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Subject: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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  • From: su do <speakingbeareturns@yahoo.com>
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Easy green tips
  • Date: Sat, 5 Apr 2008 07:20:18 -0700 (PDT)

Close- to- Home Green Tips

http://www.cleanhomejournal.com/view.aspx?pid=546&fns=1&hs225=chj&hs227=chj200804

When it comes to taking care of the planet, you, our
members, are giving it plenty of thought and TLC.
You’re recycling like crazy, doing laundry with cold
water, filtering your drinking water rather than
buying it in bottles, planting flowers, vegetables and
trees, and coming up with ways to reduce, reuse and
recycle every day. Your innovative ideas for green
living inspired us to share some eco-friendly tips of
our own. Thank you one and all for your great
suggestions.

Throw in the towel.
Jaime of Pottsville, PA, sent in this great idea.
Throw a dry towel into the dryer with your wet
clothes. “The dry towel helps absorb the moisture
quickly and leads to shorter drying time and reduced
use of energy.” Full loads also dry faster than loads
containing just a few items.

Become a peanut farmer.
Reuse packing peanuts in your container gardens.
They’re light and airy enough to allow for
drainage—and mixing them in with potting soil reduces
its weight and makes it much easier to move large
potted plants. Store your peanuts in a Ziploc® Brand
Big Bag until you’re ready to use them. (By the way,
did you know you can rinse out your Ziploc® Brand
containers and use them over and over?) To find out
where you can recycle your peanuts, call the Plastic
Loose Fill Council’s Peanut Hotline at 800-828-2214.

A fine feathered friend.
Deborah from Grand Prairie, TX, recycles old feather
pillows by putting the feathers outside so that birds
can literally “feather their nests.” Simply remove the
feathers from the pillow and place them in mesh bags
(ones with holes about as wide as those on
grocery-store mesh onion bags work well) to hang off
tree branches. “Then sit back and enjoy watching the
birds use old feathers to make nice soft nests for
their young ones.”

Drive a green machine.
Getting more mileage from a tank of gasoline helps
not only our environment but also your wallet. To
maximize your miles per gallon, start by clearing out
any junk in your trunk that can weigh down your car.
Tires should be properly inflated and your air filter
regularly cleaned. Keep your windows up when driving
on the highway to avoid drag—if it’s cool enough
outside, use flow-through ventilation. Drive at a
smooth, even speed and avoid sudden starts and stops.
Don’t let your car idle for more than a minute because
it takes less gas to restart your car than it does to
let it idle. And do consider carpooling, where
possible.

Water, water everywhere.
From east to west, our members are conserving water.
Judi in Reed, FL, Carla in Colorado Springs, CO, and
Deborah, in Yuma, AZ, all put a bucket or a pitcher in
the sink when they’re running the tap, waiting for the
water to get warm. They then use the saved water to
give their houseplants a good soak. Many of you are
also using water filters and reusable bottles instead
of buying water in plastic bottles.

Resourceful member Christine swears by water from her
washing machine (also known as “gray water”) to water
the lawn. Just be sure to rotate your “gray watering”
with fresh water. Don’t use water that contains
chlorine bleach because it can damage plants and
foliage. And be sure you don’t use laundry gray water
on vegetable and herb gardens—anything you grow to
eat—or on ornamental plantings.

Pile it on!
Many of you have compost piles or mulch pits for
turning vegetable waste and lawn clippings into rich,
organic fertilizer. In Fritch, TX, Carolyn tells us
that shreds from paper shredders make good mulch.
Noncolored pages of newspapers can also be shredded
and used for mulch—just weigh down the paper mulch
with heavier mulch material, such as wood chips or
bark. Jared of Omaha, NE, is using compost from table
scraps for his garden and donating a portion of the
produce he raises to help feed the homeless in his
area.

Eat your greens.
Make your kitchen a more environmentally friendly
place by choosing locally grown, raised or produced
organic food, whenever possible. Most food that
Americans eat travels an average of 1,500 miles before
it reaches the kitchen—and that doesn’t include
imported food. When you buy from local farmers, you’re
helping to reduce the energy it takes to get farm
products to your table. Look for locally raised
poultry and meat and dairy products and eggs, as well
as sustainable fish caught in local waters. To learn
more about organic farming and to find a farmer’s
market near you, go to www.localharvest.org.

The paper chase.
In Louisville, KY, Patricia uses return envelopes
from junk mail to write her shopping lists and then
tucks her coupons inside. But conservation doesn’t
happen just at home. “We’ve started filling our fax
machine trays at work with scratch paper,” says Rose
of Durham, NC. “That way, both sides of the paper get
used.”

Swags are in the bag.
Ziploc® Brand Big Bags, that is. “When my artificial
floral swags get dusty, I put them in a [Ziploc®
Brand] Big Bag with a few tablespoonfuls of salt.
Shake! The salt takes the dust off and your flowers
are ready to be rehung,” says Kelly, Washington, MO.
This tip is great for refreshing all your silk and
artificial flowers so you don’t have to buy new. Best
of all, you can save the salt and reuse it the next
time your flowers get dusty.

We’re glad to see that taking care of our planet and
its environment is such a big part of our members’
lives! Please continue to show your children and
grandchildren that they can play a part in protecting
the earth too. And thanks again for sharing your
inspirational ideas with all of us.






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