National Pollinator Week!

Exciting week, isn't it?

I know, I know, something like that actually exists?

Up until today, I hadn't heard of National Pollinator Week either. It was declared official by the U.S. Senate in 2007 and has been celebrated by pollinator experts and agroecologists ever since.

So what do we care about pollinators? Well, without pollinators, we wouldn't have chocolate! Or coffee, corn, strawberries, mangoes, berries, honey, tomatoes, pretty flowers, beans--all fruits and vegetables, actually. Thanks to critters like bees, butterflies, hummingbirds and some insects, we get most of our foods and keep ourselves full and happy. 

So, next time you're munching into, say, that apple or strawberry or banana or orange or a little summer mango, make sure to be thankful and mindful of those bees that helped that plant develop to produce that piece of fruit!

For more information about National Pollinator Week or pollinators in general, or to look at cool fliers and posters, visit www.pollinator.org. 

Staying "Green" in the Summer!

Now that it's summer in South Florida, there's even more that you can do to stay "green", or environmentally friendly.

For example, you can keep the lights off in your house and just crack open the blinds of your windows so that the rooms in your home can be filled with natural light. This not only saves energy, but can also make a person feel healthier as sunlight contains helpful vitamins.

   - Even during the rest of the year, if you don't need the lights on, shut them!!

Also, you should really recycle. This is the biggest cliche of environmental friendliness, but recycling your products really does reduce waste and releases less pollutants. Especially now that you might be enjoying a cold drink out of a bottle or can in the hot summer sun, toss it in the recycling bin instead of just throwing it away.

Another thing you could do is read electronically. Lots of people might enjoy sitting outside reading a nice novel in the summertime. This sounds like a completely nonsensical way to conserve resources, but reading with an e-reader (Nook, Kindle, iPad, etc.) doesn't waste paper like buying a book does. Those online libraries contain (more and more as we move into the future) virtually every book that a building might.

   - If you don't own an e-reader, getting books from the library is also a valuable way to reduce because once you're done reading, you can give it back to the librarians and someone else can read the same book without producing more.

These are just a few of the things that YOU can do to SAVE THE WOOOORLD!

Thanks for being a good and decent human being and striving to save the planet from ultimate destruction.