Wildflower Stew

We’ve all heard the doomsday scenarios for what happens when you reach “Peak Oil” which is a term for the time when world oil production reaches it’s all time peak and begins to decline forever. In one country this has happened already. After the collapse of the Soviet Union and it’s subsidies to the Cuban economy, oil imports were cut by more than half and food by 80 percent.

A brief rundown on Cuba and how it got to be this way: Cuba in the 1950s had been run by the military dictator, Batista, who wanted to make the most out of Havana’s reputation for race tracks, night clubs and casinos. The Cuban rich were getting richer off the deal but the poor, as usual, were just getting poorer so there was a revolution led by the Castro brothers and Che Guevara.

The new regime tended more toward the communist style of governing and in 1960 established diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. After the disasterous Bay of Pigs invasion and the almost catastrophic Cuban Missile Crisis, the US began an embargo against Cuba that left that nation in serious need of food and basic necessities.

The Cuban people were mobilized and worked hard and their survival was mostly due to their own efforts during this time. They invested heavily in growing sugar cane for export using fossil fuels obtained from the Soviets. Then in 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed and their economic subsidies to Cuba of $6 billion/year vanished overnight. Not long after that the US added to the embargo by prohibiting trading, travel and family remittances to Cuba. This eliminated 70% of Cuba’s food and medicine imports. The Cubans now refer to this time as “The Special Period.” The average Cuban lost 20 lbs. during this special period.

In a new documentary, Power of Community, Cubans share how they survived the transition from a highly fossil fuel dependent, mechanized, agricultural system to one using organic methods of farming and local, urban gardens. Today, half of all the food consumed in the city of Havana is grown in within the city limits of Havana. Cuba is the only country that has faced what all of us are going to have to deal with eventually - a massive reduction in our use of fossil fuels. This is a surprising and inspiring story. See the 2 minute trailer below and then go to their website http://www.powerofcommunity.org/cm/index.php for screening and ordering information.

If another world is possible, this is the one I want to work for.

Global Exchange, is a membership-based international human rights organization dedicated to promoting social, economic and environmental justice. Under their “war, peace & democracy” section is a wide choice of ways to get active. I just signed the Declaration of Peace

Friday, September 21 is the International Day of Peace. Declare peace through public signings of the Declaration of Peace and other nonviolent actions from Friday, September 14 through Friday, September 21. October 21-23 will be the No War, No Warming campaign and on October 27 the National Antiwar Mobilizations, ten mass demonstrations around the country. For the latest news on these actions you can go to http://www.unitedforpeace.org/

In September, Congress will vote on a request from the Bush administration for an additional $142 billion for the war, giving him enough money to continue the war at least another year costing (at current casualty rates) another 1,084 American lives and who knows how many thousands Iraqis. 70 members of Congress have already pledged to stop funding the war by signing on to a letter sent to the president on July 19th by Representatives Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee, and Maxine Waters. Go here to find out if your representative has signed and, if not, to send an email demanding that Congress fund only the safe, orderly and immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops and military contractors from Iraq. If your representative has signed send a thank-you letter here.

The lively , Code Pink, Women for Peace, have a pre-emptive strike for peace on their website. You can sign on to the Promote Peace with Iran - Stop the Next War Now! petition and then check out their colorful and efficient site for other ways to promote peace.

Military Families Speak Out is an organization of people opposed to the war in Iraq who have relatives or loved ones currently in the military or who have served in the military since the buildup to the Iraq war. I have been a member of this organization and these are some of the most kind, caring, dedicated people I have ever met. If you have family members or loved ones in the military and you are opposed to this war, you may join us by sending an e-mail to mfso@mfso.org and go to their website at http://mfso.org for activist opportunities.

Peace.

The Aransas National Wildlife Refuge near San Antonio Bay on the Texas coast is the only wintering ground for the world’s 236 remaining whooping cranes. Now the Army Corps of Engineers is considering a development permit for that area, which has been designated as Critical Habitat under the Endangered Species Act. The development threatens the birds’ already fragile existence. Please take a moment to sign a letter urging the Corps to reject the permit application.
http://action.wilderness.org/campaign/texas_cranes/86in3suzhbdnnn7?

Hurricanes and other natural disasters can bring chaos to coastal regions, and many people find themselves homeless and separated from their families, including many children. Habitat for Humanity is dedicated to helping those in need obtain decent affordable homes. Sign this petition to the US Senate to improve the post-disaster housing support that’s critical for low-income families and their children.
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/301943234?z00m=9456232

Your senators and representatives have the opportunity to help clean up contaminated beaches and to make sure sources of beach pollution are identified and addressed. Urge them to co-sponsor the Beach Protection Act.
http://www.nrdconline.org/campaign/nrdcaction_080607

Speaking of beaches, here are some surfers talking about the state of the ocean these days:

That’s really gross. But then consider this - there’s a proper place for everything:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlIOI3fDz5c

Or - as Texas populist Jim Hightower is fond of saying “money is like manure, you have to spread it around.”

It was gone! Just the raw wound of a recently amputated tree left where once a whole microcosm had lived. I had celebrated the birth of this little tree, rising up from the roots of the old one at the end of a long sad winter, when one morning I looked out the little window in my urban apartment bedroom and saw the hopeful green shoots reaching up for the light.

I watched as it shot up to over 6 feet, as birds and insects came, as it filled out and shook its leaves in the wind and the rain and gladdened my eyes.

This morning - gone. Clear cut. No more.

I suppose it was getting in the way of the alley traffic, interfering with commerce, so to speak. But no one asked me! I feel like I’ve been robbed. Who took my tree!?

This is a new action post that I hope to be able to put up here once a week or so. I am a petition signer. One of the quickest ways almost anyone can make a difference is to join up with other people to petition for the things we want to see happen. I’m going to give a quick write-up and a link to the petitions. If you only have a few moments, you can still help make a big difference. I have seen many good things happen because enough people took a minute to sign a petition for something they believed in.

The first one on today’s list is The Clean Water Restoration Act. Unfortunately we have to petition to restore safeguards that have long been in place but have been disregarded. Sixty percent of our water is now in jeopardy. This petition is an opportunity to ask your representative in Congress to co-sponsor this act. On the Earth Justice petitions after you sign one of them, all you have to do is put in your email address to sign another.
http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/CWRA_CoSponsor_July_2007

The next one is another Earth Justice campaign. Typical of the Bush administration the Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed a “recovery plan” for the northern spotted owl that would actually increase logging by weakening protections for salmon, clean water and old-growth forest ecosystems.
http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/Owl_Recovery_August_2007

On August 9, a cloud of the fumigant metam sodium drifted over two Kern County, California businesses, sickening eleven workers with vomiting and dizziness. Metam sodium is an acutely toxic fumigant pesticide, a carcinogen, and linked to developmental problems. It is being reviewed by both the EPA and the California Department of Pesticide Regulation. Public health advocates say fumigants contribute to smog and pose such high risk of respiratory illness that they should be phased out as quickly as possible. To demand the EPA protect people from fumigant pesticides sign this Pesticide Action Network petition:
http://action.panna.org/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=693

Many farm workers must labor outdoors in unhealthy conditions. But for some the exposure does not stop there. After completing a 10 to 12 hour work day, too many San Joaquin Valley farm workers go home and live in some of the most heavily polluted areas in the country. The small farm worker town of Arvin lies in a rich agricultural area filled with vineyards and orange groves. It also has the dubious distinction of being the town with the most polluted air in America. You can sign this United Farm Workers petition to help ensure the air in this town is cleaned up.
http://www.ufwaction.org/campaign/smog/swwn874435b8ek?

Finally you may, if you wish, go to this delightful site and join the movement - for free - to support organic dairies. Power to the people - and the critters, too.

I lay in my bed facing the window
The storm was not in the sky
  or somewhere over there
It was right on top of me and all around

The roar of light and energy from the
    lightning flashes shook my senses
       and my body

I was protected from the waves of rain
    sweeping across the land
     outside my window
but not the force of the
       bone rattling
       vision blinding
       heaven opening up
cataclysmic pulsing and crackling and booming
       of the thunder and lightning
           crashing around me

I could only pull the covers
    up to my chin and wait it out,
Eyes big, until the gods
tired of their terrifying game and moved on

Living in the modern world doesn’t change
that primal fear and maybe that’s
why I find it reassuring
when nature has her way.

R Swan
5/3/07
 

When I moved to Austin a year ago, this place was bone dry, deep into a years-long drought. The crispy brown weeds fried under the relentless sun of hundred degree days clear through September into October. It didn’t really start cooling down until late November. Winter was mild, and wet. Then the spring came, and the rains. And it rained and it rained . . . and it rained.

This is now officially the most rain that has ever fallen for this time of year here - ever. The high temperature each day is in the 80s, sometimes only the 70s. Needless to say, there’s been lots of flooding. Last year’s crispy brown weeds are 6 foot tall small trees now. Lawn mowers are useless. The ground is mucky, the vegetation jungle-thick, the snakes are coming up from the flooded creek bottoms and roaming the neighborhoods terrorizing dogs and the parents of small children.

Is this the same place? Just one state over, in New Mexico, the drought persists. No rain. There is flooding in the Midwest, too, and England is experiencing more rain than ever, which is an awful thought. It’s like Seattle getting extra rain. What does this mean?

Global warming doesn’t translate neatly into higher temperatures and that’s it. The earth is a dynamic interaction of many forces and when one thing changes, it all shifts. Climate chaos would be a better term. It’s more like - we’ve upset the balance and now there’s hell to pay.

If nothing else, these extreme weather events should get people’s attention on the fact that we have a serious problem and we need to do something about it. It has to go beyond disaster relief into future disaster prevention. The healing begins at whatever point is accessible to you. Today.

I would like to make a couple of suggestions that almost anyone can do, wherever you are, to begin to help heal the planet. Personally, I think it is important to physically touch the earth and touch the plants that grow the food we eat. I believe this helps to realign our energy with the life force that sustains us. However you feel about that, we all have to eat and all of us eat food that comes from the earth. This is a good place to start.

Picking an apple right off the tree and eating it is a different act than picking it from a grocery store bin and taking it home and eating it. Most children these days don’t know what the plant or tree that gives them food looks like. You can make a big difference in a child’s life by helping them grow plants that give them food or taking them to a pick-your-own farm or to your neighbor’s garden. You can find local farms and CSAs by going to Local Harvest http://www.localharvest.org/

Another easy thing you can do to prevent future disasters and help heal the planet is to look at what you have inside your own house. Indoor air pollution from cleaning products is real and it’s serious. There are studies that show that chemicals found in cleaners interfere with the development of neurological, endocrine and immune systems in children, trigger asthma (duh), cause changes in sexual behavior, decrease fertility, cause menstrual changes, changes in the onset of puberty, cancers of reproductive organs, miscarriages, and premature births. I kid you not. We have enough to deal with outside without doing ourselves in when we come home.

Air fresheners are some of the worst offenders. They have fragrances carried by phthalates which aggravate asthma and are linked to reproductive harm and they also contain such lovely VOCs as benzene and formaldehyde. All that just to make the air smell artificially “fresh”? A good article with a list of cleaners containing dangerous chemicals was published recently in Common Dreams: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/24/2740/

One thing I noticed when I got rid of my toxic cleaning products was the money I didn’t spend on them any more. I began using unscented dish soap and hot water to clean glass, borax in place of powdered cleansers, hydrogen peroxide instead of bleach, and baking soda in hotwater to clean just about anything. If you want a scent put a few drops of your favorite essential oil in the water as you clean. Now my house is clean, sanitary and non-polluting - to me or the environment.

The chemicals in laundry detergents can be found in 70% of North American streams according to the US Geological Survey. Those chemicals are killing the fish. I like to eat fish. I use non-polluting laundry detergent. I use about half the recommended amount and add borax, which is very inexpensive, to it. I don’t have to kill fish to get my clothes clean. And I don’t have to give my grandson an asthma attack to get the bathroom clean. For more information on safe cleaning alternatives go to

http://www.womenandenvironment.org/

In the search for safe, sane ways to control bugs of all kinds that I didn’t want in my house or my yard or my garden, I’ve discovered and tried and heard about a lot of alternatives.   Since this is the season here’s a quick rundown.

Some things are quick, some things take longer, some require an adjustment in lifestyle. There is nothing faster than “just nuke ‘em,” but there is nothing more disasterous for our bodies and our planet. Becoming conscious of our interaction with the natural world - on the microcosm level of ants and aphids - can be just as much a meditation on living in harmony with all living beings as saving a whale.

Becoming aware of our own actions in relation to the insect world is first. For example, if you don’t want mosquitos around you, don’t leave inviting habitats for them to breed in. Empty out standing pools of water and if you can’t empty something, pour a little cooking oil in it. No kidding. We used to do this in the stock tanks on the ranch where I grew up. Just a half a cup in a big stock tank would make the water oily enough the mosquitos couldn’t breed and it didn’t hurt the animals at all. Keep grass and weeds mowed and use natural repellants like eucalyptus on your skin. Avon’s “Skin So Soft” is a great mosquito repellent for some strange reason if you don’t want to smell like camphor candles (which work, too, if you can stand them).

One of the toughest things to deal with where I live in Texas is fire ants. Persistence is the key. Pouring hot soapy water down the hole is the best method I know of. You might have to do it more than once. They tend to vacate that mound only to pop up a few yards away but eventually you can get rid of them. Never let them get out of control. They can be vicious. The poisons don’t work much better than the hot water from what I’ve seen. They’re just dangerous and expensive.

Vigilance is important in dealing with wasps and hornets, also. Knocking the nests down as soon as you find one and destroying it by burning or burying it is the best way to control them. Just use a long pole, be quick on your feet and don’t get stung. It’s way better to get to the nests while they are small.

The best one-on-one bug killer I know is hair spray (non-aerosol). It glues their breathing holes together and they croak on the spot. Works on roaches, ants, wasps, flies, anything that can fly into your space. This is not a practical approach for a garden but it’s sure handy around the house.

Garlic is a good all purpose insect repellant. It will even keep mosquitos off most people (eat it or rub it on your skin - either way works). Cayenne pepper works in the garden for a lot of pests. The most important thing is to find what works for you, in your location, with the bugs that populate your area.

The safest and most effective weed killers, in my experience are spraying vinegar mixed with water and direct applications of salt, plain old table salt. It works great.

Here are some good sources that I have turned to for advice:

The Natural Gardener has lots of stuff about gardening in central Texas but it also has good tips that would work anywhere with sections like Critter Deterrent Techniques and Recipes, Lawn Problems Guide, Recipe to Kill Poison Ivy and Soap and Pepper Spray Recipes. It also has a good section on how to beat grasshoppers at their game, how to tell the caterpillar of beautiful butterflies from those that just eat up your plants and how to outfox the pernicious squash borer. A wealth of good information!

If you are seriously into causing maximum bug deaths by natural means you’ve got to check out the Dirt Doctor. He has an very informative website and a lively forum.

The product sold by Safe Solutions is an enzyme formula which not only controls insects but also bacteria, mold and viruses. I have not used this product myself but I have heard from others that it is very effective, especially for household use.
Beyond Pesticides is a national coalition against the misuse of pesticides. The site includes a database with a very complete list of all pesticides and the health and environmental effects, regulatory status, supporting information and key studies. It’s very professional and very scarey. The home page has a daily news blog, alerts and actions and a quick pest problem solving service. Also there’s a section on what to do in case of emergencies.
 

Herp Care Collection is a small, straight-forward site that was put together for people who keep snakes, iguanas and such for pets. It has a very complete list of other websites with safe pesticide information and has some excellent remedies.
 

I subscribe to the Pesticide Action Network newsletter which is an update on pesticides, health and alternatives. The website includes a pesticide database, a pest advisor and lots of helpful hints including some very creative ways of getting rid of ants.
 

The collaborative on health and the environment has a database that provides links between chemical contaminants and approximately 180 human diseases or conditions.
 

If lawns are your thing, Safe Lawns is the place to go for a beautiful, non toxic yard. 
 

And here’s some great news: The Connecticut Senate voted overwhelmingly to ban (yes - ban!) pesticides on lawns in all K-8 schools. Good for them and good for the children they are protecting!