Birds

Meadow Turf has a simple post about the Cedar Waxwings in her neck of the woods. I love birds. They seem to be the life that persists in winter when everything else is silent. The other day while trying to catch a photo of Mount Diablo with snow I caught a flock of pigeons feasting on seeds left behind after crops had been harvested. Humans tend to not like pigeons, calling them flying rats at times, but to see them in more of a semi-natural setting I can see that they are just birds. I captured a flock which is a rare sight near any cities.

(Mt Diablo, Northern CA, East Contra Costa County)

Jenny The Elephant

I was reading a story today on wowOwow.com about an elephant named Jenny who at this moment resides in the Dallas Zoo but will soon (Oct 1) be moved to a drive thru park in Mexico where her "habitat" will only be 1 acre large. Lily Tomlin (yes, the actress) wrote about her in wowOwow earlier in August and is asking for her readers to help move Jenny to an Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee where Jenny can roam 300 acres with other elephants. Wow! That is better than 1 acre and alone. Not to mention she will have no animal welfare protection once out of the United States.

If anyone reading is familiar with elephants they are very social with their kinship and some believe they show emotions such as grieving for a lost comrade. Jenny deserves to live out the rest of her life with other elephants in a protected location. Not harassed by people and vehicles in a drive thru park.

You can read about Jenny here and visit her website. Or better yet learn how you can help Jenny here.

Pass on the word. Thanks.

Be Green.

Neutralize Your Carbon Footprint

You know who you are.  You eat out with plastic cups.  You drive by yourself when you can carpool.  You still use paper napkins.  You buy bananas.  And you don't even own a bike.  You are trying to be green but life just gets in the way.  I am here to tell you that you can neutrilize your non-green sins.  You can make the world a cleaner place without even getting out of your chair, unless you need to grab your wallet.  No, I am not selling anything.  I am asking you to plant a tree.  Relieved?

Nature Conservancy, along with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is running a campaign to plant a billion trees in the Amazon Rain Forest.  It is called (drum roll) "Plant a Billion Trees".  Anywho, all you need is a dollar (unless you are really big non-green sinner, then you need more) and the above organizations will plant a tree in the Amazon Rain Forest to help clean the air, make our planet more beautiful and cleanse your sinning non-green soul.  You see if you plant a tree that means you can drive more, but we won't do that.  We will choose to ride our bikes but still donate to see our earth, the only one we have, take another clean breathe of fresh air. 

So move it! CLICK BELOW. If you can't donate now I will always have the banner located on my sidebar, at least until I get 100 trees planted. 



Be Green

Off to the Lake

My kids have 4 more days until they go back to school. Yes, they go back Monday. I am sad yet eager for them to go. Sad because this is the end of the summer of sleeping in, being lazy, playing Wii, watching iCarly and having so many adventures. (Camping, zip line, gold panning, movies, boating, gardening.) They are going into 5th and 3rd grade, getting big and that makes sad. My son has already started to pull away from mama like most boys do, yet he can't fall asleep unless I tuck him in. I am lucky I have a daughter who aims to kiss and hug me whenever she can. I know that may go for a while also but she is a girl and I can relate to her. I love them both so much and have had the pleasure of staying home with them to enjoy every moment.

But did I mention I am also anticipating my freedom again! For 5 whole hours a day, Monday through Friday, it will be quiet. The teachers have them and that is good time to be a woman with thoughts to myself again.

To end the summer break the kids and I are going to a Lake Chabot for some water fun and exploring today. I read they have paddle boats, I have never been in one. They also have bike and hiking trails so I will bring my trusty outdoor field guide I bought recently to help identify the flora and fauna. It should be a relaxing warm, adventurous day until the ride home in the infamous Bay Area traffic. I tried to see if we can get there by public transportation but I am confused. We'll see. It looks like I have to transfer 3 times, is it worth it?

I'll let you know how the day went, with pictures.

Greener Water

We recently spent some time in the local Sierra Nevada mountains along the American River. I love this river. It is so beautiful. The clear water rushing along meeting up with boulders to form rapids of white water. The plastic bottle floating near the lost sandal.

During my visit I noticed quite a bit plastic and aluminum garbage floating along, minding its own business, probably hoping to meet up with its compadres in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Oh, the environmentalist in me cried and then picked up as much of it as I could. (Picture a mom with her friends and their kids carrying beer cans up from the river. Not a good sight. But we did it.) When I got back I started to wonder where that river flows and is anyone helping to clean it up.

The river originates further up stream near Lake Tahoe from ice melt and eventually, after a few reservoirs, dams, a delta and a bay, the water ends up in the ocean. That is a long journey, let's estimate 250 miles. There are a lot of stops along the way but it is very possible that pollution from up river could end up in the ocean. While sitting on the bank of the American River you don't think of the Pacific Ocean and its wildlife. You are thinking whitewater rafting, fishing for trout and swimming. I thought of both locations. How do the locals keep their our watershed clean? And thus help the clean the ocean environment.

A watershed is a drainage basin where water from rain or snow flows down in the form of streams, rivers or creeks toward a larger body of water, i.e. the ocean or bay. What happens upstream effects downstream. Many people don't realize that. I didn't until about 5 years ago when I heard about the Marsh Creek Cleanup.

Every year on the 3rd Saturday of September our city holds the Marsh Creek Clean Up. It is a collaboration of the local city, sponsors like Home Depot, the Resource Conservation District, Friends of Marsh Creek and citizens to clean our Marsh Creek. Every year it grows in volunteers and you wouldn't believe what we pull out of the creek. One year our Cub Scout Pack pulled out a shopping cart. How sad is that? Chairs, sofas, car parts, batteries, fishing line and everyday garbage gets taken out of the creek. I always wonder how it gets there.

I don't need to tell any of you how to keep the waterways clean, I know you guys are green, but unfortunately we need to clean up after others. Please help clean the rivers, lakes and ocean and spread the word.

The Marsh Creek Clean Up corresponds with California Coastal Clean Up Day. Now I made it very easy for anyone living in California to help clean our waterways. Visit the site above and sign up. They will send you info on who your local organizer is.

You can also check with the Ocean Conservancy for clean up locations near you. There is a link for international volunteers there also. Or simply google " 'your body of water here' clean up". For example "Mississippi Clean Up" gave me Mississippi Coastal Clean Up, which is on September 20th this year. Also search for your local Department of Water Resources, they have a lot of information.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention, the American River has quite a few friends friends to help clean it up. The American River Parkway Foundation organizes a clean up. And here is a large list of Sierra Nevada and national environmental links also.

One bad note about the clean up. Ask what happens to the trash. Do plastic bottles get recycled? Where do aluminum cans go? If the organizers say to the dump, that is not good enough. Try to convince them that much of the trash floating in the ocean is from landfill garbage that got airborne. And we know you NEED to recycle those items. A couple of the articles I noted in this post address that issue. But don't give up, we all know every little bit helps.

Resources and Reads:

Green Peace: The Trash Vortex

Algalita.org - Marine research Foundation

Floating Fecal Funship - Not all garbage comes from the land.

Plenty Mag: Environmentally Sound Beaches

My Green Friday

I woke this morning to the heat. It is suppose to be 97 degrees outside today. Ohhhhh. And I am trying desperately not to turn on the A/C. So far so good at noon. But the heat really comes around 3 pm. But at that time, I am so excited, I am going on a farm tour sponsored by Contra Costa Resource Conservation District (RCD).

The tour's main focus is to educate children on where our food comes from, what it takes to produce it and what is done with it once it is processed. I am so excited to have this resource available. The kids will learn about soil, organics, seasons, food, farm machinery and storage of food. We will be visiting 2 farms, Simmoni-Massoni and Farmer's Daughter, for you bay area dwellers to come and visit our little u-pick and farm heaven.

But back to this morning. I actually did some gardening! (Now everything will die by the touch of my brown thumb.) I am on a green bean quest! I need green beans. They are the only thing out there I can grow from seed (organic of course) and, damn it, I will grow more! So I moved the watermelon plants we thought were not going to make it but are, to the back of the yard. And replaced them with green bean seeds. Then I decided to give up on growing NATURAL CALIFORNIA WILDFLOWERS (ya, I can't even grow native stuff!) and replace those with, drum roll, green beans. If everything goes as planned I will have 11 green bean plants, hopefully enough for freezing. I don't know, this is my first time growing veggies. Technically it is my husband's garden, I just water it. And now fertilize it. I use Dr. Earth and so far so good. But if you have a dog beware, they like to eat it and dig for it in your garden.

Watermelon

Cantaloupe

Our zucchini is coming along splendidly! The top picture (below) is from June 9th and below it from June 19th. They grow really fast. This city girl had no clue to this phenomenon. But I like it because the veggie grows fast also. (My husband's size 10's are hidden in the 2nd picture.) The 3rd picture is our little baby zucchini. (Can you tell this fascinates me?)

Baby Zucchini

And we finally gave up on 1 of our 3 tomato plants. It just looks ill. No water starting today. And I may replace him with.......a green bean seed!

Pathetic tomato plant

Have a green weekend.

P.S. Mama and daddy mocking bird are still keeping their chicks safe. Yesterday my neighbor found out that there are 2 chicks. Those birds are working hard.

Birds and the Bee

This morning I went outside for my daily "water my garden but still kill it" ritual. (I have a brown thumb, everything I have been growing seems to be dying. Or just not growing from seed.) And I was in for a small treat.

As I watered the watermelon plants I noticed a bee still in the flower. Cool! What a great photo opportunity! I haven't been catching the pollination in action this year. But then I noticed the bee was not moving. He was slowly dying. How sad. Well, he died doing what he loves.

Then I noticed my dog, Maggy, watching a mockingbird. The bird was yapping and squawking so much I had to see what the issue was. I looked into my neighbor's yard and there it was-a baby mocking bird. And as I did that my neighbor's dog, Ty, attacked it. My neighbor was outside also so we stopped him and checked on the little fellow. (The picture is to the left.) I will get an update later from my neighbor if the chick is fine.

Last year at this time, my dog was next door visiting her buddy, Ty, when she found and proceeded to half mutilate a baby mocking bird. My neighbor had to place it in a plastic zip look to put it out of its misery. So this year we have been on high alert for mockingbird chicks. Apparently, the mockingbird chicks fall out of the nest when they are ready to fly making it so much easier for ground predators, i.e. Ty and Maggy, to catch the babies. The perps are seen in a picture to the left. They look innocent but they true deviants when it comes to chicks.

On another note. Back on Earth Day I wrote about the city of San Jose, CA welcoming 3 peregrine falcons chicks to their city hall roof. Sadly on June 17th one of the falcon chicks, Cielo, was found dead. Apparently the bird ran into a building. There are still 2 other falcon chicks, Meyye and Mercury, that seem to be doing well and ready to leave the nest some time this summer.

Falcon Follow-Up and Animal Advocacy

On Earth Day this year baby Peregrine Falcons were born San Jose, CA. The picture above is the most recent picture posted. (Courtesy of the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group.) Aren't they cute? I prefer kittens and puppies but they grow up to be awesome birds. You can also watch them here. Maybe you can catch them having a rodent snack. (Hey, it's nature.)

These cute little guys remind me of a museum we just visited with my Girl Scout Troop named the Lindsey Wildlife Museum. If you live in the Bay Area this should be a place you take your little ones. It's a small museum and wildlife hospital. The birds and animals housed there cannot be put back into the wild for various reasons. It is a wonderful place to see predatory birds, small canines, other animals and, if you are lucky, a cougar! It was exciting to watch the cougar they had there. Unfortunately, her story is a very sad one. She was rescued from a horrible human who thought it would be fun to keep a wild cougar as a pet but when she got too big to handle the horrible human just chained her up. She was rescued years ago but is sentenced to a life of pens and boredom. The museum does their best to keep her healthy and busy. Most of her time is spent off grounds outside in a larger pen but they bring her in periodically for viewing. I feel bad for her but she is a great ambassador for her species. She is a magnificent animal and she reminded me to be vigilant when hiking.

I have always been a wildlife explorer. Wanting to save even the ground squirrel that everyone seems to ignore. Or the great whales that live in our oceans. The plight of the wolves in Montana I have followed. And now the polar bears and buffalo are having their day in the news. Going green was to next step to help our environment. I not only go green for my health and local economy but for the animals and plants that cannot speak.

Earth Day Gifts from Jose and Clara

Who are Jose and Clara? They are Peregrine Falcons that are new parents this morning! The pair has nested on the San Jose, CA city hall roof! The Santa Clara Predatory Research Group placed a nesting box on the roof for them and this morning 3 baby falcons were hatched! Watch them live here. (I am watching them eat right now, 10:28 am.)

Happy Earth Day!