The Power Is Yours - Earth

In previous the "The Power Is Yours" posts, I've touched on things you can do at home to help with water and air pollution. For this post I'll examine some things you can do to help the land.

A variety of human activities degrade the landscape or damage the soil, and here's how you can start to fight back.

1. The next time you take a walk around the neighborhood or go to the park, bring an extra bag and perhaps a pair of gloves to pick up any litter or trash which might be about.
2. Reduce the amount of waste which ends up in a landfill by composting at home and recycling paper, glass, and plastic goods.
3. Consider using reusable bags when shopping.
4. Try to find ways to prevent the erosion of your yard's soil. There are a lot of things you can do here: make sure soil surfaces are planted, roots help hold soil in place, the deeper the better. Slow run-off by having rain barrels to reduce run-off, plant a rain garden, or just having a good variety of plants including trees and shrubs, planted in your yard.
5. Plant with plants that naturally grow in your yard's soil type. Many plants can improve soil conditions on their own; prairie plants have extensive root systems which do things like correct soil compaction. Plants native to your area are also unlikely to deplete the soil of nutrients, and consider planting a mixture of plants (especially some legumes) to help put things like nitrogen back into the soil.
6. Planting native trees is also a way combat deforestation. Many homeowners live in areas where there were once forests, woods, or savannas which were probably comprised of oaks, maples, or pines depending on where you live exactly. So why not work on getting your neighborhood back to its natural state?

These are just some ideas to get you started. Remember these ideas start at home with you and can spread to others like your neighborhood association or take the ideas to city hall. The power is yours.

2016 in Review

I recognize the calendar year isn't over, but both children are currently asleep, so now is as good a time as I'm going to get to retrospect on the year.

Overall, the year went by really quickly. We added new plants including junipers, red osier dogwoods, ox eyes, and asters. We also had a number of first time visitors including: Common Red Polls and Northern Flickers. In total, we've counted 44 species of birds this year.

Here's what the table looks like over time (Note: I've taken bees out of pollinators because I'm really bad at identifying species, so I'm only counting butterflies from now on.)

Year	Mammals	Butterflies	Reptiles & Amph.	Birds
2016	7	13	1	44
2015	7	12	1	47
2014	7	10	1	40
2013	7	10	1	40
2012	5	10	1	31

We also had sandhill cranes raise a colt in the neighborhood, and they made pretty frequent visits to our yard. In addition to the cranes we had American Robins and Eastern Bluebird successfully nest in the yard.

It was another good year of biodiversity in our yard, good enough to convince me to expand one of the front flower beds again next spring to add more Little Bluestem, New England Aster, and Ox Eyes.

Crane Parenting

Red Admiral

Mr. Bluebird checking out his new house.

The Power is Yours - Air

Most of the time when people talk about climate change, the subject is really air pollution. Air pollution comes in various forms from things like particulate matter ending up in the air we breath to the emission of green houses gases, most notably carbon dioxide.

This biggest source of air pollution is burning stuff, particularly burning fossil fuels.

What are fossil fuels? Fossils fuels are energy substances which are essentially made up of long since decomposed living matter, i.e. it's essentially the fossils of swamps and forests of long ago. In other words, plants which sequestered a bunch of carbon decomposed beneath the earth, still containing their carbon, turning into things like coal, when we burn them we release this long sequestered carbon back into the atmosphere, along with other pollutants like ash.

There are a host of other concerns beyond climate change or global warming which can be discussed when we talk about air pollutions such as effects on human health like asthma or other environmental concerns like acid rain, but these all come back to one truth, we and all living things need clean air.

So what actions can we take as individuals who need clean air?

The key piece here is the burning of fossil fuels. These are primarily used to generate energy to do things like turn on the lights, heat your home, drive your car, or mow your lawn. The simplest solution is to reduce our use of these things. Here are some suggestions:

• Make sure your home is properly insulated; this includes insulation itself as well as eliminating things like drafts around windows.
• Adjust your thermostat a few degrees (cooler in the winter, warmer in the summer); appliances like the condenser for your air conditioner are power hogs. Additionally consider how many months of the year, you can go without using heating or cooling to control the temperature of your home.
• Use Energy Star appliances, refrigerators, washers, hot water heaters, frankly most major appliances have become better about using less energy.
• Reduce how much gas you use; this may mean driving less, driving more fuel efficient cars, using public transportation when available, replacing your lawn mower or trimmer with a manually powered or rechargeable.

The above list are fairly simple things that can be done, but large scale solutions like adding solar panels to your house or using a geo thermal pump for temperature control are also options.

Your carbon foot print can also be offset by making different choices about the food you eat. Take for example the carbon footprint of beef. Grain is seeded, tended to and harvested by machines burning diesel, then driven to a grain elevator or processing plant, energy is spent turning the grain into feed which is delivered (still burning fossils fuels) to the cows. The cows are eventually loaded onto trucks and driven to be slaughtered. The production of meat has a large carbon footprint. Fruits and vegetables which are transported long distances such as out of season strawberries which may be grown in distant places like Peru have a bigger carbon footprint than if you only purchase them in season and / or from local producers. If we consume less meat and fewer out of season produce items then we can reduce our own carbon footprints.

Lastly as mentioned earlier, the fossil fuels are largely comprised of decomposed plant matter which had (prior to being burned) sequestered carbon. This is a major function of plant life. Turf grass doesn't sequester much carbon. In order for your yard to help reduce your carbon footprint, you need to plant trees; they sequester the most carbon. Even native grasses which are taller and have deeper roots will sequester more carbon than turf grass but the real winners here are the trees.

To wrap this topic; here are some things you can do: be more efficient with energy usage at home, burn less gas, invest in clean energy technology for your home or car, be mindful of your food's carbon footprint, and offset your own by planting trees. Even if there isn't political will to encourage this things along the way, remember the "Power is yours"; it all starts at home.

The Power Is Yours - Water

Let's start with water. Our country is facing a variety of challenges with keeping our water supply and water ways healthy. Here are few of the big challenges facing America's water.

1. Algae Blooms in Lakes - WI DNR
2. Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia (aka Dead Zone) - NOAA
3. California Drought
4. Contaminated Drinking Water - WI Watch
5. Flooding - Weather.com

This list is a complete list of challenges facing America's water systems, but it's a decent sample of what we're dealing with.

These issues can be further broken down and understood based on various factors related to the problems. These factors include:

1. Nutrients, chemicals, and bacteria entering the water system via human activity.
2. Water consumption and overconsumption
3. How rain enters the water system

The core piece here is really about how rain enters the system. It falls from the sky (that's a lot of potential energy to start with) and hits the Earth's surface then quickly begins moving to the lowest point, becoming runoff. It picks up the things (chemicals, bacteria, dirt, etc) which it encounters and eventually deposits its payload somewhere. Some of this water will seep into the ground, where various layers of earth and roots may act as filter to help purify the water; while other water will end up in ponds, lakes, and rivers.

Because this is how the system works, it's a good place to start. Rain water which strikes impermeable surfaces moves very quickly; such surfaces include: driveways, roofs, roads, and compacted soils. This water moves quickly, moving with it more debris.

Here are some things you can do to help:

1. Rain barrels to catch and store water and prevents runoff.
2. Permeable paving to reduce runoff
3. Plant trees to reduce runoff
4. Use native plants to help improve your yard's water infiltration
5. Convert your roof from a traditional roof to a green roof.

Even if you've done things to help keep water onsite in your yard, some water will escape and carry things with it, but you have the power to help control what things are carried away. Leaves, yard waste, and pet waste can add additional nutrients to the system, just like chemical fertilizers. These are pretty simple to tackle:

1. Don't fertilize your lawn.
2. Compost your leaves and yard waste onsite in your yard or haul them yourself. Do not leave them piled up in the curb and gutter in the street.
3. Pick up after your pet.

We can all also pay attention to our consumption. There are a variety of low flow water fixtures which you can use. There are other ways to limit your use as well such as limiting lawn watering or car washes.

Lastly get involved. Identify your local watershed. There are often volunteer or advocacy initiatives at a local level such as restoring wetlands (BTW highly beneficial), or advocating for local policies which encourage property owners to be water-frendly. As stated before, these are big problems, but they can be solved with actions of individuals even on a small scale. Remember, the power is yours.

The Power Is Yours

Ever feel like a problem is so big; it must require a big solution from someone powerful?

Think again. Most big problems aren't solved by one big solution. They are broken down into smaller problems with goals and focused tasks to address each goal. They are solved by individuals because individuals in action are powerful.

Environmental degradation (that is climate change, water quality problems, habitat loss, invasive species etc.),primarily caused by us, is a huge problem.

Many people are concerned about how the changes in the federal government will affect how the US will approach these issues.

These issues however all start at home, and federal policy doesn't have to be the solution for them.

Over the next couple of weeks, I'll write a few posts about things you can do to address these big problems, as Captain Planet always said, "The power is yours.". For now, here are a few ideas off the top of my head.

1. Rain barrels
2. Replace turf grass with native plants
3. Adjust your thermostat a few degrees
4. Make sure your home is properly insulated
5. Eat one meat free dinner a week
6. Pick up trash you see on the street or in local parks
7. Use less gas
8. Recycle
9. Get out and enjoy nature with your kids, teach them to love it too.

Don't Want to Read, then Watch: Bringing Nature Home Videos on WPT

I started this site and all the work on our yard because of the book, Bringing Nature Home by Doug Tallamy. Knowing that not everyone has the time or interest in reading his works, I found some videos which are certainly worth your time. If you have two hours, watch both. If you have only one hour, watch either. They are great condensed versions of Bringing Nature Home and The Living Landscape.

Videos

WI Public TV - University Place - Video 1

WI Public TV - University Place - Video 2

Native Evergreen Shrubs and this Year's Project

After getting myself all setup on Cornell Lab's YardMap, I realized that while we'd made incredible progress in landscaping the yard and providing biodiversity, we hadn't gone as far as I'd thought. "Lawn" still makes up a large percentage of our property. This means it's time for another project. Or more precisely to circle back to a project from yesteryear and complete it as originally envisioned.

The initial mission, better layering. In particular find some shrubs.

But what kind of shrubs?

We already have lots of Serviceberry, and we have Highbush Cranberry, Pagoda Dogwood, Nannyberry, Staghorn Sumac, and Black Chokeberry.

Something new. Something different. Something with texture. Something to add interest in the winter.

I began searching. I spent a lot of time on the WI DNR's Natural Communities site.

A list of possibilities began to form: Ninebark, New Jersey Tea, Winterberry, Blueberry, Juniper, Red Osier Dogwood, Witchhazel, American Filbert...

I began searching for native evergreen shrubs. This was hard. Perhaps impractical. Perhaps evergreens don't like being shrubs.

I had found two: Juniperus Communis and Juniperis Horizontalis.

In further searching I encountered "Eastern White Cedar". I looked at the latin name, Thuja Occidentalis. How could this be? I knew Red Cedar to be Juniperus Virginiana. Of course, Red Cedar is actually a juniper tree, I read more. American Arborvitae.

"Arborvitae? Those silly hedgerow-looking evergreen trees that people plant to make privacy fences?" I thought.

I began looking at cultivars for all three: Common Juniper, Horizontal Juniper, and American Arborvitae.

I've ruled out Horizontal Juniper as I'm not looking for ground cover, but the options available for the other two are really interesting.In the end, it will probably come down to availability and selecting which ever will look best next to the Red Osier Dogwoods, I intend to plant.

More info:

Eastern White Cedar in WI

Common Juniper in WI

Horizontal Juniper in WI

2016 - Off to a Great Start - First Common Redpoll

Each New Year's Eve while others excitedly waiting for a ball to drop in some distant metropolitan city, I prep a spreadsheet. The next morning begins a new year of not only bird counting but documenting each species which travels through our yard. Getting the winter well documented is crucial, as some of our visitors are drop-ins from Canada who have migrated to "warmth" of Wisconsin.

Today, we had the first Common Redpolls to have ever visited our yard. I added them to this year's spreadsheet and then had a realization, I'd never totaled the number of species across years. I had no idea how many different species had visited the yard over the course of the last few years.

One of the Common Redpolls who came to visit today.

It turns out that the Common Redpoll makes number 58. This also means that my original goal (yet to be met) of having 50 species in the yard in a single year ought to be more than attainable. If last year's total of 47 is any indication (and we've already got 18 so far for 2016), 2016 could be the year. Maybe I need to think about upping the goal from 50 to 60 or 65.

2015 Year in Review

At the start of each year, I like to reflect how the year in our little yard went. We've spent a lot time trying to turn our quarter of an acre lot into a place rich in biodiversity. This year saw the fewest amount of new plantings since we moved in. The only significant additions were another Eastern Redbud as well some additional Bee Balm and Cardinal Flower.

Overall species diversity improved some either that or our ability to identify them has gotten better.

Here's what it all looks like.

Year	Bees and Butterflies	Birds	Mammals	Reptiles and Amphibians
2012	13	31	5	1
2013	14	40	7	1
2014	15	40	7	1
2015	15	47	7	1

Noteworthy newcomers to the list included:

Sandhill Cranes - who skulked about the neighborhood this year

Eastern Wood Peewee

Palm Warbler

Here some picture highlights from last year

Summer Tanager


This is from the second Eastern Bluebird nest, we had 9 fledge in total over 2 nests.


Wood Ducks came by for a short visit one spring morning too.

2015 was a really great year, and we're hoping to do some additional planting this year to make 2016 even better.