Minneapolis – Page 2 – Health4earth

Why are bees dying at an alarming rate?

Add plants bees love to your yard! — Add plants bees and butterflies love to your yard!

Bees have been a worry to me all summer. They haven’t been feeding on the plants that are usually loaded with bees. Wild geranium, Culver’s Root, chives and a flowering maple they usually are passionate about have been lacking bees.

Bees love bee balm and anise hysopp, but this year not so many bees. — Bees love bee balm and hyssop, but this year not so many bees.

In August with the blooming hyssop, cone flowers and golden rod the bees are here, but not in the typical numbers for this time of year.

We must do better to make sure our yards have flowers pollinators love and avoid all chemicals. It frightens me that some of the plants we purchase are still laden with heavy chemicals and neonicotinoids. I wonder how all these chemicals are going to affect human health? How is neonicotinoid farm run-off going to affect aquatic life?

A study below by the US Geological Survey finds neonicotinoids in our water ways. Here is the link: http://m.ktvz.com/news/Insecticide-found-in-half-of-sampled-U-S-streams/34779418

MINNEAPOLIS TAKES ACTION TO PROTECT POLLINATORS AS A POLLINATOR-FRIENDLY CITY

The City of Minneapolis urges all Minneapolis property owners, residents, businesses, institutions and neighborhoods to become more pollinator friendly by adopting practices including:

Committing to not use pesticides, including insecticides that stay in the plant, on their properties.
Avoiding planting flowering plants that are treated with insecticides that stay in the plant.
Discontinuing the sale of pesticides and plants that are treated with insecticides that stay in the plant.
Planting more pollinator forage on their property and using organic or chemical-free lawn and landscaping practices.

Here is the link: http://www.minneapolismn.gov/news/WCMS1P-147750 Unfortunately, Minnesota has ridiculous preemption laws, and a city can’t make rules stronger than existing state legislation

Morning Earth Healing Images 8.28.2015

Golden rod picture by John Cady — Golden Rod picture by John Cady

Pollinator Heaven

Hummingbirds and bees love our Minneapolis yard !

Monarchs are crazy about Liatris!

Life in an Urban Garden

Spiderwort are blooming — Spider-wort are blooming

Everything is green and lush. Everyone loves their yard in June. Whether you have a grass turf yard or native plants, urban yards are beautiful. How can you create a vibrant living landscape with a more friendly tilt to pollinators?

I watch the monarch butterflies and the swallow tiger tail and hope they leaving eggs as

they flit around. The painted lady butterflies have deposited egg fuzz on the pearly everlasting making them look wilted and sick. In just a short time the caterpillars will emerge and the pearlys will be normal and healthy. Hopefully, the cycle will continue and new butterflies will live long enough to plant more eggs. Birds eat these butterflies.

The native Canada Anemone is blooming now!

The columbine and the wild geranium have almost completed their blooms, but the Canada Anemone and the spider-wort are magnificent!

We are digging our rain gardens deeper and wider. Then we plant blazing star, cardinal-flower, and turtle head to the bottom of these rain capturing gardens. The butterflies, bees and hummingbirds will love these new additions.

See the article below for ways you can create a vibrant living landscape with a more friendly tilt to pollinators: http://www.startribune.com/planting-with-pollinators-in-mind/306646301/

Minneapolis Ban on Styrofoam Food Containers Begins

Styrofoam I pulled from Lake Harriet in Minneapolis. It is breaking into small pieces and could last forever!

I am happy, it is Earth Day, and I am very happy that the city of Minneapolis took a bold stand on Styrofoam containers. Congratulations to Minneapolis for banning Styrofoam “To Go” containers. The ban begins on Earth Day, April 22, 2015.
Minneapolis is a city of many lakes, many creeks, and the Mississippi River. Materials like plastic and Styrofoam break into tiny pieces and could exist for hundreds of years in these water bodies.

“It’s estimated that 10 million Styrofoam containers are thrown away in Minnesota each year. Styrofoam is not impossible to recycle, but is difficult to clean and far costlier to recycle than other, more sustainable containers. Styrofoam also contains potentially cancer-causing chemicals that leach into food, especially when heated.” City Pages
http://blogs.citypages.com/food/2014/05/styrofoam_officially_banned_in_minneapolis.php

http://www.kare11.com/story/news/local/2014/05/23/minneapolis-approves-ban-on-styrofoam-cups-containers/9513939/

http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2015/04/22/mpls-businesses-brace-for-styrofoam-container-ban/

Zero Waste, Is it Possible?

Bulk purchasing exactly the amount needed for zerowaste — Bulk purchasing exactly the amount needed for zero waste

I have just spent the morning in a seminar learning about the new organic compost program in Minneapolis. With an obsession for reducing trash I work on this daily, but just can’t see how to get to zero waste. We purchase in bulk using compostable paper bags, and refill every bottle with items that are available.
One woman, Bea Johnson, has been able to accomplish zero waste. What is the most amazing of all, she and her husband have two sons!

Here are Bea Johnson’s 10 easy steps to zero waste living:

Some co-ops have fabulous selections of soaps and lotions for bottle refills.

Refuse

Fight junk mail. It’s not just a waste of resources, but also of time. Register to receive less at org,optoutprescreen.org and catalogchoice.org.
Turn down freebies from conferences, fairs and parties. Every time you take one, you create a demand to make more. Do you really need another “free” pen?

Reduce

Declutter your home, and donate to your local thrift shop. You’ll lighten your load and make precious resources available to those looking to buy secondhand.
Reduce your shopping trips and keep a shopping list. The less you bring home, the less waste you’ll have to deal with.

Reuse

Swap disposables for reusables (start using handkerchiefs, refillable bottles, shopping totes, cloth napkins, rags, etc.). You might find that you don’t miss your paper towels, but rather enjoy the savings
Avoid grocery shopping waste: Bring reusable totes, cloth bags (for bulk aisles), and jars (for wet items like cheese and deli foods) to the store and farmers market.

Recycle

Know your city’s recycling policies and locations—but think of recycling as a last resort. Have you refused, reduced or reused first? Question the need and life-cycle of your purchases. Shopping is voting.
Buy primarily in bulk or secondhand, but if you must buy new, choose glass, metal or cardboard.Avoid plastic: Much of it gets shipped across the world for recycling and often ends up in the landfill (or worse yet, the ocean).

Rot

Find a compost system that works for your home and get to know what it will digest (dryer lint, hair, and nails are all compostable).

Turn your home kitchen trash can into one large compost receptacle. The bigger the compost receptacle, the more likely you’ll be to use it freely.

http://ecowatch.com/2015/03/10/bea-johnsoon-zero-waste-guru/

What do you do to reduce your waste?

Please Keep Leaves Out of the Street

Please Keep our Water Healthy

It has been a marvelous fall for both colors and weather, and now the clean up of falling leaves begins. Please DO NOT put your leaves in the street. It is hard work bagging up leaves, but leaves washing down the into the storm drains pollute the lakes and streams. Help keep the water we have as clean as we can. Many would give a lot to have our colorful leaves, lakes, and clean water! Also, leaves and trash can plug the drainage systems so the water will not drain from our streets.

Below is the City of Minneapolis Code on leaves:

Minneapolis Code of Ordinances, Title 17:

427.270. – Leaves, grass on streets.

No person shall leave, or cause to be placed, any leaves, grass clippings or other organic debris on or along any public street or alley. (Code 1960, As Amend., § 583.380; Ord. of 6-14-74, § 1)

https://www.municode.com/library/mn/minneapolis/codes/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=COOR_TIT17STSI_CH427INGE_427.270LEGRST

Protecting Birds and Building a New Stadium

Call the Vikings and tell them to install bird safety glass. 952-828 6500, or http://www.vikings.com/footer/contact-us.html and call Gov. Dayton 651 201 3400.

Our bees, butterflies and birds are in serious decline. We all should reduce our footprint to protect our wildlife. This also means businesses and the Minnesota Vikings! In Minnesota we are having a debate over whether the Minnesota Vikings should place bird protective glass on the new stadium being built. This stadium is near the Mississippi River, a major migration flyway. And…it is a publicly funded stadium, one-third being paid for by the citizens of Minneapolis. To be a good corporate citizen the Vikings need to follow state laws(safety glass), and positively contribute to the environment where they reside.
The Star Tribune, Minnesota’s largest newspaper editorialized that in the big scheme of things, it was not a big deal to protect these birds…WOW! http://www.startribune.com/opinion/editorials/279625602.html “Keep Bird Deaths in Perspective” I consider the Vikings actions and the editorial board both hitting a new low! In my perspective 1 million for protective glass is minimal when a billion dollars is being spent and large portion is a public hand-out!!

This is the counter argument from Audubon:

As stewards, we are responsible for our impact on the Earth’s well-being, and it is precisely the logic presented in this editorial that is putting our vital ecosystems in trouble. We know that it is not a single deforestation event, a single oil spill or a single storm that leads to significant decline of bird species, but rather the effect of multiple factors over time. The good news is that the same way our cumulative actions can stress and degrade the environment, our individual actions can lead to its protection and recovery. Take the bald eagle, for example, or bluebirds.

Migratory birds are legally protected because they play a pivotal role, pollinating plants and controlling insect populations. One bird can eat 500 pests per day, reducing the need for toxic pesticides. Disarmingly, their populations are not constant; they are decreasing because of human activities, including glass buildings. Research shows that many once-common species have had a 50 percent reduction in just the last 50 years.

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/279846202.html

Video,”Change the Glass Now” http:youtube.com/watch?v=ngvN7oHhHwY

What can you do?

1. Call the Vikings and tell them to install bird safety glass. 952-828 6500, or http://www.vikings.com/footer/contact-us.html and call Gov. Dayton 651 201 3400.

2. Reduce the chemicals you use in your yard, and plant bird friendly plants like cone flowers, little blue stem grass, cup plant, and Joe Pye Weed. These are just a few ideas that are easy to grow and birds love these plants.

3. Leave your car at home or carpool at least one day a week to reduce pollution.

4. Reduce plastic consumption and recycle all plastic bags.

Community facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/birdsafestadium

Cone flowers: Easy to grow, and loved by birds!

Record Cold and Record Heat

Minneapolis will probably set a record cold for this week’s temperatures, and British Columbia and the Arctic might set record heat records.

When I travel, people often say, “Minnesota, it is really cold there!” This week’s cold spell during the All-Star Game is going to reinforce those beliefs. Usually this is the hottest week of the year in Minnesota with average highs in the 80s F.

As someone who loves outdoor activity, I love cooler temperatures, but what is scary is the record heat in British Columbia and the Arctic.

From Minnesota Public Radio: As Minnesota shivers today in record July cold, western Canada is baking, and literally burning up in record heat.

This unprecedented “high amplitude” jet stream pattern is producing record cold and record heat at close range within North America.

Temperatures reached 105 degrees Sunday in parts of British Columbia. At least 20 weather stations across western Canada set high temperature records Sunday.

http://blogs.mprnews.org/updraft/ Get the entire story from Paul Huttner at MPR

And from Paul Douglas at the Minneapolis www.Startribune.com

Climate Change for Dummies. Here’s an excerpt of an Op-Ed at the Concord Monitor: “…I distinctly remember my professor Richard Bopp, researcher at Goddard Institute for Space Studies, telling us that the only thing he knew was that you could not overload such a delicately balanced system like our atmosphere and not have something change. The idea that everything in the world would gradually and evenly rise in temperature was unlikely, but he and his colleagues could not offer an alternative at that time. Well, 25 years later, we have a better idea. Thanks to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a voluntary 2,000-member group of scientists committed to understanding climate change, we can verify that we are experiencing more severe weather and increases of ocean levels, glacial melting and average temperature…”

Business Recycling Grants Available

Hennepin County Grants,

Deadline June 15, and October 15
Apply Now!
A newly elected Minneapolis City Council is finally committed to enforcing city recycling rules. On Earth Day, April 2015, Minneapolis restaurants will be required to use recyclable/compostable take-out containers, and offer on site recycling.

Hennepin County has grants to help businesses with these changes:

Apply for these grants, or call about questions:
http://www.hennepin.us/businessrecycling
or call 612 543 1316, for composting call 612 348 5893

http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/260496151.html To-go has to go!

http://www.startribune.com/local/260862031.html Recycling bins head to work

Ban Styrofoam Cups and Containers

42nd day of my litter removal. Lots of Styrofoam!

I am encouraging Minneapolis and other city governments to ban Styrofoam. The past 42 days I have done daily litter pick-ups on my walks in Minneapolis. I was picking up Styrofoam along with wrappers, cans and plastic. Some of what was picked-up could be recycled, but Styrofoam, which is recyclable, is hard to find a place to recycle. I think the Twin Cities area has one place to recycle Styrofoam which is miles from my home.

At an Earth Day pick up along the Minnehaha Creek . I was surprised to notice how much the Styrofoam along the creek was breaking down into little pieces. Pieces so small it was impossible to pick up. Water and sun cause it to break up faster. The past few days I have been picking Styrofoam out of Lake Harriet. It has broken into pieces that might never dissolve and survive in the lake for generations. I wonder what harm this does to the birds and fish?

Banning restaurant containers is only a very small piece of this, but it is a start. The best part of banning Styrofoam could be that it heightens awareness for individuals who never think about the consequences of Styrofoam.

Finally, I have never figured out why businesses that sell products that are so harmful to the environment are not held responsible for what they spew. Why aren’t they at least required to offer recycling?

“People are already paying a price for allowing this packaging (styrofoam), noting the cost to remove the materials from the recycling stream, uncloging storm drains and picking up litter. You’re paying for it in so many different ways,” Minneapolis Council Member Andrew Johnson http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/258989321.html