An email is spreading across the Internet warning about termites in mulch stockpiles from the hurricane ravaged Gulf Coast. As the GLRC’s Tana Weingartner reports, the email is more rumor than fact:
Transcript
An email is spreading across the Internet warning about termites in
mulch stockpiles from the hurricane ravaged Gulf Coast. As the GLRC’s
Tana Weingartner reports, the email is more rumor than fact:
The email says Formosa termite infested trees downed by Hurricane
Katrina are being mulched and sold off by the state of Louisiana. The
writer warns the infected mulch could end up at your local big box
hardware store.
The Mulch and Soil Council’s Executive Director says that’s just “not
true.” Robert LaGasse says the well-monitored clean up operation and a
preexisting quarantine banning wood products from being shipped out of
the area are part of what keeps the termites from spreading.
“We’ve never had an infestation issue with termites in mulch, in bagged
product.”
LaGasse adds even if the mulch was shipped out of the region, the
chipping and grinding process along with the heat generated by the
mulch would be enough to kill any termite.
The Formosa termite has been a problem for parts of the South since it
was first brought into the country after World War II.
A major city is about to become the first in the nation to generate energy from dog poop. Yes, you heard that right… dog poop. The GLRC’s Tamara Keith reports:
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A major city is about to become the first in the nation to generate energy
from dog poop. Yes, you heard that right…dog poop. The GLRC’s
Tamara Keith reports:
A recent study by the city of San Francisco found that nearly 4-percent
of all the trash picked up from people’s homes is animal waste. Yuck.
And while most, would gladly leave that stinky issue alone… San
Francisco officials see it as an opportunity.
The city’s garbage company is launching a pilot project. They’re
planning to collect the waste and then put it in a methane digester. As
the waste breaks down, it will produce gas that can be burned to power
an electricity generating turbine.
Robert Reed is a spokesman for Norcal Waste, the trash company.
“There’s literally 10 million tons of pet waste created annually in the
US, and it’s an edgy area of recycling. No one is doing anything about
it.”
Reed says he hopes San Francisco’s poop power program will be a
trendsetter.
Compact fluorescent light bulbs can save energy and money. (Photo courtesy of National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
They say that charity begins at home. So does energy conservation. At least, that’s the idea behind a new program designed to get children interested in saving energy, one light bulb at a time. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports:
Transcript
They say that charity begins at home. So does energy conservation. At least,
that’s the idea behind a new program designed to get children interested in
saving energy, one light bulb at a time. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Chris Lehman reports:
All of German Valley Elementary School’s 100 students are gathered in the
gymnasium to learn about saving the world…
“You guys are the ones who are going to have to worry about this stuff down
the road as you become adults and go out into the world. We always want to
plan, don’t we fifth grade.”
“Yes.”
These kids are about to get a lesson in saving the planet. Although German
Valley Elementary is surrounded by farmland, the students are going to be
treated to a rap concert as part of that lesson. Their teachers are the rap stars,
trying to drive the message home…
(Sound of teacher rap skit)
The unusual school assembly is the kick-off event in a program called PEAK,
which stands for Preserving Energy for All Kids. It’s funded by a legal
settlement against one of the biggest power companies in Illinois: ComEd.
An audit found ComEd under funded its infrastructure. As part of a court
settlement, money was set aside to encourage energy conservation.
David Kolata is Executive Director of the Citizen’s Utility Board. The
consumer advocacy group is one of the agencies charged by the courts with
dispersing the 16 million dollar ComEd settlement.
“The mandate is simply to use that money to reduce our energy usage as
much as we can. We’ve taken the approach that there are multiple programs
out there that makes sense and we’re trying to see…basically pilot programs
to see what works and what doesn’t.”
So, German Valley Elementary is a testing ground. The school was
recommended by State Representative Jim Sacia. Sacia says educational
programs such as PEAK are crucial as younger generations face growing
questions about energy shortages in the future.
“I think it’s just so important that they learn at a young age the importance of
conserving energy and to consider alternative energy sources so that they can
make the world a far more energy-efficient place in years to come.”
The PEAK program includes more than school assemblies and teachers
mimicking rappers. The bulk of the lessons take place in the classroom…
(Sound of classroom presentation)
Teachers at schools participating in the PEAK program use teaching
materials generated by a California-based organization. One of the first
lessons is about the difference between standard light bulbs and compact
fluorescent light bulbs. Those bulbs use about one-third of the energy of a
standard incandescent light bulb, and can last up to ten years.
Students are given an assignment: to go home and count all of the light bulbs
in their house. Then they’ll figure out how much money their parents could
save by switching to compact fluorescents.
The PEAK program is in its beginning stages at German Valley Elementary,
but the message of energy conservation seemed to be hitting home with fifth
grader Brian Kraft:
“Because if we’re older and we don’t have any energy there will be nothing
to do and see.”
“How do you want to save energy yourself?”
“Turn lights off, play outside more than play inside.”
Playing outside means less TV watching and video game playing… and that
saves energy too.
Fifth grade science teacher Robert Nelson says the initial phase of the PEAK
program has generated positive feedback from children and their parents.
The school intends to sell compact fluorescent bulbs as a fundraiser later in
the school year.
Maggots can be used as a medical treatment. Specifically, to help treat wounds. (Courtesy of the National Institutes of Health)
Maggots can be used to disinfect a wound due to their attraction to the bacteria. (Courtesy of the National Institutes of Health)
An ancient medical treatment is starting to be used again to treat wounds. But for many people, just the thought of the treatment is stomach-turning. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Melissa Ingells has the story:
Transcript
An ancient medical treatment is starting to be used again to treat wounds,
but for many people, just the thought of the treatment is stomach turning.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Melissa Ingells has the story:
Ray Peterson has already lost one leg to diabetes. On his remaining foot
there’s a deep wound, and it’s not healing. It’s not getting better because
of the diabetes. He could lose his second leg.
His doctor is taking the dressing off Peterson’s wound. The wound…is
ugly. It looks like someone drilled a quarter-sized hole deep into
Peterson’s foot. The wound smells bad, and then the doctor finds
maggots. The blowfly larvae are squirming around in there. The doctor
is not surprised, though. He put the maggots there a few days ago. It’s
part of the treatment to save Ray Peterson’s leg.
They’re not exactly the kind of maggots you’d find in your garbage can,
but they’re similar. Last summer the FDA approved maggots as medical
devices.
The maggots eat the dead tissue, not the live flesh. In a process
researchers don’t completely understand… the maggots actually clean
and disinfect the wound much better than a surgeon could. Apparently,
they’re attracted to the bacteria in the dead tissue.
Ray Peterson is in his doctor’s office, trading in some big, full maggots
for some new hungry ones.
The old, fat maggots are washed off with saline. The doctor has to dig around
with the tweezers to get a few strays out.
Ray Peterson says he doesn’t mind seeing the process.
“I enjoy watching them, truthfully.”
The doctor cleans the wound a bit more and then places tiny, new maggots on
it with a small spatula.
(Sound of office)
There are plenty of maggot jokes as Dr. Dowling and the nurses work on
Peterson’s foot. Dowling says that his staff has become comfortable with
the maggots, but many health care professionals are not.
“Actually the patients react much better than the doctors. Every patient
I’ve done it on has been very excited and enthusiastic. I can’t say that’s
always the case for the medical community at large. I’ve had some
doctors tell patients if you have maggots on your foot, don’t come in my
office, but I think that will go away with time the more it’s accepted.
The new maggots start moving around as soon as they feel warmth and smell
food. Dr. Dowling and his nurses quickly contain them with a bandage.
“We build a cage around the wound to hold the maggots in, we’ll put the
maggots in, cover up the cage, and leave it there for two to three days,
and during that time the maggots will increase in size two to three times.
And then, when they come in we’ll take the cage off and wash the maggots out
with saline solution, and look at the wound and decide if it needs another
application or not.”
Several clinical studies have been conducted on the maggot treatment.
The results have been overwhelmingly good, but because the idea is so
repulsive to many patients or their doctors, the practice is still not
widespread.
Robert Root Bernstein is a professor of physiology at Michigan State
University. He co-wrote the book “Honey, Mud, Maggots and other Medical Marvels.”
“Taking a maggot or a bunch of maggots and putting them in a wound and watching
them crawl around in there is not something that most people find appealing, and
usually okay for the patient – the patient doesn’t actually have to look. It’s the
practitioners who have to deal with these squirmy little things and have to put
them in and take them out who seem to have most of the problem with the therapy.”
Root Bernstein says maggot therapy might catch on. That’s because doctors are seeing
more and more diabetic wounds as the rate of diabetes keeps going up in the U.S.
When medicines such as antibiotics don’t work on the stubborn wounds,
patients and doctors sometimes turn to the maggot therapy as their last hope for
recovery.
Ray Peterson found out about maggot therapy when his daughter saw an
article in a local newspaper. He says at first his friends were a little put
off, but then started kidding him about the procedure.
“They call me maggot man. Just for a joke. I go along with them. You’re a pretty
good sport about this. You gotta be.”
And Peterson says the good-natured ribbing is sure a lot better than the
alternative. Peterson also thinks if people can get past the “ick” factor…
more people’s limbs might be saved by maggot therapy.
States that are looking at regional agreements to reduce air pollution could face legal challenges. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
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States that are looking at regional agreements to reduce air pollution could face legal challenges.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Some states are upset with the pace of federal efforts to address climate change. So, they’re
considering teaming up on their own. For example, New York and some other eastern states plan
to begin a trading program in 2009, aimed at reducing carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to
global warming.
Robert Percival is an environmental law professor at the University of Maryland. He says the
regional efforts must proceed carefully.
“If the federal government fails to take action against a major problem there’s no problem letting
the states step in as long as they do so in a non-discriminatory way.”
In other words, the states can’t interfere with interstate commerce, by ruling against utilities or
other firms that produce products outside their regional collaboration. If the states do
discriminate, they’d need to get approval from Congress, and with Capitol Hill and the White
House currently on the same page on many issues, it isn’t clear federal lawmakers would back the
states.
American chestnuts (left) are smaller than Chinese and European chestnuts. The Chinese and European varieties are also resistant to the blight, making the imports more desirable to growers. (Photo by Lester Graham)
American chestnuts were an important food source for wildlife because there was a more consistent crop each year than acorns. (Photo by Lester Graham)
Bill Nash of Nash Nurseries holds the spiny husks that hold the chestnuts. The American chestnut grove behind him is 20 years old and has not yet been hit by blight. (Photo by Lester Graham)
Food is always a big part of the holidays. But one
traditional food has – for the most part – disappeared from American tables. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Food is always a big part of the holidays. But one traditional food has – for the most part – disapeared from American tables. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
(Sound of Nat King Cole singing, “Chestnuts roasing on an open fire…”)
That old chestnut of a song romanticizes roasting chestnuts as a part of the holidays. But a lot of us have never even seen chestnuts, let alone roasted them on an open fire. Chestnuts used to be a major part of the Eastern hardwood forest. There were millions of them. In fact, 25 percent of all the mature trees were chestnuts. But a blight, imported with some Chinese chestnut trees, slowly wiped out the American chestnuts. Now, they’re gone.
Well… almost. Much of the root stock is still alive. Sprouts grow until the blight knocks them back again. A blight only hurts the standing tree where it branches out.
And, in a few isolated pockets in the Midwest, the blight hasn’t reached the trees. A few American chestnuts are alive and growing and some of them are free of the blight. At Nash Nursuries in central Michigan, owner Bill Nash is guiding us through a rare sight… a grove of American chestnuts.
“These are 20 years old and as you can see, they’re fairly good sized. The American chestnut is quite a rapid growing tree. It’s well-suited for our climate, so it doesn’t have any of the problems that some of the hybrids do as far as growing and cultural care you have to take care of them. The Americans, you get them started and they’re pretty much on their own.”
In a few places in Michigan and Wisconsin there are small groves of chestnuts. They’re prized trees. They’re great for shade. The hardwood is rot resistant and makes great furniture and fence posts. And the chestnuts are eaten by humans and wildlife alike. Bill Nash says the tree will be popular again if it ever overcomes the blight that’s hit it so hard.
“The American chestnut will make another big comeback in this country as a yard tree, as a timber tree, as a wildlife tree.”
That part about a wildlife tree is more important than just worrying about the squirrels and bunnies. Chestnuts were an important food source for all kinds of animals.
Andrew Jarosz is a plant biologist at Michigan State University. He says the loss of chestnuts has been hard on wildlife populations.
“Chestnuts shed nuts in a more regular pattern than oaks, which will have what are called mast years – where they’ll have major crops, massive crops one year and very small crops in other years – which means it’s either feast or famine if you’re depending on oaks.”
Since the blight first began hitting American chestnuts about a century ago, researchers have been looking into all kinds of ways to stop it. One way is to cross it with the Chinese chestnut which has a couple of genes that resist the blight. But it takes a long time to breed out the Chinese characteristics from the American chestnuts and still keep the resistant genes.
Another approach is genetic manipulation. Genetically modifying the American chestnut tree to make it disease resistant. Again, work is underway, but it takes a long time. And even after success, it’s likely some people won’t like the idea of releasing a genetically modified organism into the wild.
The final approach worked in Europe when the blight hit there. It seems there’s a naturally occuring virus that kills the blight. It spread naturally in Europe. There are a few groves in Michigan that have naturally acquired the virus and it’s working to keep the blight at bay. Andrew Jarosz is working on the research. He says the trick is figuring out how to get the virus to spread to other trees short of manually spreading it on cankers infected by the blight.
“If we’re literally talking about millions of trees across probably, you know, the eastern third of the country, we obviously can’t treat every canker on every tree. And we need to be able to figure out a way to deploy the virus in a way that it can spread.”
Even with all that hopeful research, it’ll be ten years at least before some practical solutions end up in the forests, and Jarosz believes a couple of centuries before the American chestnut holds the place it once did in the forests.
Bill Nash knows it’ll be a while before there are major changes, but he is optimistic about the American chestnut.
“Oh, I would think the tree has a bright future. There’s enough people working on that, enough programs going on now… So, I would suspect that in the not-too-distant future we should have some of this progress made. You know, Robert Frost in his poem predicted the comeback of the American chestnut, that something would arise to offset that blight. And we’re starting to see that.”
Frost put it this way: “Will the blight end the chestnut? The farmers rather guess not, It keeps smoldering at the roots And sending up new shoots Till another parasite Shall come to end the blight.”
Seems Frost was an optimist too.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
For almost forty years, Dr. Robert Betz searched the railroad tracks and
back roads of the Midwest for remnants of the nearly extinct tall-grass
prairie. Along the way, he helped define and popularize a new
environmental movement on the rise throughout the Great Lakes and the
country—a movement called ecological restoration. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Alex Blumberg has this report:
It may be that we’re entering a kinder, gentler era when it comes tohow we interact with animals. These days, more and more anglers catchand release fish…Dog training is moving away from dominance and towardcooperation…And a method of working with horses is bucking the traditionof "breaking" them. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelsonreports:
