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Kathy Costello's Earth Calendar
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Kathy Costello updates environmental news and local events Monday-Saturday at 10:30 a.m., and Monday-Friday afternoons at 1:40 on 89.7 WNKU. For a weekly, in-depth look at the world around us, tune in for National Public Radio's Living on Earth, Saturdays from 6-7 a.m.; and check out the environmental news from our Public NewsRoom™. The "E-Chievement Awards" celebrate folks around the country who make a difference in thier communities on E-Town, each Sunday from 3-4 PM.
From our calendar: |
July 25th, 1:00 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. Whoooo Flies By Night? at Embshoff Woods River Mount Pavilion @ 1:00 p.m. and Mitchell Memorial Forest Stone Shelter @ 3:30 p.m.
Owls are amazing nocturnal predators with an astounding array of specialized adaptations that allow them to function on the darkest nights. Join the park naturalist for a look into the amazing world of owls July 25th 1:00 p.m. at Embshoff Woods and 3:30 p.m. at Mitchell Memorial Forest Stone Shelter. For information call (513) 521-7175.
August 1st, 2:00 pm Birds of Prey at Sharon Woods Sharon Centre. Raptors, such as hawks and owls, are majestic hunting birds. Your family will meet some live birds of prey and learn about their natural history. For information call (513) 521-7265.
August 3rd, 7:00 p.m. How Can “Nature Mentoring” Restore Our Community? To answer
this question, the Cincinnati Nature Center cordially invites you to join them on Tuesday, August 3rd at 7 p.m. for an enriching and inspirational evening with world-renowned naturalist and “nature mentor” Jon Young. The Jon Young presentation will kick-off the commencement of CNC’s adult education program, NatureVersity. NatureVersity is a new CNC program that offers mentorship and naturalist training courses for adults who desire to enrich their lives through nature. By providing inspiration and support to adult mentors and teachers, CNC hopes to encourage them to share their environmental experiences with the people in their lives. NatureVersity class topics include Natural History, Group Interpretive Techniques, Mentorship Skills and Nature Play Facilitation. For more information about Jon Young’s presentation or about NatureVersity, visit www.CincyNature.org and click on the programs and events calendar. You may also contact Amy Johnson at ajohnson@cincynature.org or call (513) 965-4894.
August 4th, 6:30 pm Kids' Crafts, Toad Abodes at Pattison Park. Kids will learn all about the toads in their own backyard and create a cozy shelter to encourage them to stick around. They'll meet a live toad and search the park to find some in the wild. Preregistration is required for this program. Program contains a fee of $4.00 per child. Please call (513)876-9013 to sign up.
Saturdays in July and August, 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Stream Exploration at Cincinnati Nature Center. Cincinnati Nature Center streams are important habitat for many species, and with so many visitors, the Nature Center is careful to limit the amount of activity along its banks. That's why it's a special treat to have the opportunity to splash, play and explore within the boundaries of Rowe Woods' Stream Access B any Saturday in July and August 11:00 am - 2:00 pm Enjoy the outdoors as you descend to the stream, where a naturalist will be stationed with collecting equipment, ID sheets and other information. The staff will serve as facilitators only; parents must be present to chaperone children at all times. For information call (513) 831-1711.
Every Third Thursday of the Month join the Campbell County Environmental Education Center for environmentally-themed family games! All ages are welcome! Games for all ages and skill levels will be available, featuring games from Project WET, Project WILD, and Project Learning tree The Campbell County Environmental Education Center is located at 1261 Race Track Road,Alexandria, KY 41001. For registration, directions and information call (859) 572-2600.
Green-themed Family Fun: Children’s Programming this Summer at the CAC. Need an alternative or supplement to the traditional summer camp? Want your children to experience learning through creative play in a stimulating and safe environment? Check out the Contemporary Arts Center’s UnMuseum. The CAC is a great place for fun, education, and meeting new families with similar interests. This summer the UnMuseum programming is all about nature and conservation. The best part is that you can discover the wonderful, interactive world of the UnMuseum all for the cost of admission.
For More Information and complete schedule of programs, visit http://contemporaryartscenter.org/unmuseum or contact us at 513.345.8400.
The Contemporary Art Center is located at 44 East 6th Street, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Wild Wednesdays at Middleton Mills Park! Discover the fascinating world of wildlife with Kentucky Recreation and Park Society’s WILD WEDNESDAYS. It's an event that runs every week through August 25th. The free programs are held * rain or shine * at Middleton Mills Park in Shelterhouse 2, beginning at 10:00 am, and last about an hour each week. Kids will learn simple definitions for big words such as biodiversity, endangered, conservation, preservation, ecosystem, extinction, and interdependence. Wild Wednesdays will feature Bald Eagles or Great-horned Owl when Raptor Rehabilitation of Kentucky visits! Meet Farmer Frank and a variety of barnyard animals from Sunrock Farm and encounter live Cincinnati Zoo creatures face-to-face! Wild Wednesdays is free to attend and enjoy. Instead of money, donations of non-perishable food and personal care items are collected for those less fortunate. For news of upcoming programs, activities, and events to be held in Kenton County's parks, call (859) 525-PLAY (7529), or visit http://www.kentoncounty.org.
Recycle Your Motor Oil. You can make a difference by recycling your used motor oil. Did you know used oil can be re-refined into base stock for lubricating oil. If you recycle just two gallons of used oil it can generate enough electricity to run the average household for almost 24 hours.
Cars are an indispensable fact of life for most of us. So, too, are abundant and clean supplies of drinking water. What we do with the used oil from our cars plays an important role in balancing our desire for convenient transportation with our desire for a clean and healthy environment today and for future generations.
We are all familiar with recycling newspapers, aluminum cans and glass and plastic bottles, but you may not be aware of the efforts of the petroleum industry and other groups to promote used motor oil recycling: providing convenient collection sites for the purpose of keeping used motor oil out of our waterways and ground water supplies and getting used oil into the recycling system.
Motor oil has value even after it has been drained from an engine. The oil you take to a collection center to be recycled saves energy. It can be reprocessed and used in furnaces for heat or in power plants to generate electricity for homes, schools, and businesses. It can also be sent to a refinery that specializes in processing used oil and re-refined into lubricating base oils that can be used to formulate engine oils meeting API specifications.
What can you do? If you change your own oil, be certain that you take it to a collection center for recycling. If you take your car to an automotive service outlet, you can be fairly certain that they recycle the oil that they change. But if you're not sure, ask.
Used motor oil that is collected by "do-it-yourselfers" is critical to the used oil recycling system. Next time you change your own oil, remember, you can make a difference by recycling the oil from your car, truck, motorcycle, boat, recreational vehicle or lawnmower. By dropping off your used motor oil today you help prevent pollution and conserve energy for a safer and healthier tomorrow. to find a recycling center near you go to www.earth911.com
EPA Insect Repellent Information
The arrival of warmer weather signals the return of biting insects. Recognizing that, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which regulates pesticides, has updated its insect repellent Web page. By reading and following label directions, the use of repellents can reduce or eliminate the discomfort of insect bites. Ticks can transmit serious diseases such as lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and other serious diseases. Repellents also curtail the spread of such mosquito-borne diseases as St. Louis encephalitis and West Nile virus.
The Web page serves as a one-stop-shop for information on registered repellents. It provides up-to-date listings of mosquito and tick repellents as well as tips for choosing the right product to meet your needs. One of the key features of the revamped Web page is easy access to information about protection time. It will help people choose the right product for the length of time they will be outdoors.
For best results, use only insect repellents registered by EPA. When used according to instructions on the label, registered products have been shown to be effective.
More information on insect repellent: http://www.epa.gov/repellentfinder.
Take The Pledge! Friskies and Fancy Feast brand cat foods, together with Keep America Beautiful, are raising awareness about aluminum pet food can recycling.
* Recycling aluminum cans saves 95% of the energy used to make aluminum cans from virgin materials.
* Aluminum pet food cans contain approximately 40% recycled aluminum, the industry average, so that means recycling 1 ton of aluminum cans conserves the equivalent of 36 barrels of oil, or 1,665 gallons of gasoline.
* Discovered in the 1820s, aluminum is the most abundant metal on earth.
* Over 50 percent of the aluminum cans produced are recycled.
* A used aluminum can is recycled and back on the grocery shelf as a new can, in as little as 60 days.
* Every minute of everyday, an average of 113,204 aluminum cans are recycled.
* Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to keep a 100-watt bulb burning for almost four hours or run your television for three hours.
* Tossing away an aluminum can wastes as much energy as pouring out half of that can’s volume of gasoline.
* Aluminum never wears out. That means it can be recycled forever!
Take the Pledge to help our mother earth and recycle pet food cans! For each pledge made
now through May 30th, Purina will donate $1.00, up to $100,000, to Keep America Beautiful. As a fan of the environment go to www.togetherwecanrecycle.com. It only takes about 2 minutes. I hereby pledge to make the world a better place by recycling my aluminum pet food cans, in order to positively impact the environment for years to come. I Pledge!
Time to register kids for Imago Summer Camps. It is time to start thinking about summer plans, and kids naturally love to spend that time outside playing games, exploring, and making new friends. Imago Earth Center will be offering six weeks of nature-based summer camps, as well as two specialty camps. The camps are full of age-appropriate games, activities, and crafts to create a memorable summer for any child. Spaces fill up fast so don't hesitate to register. Full description of Imago summer camps at www.imagoearth.org.
Invite birds to your backyard. Mid-winter is the perfect time to put out a birdhouse. Even though there still might be snow on the ground in many places and many bird species are still far to the south, it’s not too early. Chickadees, bluebirds, screech owls and woodpeckers are among the bird species that will use a birdhouse built and mounted to their specifications.
All of these species stick around for the winter and at this time of year begin scouting out locations to build their nests come spring. If you have a birdhouse out now, these birds are likely to pick your yard as the place to raise their new family once spring arrives. If cold or snowy weather is keeping you inside and you’re looking for a fun do-it-yourself project, consider building your own birdhouse instead of purchasing one. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology has plans for several different types of birdhouses, along with plans for predator guards to keep animals like raccoons, snakes and cats away from nesting birds. Visit http://www.birds.cornell.edu.
Ever wonder how much water you really use around the house? Visit The Field Museum's Water Calculator to take an in-depth look at your home water use. Make your way through a virtual house, answering questions about your water use and collecting easy water-saving tips. At the end of the exercise, your total score will be compared to the national average household water use, as well as other water calculator users.
Access the calculator here: http://watercalculator.fieldmuseum.org/.
National Wildlife is now accepting entries to their 40th annual photo contest. Cash prizes totaling more than $30,000 — including two $5,000 grand prizes — will be awarded to the winners in three divisions: Professional, Amateur and Youth. Winning photographs will be published online and a selection will appear in the December 2010 issue of the magazine.
In exchange for your $20 entry fee, you can submit as many as 25 photographs in the seven categories. You also will receive a one-year membership to the National Wildlife Federation, including six issues of National Wildlife and a 10% discount on all NWF catalog merchandise. The categories include:
Mammals
Birds
Other Wildlife
Backyard Habitats
Connecting People and Nature
Landscapes and Plant Life and
Global Warming
Visit www.nationalwildlifefederation.org for details!
The Campbell County Environmental Education Center is a 50 acre education park with two hiking trails and several exhibits. Located just 20 minutes south of NKU in Alexandria KY, it is next to AJ Jolly Park off of Route 27 on Racetrack Rd.
The Center offers educational and passive recreational services to all County residents and regional visitors. The building, which is open Wednesday thru Sunday from 8:30 am till 5 pm, offers exhibits on Tree Identification, Wildlife Tracks, and Solar energy.
The Center houses a working bee hive, animal mounts, and a wildlife blind! The main trail is a little under a mile and includes numerous educational signs describing the many natural features of the Center. A side trail, which is under a half-mile, is a more naturalized trail that takes visitors past an old home site and well.
Meet at the center for daily fireside chats at 10 am and interpretive walks at 4 pm, as well as general programs about Campbell County nature and ecology. Bring friends and family and explore this gem of southern Campbell County! For more details visit http://ces.ca.uky.edu/campbell/EnvironmentalEducationCenter.
Kenton County Parks are accepting reservations for the upcoming outdoor season for all shelterhouses in the parks maintained by Kenton County Fiscal Court, including those located in Lincoln Ridge, Middleton-Mills, Richardson Road, and Pioneer parks.
The eight shelterhouses are available by advance reservation and payment of a non-refundable permit fee. A permit entitles you to exclusive use of the shelterhouse from 9:00 am until dusk. Personal checks, money orders, and cash are accepted.
The KCP&R office is located at 3902 Richardson Rd., Independence, KY 41051, and just inside the entrance to the Golf Courses of Kenton County. Directions: From I-275, go south on Turkeyfoot Rd., past Industrial Rd. Turn left on Richardson Rd. at St. Barbara’s Church. The entrance to the Golf Courses of Kenton County is down about a mile on your right. As you turn in off Richardson Rd., look for a sign and driveway on your left. Follow driveway to the office.
You may make reservations any weekday during regular business hours, between 7:30 am and 4:00 pm. Call (859) 525-PLAY (7529) for shelterhouse availability.
For news of upcoming programs, activities, and events to be held in Kenton County's parks, call the Parks & Recreation office at (859) 525-PLAY (7529). Sign up for a once-a-week e-mail update of What’s Happening in Kenton County’s parks or check out our web site. Go to kentoncounty.org, scroll down and click on County Departments, then on Parks and Recreation, and then on Recreation.
WE CAN HELP SAVE RAINFORESTS WITH A DAILY CLICK OF THE MOUSE! Rainforests are some of the world's most ancient and complex ecosystems. They cover a mere 2% of the Earth, yet more than half of all plant and animal species live there. The rainforest is home to creatures as famous as the jaguar and poison dart frog, as well as lesser-known and even unidentified species. These ecosystems are an amazing resource that is quickly slipping away.
The rainforest is where many modern food staples originated, including tomatoes, corn, and chocolate, but we use a mere fraction of the edible plants available there. Western science has analyzed less than one percent of rainforest plants for medicinal compounds, and the indigenous tribes that use these plants are rapidly disappearing.
To complicate matters more, the rate of species extinction in the rainforest is undeniably high. As the forests are burned for short-term farming, grazed, and harvested for wood and other compounds at an unsustainable rate, we are swiftly losing the very species that may someday provide needed cures or disease-resistant crops. With them, we lose an extraordinary number of unique creatures found nowhere else in the world.
The Rainforest web site provides a feel-good way to help promote awareness and prevent deforestation every day — through easy and quick online activities. And we can help
With a simple, daily click of the green "Click Here to Give - it's FREE" button at The Rainforest Site, visitors help to preserve rainforest land. Visitors pay nothing. Critical habitat is preserved by charitable partners.
Please remember to click every day to save important ecosystems and give hope to future generations. Every click counts in the battle to save our rainforests. Visit www.therainforestsite.com to do your part.
Visit CNC to explore the bounty and natural resources provided by our land. Join in on upcoming adult and family programs, including Abner Hollow Cabin Drop-In Opportunities on Saturdays and lectures by local historians. Stop by the Rowe Visitor Center to view our new exhibit featuring animal pelts and mounts, tree nuts, and other displays showing the area's natural bounty. Then hit the trails with our history hike or "Nature Calls" tour and experience firsthand the legacy of CNC's land. For information visit http://www.cincynature.org/.
Wildlife Watch Website. The change of seasons is an important influence on animal behavior. Whether it’s the hot season turning cold or the dry season turning wet, wildlife has to adapt to survive. One strategy is migration. Songbirds, waterfowl, raptors and hummingbirds travel north and south each year, some as far as the tropics! Caribou and pronghorn shift their ranges to find access to food. Even insects such as monarch butterflies and green darner dragonflies travel great distances to survive the change in season.
So, migratory species are now on the move! The fall season offers great wildlife-watching opportunities in your own backyard or at a local park or nature preserve. Report your sightings on the National Wildlife Federation’s Wildlife Watch website www.nwf.org. Your observations will be used by researchers will review your findings and track the health and behavior of wildlife and plant species nationwide.
Volunteers Needed!! The Community Collaborative… Rain, Hail and Snow Network (CoCoRaHS) organizes volunteers in communities throughout the United States to collect and measure precipitation rain, hail and snow in their communities. Citizen volunteers are trained how to measure precipitation using a rain gauge and hail pad, record their data and report their measurements online. Data collected by volunteers complements observations made by the National Weather Service and is used by local meteorologists, researchers, emergency managers, farmers, outdoor enthusiasts, teachers and others. Remember, every drop counts! Sign up to become a Volunteer Observer or Local Volunteer Coordinator with Community Collaboration Rain Hail and snow in Kentucky or Ohio or Indiana to help this network grow. You can volunteer as an individual or as part of a community or school group. Check out www.cocorahs.org to learn more.
Kenton County Parks & Recreation is on a mission. They hope to collect ONE MILLION aluminum can tabs to be donated to the Ronald McDonald House and they are hoping you will help by saving the little tabs you pull to open your aluminum soda or soup can.
The tabs collected will be recycled to generate funds to offset Ronald McDonald House expenses such as helping care for families who stay there during trying times each year.
So far, they have reached one fifth of their goal. As of this week, they have collected 215,000 pop tops-that’s just 785,000 away from a million! With your help, they will meet their lofty goal. When the goal of 1 million tabs is reached Kenton County Parks and Recreation will need 2,000 people wearing necklaces of 500 can-tabs each to do a “hands-across-the-park” chain when Ronald McDonald comes to visit and collect 1 million pop tops
There is no need to wait until you have many, MANY thousands to donate but If you have a whole bunch, call Steve Trauger at (859) 525-PLAY to work out a delivery or pickup.
Save ‘em! String ‘em! Donate ‘em to KCP&R for Ronald McDonald House!
Paper Calculator
Who hasn't been frustrated by a neighbor in the next cubicle who tosses office paper into the trash, rather than the recycling bin? Who hasn't wondered if the paper in that recycling bin actually gets recycled? Or if the office really needs to use all that paper in the first place?
If you've found yourself feeling guilty about all the trees that were sacrificed for that memo about the new company dress code, try the Environmental Defense Fund's new Paper Calculator 2.0, an updated version of a tool that has helped thousands of businesses reduce their paper use.
The tool quantifies the environmental impact of a company's choice in paper. Having those numbers can arm the interested employee with the facts needed to change purchasing decisions.
For instance, switching your annual order of 100 tons of copy paper to a paper with 50% recycled content could save 173 tons of wood, 100,000 pounds of greenhouse gases, hundreds of pounds of toxic air and water pollutants and more than 50,000 pounds of solid waste.
The average American consumes more than 700 pounds of paper a year.
The paper industry is the fourth-largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions among manufacturers and paper accounts for one-third of landfill waste. Reducing paper consumption just 10% – the rough equivalent of getting your office to buy paper with more recycled content – would be like taking 280,000 cars off the road. Paper calculator at www.edf.org/papercalculator/.
GAS SAVING TIPS
The surest way you can improve your fuel cost problem is to change your motoring habits. Listed below are some ideas!
1. Avoid prolonged warming up of engine, even on cold mornings - 30 to 45 seconds is plenty of time.
2. Be sure the automatic choke is disengaged after engine warm up... chokes often get stuck, resulting in bad gas/air mixture.
3. Don't start and stop engine needlessly. Idling your engine for one minute consumes the gas amount equivalent to when you start the engine.
4. Avoid "revving" the engine, especially just before you switch the engine off; this wastes fuel needlessly and washes oil down from the inside cylinder walls, owing to loss of oil pressure.
5. Eliminate jack-rabbit starts. Accelerate slowly when starting from dead stop. Don't push pedal down more than 1/4 of the total foot travel. This allows carburetor to function at peak efficiency.
6. Exceeding 40 mph forces your car to overcome tremendous wind resistance.
7. Never exceed legal speed limit. Primarily they are set for your traveling safety, however better gas efficiency also occurs. Traveling at 55 mph give you up to 21% better mileage when compared to former legal speed limits of 65 mph and 70 mph.
8. Traveling at fast rates in low gears can consume up to 45% more fuel than is needed.
9. Manual shift driven cars allow you to change to highest gear as soon as possible, thereby letting you save gas if you "nurse it along". However, if you cause the engine to "bog down", premature wearing of engine parts occurs.
10. Keep windows closed when traveling at highway speeds. Open windows cause air drag, reducing your mileage by 10%.
11. Drive steadily. Slowing down or speeding up wastes fuel. Also avoid tailgating - the driver in front of you is unpredictable. Not only is it unsafe, but if affects your economy, if he slows down unexpectedly.
Conserve Energy in Your Home
The surest way to kill a phantom load, otherwise known as standby power or lopomo, low power mode, is to simply pull the plug. That means when you're done with your coffee pot, microwave, hair dryer and other devices, disconnect them totally from their power sources.
Next to the TV, which can draw 12 watts of electricity even after you flick off American Idol, the biggest standby energy hog is the home computer and its suite of devices. A printer can draw 11.5 watts when idling, and a subwoofer, 10.8.
Plug them all into a power strip and, when you're through cruising for green tips, turn it off!
Paint Disposal
To dispose of water based paint, fill a plastic-lined box with cat litter or sawdust, pour the paint into the container, and let it dry before putting it in the garbage. Latex and oil-based paint can be thrown away with your regular garbage, as long as it is dried. To dry out your paint, simply mix sand, sawdust, or cat litter with your paint and leave the lid off. Once dried, dispose with your regular garbage (with the lid off).
Safely Store or Dispose of Household Hazardous Waste.
Did you know that there are about 100 pounds of household hazardous wastes - oil, antifreeze, paints, pesticides, fertilizers, and other products) in the average home? In most American households, hazardous wastes are hiding-out in the garage - 94 percent of households indicate there is at least one HHW product in their garage. Not only do these products take up space, but some can release carbon monoxide or volatile organic compounds that impact indoor and outdoor air quality. And, if products are stored in an area where rainwater, snowmelt, or floodwater can reach them, they can be transported into storm drains, rivers and streams, and even well water, putting water quality at risk.
Take advantage of mild weather to get a head-start on cleaning the garage. Make sure that products are stored safely, and properly dispose of those you no longer need. It’s best to store HHW products in their original containers (which also have directions and warning labels attached), and keep them away from pilot lights, water heaters and electrical outlets, which could start a fire. Keep your products in an area that stays dry and is not accessible to kids or pets. Once you’ve gathered up products you no longer need, take them to a local hazardous waste collection site - visit www.cleanup.org or call 1-800-CLEANUP to find one in your area.
GREEN CONSUMER WEBSITE According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, more than 2 million tons of used electronics are disposed of each year. Based on current disposal rates, Americans will have discarded up to 154 million computers by 2005. You can help reduce this number by visiting WWW.GREENERCHOICES.ORG
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