammer out the finances package for the developing countries, expected to total €15bn a year from the EU.

Despite today’s agreement, environmental campaigners denounced the EU accord as inadequate.

“The level of ambition demonstrated by environment ministers will not deliver a fair and just global climate agreement in Copenhagen,” said Sonja Meister, climate campaign coordinator for Friends of the Earth. “Europe must go much further than this and live up to its historical responsibilities by committing to cut emissions by 40% domestically by 2020.”

China has also over taken the United States for being the largest emitter of carbon dioxide on the planet.
Greenpeace said the top 10 companies, which provided almost 60% of China’s total electricity last year, burned 20% of China’s coal — 590m tonnes — and emitted the equivalent of 1.44 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide.

“China is suffering the pains of extreme weather events such as droughts, heat waves, typhoons and floods, worsened by climate change. These power companies can and must help China to prevent climate disaster by rapidly increasing efficiency and the share of renewable energy such as wind and solar,” said Yang Ailun, Greenpeace’s climate campaign manager, at the launch in Beijing of the Greenpeace report, Polluting Power: Ranking China’s Biggest Power Companies.

Greenpeace urged the Chinese government to impose energy and environment taxes on coal, encouraging increased efficiency and a move to renewable sources. It also called for a doubling of the national renewable energy target to 30% by 2020 and for stricter efficiency standards for coal-fired power stations.

The State Council, China’s cabinet, is currently drawing up plans for a massive “new energy” programme to cut emissions and ensure energy security. Reports in the domestic media and from foreign diplomats suggest the next decade could see between 1.4 trillion (US$200 bn) and 4.5 trillion yuan (US$600bn) investment in projects ranging from nuclear power, low carbon transport and clean coal technology to super-efficient electric grids.  Let’s see what happens!

At first it even seemed as though it might be a small project. In fact it started with a single fruit; an Asian pear my wife had brought home from the local oriental store. After eating the fruit, I found 8 seeds that looked just like apple seeds inside. “I should plant these” I thought to myself, “I’ve never seen an Asian pear tree before, so I wonder what it looks like.”  Then I bought a couple of mangos, and decided to grow them as well.  Now I have grown mangos from seeds before, though they won’t overwinter outside here, they make good potted trees to bring in during the winter as long as you keep them pruned. So I knew it was not only possible, but fairly easy to grow at least some trees from seeds.

To get started I bought about $20 worth of potting soil from the store (I still have more than half left) as well as a bag of popsicle sticks from the craft store.  I used the popsicle sticks to mark what kind of seed was planted in each pot. For the pots, I punched a hole in the bottom of some yogurt cups I had been saving just for seed planting. So I got to reuse the yogurt cups, and I got to reuse what few popsicle sticks I got from the popsicles I ate this year.  The rest of the popsicle sticks cost me around $2.50 at the craft store for a pack of 200. Then I simply went to work filling the pots with soil and dropping a seed in each one.  I didn’t do anything special to prepare the seeds, though it should be noted that if you’re impatient and want them to grow quickly after planting them, there are some seeds that you’ll want to refrigerate for up to 60 days before planting. For my project however, I am content to wait until winter turns my garage into a natural refrigerator.

I started out planting just 8 seeds, but every day I added between 3 and 15 more and the project quickly grew into something much bigger than I ever anticipated. Today, six of the eight original Asian pear seeds have sprouted and there are an additional 200+ planted seeds in my garage that I’m just waiting to come up.  I only live on a third of an acre property, but I am constantly finding new ways to work more trees into my property. I already have 10 fruit trees on my little sliver of land, and I have got 5 more on order in the fall. That’s in addition to the large willow and Japanese maple trees already growing here. So I expect to be able to work in a few more before the property gets tree-crowded, but it goes without saying that I won’t have room for all 200 if they all come up.

Even after the trees that do germinate begin to grow, it will still be several years before they begin bearing fruit. Then there’s no guarantee that they will all bear good fruit. While some trees like peach trees will generally grow true to their parent from seed, other trees like apple trees do not grow true to the parent, so it’s a toss-up whether you’ll get good fruit from it or not. That’s ok though because even if most of the resulting trees don’t produce good fruit, they’ll still produce fruit that the local wildlife will thrive on. Furthermore whether or not the trees produce any fruit at all, they will still flower, which provides food for pollinating insects and birds.

Some of you might be wondering what I’m going to do with hundreds of fruit trees that may or may not produce good fruit. Well the first thing I’ll do is offer free trees to all my neighbors in the neighborhood. After that I’ll place an ad offering free trees to anyone living within my zip code. If I still have trees left after that I’ll plant them on some undeveloped property near me. The reason I want these trees near me is that they’ll provide food for my bees, food for local wildlife, pretty flowers in the springtime, and for those trees that do bear good fruit, they will reduce the carbon footprint of the local food economy by bringing the food source closer to home for the people who eat the fruit. They will also help cushion the area against the effects of possible food shortages in the future.

Sometime around planting the 150th tree seed I decided that this was a full-scale major project and therefore it deserved a proper name. I dubbed this ‘The John Chapman Project’ in honor of John Chapman whom you may better recognize as Johnny Appleseed. I thought it only fitting since he did much the same thing as he wandered the countryside planting apple seeds wherever he went and starting several hundred apple orchards and having planted literally millions of apple trees. Though my project seems minuscule compared to his, and I intend to plant fruit tree seeds of all types, I still thought it fitting to pay homage to such a man after my own heart. By the way, there is an apple tree known to have been planted by Johnny Appleseed that’s still alive in an Ohio orchard.  It’s getting close to being 200 years old.

For now I will keep plugging away planting seed after seed, and in the next few years I hope to convince at least a few teachers to try a project like this with their classrooms. It is an excellent learning opportunity where you can teach the kids about American history via Johnny Appleseed, about botany, and about the environment and the sun or rain cycles, even about nutrition. I can think of no other classroom projects that would cost a total of under $20 and would tie into so many different lessons. Plus there is a high likelihood that many of the tree seedlings going home with the children will get planted somewhere because how can a parent bring themselves to destroy something their kid brings home and is proud of completing.  Even if nothing else were to come from it, the trees will help remove at least some of the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Apple Tree that is 3 years old below:

Asian Pear Trees Below:

In many countries where agriculture is difficult due to regional climate and other factors, fish is often a main staple in the diet of that region. Here in the USA, although we typically eat around 20 kilograms of fish a year, that is still not a major component of our diet. Most of the fish consumed in the US either comes from the ocean or commercial fish farms. But we have a vast and relatively untapped resource of fish in our freshwater lakes and rivers that can help supplement our diets and make up some of the shortfall in food. But to tap this resource, we need to do it in a much more eco-friendly manner than we have with other resources in the past.

To fish in a more eco-friendly manner, I propose we take a five-step approach to eco-fishing.

1. Pack out everything you pack in, and more… trash that is. Trash, specifically plastic or Styrofoam trash is clogging our lakes. It doesn’t take long to find a Styrofoam cooler lid that flew off someone else’s cooler while they were motoring along… or bait can lid, or a wrapper of some kind. So the number one rule of eco-fishing is to take out at least one piece of trash that wasn’t yours. It’s not hard and you’ll leave the lake, or ocean a better place for it.

2. Only keep fish from invasive or overpopulated species. Many lakes in the USA are overpopulated by certain types of fish which causes the stunting of growth of all species of fish. Most commonly this will be Bluegill. Also invasive species of fish such as regular Carp, Drum, or that new Asian Silver Carp. These fish have no natural predators in the area and consume so much of the waterway’s food that native fish are often displaced.

3. Use every part of the fish you keep. This doesn’t mean you have to learn how to make sewing needles out of the bones, but if you’re not going to eat it, bury it in the garden. Decomposing fish give off vital nutrients that plants just love, so unless you have dogs in the area, don’t even worry about burying them more than a foot deep. You want them to be shallow enough for the plant roots of whatever is planted over them to reach the remains. Then you won’t have to worry about amending the soil they are buried under with nutrients for about 5 years.

4. If you use a boat make sure it’s properly maintained so that you’re not dumping any gas or oil overboard.

5. Use 100% lead-free tackle.

If we are all mindful enough to remember these five steps then we’ll leave our waterways healthier, we’ll have some delicious extra food, and we’ll have fun with the whole family.

German representatives of environmental groups yesterday widely welcomed the news that big businesses were prepared to give the project a backbone for the first time.

“Businesses have finally recognised that renewable energies belong to the future, and in times of economic crisis this also sends out an important signal for economic growth,” said Andree Bohling of Greenpeace.

Torsten Jeworrek, board member of Munich Re, the German re-insurer which is leading the project, said: “We want to found an initiative which over the next two to three years will put concrete measures on the table.” The 400 billion euro investment would be enough to cover 15% of Europe’s electricity requirements, according to Jeworrek.  He added “in technical terms this project can be realised” but stressed in order for it to be sustainable it would have to finance itself in the long-run and be competitive within 10 to 15 years.

We had a superb crop of peas which quickly outgrew our appetites. The pea plants grew to over 3 ft tall.  The peas were allowed to mature until they almost looked like they were drying out and the plants stopped flowering. To pick peas I find the easiest way is to pull up the vine and pick the pods off the vines. Once the vines have been picked they go to the compost bin. Once in the bin the vines are chopped up with hedge clippers to speed decomposition into garden compost for our organic gardens.

After picking comes the shelling. I like to use a knife which I insert along the spine of the pea pod. This cuts the connection between the spine of the pod and the pea. When I break the pod open and the fat green peas drop freely into a container. I find this easier than trying to break open the pods and scrape out the peas.

Once I finished shelling the peas I ended up with about 3.5 pounds of green peas. I decided to can these peas using a recipe from the Ball Corporations canning recipe site. The recipe requires pressure canning for 40 minutes at 10 pounds. Below is a photo of my canned peas and carrots with chives (ingredients are simply peas, carrots, a teaspoon of clipped chives and a half teaspoon of salt.)

In this effort I canned six pints of peas and carrots. I used my little pressure cooker and it’s matching canning kit. Since my pressure cooker can only hold 4 pints I had to do two batches at 40 minute each. At some point in the future I will upgrade to a multiple quart pressure canner which will allow better efficiency. Even though I had to cook two batches, which is inefficient, the nice thing about canned food is that once the process is over the food sits on the shelf consuming no more energy. On top of that, the jars are re-useable. The only items not re-useable are the sealing lids.

Interested in canning? You may want to know what the least expensive way is to begin canning. Boiling water bath canning is least expensive. A boiling water bath canning set can be purchased for less than $50. Of course used equipment could be purchased much less expensively. What can be preserved using the boiling water bath method? Here is a handy reference chart from the USDA’s Principles of Home Canning.

The chart shows that Alkali or low acid foods like meat, fish, green beans, peas, carrots or mushrooms must be canned with a pressure cooker. The results are fantastic. But the results from using the boiling water bath method of canning are equally good when used with high acid foods. I plan to have a cupboard full of jellies, jams, pickles and tomatoes…all of which can be canned using the boiling water bath method. Interested in pressure canning? A pressure canning set will cost about $100 or more if it is large enough to process multiple quarts of food.

With both a water bath and pressure canner you will be able to can almost any food. Everyone should learn to preserve fresh fruits and vegetables. Canning is one method of preserving food which is environmentally sound and makes use of the bounty of a harvest which might otherwise go to waste. Could there be anything more wholesome, educational and environmentally friendly than raising and then preserving food? Just think…food that begins in your backyard garden and travels a short distance to your kitchen cupboard; food on your table from your garden all year round.

Check out more organic gardening tips at http://www.redbayfarm.com or to chat directly with CarolinaJim, go to our Green Forum at http://www.greenearthfriend.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=586

Happy canning everyone!

The Recovery Act was signed into law by President Obama on February 17th, 2009. It is an unprecedented effort to jump start our economy, create or save millions of jobs, and put a down payment on addressing long-neglected challenges so our country can thrive in the 21st century. The Act is an extraordinary response to a crisis unlike any since the Great Depression, and includes measures to modernize our nation’s infrastructure, enhance energy independence, expand educational opportunities, preserve and improve affordable health care, provide tax relief, and protect those in greatest need. Learn more on recovery.gov.

Implementing the Recovery Act

The Recovery Act specifically includes $7.22 billion for projects and programs administered by EPA. These programs will protect and promote both “green” jobs and a healthier environment. These environmental areas include:

• Clean Water State Revolving Fund and Drinking Water State Revolving Fund:$4 billion for assistance to help communities with water quality and wastewater infrastructure needs and $2 billion for drinking water infrastructure needs. A portion of the funding will be targeted toward green infrastructure, water and energy efficiency, and environmentally innovative projects. View general information about the Clean Water State Revolving Fund and the Drinking Water State Revolving fund
• Brownfields:$100 million for competitive grants to evaluate and clean up former industrial and commercial sites. View general information about the Brownfields program.
• Diesel Emissions Reduction: $300 million for grants and loans to help regional, state and local governments, tribal agencies, and non-profit organizations with projects that reduce diesel emissions. View general information about diesel emissions reductions achieved through the National Clean Diesel Campaign.
• Superfund Hazardous Waste Cleanup: $600 million for the cleanup of hazardous sites. View general information about the Superfund program.
• Leaking Underground Storage Tanks: $200 million for cleanup of petroleum leaks from underground storage tanks. View general information about the underground storage tank program.

The new law is geared for performance and unprecedented transparency. EPA plans to award both the designated funds to states and the competitive grants as quickly as possible. All funding will be monitored by the agency’s Inspector General, which will receive $20 million for oversight and review. Announcements of grants will be posted on recovery.gov to ensure transparency.

Learn more about EPA programs that implement the Recovery Act, and about the major actions EPA has taken to implement the Act.