The polluting of the Gulf of Mexico by the still-spewing oil disaster is just the latest of our assaults on the region. Did you know that for part of every year, the area near the Mississippi River delta has been so poisoned by agricultural and industrial contaminants that it is literally called the Dead Zone? And that was BEFORE the recent spill. There are hundreds of Dead Zones around the world that ebb and flow with the seasons, but this may set a record as a Dead Gulf. What can you do? Choose organic food as often as you possibly can. Plant a fruit tree, grow some tomatoes in a pot – join the growing crowd of urban farmers who are starting to take back the ancient human art of growing food.
You may recall the term “gleaning” from your Sunday school or temple classes. Gleaning means going out into the fields after the reapers have harvested the crop, and picking up grain or produce that was left behind. Biblical growers would sometimes leave extra on purpose, so that their poorer neighbors would not go hungry. Nowadays, gleaning is back, as kindly folks let groups like Second Harvest come to their land to collect apples and other foods that would otherwise go to waste. Marin Organics, an association of organic producers and businesses, has a gleaning program that in 2009 collected 200 boxes of carrots, greens, potatoes, and strawberries which were donated to schools and needy families.
[news from the Marin organic newsletter 4/16/10; website at marinorganic.com]
No, not the bookstore – the edges around farm fields. Organic and sustainable farmers have long known the value of hedgerows around fields – they allow habitat for wildlife, improve water quality, and offer homes for pollinators. Recent food safety scares have caused some places to blame hedgerows, but we think that’s like blaming the rooster for sunrise. Food safety comes with fewer toxins, better inspections, and cleaning up the meat supply. (FYI: I don’t eat meat myself, and you might not either if you knew about the cruelty and filth involved). Anyway, we congratulate the Wild Farm Alliance for encouraging border planting on farms.
Farmers, ranchers, commercial fishermen, and Native Americans had been contending, sometimes bitterly, over the Klamath River and its dams for years. But during the last few years, courageous individuals from these groups have reached out to each other to find ways to cooperate. The Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement was reached in 2008, and an agreement to take down four dams was reached a few months ago. To anyone who thinks adversaries can never get along, I strongly encourage you to read this story. For the full article (by Jacques Leslie in the Spring, 2010 issue of Earth Island Institute), go to www.earthislandinstitute.net.
Did you know that “more than 6 million tons of food products are dumped annually” in California? According to an article in the SF Chronicle, restaurants, farms, and grocery stores have the chance to make a positive impact opposed to a negative one. Read the full article “Vast Amounts of Food Trashed Despite Incentives”.
Restaurants can do more by participating in food-donation programs since less then 1,000 of the 90,000 restaurants do. Grocery chains and restaurants have the opportunity to compost their leftover food, donate to food banks, or participate in some sort of hunger-relief program. “Costco sends about 45 million lbs. of food each year to the compost”!!! In addition, “Albertson’s Inc. was the first food chain to start a formal perishable-food-recovery program.” Yes, there is the fear that the company will be liable for bad food, but the federal law in 1996 “protects all donations made in good faith.” Imagine the impact if more grocery chains participated!
Don’t forget that you can make a difference to by composting your leftover food or take action by volunteering at a local soup kitchen and find an organization nearby where you can help farmers “’reharvest’ California’s vast produce landscape and divert edible food to food banks and soup kitchens.” As Mike O’Leary of Boskovich Farms put it, “Waste is inevitable.” But we need to work together on this to minimize this.
To read more about food waste in California and to view a video on donations, go to www.californiawatch.org.
How important is it to keep plastic out of the environment? A few weeks ago, the Marine Mammal Center learned that a gray whale carcass was floating in San Francisco Bay. Though the MMC exists primarily to rescue and release living animals, Center scientists rushed to the scene to examine the dead whale, to try to discover what killed it. Results of toxicology tests are pending; scientists also found trash and other plastic in the whale’s stomach. We know that birds and other animals have died because of swallowing or getting tangled in plastic. MMC’s news story concludes, “This finding of trash deep inside the belly of a whale serves as an Earth Day reminder that we are all connected to the ocean. By helping to reduce our use of plastics and to properly dispose of those plastics, we can indeed make a difference in the health of the ocean and the creatures that live within its waters. Learn more about how you can help and about The Marine Mammal Center “Save Our Seals. Save Ourselves.“
The carcass of a 37-foot-long juvenile Gray whale washed up in the SF Bay on April 21. © The Marine Mammal Center
