Hemp Clothes

The picture shows hemp swatches. I've been researching hemp clothing for the new book. Just how eco-friendly is it? By all accounts, it's much better than conventionally grown cotton, the most pesticide-intensive crop in the world. I've been wondering though, if hemp is so great, how come most of the hemp-clothing vendors online don't promote their clothing as organic? I got the answer today. I called a major hemp vendor in California; his web site sells hemp clothing and other hemp products. He reminded me that it's illegal to grow hemp in the US, because it's technically the same plant as marijuana. I knew that, just forgot. Hemp however is from a variety of Cannabis that is useless as a mind-altering substance, because it contains hardly any THC. The hemp vendor I called told me that virtually all the hemp sold in the US is grown and manufactured into textiles in either China or Romania. I told him I had just seen the video "Wal-mart: the high cost of low prices" about Chinese sweatshops. I told him I was leery of any clothing manufactured in China. He said he'd been to one of the factories that produces his textiles. What was it like?, I asked him. It was "just a regular factory" he said. I didn't think to ask him about wages or hours per week on the job - those are two things that define sweatshops. Plus child labor and dangerous working conditions. I should call him back. But anyway, he pointed out to me that fabrics grown and manufactured outside of the US are not going to be certified organic by the USDA, because the USDA certifiers are not in China and Romania.

He said even though hemp is not certified organic, it is earth-friendly. My reading has corroborated this. Hemp just doesn't have the voracious insect pests that are attracted to cotton, so pesticides are not needed. At least, they're not needed as much.

I asked him about bamboo fibers. Of course, I expected he might have a biased answer, since he sells hemp clothing and hemp other stuff. But I thought he might also have something interesting to say. He did. He said bamboo is not a natural fiber like hemp or cotton because there is no usable fiber in the bamboo itself. Rather the bamboo is ground up and treated with chemicals that turn it into a liquid. Then the liquid is shot out from something like a showerhead. The extruded streams of liquid harden into the fibers that are woven together to make bamboo fabric. Hmm. Didn't know that. That's not necessarily bad, unless the chemicals are bad. Need to research that, call some bamboo fabric vendors. See what they have to say about that. The plot thickens...

I've discovered in my perusal of various sources this week though that bamboo is grown in China and woven into textiles in China. Just like hemp. Now wait a minute! I don't want to wear clothes made in China! After the "Wal-mart: the high cost of low prices" documentary about abusive labor practices and sweatshops in developing Asian countries, I don't want anything produced there. So we're back to cotton. Organic cotton. Cotton uses a lot of land, even organic cotton. But....at least some of it is made here in the US. I need to research more about wages and working conditions of cotton laborers in the US. And I need to read about linen from flax.

But you know what the best answer is to the "green clothing" dilemma. Buy vintage clothing. I get most of my clothes from thrift stores. Three-fourths of used clothes wind up in the land-fill, so if I'm buying used stuff, I'm pulling it right out of the waste stream. I'm not supporting sweatshops or environmentally damaging practices.

I'm lucky though, we have a couple of really good thrift stores in my town, where the clothes are in good shape and easily accessed. The best one is run by AmVets.

More later on bamboo, hemp, and linen.

Red, Red Mulch

Yesterday afternoon I was holed up at my work table, reading about organic cotton, and conventional textiles and toxic commercial dyes. I was working on the eco-groovy clothing chapter for the new book. Needing a stretch, I wandered out into the front yard. I noticed straightaway that the next-door neighbors had just heavily mulched their flower bed with a kind of mulch that's dyed red; it looks like dyed red hair. It's a garish bright red. Egads I said to myself. Their flower garden is just uphill from our organic vegetable garden, just a few feet away. I picked up a handful of red, red mulch and brought it inside, put it in a cup with a little water. After 30 seconds, I poured the water into a white cup. The water was dark red, opaque; the cup was stained red. I went back outside and looked at one of the mulch bags lying in their yard. It said "Red Colored Mulch." Manufactured by P&L Bark Nursery in Pageland, SC.

I came back inside and looked at one of the textiles articles I was reading. It said, "Virtually all commercial dyes are toxic, made from petrochemicals with heavy metals."

Okay so now what, I wondered. I really like the neighbors, a nice couple with a 14-year-old son. But I definitely didn't want that stuff in the veg garden. So I went and knocked on the door,
next door.

The son came to the door, parents were out. I told him how nice the flowers looked. He bought all the flowers and all the mulch himself, he said, an early mothers day gift. He planted them all and laid all the mulch down himself. (Ouch.) His hands and arms were still red. He liked the red mulch, he explained, even though it cost more than the non-dyed mulch.

I showed him the red cup and explained about the organic garden, and toxic dyes. "But" he said "I thought if the government says it's okay, you know, if they sell it at Home Depot, it must be okay." Well. "I used to think that too," I said. "Then I started reading. Started calling people, interviewing people. Just because someone sells it, doesn't mean it's okay." We talked, in a friendly way. I told him I would be happy to scoop it all up myself, buy more un-dyed mulch and lay it down. I just needed permission to begin. He called his mom on her cell.

An hour later we were all scooping up mulch. In about 30 or 40 minutes we scooped up 8 bags of red, red mulch, enough to fill both roll-out trash bins, theirs and ours. We cleared it out of their flower garden. I offered to buy more mulch, 8 more bags. They declined.

We actually had a very friendly conversation during the whole thing. I was very nice, they were very nice. It probably improved our relationship. I was as extremely affirming of the son as I could be at every step. He deserves it; he's a neat kid.

The next morning I put money to reimburse them for all the mulch into a card, a nice card, and taped it to the inside of their door. Said do what you like with it.

Now they have mulch-less flower bed. The soil is still a little red, from the one watering he gave it before I saw it.

Shouldn't we have more limits on chemicals in the environment? Dye on mulch serves no purpose at all. It's not even pretty. I think about the kid's red arms. I told him to wash them. I hope he did.

Here's Your Chance to Tell It Like It Is

Blog readers:

We are looking for original content from writers and non-writers on the subject of personal experiences with green choices.

It's for our book, from Fulcrum Publishing, 2007, tentatively titled How Americans' Spending Habits Shape Our World by Sally and Sara Kate Kneidel.

Like our last book, Veggie Revolution, this book will be rich with "community voices," your voices - brief quotes or short essays from actual experience. If you try to use your bike or ride the bus instead of driving, we'd like to hear what that's like for you, good or bad.

The writing does not have to be perfect. A casual, conversational tone is often more effective. If you have comments that are journalistic or op-ed, that could work as well. Most pieces we use are 200-1000 words. Longer or shorter submissions may be considered if especially interesting or unusual.

Your green experiences do not have to be exemplary to make good reading. In fact, imperfect efforts are sometimes more interesting. As Kermit says, It's not easy bein' green.

Some topics we hope to read:

On transportation:

any experience you have with hybrid cars, cars using biodiesel or greasel, mass transportation, walking or biking, communities designed to minimize travel to work and shopping

On green housing:

any experience you have with energy-efficient construction, green building materials, living off the grid, living in a passive solar house, a straw bale house, a rammed earth house, earth bag house or other earthen construction, a recycled house (an older house relocated to a new lot), a home that shares walls and green space with neighbors, close to work

On green fabrics and clothing:

organic cotton or wool, hemp, bamboo, recycled or vintage clothing, etc.

On the trade in pets taken from nature:

tropical birds, reptiles, amphibians, etc., both exotic and local

On green diet choices:

local, seasonal, vegetarian, vegan, pastured, organic, etc.

On green vacation choices:

places you might volunteer to do environmental work, involving less fossil fuel for travel

On green career or volunteer choices, especially ones that you have chosen or considered:

On deforestation by giant lumber companies for the paper industry, especially if you have worked in a chip mill or have personal experience with this

On problems and solutions related to world population growth, especially in terms of land use, fuel, energy

On globalization and sweatshops, especially if you have visited one

On the problems associated with huge corporations like Wal-Mart, International Paper, Smithfield, Tyson, etc.

The deadline is June (prefer early June). We can use your first name, first and last name, or you may pen anonymously. It's up to you.

Please send submissions to treeduck@earthlink.net. Send also a statement, in the email, saying that you (write your name and date) give us permission to use the piece in the book, specifically in How Americans' Spending Habits Shape Our World by Sally and Sara Kate Kneidel, from Fulcrum in 2007.

To help us distinguish submissions from junk mail, please put “book submission” in the email’s subject line. Feel free to query first. Although we may not be able to use all items submitted we will do our best to consider everyone’s experiences as part of the overall project. We’ll also post any omitted submissions on our blog, http://veggierevolution.blogspot.com.

Thanks!

Sally Kneidel

Organic Cotton - It's Worth Every Penny

I've been researching organic and natural fibers for the new book. Fascinating. It makes we want to smack my forehead - for all the years I spent with my head buried in the sand.

Here's the crux of it. Cotton is advertised as a "natural" fiber, as opposed to, say, nylon or rayon. And cotton can be natural. But, as some of you may know, cotton is one of the most pesticide-intensive crops there is. I've been hearing that for a few years, as I went right on buying cotton underwear, jeans, corduroys, T-shirts, sweatshirts. But I didn't really get it until this past week, which I’ve spent reading articles about the textile industry.

It takes a pound, a whole pound, of pesticides and fertilizers to produce enough conventional cotton to make one T-shirt and one pair of jeans!

Cotton uses 25% of the world's insecticides. In the US, cotton is second only to corn in the tonnage of pesticides used. (Corn is the heavy because it's the mainstay of the livestock industry. Fifty-six percent of the corn we grow is fed to farmed animals that will be served up on the dinner table. Now even more corn is being grown to provide ethanol as a gasoline additive. But that's a topic for later.)

What about those pesticides on cotton? Five of the top nine most commonly used cotton pesticides are Class I or Class II chemicals - the most toxic and carcinogenic pesticides. Like all chemicals, they're dispersed to some degree in the environment when they're sprayed on fields or crops. Ingested by birds, mammals, reptiles. Toxic to amphibians and fish living downstream from sprayed fields.

Here's something that surprised me. Two-thirds of the cotton crop winds up in our food chain! So we're eating all those pesticides too! Cottonseed oil is common in processed food. And cottonseed hulls or meal is a common "protein supplement" for cattle.

Cotton is also extremely toxic to workers. Ninety-one percent of laborers in the cotton industry have a diagnosed health disorder of some kind.

What about clothing consumers? All these toxins wash out when the T-shirt or jeans are washed - right? That's what I've been thinking all these years. No. They are slowly emitted during the lifetime of the garment. What about "easy care" or "permanent press" cotton? Formaldehyde. That's what makes them "easy care".

What about the dyes? "Virtually all commercial dyes are toxic petrochemicals, many contain heavy metals," said one of the documents I read last night. Like the pesticides, these dyes have their impact on the workers in the textile mills. They also have a heavy impact on the environment, because, at some point, the dyes wind up as wastewater. Dyes in particular are hard to remove from water, so cleaning or filtering processes, when attempted, often fail. To cut to the chase, even in the best circumstances, the dyes wind up in rivers. In developing nations, where many or most textile mills are located these days, the dyes can often be piped raw and unfiltered right into the rivers, with no effort at all to extract them from the wastewater. That's the beauty of overseas textile mills and sweatshops in empoverished nations - no labor laws to protect workers, no environmental regulations, no functioning governmental infrastructure to care one way or another what goes on.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news. But, man, we need to be supporting the providers who are trying to make a living offering organic fibers. I said to my husband last night, we're not buying anymore conventionally-grown cotton socks or T-shirts or underwear or anything. Period.

Here's the good news: there are lots of alternatives to conventional cotton.

Here are the alternatives as I see them.

Organic cotton: It’s grown without the massive amounts of pesticides and fertilizers used in conventional cotton cultivation, which is a huge advantage for the environment, for laborers, for consumers. Organic cotton products cost 25 to 50% more, but not choosing organic, for me, feels like once again sticking my head in a hole and saying, it’s not my problem. It is my problem. I want to be engaged with the world enough to say it is my problem, and your problem, and his problem. We have to take responsibility, choose who we wish to fund, refuse to participate in corporate systems that are screwing the environment, laborers, and consumer health.

If you google “organic cotton” or “organic fibers” you’ll find organic cotton vendors online. Organic cotton isn’t perfect – the cotton dust can still cause respiratory ailments for workers. And the USDA organic certification only applies to how it’s grown. It doesn’t apply to the manufacturing process. But the Organic Trade Association offers an additional certification for the manufacturing process, which affects the use of formaldehyde to reduce wrinkling, and the use of toxic dyes.

Vintage clothing: Ah, yes. Being a cheap-skate and bargain-hunter, and being poor (struggling writer married to high school teacher), I partake heavily of the thrift store offerings in my town. We have a great thrift store, operated by AmVets. Every so often, when I’m with Sara Kate, we stop and do an inventory of what we’re wearing at the moment, how much of it came from Community Thrift. Usually I’m about 90% clad in Community Thrift items: shoes and socks included.

Thrift store purchases are guilt-free. The average American buys 48 new clothing items every year and discards an almost equal number. Most of the discards wind up in the landfill, about 10% are recycled. Of the recycled, about half make it to thrift stores. The rest are shredded to make blankets or commercial rags, and I don’t know what else. True, some thrift store items can still have toxic dyes – any dye that bleeds into laundry water is also absorbed into your skin when you wear it. But at least I’m not funding the corporations that are trashing the environment and exploiting laborers to offer cheap new products. Instead, I’m funding a non-profit with a humanitarian mission.

Organic wool: I was surprised to read about all the toxins used to produce wool, a lot of them in the form of dips applied to the living sheep to kill parasites. Again, these miticides and so on are toxic to both workers and the environment, not to mention the animals themselves. Organic wool is grown without the use of these pesticides.

Linen (from flax) and hemp have their merits as clean and green alternatives to conventional cotton, in some cases. We’ll write more about those in the book, and in later blog entries. I read a good bit about bamboo fiber yesterday. It seems to have a lot going for it, in that it doesn’t require heavy use of pesticides or fertilizers. It also grows to maturity in three years and doesn’t need reseeding. And from what I’ve read, it can be as soft as cotton, which hemp is not. But, bamboo is typically grown and manufactured into textiles in China. After watching the documentary, “Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices,” I’m leery of anything manufactured in China because of labor concerns. That movie documented exploitive working conditions and abysmal wages for workers in Chinese factories. Also, none of the vendors I came across who are marketing bamboo clothing online are claiming to have an organic product. So…I’m not sure about bamboo yet. I plan to make some phone calls next week.

So. As I discover more, I’ll report it here, and in our upcoming book from Fulcrum in 2007. The working title was The Power of Your Pocketbook, but is now How Americans’ Spending Habits Shape our World. Fulcrum will most likely select a new title altogether after the book is completed.

I would love to hear from you readers about your adventures in trying to sort through the new alternatives to conventionally produced fabrics: your impressions, frustrations, and successes. We’re looking for reader submissions to include in the book. You can send submissions to treeduck@earthlink.net.

A Rammed Earth House Near Chapel Hill

I've been researching rammed earth houses today, and reading over an interview I had with home owner and real-estate agent Gary Phillips near Chapel Hill. He built a rammed earth house with a little help from his friends. It's a beautiful two-story cottage that I would never guess is made from soil. The surface of his outside walls is not painted, plastered, or stuccoed. It's just a smooth light-brown surface. If I didn't know what it was, I guess I'd think it was some kind of tinted and slightly textured concrete. It's that smooth and even. Gary's rammed earth walls are 2 feet thick.

When I visited his house, he explained to me that each wall is made by pouring soil with a front loader into a concrete box made of two 8-ft-tall sheets of vertical concrete that are two feet apart. As each load of soil is dumped inside the box, a work crew gets on top of the soil and tamps it down with a pneumatic tamper, layer by layer, until they reach the top of the concrete form. The completed soil wall has to "cure" for only 24 hours! Then the concrete is moved and wall stays where it is! That's amazing to me. Gary put iron oxides between some of the layers of soil in his walls just for aesthetic reasons. The oxides leave undulating dark horizontal striations in the finished wall, a charming effect.

Sara Kate and I will be writing more about Gary's house and about other earthen building materials in our upcoming book about green consumer choices.

Where are we going? And why am I in this handbasket?

Springtime and Sustainable Food in the Mountains

We spent the last week, more or less, in Asheville NC doing promotional stuff for Veggie Revolution. Sara Kate is working right now at Sunnybank Inn near Asheville. We did presentations at two colleges (Mars Hill and Warren Wilson), at Malaprops bookstore, at two natural food stores (Earth Fare and Greenlife), and at the Asheville Friends Meeting House. And an interview on WCQS radio. Sara Kate was interviewed last week by The Mountain Xpress, a weekly newspaper in Asheville. It was a pretty intense week, but fun. Asheville is a refreshingly progressive community, especially for North Carolina. I enjoyed the profusion of liberal and environmental people with attitudes. I liked this bumper sticker: "Where are we going? And why am I in this handbasket?"

I want more bumper stickers!

Elmer Hall, who owns Sunnybank Inn, and Matt McGuire, who works for Elmer, set up most of the events. Just to promote the book. I am very grateful for that, I know it was a lot of work. Between the two of them, I think they know just about everybody in Asheville. Others who helped make the series of events go smoothly were Aubrey Raper, John Templeton, and Laurie Pedersen of Mars Hill College, Alsace and Andrew of Malaprops bookstore, Megan of Earth Fare, Dustin Rhodes of Warren Wilson College, Amy Joy Lanou of UNCA, and Mary Alice Lamb who served us all a gourmet vegan dinner.

We met loads of interesting people. Elmer was right up there at the top. He's a Buddhist and an Episcopal minister. How does that work? He went into the Peace Corps after college and taught high school in Singapore, where he had lots of Buddhist and Taoist friends. The Inn is full of Asian wall hangings and zen meditation cushions. After his Asian thing, Elmer returned to the States, went to grad school, and became a chaplain at Duke University. Did that a few years, then he and some friends opened the first vegetarian restaurant in NC. Now he and his 3 or 4 employees offer beds and scrumptious vegetarian meals to hikers from the Appalachian Trail, which runs right across the Inn's front yard. When prodded about Buddhism's messages for life, Elmer told me that human suffering comes from our desires. Americans want too much, he says. If we desire less, then we'll suffer less. I tried to get Elmer to tell me more about living simply, and about the connection between suffering and desire, but he declared himself unable to ponder such matters while chopping onions for the evening meal's soup. He was blotting his eyes at the time, from onion fumes, so I had to relent. Next time.


The other folks who work at the Inn were equally entertaining. Matt - well, Matt's just one of my favorite people period. I've known him for a couple of years, and he's always good for an adventure. Matt is a young man who can spring from full slumber to breakfast duty in a matter of, literally, seconds. With a versatile 'do and threads, he's at the ready day or night. He does have to set his internal alarm clock the night before, or efforts to rouse him the next morning will fail. So he says. Matt and Sara Kate have been interested in sustainable food for a long time. The two of them thought up the theme "Food Ethics" for the communal household they lived in at Guilford College last year. Matt and Sara Kate also ran Guilford's community service program for its students in Guadalajara Mexico last fall. That was one of their biggest adventures. Matt will ride his bike from Asheville to Charlotte and back when the urge strikes him, and think nothing of it. Sleep beside the road somewhere. Or from Guadalajara to the Pacific coast, he's done that too. He's a lad unfettered by conventional thinking.

Jonathan is an interesting guy too. He works at the Inn, and at Elmer's farm, up the road. Jonathan introduced me to stewed or steamed nettles, which are quite tasty. He claims that nettles and other wild greens are higher in nutrients than cultivated greens. I believe it. While the hikers at the Inn feast on waffles or pancakes or Sara Kate's spicy muffins for breakfast, Jonathan eats every morning what he calls rice "gruel." It's a bowl of brown rice with something added. While I was there he had acquired about 40 lbs of someone's surplus apples and had made apple sauce. A lot of apple sauce. So the next morning he had, I think, nettles and apple sauce on his gruel. It doesn't sound that good. But it looked good. I think it was good. He was enthusiastic about it.

I asked Jonathan what his favorite food was, thinking he might say chocolate cake or pie or something like that. He's 24. Young men like to eat. But he said tomato sauce. After that, cucumbers. In summer, he says, he can eat a cucumber every 10 minutes. Or he might alternate between cucumbers and spinach. He's partial to dark green winter squash too. And Japanese pumpkins. Jonathan is going to be food maverick in some way. I can see he's building up steam toward something, some new way of thinking or writing about food. Just about the whole time I was at the Inn, Jonathan was in Elmer's big kitchen, experimenting. Cooking up something crafty. He's nice too. He shared a whole square of his precious vegan chocolate with me. A little square. But still, a whole one, just because I was curious about it. Now I know about vegan chocolate.

Brian also works at the Inn. He regaled us with his travel stories on more than one occasion, until we were in danger of losing bladder control. I especially enjoyed the one about the Canadian nurses, and the German hostel where the youth group tossed the mattresses out the windows, and the wombat in Australia that turned out to be a territorial basset hound. Thank you Brian. I look forward to more stories, and to hearing the real truth about Starbucks, and the insider scoop on the coffee industry. The second largest commodity traded in the US (in volume of trades). Is that what you said?

The panel discussion on sustainable food that we participated in at Mars Hill College on April 6 was one of our favorite events of the week. We met Andrew Euston of GreenBridges Sustainability Consulting there, also saw Pat Tompkins and other illustrious persons in the green community near Asheville. During the panel we were talking about the resistance factor that keeps people from getting on board the humane and sustainable food bandwagon. Lots of folks wish to believe that, here in America, we can trust what the government tells us, and can even trust what corporations tell us. The average American wants to believe that no one is engaged in false advertising, that the goal of big business and our administration is to serve and protect the interests of consumers. At the Mars Hill panel discussion, we talked about how giant food corporations do not have our best interests at heart, but rather exist to create profits for stockholders - and we talked about how scary it is to take the first step in admitting that. It's scary to admit that all is not well in the food industry. Because once you admit that, it opens the door to disillusionment. It can lead to a complete change in world view. What do you trust? Andrew Euston used the word "grieving." We all agreed that when we first admit we're being lied to and deceived by food corporations and the government, we grieve the loss of trust, the loss of innocence, the loss of our illusion of safety.

The solution, we agreed, is to educate oneself, to become informed consumers. To buy local food from providers whose methods we can see. To be selective in who we choose to support with our consumer dollars. For more information about finding local humane and sustainable providers of produce and animal products in the mountains, contact the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project. For information about local food elsewhere in North and South Carolina, contact the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association. Elsewhere in the country, check out your local farmers' markets and look at Local Harvest and Eat Wild. If we all are willing to change our diets a little bit, to support providers who are raising food without fouling the environment and without keeping animals in misery, then we can put the corporate meat giants out of business. We really can!

Monkeylala

“It’s so beautiful, just like Scotland!” I often recall this comment, made by a fellow teacher on my first trip to Central America. I was with a small group promised a tropical rainforest experience in Honduras. I had never felt so out of place in my life. As she made this rapturous exclamation, I was on the verge of tears. Didn’t she realize where she was? Turned out her comment, made early in the trip, was prophetic. We never did get into any rainforest. Deforestation was so extensive that our group leaders couldn’t find any for us to see. The comparison with Scotland wasn’t all that bad, in fact. The gentle mountains we saw as we traveled along the highways were covered in rolling pastureland with scattered cattle. I’ve learned since then that for each hamburger produced from tropical cattle, 55 square feet of rainforest is sacrificed. I’ve also become vegetarian since that trip.

I tried to make the best of it. I realized that to salvage what rainforest experience I could, I would have to take every available opportunity to explore whatever remnants of forest I could find. My hope was that if I saw enough and got lucky, maybe the sights could blend together over time into the rainforest experience I had hoped for.

I did see a big tree! It was a Ceiba tree, roughly eight-feet wide at mid-height, with buttress roots towering twice my height above the forest floor and expanding easily to a circumference of 80 feet at its base. It was four-hundred-years old, with a spreading canopy covered by orchids, bromeliads, and hanging vines. I remember the tree well because to enjoy it I had to really focus on it. You see, it was on a nature trail with open fields 100 yards away. I also had to put my fingers in my ears. Otherwise I could hear the sound of workers hammering in the distance. I tried to imagine (with limited success) hundreds of trees like this, scattered through a humid rainforest, lush and beckoning.

A few hundred miles away on another nature trail, I came upon a group of white-collared manakins. These birds, roughly robin-sized but stubbier, with bright yellow breasts and white throats, treated me to a mating display that I won’t forget. Each male uses its wings to sweep clear for himself a circular patch of the forest floor roughly three feet across. A dozen or so males may set up these neatly manicured territories in an area about one-half acre in size. When a female comes along, the males immediately respond by hopping up on tree branches and making loud snapping noises with their wings. They actually pop some bones as you might do while cracking your knuckles. The pops are followed by whirs caused by the vigorous fluttering of their wings. The best snapper in the group gets the benefit of mating with as many as 95 percent of the females that come by. It was a thrill to get swallowed up in their snaps, crackles, and pops.

The area was also inhabited by Black Howler Monkeys, and they provided me with another memorable experience as I walked a trail with a guide and another teacher, Mark. Again, we had to try to forget the farmers’ fields that were only yards away. We put blinders on and focused on the howlers that were scattered in a narrow, but fairly well-developed forest that meandered along a winding river. As we wandered along, we unknowingly approached a Howler group high in the trees. Before seeing them, Mark confused us by calling our attention to some “rain” falling from above. Other than the darkness due to the canopy overhead, there was little to suggest that a storm was approaching. A quick look into the trees, however, clarified the matter. The “rain” was coming from the monkeys. Monkeys often do this, as well as hurling feces (yep, they did that too) when threatening invaders enter their territory. The moment was only spoiled by my jealousy of Mark; I wanted the experience of first discovery, even if it meant getting sprayed and splatted.

Another adventure took place while walking through yet another forest patch, this time with houses actually in sight. I came upon a basilisk lizard. Locals call it the Monkeylala, or the Jesus Christ lizard. This particular one, small at roughly 10 inches, was resting between me and a small stream. It gets the latter name because when chased and surrounded by water, the Jesus Christ lizard will often stand up on its hind legs, and with its long webbed toes, quickly run across the water without sinking. What a treat! I turned slowly to get a better look, but spooked him. The basilisk tore away and raced upright across the surface of the stream, toes flailing wildly, head held high in the air.

My next thrill came when I was walking alone along a botanical garden trail. Here, in a flourishing jungle, I got closest to the feeling of being in a virgin rainforest. The huge leaves that arched from the plants throughout the garden made me feel small. The effect was lessened somewhat by the fact that many of the plants were growing from pots scattered along the paths. But I found that if I kept my head up at the right angle, I couldn’t see the pots. I was walking along and looking up when a sudden rustle in the leaves above me made me jump. A vine snake was just in front of me! I was astonished at its shape. Although close to three feet in length, it was almost pencil-thin. The snake looked like one of the hundreds of vines that were tangled throughout the bush. As the snake slipped away, it held its tongue rigidly straight out, like it was stuck. What a hoot! Why would the snake do this? Possibly sticking out its tongue was a desperate attempt to make its widest and most conspicuous end look more like part of a vine. But the effect gave me a good laugh.

I started recording all of these separate experiences in my journal. I tried to appreciate each one for what it was. I never saw a scrap of virgin rainforest, but I did see mature rainforest trees, draped in vines and lush lianas. I did have 16 close encounters with tropical wildlife, and for that I was very grateful.

I hoped that, in time, if I was able to forget the roads, the fields, and the construction that always seemed to intrude, then the snapping manakins, the huge Ceiba tree, the Monkeylala lizard, the slinky vine snake, and the rude Howlers would merge in my mind to give me the rainforest experience I was after.

I was left to wonder what else there was to see, and what else won’t be seen if deforestation continues at its current pace. There are no simple solutions to this problem. Honduras’ current population of 7.2 million is projected to hit 12.6 by 2050. Sixty-four percent of Hondurans live in poverty. What can be done if there is money to be made by selling timber and raising cattle? A short list would include not buying rainforest wood products, eating less meat, supporting sustainable agricultural ventures like shade-grown coffee, funding international family planning programs, and providing educational opportunities for women to help lower birth rates and increase family income. A tall order, but doable if we acknowledge the problem and act now.

[A guest essay by Ken Kneidel, in our next book The Power of Your Pocketbook by Sally Kneidel and Sara Kate Kneidel, due out in spring of 2007. This essay is previously published in Latin Line, a publication of Charlotte Latin School]

Tyson and Smithfield Drooling over Untapped Meat Profits Abroad

I just finished writing a long chapter about the giant meatpacking corporations Tyson and Smithfield for the new book. I learned a lot researching the chapter. Learned a lot about why the meat industry loves North Carolina so much. Only 3.8% of NC workers are unionized, the lowest percentage in the industry. So NC provides cheap labor. We also have the highest rate of increase in the numbers of immigrant residents, who are ideal employees for the dangerous meatpacking industry, from the corporate perspective. Between 1990 and 2000, NC has seen an increase of 273% in the numbers of immigrants who settle here. Most are Latino.

The Smithfield slaughterhouse in Tar Heel NC is the world's largest meatpacking plant for hogs, processing 32,000 hogs per day. More than half of the 6,000 employees at the Smithfield slaughterhouse are Latinos, many undocumented. When immigrant workers object to speeding up the processing line, because it increases the risk of injury from the sawblades, they're just threatened with deportation. Or fired. Many can't speak English, and no one wants to be deported, so no one complains.

The story with Tyson is similar - it'll all be in our new book, with details. Tyson is the world's largest poultry producer, raking in an astounding $26 billion a year in revenue.

Here's the really scary part. The president of Smithfield says he has plans to make Poland "the Iowa of Europe." (Iowa is the only state in the US that has more hogs than North Carolina.) And John Tyson, CEO of Tyson, said in 2005 that Tyson sees the expanding market for meat in China as the source of Tyson's profits in coming years. They've saturated the US market, now they're exporting the factory farm model abroad. Between the two of them, Smithfield and Tyson already have factory farms up and running in more than a dozen countries.

China, the world's most populous nation (1.3 billion people, compared to our 298 million), already has 14,000 factory farms. But only 15% of their meat is coming from factory farms. So China is a field waiting to be plowed by the likes of Smithfield and Tyson. So much to plunder....they're drooling at the prospect of mo mo money for their stockholders and executives. They're going after the developing nations, where, you guessed it, labor is cheap and non-unionized, and environmental laws that might impede waste disposal are slack. Where do the animals' rights fit into this scenario? At the very very bottom.

What's to be done? Tell other people what you know. Write a letter for the editorial page of your newspaper. Write letters to the executives of Smithfield and Tyson. At the very least, don't buy Tyson or Smithfield products at the grocery. Although the other giant poultry producers, Perdue, Pilgrims Pride, GoldKist, are all up to the same thing. The ultimate solution is for all of us to avoid buying products from these factory farming corporations. Eat plant-based foods. If you do eat animal products, buy them from local providers who use humane and sustainable methods. Check www.localharvest.org or www.eatwild.com for help in locating pastured animal products in your area. Or ask at your local natural foods store or farmers market. In North Carolina, contact Carolina Farm Stewardship Association at www.carolinafarmstewards.org. In Georgia, contact Georgia Organics at www.georgiaorganics.org for help in finding responsible providers.

Inspired by Folks Making Green Choices

I’ve met so many interesting people lately, folks who choosing to do things differently. Some are environmentalists, some have their own reasons. I’ve been interviewing folks about biofuels, pastured livestock, and green housing choices. And about the timber companies around here that are clear-cutting and turning our Southeastern forests into paper. Corporations that are up to no good! But people all over the place are stepping out of line to try to change the system. I’m inspired and honored to meet the good people my research has led me to in the last year and a half.

Last week I interviewed Trip Overholt, who lives in a house whose first floor is straw bale, and whose second floor is made of recycled and salvaged materials. The house is powered by photovoltaic cells in his front yard. He makes his own biodiesel fuel for his truck and his family car. Cool, very cool. Trip’s got it going on environmentally, he’s got it covered from just about every angle.

I also interviewed Gary Phillips, another innovative sort of person who built a rammed earth house. I was amazed at his house, the walls were as smooth as plaster, but were made of soil (plus 5% concrete) that had been poured into molds and allowed to “cure.” The house was beautiful.

I’m a huge fan of Jim Cameron and Kathleen Jardine’s work as designers of passive solar homes in the Triangle area of NC. They’ve integrated so many different features of green design into their houses, in addition to the passive solar aspect. They’ll have a new web site up soon about their work. I’m grateful to them for educating me about green design and energy efficiency in general. Plus, they introduced me to Trip and Gary and several other people making green choices in the Chapel Hill area, all of whom will be featured in our new book.

These are just a few of the folks who are inspiring me lately.

Earthlings the documentary, Sara Kate in Hot Springs, Pastured Cattle

I talked to Sara Kate on the phone last night, she's living in Hot Springs in the mts of NC. The population of Hot Springs is 640 people. She and Matt are working as cooks at Elmer's hostel on the Appalachian Trail. They're also living at the hostel. Sara Kate says she can see the trail from the kitchen window. Yesterday was their first day on the job. They made sauted tofu and a pie, among other things. I forgot what kind of pie, and what veggies or bread they made. I guess I wasn't listening very carefully. She sounded tired at 9:00 p.m. when she called. I was distracted by stuff going on here.

She has no computer, can only do email at the Hot Springs library which is open 16 hours a week.

I'll be visiting them when we do a presentation at Malaprops Bookstore in Asheville on April 6 at 7:00. We'll be doing a panel at Mars Hill College on April 6 too, earlier in the day. And will be interviewed on WCQS radio in the late afternoon of April 4. Something at Warren Wilson College on April 5 I think. And a book signing at Earth Fare, and a pot luck on Friday April 7. I'll put it all on the calendar on the blog as soon as I get the times, and figure out how to put stuff on the calendar. Sara Kate and Matt and Elmer are arranging it all, since they're up there and I'm not. It's gonna be a busy four days. That's probably the last set of appearances we'll do for Veggie Revolution before the next book is finished in June. I can't do promotional stuff and write under a deadline at the same time, it's making me a basket case.

I hope to interview Scott Quaranda of the Dogwood Alliance while I'm in Asheville, on the subject of chip mills and deforestation in the Southeast. I want to interview somebody who actually works at a chip mill too, if I can find somebody to talk to me. We're hoping to go by Earthaven too if we have time, to see their earth-bag house.

This afternoon I'm going to Chapel Hill to interview Trip Overholt about his PV strawbale house with compost toilets and his biodiesel truck. Tomorrow I'll interview Gary Phillips in Silk Hope NC about his rammed earth house.

Yesterday I spent the day writing up an interview with Philip and Sheila Brooks about their pastured cattle business. They live in Union County, raise about 45 cows/steers at pasture. No corn, no hormones, no antibiotics. I liked the Brooks a lot. And their cows. I spent the day yesterday writing about how relatively well-off their cows are in comparison to feedlot cattle. Then when I was talking to Sara Kate she was telling me about the movie Earthlings. She told me to watch it. She said it's about the meat industry, has footage of the kosher slaughterhouses, footage of a pig being killed with a captive-bolt stunner. And so on. She said it was moving, jarring, effective. She says she wants to avoid all animal products now, unless she can see herself how the animal was raised. Like for example, Cassie and Natalie's pastured layers (hens). I need to see it. I need to watch that Wal-Mart documentary too. I want to watch Earthlings then rewrite my chapter about the cattle. Ken, who was kind enough to proof-read for me, said the cattle chapter was way too long anyway, needs drastic revision. Well. Things change. That's what it's all about, growing and learning. If I didn't learn anything from working on the books, then why bother? That's the point really.

So. I'm gonna look at the library or amazon for Earthlings and for the Wal-mart documentary, drink more coffee, run to my dresser drawer for a tiny square of chocolate, then work on revising my cattle chapter some, and finally head out of here for Chapel Hill and hope I don't run into a big snag on I-85. Which I usually do. Whoever you are who bothered to read this, I hope you have a good morning and a whole good day.
Adios
Sally

I Interviewed the Owner of a Straw Bale Home; Very Cheap to Build

This past week I interviewed Barry Ford in Lancaster SC about the straw bale house that he built with his wife and son, who was then 8 yrs old. The house is 2300 square feet and cost them only $13,000. That works out to $5.65 per square foot! Wow. I'm not sure what usual construction costs are in Charlotte, but I'm told that in Chapel Hill, construction of a conventional house is about $130 per square foot.

The Fords had no labor costs, because they did they whole thing themselves. Barry says they used about 30% less wood than a conventional stick-built home. There are no studs in the walls. The water pipes and electrical wires run under the floor, so there's nothing in the walls but bales of straw, laid flat so the walls are 22 inches thick. That's a lot of insulation. The bales are covered with stucco inside and out.

They got the bales pretty cheap - Barry said he and his wife drove around in the back country looking for farmers baling hay. When they saw one, they'd stop and ask him if they could buy the bales. They got 50 to 100 at a time, sometimes paying as little as 75 cents, up to as much as $3 a bale. The house now has more than 1000 bales in it.

They've had no trouble at all with moisture. He said they actually had to add a little moisture to the bales, because if they're too dry, the straw is too brittle. They have a little moisture meter sticking out of the straw in one of the window wells to keep track of the moisture content, although it hasn't changed. The only place you can actually see the straw is in his "truth window," a glass pane in the wall that shows the straw behind it.

Barry says building a straw bale house is cheap, but not if you hire a contractor to do it. The construction of a straw bale home actually takes longer than a conventional house, so the labor costs can be high. The good thing about building with straw bales is that a family of three can do it alone. The only thing the Fords got help with was putting the roof trusses into place, a total of 7 hours of assistance.

The house was pretty interesting. Building with straw is a good choice environmentally because straw is actually a waste product. It's the inedible stem of a grain like wheat or rice, after the grain has been removed. Using a straw and stucco wall means you're not using other materials, which require energy to produce and transport. Some wall systems, like OSB board, are toxic. OSB board "offgases" toxic fumes in homes, and creates toxins during manufacturing.

The Ford's straw bale home will be one of the green and economical housing choices featured in our upcoming book from Fulcrum, The Power of Your Pocketbook: How Americans' Spending Habits Shape our World.

Trolling for reader comments and opinions to use in our next book

Hello everybody
I've mentioned in earlier posts that Sara Kate and I are working on a book about green consumer choices. Like Veggie Revolution, this book will be full of short interviews and "student voice" sections. These will be brief quotes from anybody and everybody of all ages about the subjects in the book. Right now, we're looking for comments on topics related to green choices in transportation and housing.

For example, here are two that we have on the subject of living without a car, for the new book:


"I don't have a car because I don't have my license. It's just never been convenient to get it. Ideally, I'd like to live somewhere with good public transportation, and never need a car. I guess I should get my license, so I could help drive on road trips, or drive friends' cars occasionally, but I don't really want a car of my own. Even if I could afford it, I don't want the responsibility. Or the guilt!
"Not having a car isn't too difficult. In Washington DC, it was really easy; I took the bus and metro everywhere. And in my hometown, which is a very small town, I rode my bike everywhere. It was actually good for me; I rode my bike a lot more in high school than I would have if I'd had a car. What's tough is living in a mid-sized city like Greensboro. It's not too hard to catch a ride to school with a friend, but Greensboro's public transportation system is pretty mediocre. Actually, it's awful. If I want to do anything on my own, like go to a concert nobody else wants to go to, I'm out of luck."
- Emily, age 23

"I just bought a used Honda. Originally I'd hoped to get a diesel vehicle, and either make my own biodiesel or convert it to run on greasel. But I couldn't find a reliable diesel car anywhere! They all had something weird about them, and I needed a car right away, so I could get to work. Maybe I can still do biodiesel later in life, but for now it just wasn't practical. I wouldn't want to pay to get a crappy car converted and then have to get it replaced anyway.
"It was pretty easy for me to learn about the options, at least. I know all about how to make biodiesel now, and if I wanted to have a biodiesel or greasel car, I'm sure I could do it. Obviously it would be a lot easier if we had more resources, if there were more people doing it... but what's going to make these alternative options take precedence over gasoline is those people who get out there first and do it on their own. For those first people it's hard, and there's not much support or information or resources, but it sets a precedent. It gets people talking. It shows that people are paying attention, and that we care about this stuff. We are so dependent on gasoline and finite resources... the end seems like a long way off, but it's not. So yeah, it takes some research, but look how much I know now!
"I also want to get a bike, for going short distances. Although this just isn't a biker's world, unfortunately. It's dangerous! I thought about riding Emily's bike to work when I worked just down the street, but Battleground Avneue? It's a three-lane channel of death. I'd be taking my life in my hands daily. Even with protective gear on, I wouldn't feel safe."
- Ashley, age 22

If anybody would like to send us a paragraph or two or three on any of the following topics, we would love to have them. The working title of the book is The Power of Your Pocketbook: How Americans' Consumer Choices Shape the Future of the Planet. The deadline is June, the book will be out from Fulcrum in spring of 07. If you would like to contribute, we can use your first name, first and last name, or it can be anonymous. It's up to you.

Here are the subjects we need comments on:

Have you ever had to rely on mass transportation for your daily stuff - shopping, getting to work, and so on? any comments on that, good or bad?

Have you ever lived anywhere where you didn't have a car and had to walk or bike everywhere? was that a problem?

Have you lived or traveled in another country that is less reliant on cars? What is/was that like?

Do you have any personal experience with alternatives to gasoline-powered cars (hybrids, cars using biodiesel, straight vegetable oil, etc.)? What was that like? Good and bad

Have you lived in any of these situations? Please describe impressions:

passive solar house

off the grid

strawbale house

rammed earth house

recycled house (an older house relocated to a new lot)

a home that shared walls and green space with neighbors (the greenest use of space - combats urban sprawl)

Is either local or organic food a priority for you? Which is more important to you and why?

Have you lived or traveled anywhere where you saw specific results of globalization, or saw impoverished women working for pennies a day in sweatshops, or other examples of American corporations exploiting workers in developing nations? any anecdote or image appreciated, or a tirade. Either one.

Or if you would like to comment on something I didn't specifically ask, but is related, feel free. The gist of what we're getting at, in the sections on transportation and housing, is how Americans use more than our share of resources and energy by relying heavily on gas-guzzling cars, and and by heating and cooling our buildings inefficiently. Among other things.

If you want to write something, you can send it to me directly at treeduck@earthlink.net. I'll need a way to contact you in case we have a question.

Thanks a lot!
Sally

SUSTAINABLE ENERGY IN MOTION BIKE TOUR

Readers and friends:

I got this notice via email yesterday, from Mark Retzlaff of the Portland Peace and Justice Center. Sounds like an interesting bike program. His email is mark@portlandpeace.org.

Sally

Hello,

I wanted to drop you an e-mail about a really great project I'm
involved with, that you may want to cover on your weblog. It
is a community service on a bike program, exploring sustainability,
intentional communities and organic farms. Our website is
www.portlandpeace.org

Please let me know if you can cover this, and if you have any
questions!

-Mark Retzlaff

.........................................
SUSTAINABLE ENERGY IN MOTION BIKE TOUR - www.portlandpeace.org
.......................................................................
Bike hundreds of miles. Meet incredible people. Participate in
amazing service projects. Stay on organic farms and work to promote
sustainable food growth practices. Study and work with Native American
communities. Live with the land and camp under the stars.
Change your world, one mile at a time.
.......................................................................
web: www.portlandpeace.org phone: 503-239-8426
.......................................................................
WE ARE GIVING ONE OF OUR TOURS AWAY -- VISIT OUR WEBSITE TO WIN!
.......................................................................

This summer, you can take an extraordinary journey. Tune up your bike,
pack your bags, and join fellow riders from all over the world for an
incredible excursion across Oregon, utilizing the most sustainable
method of transportation available: your own bike.

* Study and apply the philosophies of permaculture, alternative
building, appropriate technology and sustainable energy.

* Spend time with Native American communities, work with salmon
restoration and indigenous building practices.

* Gain a deeper understanding of how organic food is grown, and
distributed.

* Explore some of the most beautiful places in Oregon while learning
about natural history, deep ecology, and environmental ethics.

* Observe local economics projects and grassroots democracy struggles
in places through which you travel.

* Participate in a traveling community of cyclists coming from all
over North America with a variety of backgrounds but with a shared
longing for a better world.

* Discover consensus decision-making and use it to make collective
decisions within your community.

* Learn about nutrition, health and fitness through long-distance
cycling.

Visit our website for more information and to enter to win one of our
one-week tours! www.portlandpeace.org / 503-239-8426

.......................................................................
web: www.portlandpeace.org phone: 503-239-8426
.......................................................................
WE ARE GIVING ONE OF OUR TOURS AWAY -- VISIT OUR WEBSITE TO WIN!

Greasel or Straight Veg: Cars that Smell Like Tacos and Doughnuts

Thursday night Sara Kate and I met some folks from the Very Vegetarian Society of Winston Salem, at our Earth Fare presentation in Greensboro (NC). They have a well-done and useful newsletter, with recipes and articles on nutrition, and a webpage at www.veryvegetarian.ws. They told us about the North American Vegetarian Society, www.navs-online.org, and the annual Summerfest organized by NAVS. They go every year and love it. Sounds interesting.

We interviewed a couple of people from Chapel Hill the next day, for the new book. We're working on the section now on eco-friendly cars. Talked to a woman named Kim who bought a conversion kit for her diesel Subaru so that her car can now burn vegetable oil as fuel, instead of the petroleum diesel most Subarus use. Now that she has the conversion kit on her engine, Kim could buy vegetable oil from the grocery as a fuel for her car, but that would be very expensive. So she, and a growing number of other grass-roots environmentalists, are filling their tanks with used vegetable oil that is discarded by restaurants. It's called greasel or "straight veg" by those who use it.

The cool thing about greasel is that it's free and guilt-free. It's a subversive, non-taxable, non-polluting fuel that's not dependent on our Middle East affairs to keep the supply flowing. Greasel is a true do-it-yourself fuel that frustrates the government and industry folks who want to get in on the action in some way. I like the recycling aspect; Kim is re-using oil that will otherwise be thrown away. She picks up her used oil from a restaurant in Carrboro - they save it for her. It's a Mexican restaurant, so her car smells like tacos and burritos when she drives. If she got her oil from a doughnut place, then her car would smell like doughnuts. Could be worse!

Greasel, also called "straight veg," is not the same thing as biodiesel. Biodiesel is a vegetable oil that has been chemically altered, so that a conversion kit is not necessary for your car. You save money on the conversion kit, which can be pricey, but the downside is that biodiesel is not as easy to find as straight vegetable oil. I've been told that there are only about six biodiesel stations in North Carolina. Not sure if that's true. Plus, biodiesel is expensive - more than $3 per gallon. In some places, owners of diesel cars are pooling their resources and forming coops to make their own biodiesel, or bring it in from somewhere else.

But before you get too excited - remember that to use either greasel or biodiesel, the car must have a diesel engine. Since only 3% of new American cars are diesel, that cuts out most of us.

We're also learning about ethanol as a biofuel for gasoline engines. Cars can be modified to use a fuel that's 85% ethanol, which cuts way down on harmful tailpipe emissions and greenhouse gases. But more on that later.

Biofuels and Mr. Bush

I've been reading more today about green cars. Eco-friendly cars, that is. Getting ready to interview a couple of people about biofuels and alternative car technologies for the book we're working on now, The Power of Your Pocketbook: How Americans' Spending Habits Shape our Future.

It's interesting that Bush gave lip service in his state of the union address on Jan 31 to our energy dilemma. He seems to want to decrease our dependence on foreign oil, and to increase spending somewhat on renewable and sustainable sources of energy for cars.

Yet the amount he proposes to spend is a drop in the bucket compared to what's needed. If the federal government can't commit to research, development and especially putting new development into practice, then industry won't commit either.

Bush says he supports the use of waste plant matter, such as switchgrass and wood chips, to make ethanol for gasoline engines. That would be great if he really meant it. But the Department of Energy is only funding a pilot project, and has no plans to convert switchgrass or any other plant waste into ethanol on a commercial scale.

Daniel Kammen, director of the Institute of the Environment, says that a car can be converted to use ethanol with only $100. He says the demand is there, if the supply of ethanol was ready. But it's not.

Greasel is popular here in North Carolina, at least in the Triangle area, as an alternative biofuel for cars. But greasel can only be used in a vehicle that has a diesel engine. Biodiesel is another fuel option for diesel engines. Greasel is straight vegetable oil; biodiesel is vegetable oil that has been modified chemically. The nice thing about greasel is that it can be free. Using it requires first of all buying a conversion kit for your diesel engine. But after that, many greasel users get their vegetable oil from fast food restaurants that are throwing it away. Biodiesel, on the other hand, does not require the conversion kit but can be costly and hard to find.

At any rate, as I mentioned, both greasel and biodiesel are usable only in diesel engines. And very few American cars have diesel engines. So....back to ethanol, for a widespread biofuel solution. For now.

As Daniel Becker of the Sierra Club points out, the most effective thing Bush could do right now is to mandate that all new cars get better gas mileage. He could do that right now. Certainly we have the technology to make all cars get 35 or 40 miles per gallon. So, if Bush really means what he's saying, then why doesn't he do that? Why? I don't know the answer to that. I suppose he's protecting automakers' financial interests. Everything boils down to supporting big business for Mr. Bush. But I don't see the connection exactly. If someone would like to explain it to me, I'd like to hear it. Who is it that would suffer and complain if new legislation made all cars get better gas mileage?

Georgia Organics in the land of 1.75 billion chickens

What's happening with the alternative food movement in Georgia, and especially Athens, home of the University of Georgia.....

I just talked to a woman who works for Georgia Organics, an organization in Georgia that supports organic farmers and farmers who use sustainable practices but may not be certified organic. Sara Kate and I will be at Earth Fare in Athens Georgia (home of University of Georgia) on February 6 from 4:00 to 7:00 and at UGA's Great American Meatout on March 20, sponsored by Speak Out for Species (see www.uga.edu/sos for details later about our presentation).

But anyway, the person at Georgia Organics told me that Georgia doesn't have nearly as many hogs as North Carolina, but has more chickens than any state in the US - 1.75 billion broilers every year. Whoa, is that right? That's what she said. She said corporate chicken farms are particularly numerous around Athens, and that their waste drains into the North Fork and the Middle Fork of the Oconee River, which I've rafted with my family. Beautiful wilderness areas. She said in Georgia there is a law that keeps chicken farmers who raise fewer than 20,000 birds per year from marketing their birds to the public. So that knocks out small farmers who might raise a few chickens at pasture, unless they want to take a risk and sell the birds on the sly to their neighbors. All the chicken in Georgia has to be produced by factory farms owned by corporations like Tyson, Goldkist, Perdue, etc. That's bad. I'm a vegetarian, but I do believe that for folks who eat meat, it's so much better for the animals and for the environment to buy pasture-raised animal products. Rather than products from animals raised in misery, crammed into stinking crowded dark warehouse-like buildings. We describe our visits to such miserable places in Veggie Revolution.

In the Athens area, Farm 255 is a restaurant that uses locally grown produce. Full Moon Farm is one farm that provides produce to that restaurant; they also offer CSAs to consumers. A CSA is a yearly agreement, where the consumer pays the farm a yearly amount, and the farm delivers a box of produce to that consumer every week. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture.

Athens also has a coop for consumers who want local and/or organic produce: http://locallygrowncoop.com. The contact person fo the coop is Eric at 706 245 9774. Another person in Athens told me that Athens has a coop called Daily Groceries Coop.

Georgia Organics is offering a sustainable ag conference on Feb 10 and 11. They're working on a brochure to go out this spring that will be a statewide guide to sustainable producers who market their food to their local communities. Visit their website www.georgiaorganics.org to find out how to get the brochure or to learn more about the conference.

I just found out today about the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project. Need to do some research about that.

If you have more tips about the movement for a healthy, humane, and environmentally sound food system in the Georgia area, please post comments or email us. We want to be ready for our Georgia visits in March and April. We'd love to come to your community too and talk about factory farming, and the alternative food movement. It's gaining steam! Email us at treeduck@earthlink.net.
Sally

Now, What's in that Pet Food?

Sara Kate and I have been doing research for our new book about the power we have as informed consumers. When we buy selectively, we are making a conscious choice about which corporations to fund and which corporations will shape the future of the planet. Sara Kate and I are trying to make more deliberate choices ourselves, as consumers. We're trying to find out what all these corporations are up to.

Does anybody have any leads or links to info about pet food or pet treats? About Greenies?

I met somebody the other day who used to work for Purina. He told me that Purina no longer exists, it was broken up and went to Nestle, which now does all the pet chow, and Cargill, which now does all the industrial chow. Both companies kept the Purina label though because it's so familiar and popular. Both the pet chow and the industrial chow for farmed animals are composed largely of slaughterhouse waste ("meat by-products"). Does everybody know that? I've sort of lost my perspective, after hearing a variety of people expound on the topic. By-products include heads, organs, feet, fat, skin, chicken poop, "feather meal," bone meal, etc.
My friend said that, in the hog-chow industry, they say of pigs that "the only thing wasted is the squeal."

Are there pet foods, pet treats out there that don't include that glop? Although - really, is the glop all that bad? I understand that it is illegal now to use the carcasses of animals that dropped dead on their own, without being killed. In case they were sick.

A farmer I talked to who raises beef cattle at pasture told me, yes the slaughterhouse by-product glop is that bad. Because it contains all the pesticides, antibiotics, and hormones that were fed to those animals. He said that's why cancer rates are so high in dogs. It is true that my two dogs both died of cancer...
Need to investigate this further.

Sally

Internationalist Bookstore in Chapel Hill - a bookstore that supports grassroots efforts

Last Wednesday, Jan 25, Sara Kate and I did a presentation on our book Veggie Revolution at the Internationalist Bookstore in Chapel Hill, NC. I want to put in a plug for the Internationalist. They (Biff in particular) did a great job of publicizing the event and we had a great turnout. It was the liveliest audience we've had. I expected, being a college town (UNC), that a lot of the folks would be well-informed and opinionated about the meat industry and our American food system, and that was the case. We had lots of excellent questions about animal rights, veganism versus vegetarianism, where the alternative food movement is headed, and what we can do to keep it rolling.

I was amazed to find out just a couple of weeks ago that the Internationalist Bookstore is a nonprofit organization, and is staffed almost entirely by volunteers! It exists to support grassroots efforts at social reform - authors, organizations, and so on. This spring the Internationalist will be hosting a panel to discuss the sustainable agriculture movement, and Sara Kate and I hope to be part of that. The Chapel Hill area (actually nearby Pittsboro) seems to be a focal point for the sustainable ag movement. Pittsboro is home to the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association, also the Rural Advancement Fund, the Rare Breeds Conservancy, and Central Carolina Community College, which has a thriving and innovative academic program in sustainable agriculture. It's an energizing community - lots of local organic farmers and farms using sustainable methods in the area. Exciting things are happening there.

Family Seeks Other Families for Vegetarian Potlucks

Our family is interested in starting a group for vegetarian families with children in the Charlotte area. We envision potluck dinners and cookouts for various holidays to start with. We could do more than that as we get together and organize. You can e-mail us at tikvah@bellsouth.net.

Scott and Miriam

Community Gardens

A caller on our Charlotte Talks radio show mentioned community gardens here in Charlotte. Here's some more information about that.

The gardens are offered by Parks and Rec, and 10x10 foot plots can be rented for $3 a month or $25 a year. They feature improved soil, and some have a water supply on site. There are a number of locations, including:
- Little Sugar Creek Greenway
- Baxter Street Park
- Huntingtowne Farms Park
- McAlpine Creek Community Park
- Ramsey Creek Park
- Reedy Creek Park
- Winget Park

For more information, check out www.parkandrec.com or call 704-336-3854.