this is good

“Let every individual and institution now think and act as a responsible trustee of Earth, seeking choices in ecology, economics and ethics that will provide a sustainable future, eliminate pollution, poverty and violence, awaken the wonder of life and foster peaceful progress in the human adventure.” – John McConnell, founder of International Earth Day

The Real Energy Crisis: We Use too Much

Fossil fuels will eventually run out.  And they contribute to global warming and pollution anyway.  So we need renewable energy sources.  We have some pretty fantastic ideas with solar power, wind power, alternative fuels, and more–they offer real and exciting potential.  But there are problems with all of them.  They are expensive.  They often take up a lot of space.  They aren’t without their own sustainability questions.

We’ve got to do something, though, and we have to do something quickly, because forecasts predict terrible forest fires, stronger storms, rising temperatures, disappearing islands, and more endangered species.  I don’t even understand this El Nino thing (it stands for “the nino” for those of you who don’t speak Spanish), but I know enough to be a bit worried about it.  It seems we are investing so much time and money into doing something drastic that we have forgotten about the smallest, easiest, and cheapest step we can take.  Use less energy.

If you’ve ever, as I think we all have, had that moment when you think “we’re screwed,” then you’ve also thought of changes you can make.  ”I can recycle,” you say, or “I can ride public transit” or “I can buy sustainably-produced and local food.”  Yes, you and I can do all of those things, and if only we had money we could replace our old appliances with energy-efficient appliances.  We could buy solar panels (maybe even enough to produce energy for one of our neighbors as well).  We could buy hybrid or electric cars.  Even the government is helping us with many of these.

But I wonder if the only real solution is not using electricity.  Think about that–I know it’s sounds uncomfortable, and it requires some serious life changes.  Is it the only solution, though?  I’m asking.  I’m thinking out loud.  Because with little effort and maybe a little money, I can light my house with olive oil lamps.  I can wash all of the dishes and clothes by hand.  I can heat my home and cook with a wood stove (okay, that might require a bit more money and effort), but these are legitimate thoughts, and they all seriously reduce my ecological footprint.  I’m very aware of the difficulty involved with these, as I’ve done zero of them, but I can’t shake these thoughts.

So for now, as I consider these things, I’m aware that I can always make more changes.  I’m also pretty sure that the production of electricity is always going to exact a toll on the environment (does that answer my question?), and if I don’t eliminate my use of it, I can certainly work towards that and reduce my use.

We need to make changes, and we need to consider serious changes.  Nearly all of us are taught from an early age to leave any space we occupy better than how we found it.  I do hope that I am able to leave this a better place.  So in order to pursue that goal, below are some practices we can adopt.  I encourage you to try these as well as contribute your own ideas to the effort.  Understand that none of these is a new idea (in fact, many are quite old), but they are all feasible.

Supplement lighting with olive oil lamps (visit Mother Earth News for guidance)
Hang dry clothes
Turn the thermstat down (and wear more clothing)
Walk to the store
Ride the bus

Please offer your ideas.  Again, these are things that have been done, so I realize I’m not starting any sort of revolution, but your old ideas might become my new ideas.

Preparing for Winter

Due to the beautiful weather and a need to accomplish house and yard tasks prior to winter, posts have been a bit lacking.  This is what we have done:

Planted blueberry bushes: I purchased 3 year-old bushes from Waters Blueberry Farm in Smithville.  They will offer us organic blueberries for up to 65 days each year, and since local, organic blueberries are hard to come by, we hope this will save us some money and trouble.  Plus, edible landscape is fun.

Amended clay soil: be very glad if you don’t have clay soil.  We have spent a lot of time mixing sand and leaves into the clay soil in hopes of creating a more friendly environment for plants.  We have also planted tulips and daffodils as we have amended, so come early spring, our front yard should offer a splendid view.

Repaired old windows: this is ongoing and may be for quite some time, but we currently have a hole in our house.  Our old windows have been nearly useless for the two years I have owned the house.  The glass is about to fall out, and most of them are painted shut.  So, I am trying to fix them.  I have removed one window and am working to reseal the glass.  I have to do this one window at a time, and I hope to finish two more before cold weather.

This is what we have left to do:

Plant a ton of daylilies: these things are everywhere in our yard, and between the spot where we planted the blueberry bushes to the front where we amended the soil, we removed quite a few.  We are going to plant them in the backyard in hopes of adding some color to our urban lawn.

Add insulation to the attic: before October ends, we plan to blow some additional insulation into our attic.  Old, leaky houses are expensive to heat, and I’d like to keep stress on the environment and on our pocket book (what is a pocket book, anyway?) to a minimum.

Lots to do.  Not a lot of time.  Far too soon, though, cold weather will discourage me from venturing outside and force me to dream of daffodils and spring planting.

The Blessed Ones

Many of us have been blessed with knowing how our goods are manufactured, how our every action affects our environment, how our decisions do eventually affect individuals across the globe, how certain chemicals damage our bodies.  And I hate, but also love, the stress that knowing causes.  It doesn’t just stress me mentally, but also physiologically and financially.

I am proud that I stress about every item I place in a trash bin.  I need to know that my trash has to go somewhere.  But I also have to deal with the mental anguish and do everything I can to divert that item from becoming trash next time.  That mental anguish causes me to pull out my eyebrows and sideburns–literally.

I hope Knowledge is Health, Courtney’s and my attempt at a blog, does simply offer knowledge that can positively affect our health and our world’s health.  I am passionate about this stuff, and I know some of our readers share that passion, but I also understand that we are all on unique journeys that take different, and very beautiful, turns.  My passion does not have to be your passion.

I hope that for our actions detrimental to our own health and our world’s we will feel sorrow.  And I hope that for the changes we make out of concern for ourselves and others we will feel bliss.  It’s just about impossible to know the consequences of all of our actions, but we owe it to ourselves, our neighbors, and our future neighbors to respond when we learn of those consequences.  And our response should be as unique as we are.  All I ask is that you respond.

Real Milk is Raw

We bought our first gallon of raw cow’s milk just over two weeks ago.  I had been calling around the city to find a place to buy it, but most of the farms I called didn’t deliver, so it would have involved driving at least 40 minutes to pick it up (Missouri law allows raw milk sales only when it is either purchased directly from the farm or delivered).  While at the Brookside Farmer’s Market, though, I happened to talk to a woman from whom I had been purchasing peppers, okra, and pecans.  She said her husband delivered raw cow’s and goat’s milk, so I scheduled to pick some up the following Saturday.

Raw milk has multiple benefits over pasteurized milk, so I’d like to outline a few of those benefits.

1.  Raw milk contains beneficial enzymes that are destroyed in the pasteurization process (by the way, you might ask, “but I thought pasteurization was necessary to prevent diseases.  Wasn’t that the genius of Louis Pasteur’s discovery?”  Well, yes, it was.  We know far more about the spread of diseases than we did previously, and contamination with such diseases is preventable through clean practices).  These enzymes assist the body in digesting the milk, so for those who are lactose intolerant, raw milk could be an alternative.

2.  Raw milk contains healthy bacteria that are destroyed in the pasteurization process.  These healthy bacteria populate the human digestive system, so that we have a balance of good and bad bacteria.  A common problem in an age of antibiotics is that our bodies are relatively low in good bacteria, because antibiotics kill all bacteria (not just the bad), so it is essential to our health and ability to fight illness that we have a balance of these bacteria.  Also, as an added bonus, since raw milk still possesses these good bacteria, the milk doesn’t go bad in the way pasteurized milk does.  Sure, it does sour, but it just becomes sour cream, buttermilk, and cream cheese.  Once raw milk goes sour, you could argue that it’s actually better for you, since it contains even more beneficial bacteria.  And you don’t have to throw it out.

3.  Raw milk that comes from pastured, not to be confused with pasteurized, cows is much higher in healthy fats, since the cows are consuming what they are meant to consume–grass.  Cows stomachs do not tolerate the corn that CAFOs have forced them to consume (or the cow lard, or the chicken droppings).  They are animals destined for grazing fields of grass, and when they are able to do this, their flesh and milk (and in turn, butter, cheese, etc.) are actually better for us.  Even full fat milk is more healthful when it comes from pastured cows.  On top of the healthy fats, the milk is also higher in many essential nutrients when the cows are allowed to graze the fields.

4.  Raw milk is just so creamy.  And tasty.

I am making cream cheese with raw milk right now, and I intend to make butter with the next gallon.  Court and I also plan to try the raw goat’s milk, which is another alternative for those who are lactose intolerant.  I encourage you to try it (they also sell half gallons).  If you’d like more information, comment, and I’d be happy to discuss with you.

For more information, visit www.raw-milk-facts.com.

Cosmonauts are Cool

“Only when I saw the Earth from space, in all its ineffable beauty and fragility, did I realize that humankind’s most urgent task is to cherish and preserve it for future generations.” – Sigmund Jahn, German cosmonaut

Flea Battle Aftermath

As many of you know, we have been fighting fleas in our home and on our cat.  We were determined to do so without chemicals, and we are nearing an end.  For an account of the brutal fight and our perceived solution, visit the original post here.

I say perceived solution, because we weren’t as done as we thought we were at the time.  So I will add this to the solution (which, in the end, did work): you must be patient and persistent.  I had a conversation just the other day with a former employee of an unnamed pest control company, and he said that ridding your home of fleas without chemicals is impossible.  Not true!

I think the first key to beating fleas is this: catch them early.  We began washing Greta at first itch, but we stopped there.  It’s likely they were reproducing at riciculous rates (remember, fleas lay as many as 20 eggs a day) for a week or more before we addressed fleas in our home.  So we had spotted the fleas an early lead.  When you first see an itch, bathe your animal and vacuum your home often for at least a week.  After the week, you will have an idea of how bad the problem is.  As I said in our solution, it helped to isolate Greta while we worked to control the flea population in our home.  Because the fleas need a meal to reproduce, we were able to combine picking them off our ankles with vacuuming, and they have slowly declined.

We were catching 20-40 fleas a day for quite a while, but yesterday we only saw three, and this morning (when the fleas are usually eager to find a juicy ankle), we didn’t see any.

Fleas can be defeated without chemicals, and though Courtney and I nearly drove ourselves mad in the process, I firmly believe that it was worth it.  Neither Greta nor we breathed or absorbed toxic substances, and our home is nearly flea free.

We are determined to keep the fleas under control, so we are prepared to bathe Greta once or twice a month, and we are prepared to vacuum more regularly, which our guests will probably appreciate anyway.  Now we know that chemical-free flea control is about patience and persistence.

And knowing is half the battle.

I’m a Sucker for Green Beer

I like the taste of beer.  A lot.  And I really like beer that has a small carbon footprint.  For Kansas Citians, that beer is anything from Boulevard Brewing Company, since it’s just so close (and they have a relatively new, state of the art, energy efficient brewhouse).  But I also like to switch it up occasionally, so it’s nice to know there are eco-friendly beer producers throughout the US.  One of those is Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. 

At Sierra Nevada, they have covered every inch of roof with solar panels.  They also grow their own hops, filter their own water, and pay farmers to grow organic grains.  The only reason their beer isn’t organic is this: beer is about 90% water, and water can’t be certified organic.  Pretty cool.  If you’d like to know more about Sierra Nevada’s environmental stewardship, visit their website.

And visit your local Gomer’s for a nice selection of Sierra Nevada brews.

Food Budget

“Americans spend just 10 percent of their disposable income on food, compared with 22 percent in 1932.”

Think about it.

Fighting Fleas Naturally

We are presently locked in a flea battle.  The fleas entered via the house beast and have taken over our home.  We don’t use any flea repellent on Greta, our cat, because my research tells me that the chemicals used in those drops originate from chemical warfare.  On top of that, over time, the fleas develop a resistance to that, so the drops are getting increasingly more potent.  I have also read the horror stories of cats and dogs responding quite poorly to the drops, and even though I am not exactly an animal rights activist, I do like Greta quite a bit.

*By the way, if you don’t care about the details of the flea battle, scroll to the bottom for the solution.  It will be clearly marked “Solution.”

As far as our home goes, we were against the “flea bomb” from the beginning.  We do everything we can to avoid harmful chemicals in foods and cosmetic products, so there is no way we were willingly going to fill our home with additional chemicals.  So the all-natural flea battle began.

I have done a lot of research on environmental, human, and animal-friendly flea control.  Before I outline what we’ve done, though, you should know this about fleas.  Female fleas lay as many as 20 eggs a day, and they often lay them either on the animal or in dark spots.  Needless to say, the problem can get out of hand very quickly.

We started out with this:

We vacuumed the house really well, especially in Greta’s preferred spots, and dumped the contents outside.  We also washed all bedding and furniture covers (I read that it’s recommended to wash in hot water to kill the fleas and larvae, but I think if you use a dryer, cold water washing should be fine).

After vacuuming, we sprinkled salt in as many dark and secluded locations as possible–this is supposed to dry out the larvae.  We repeated this every few days for a little over a week.  I know not all people have this option, but since we have a screened porch that is shut off from the rest of the house, we shut Greta on the porch in an attempt to control the indoor flea population.  We placed a white sheet on the couch on our front porch, since Greta spends nearly all of her time on it, and this allowed us to easily see how many flea droppings (made of feces and eggs) we were dealing with.  We changed and washed this sheet daily.

As far as Greta goes, we realized our biggest mistake when initially dealing with fleas on her body was that we were washing her too quickly.  She, as most cats do, hates baths (I always end up with a few abdominal puncture wounds).  Because of this, we often lathered and rinsed as quickly as possible.  We noticed after one of these baths, though, that fleas had latched onto her belly, but were still alive.  We now know that we must lather her and leave her lathered for 10-15 minutes.  We use a mild all-natural soap and bathe her in the sink, allowing her to sit in belly-high warm water–she seems to tolerate this.  Beyond bathing her, which you shouldn’t do too frequently, because cats have fairly sensitive skin, we comb her two to three times a day with a flea comb.  I catch the fleas and droppings and put them in a soapy water dish kept nearby.

We did all of this pretty faithfully (I missed a few early morning combings) for over a week.  And we still had fleas.  They weren’t terrible, but both Courtney and I were very frustrated.  I had read about another solution, though, that we hadn’t tried simply because we hoped to rid ourselves of fleas with no chemical, compound, or substance.

Solution:

We bought diatomaceous earth.  Visit the link to learn more about it, but basically, it stabs into the exosceleton of the flea and dehydrates it.  Since it is a mechanical killer, rather than chemical, the fleas cannot develop a resistance to it.  I mixed one part table salt, with one part DE (partially because they both will combine to dehydrate the fleas and the larvae but also because the DE tends to clump like powdered sugar, and the salt breaks up the clumps).  I spread it all over the basement, since we realized that the fleas were especially bad down there, and all over the house, giving special attention to rugs and spaces under furniture.  While spreading the mixture, it’s important to wear a mask.  Even though the DE is too fine to harm human or animal skin, it can cause problems if inhaled.  You might also consider wearing goggles.

After two days with the DE and salt mixture spread around the house, we went an entire evening without seeing a flea.  We plan to wait a couple more days before vacuuming it all up just to make sure we got them all.  We’ll also wash Greta really well before allowing her back in the house.  One final note: we boil a couple of cups of water and add some rosemary to it to form a rosemary tea, and we spread it all over Greta, allowing her to air dry.  Fleas seem to hate rosemary, and it makes her smell quite nice.

We’ve also put trays of rock salt under furniture, because it’s supposed to repel fleas (not sure why), and when I vacuum now, I vacuum up a small amount of DE just to make it harder for fleas to survive inside the vacuum.  After a couple of days, I’ll give you an update, but for now, we are very hopeful.

Update:

Here is our greatest lesson learned from the past two weeks: as soon as you think you have the fleas beat, prepare for another round, because they just don’t go that easily.

Another thing I have learned about fleas is that without a meal, they cannot lay eggs.  Adult fleas can live for months without a meal, but newly emerged fleas can live only a week.  This is encouraging, because 1) we haven’t seen any big fleas in over a week (you will know the big fleas from the little fleas–the big ones are brown and quite ugly) and 2) we know that the fleas in our house have not had any meals in over a week, since we check our ankles often, and they should begin to die off.

So, we do still have fleas, but they are not the nuisance they had been, and I am confident we are getting closer to victory.