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Our oceans are turning into plastic, killing millions of birds, turtles, sharks, dolphins, whales and leaching dangerous poisonous chemicals. You probably have heard about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in the North Pacific with 250 million tons of garbage floating on the surface of the ocean. It’s larger than Texas !  That’s the biggest one, but there are 4 other world oceans with huge islands of floating plastic growing bigger every year including one in the Atlantic,

David Pogue of The New York Times had this excellent segment on CBS Sunday morning a couple of weeks ago all about this “soup” of floating garbage that is filling our oceans.  The video says more than I ever could !   Capt. Moore in the video also has an new book called Plastic Ocean and an informative web site about the issues. 

For more information on marine debris, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris program has an excellent web site with lots of information, videos, and projects. 

Plastic bags make up part of this ocean trash.  For some reason, big time actors are now obsessed with narrating “mockumentaries” about the plastic bag.  The best is with Werner Herzog as the misunderstood bag.  And there is another with Jeremy Irons as the sad sack.  They are clever and fun, but really do make you think about the lowly little plastic shopping bag in a whole different way.

But in all seriousness, what can you do to locally help solve the problem of plastics ? Obviously recycle with a vengeance, bottles of all types, jugs, bags, baggies. Check with your town about which types of plastic they recycle.  Here is some good info from the CT DEEP and from the CT Recycling Guide 

Cut down on your plastic usage.  Don’t buy lots of small water bottles, buy one reusable bottle and fill it up from a large water jug.  Don’t use little baggies for lunch, but a reusable container.  Use cloth shopping bags.

You can also help by participating in a spring clean-up along the shores of Connecticut’s beaches whether rivers, lakes or Long Island Sound.  Spring is the best time for this since the vegetation does not hide the debris accumulated over the summer, fall and winter.

 Here is a good list of some of the Save the Sound Coastal Cleanups coming soon this spring to a Connecticut location near you.  Connecticut Community Boating also sponsors Beach cleanups in March and April along Connecticut’s shorelines. Here is there Beach cleanup promo  and details about the upcoming trash days.

Let’s do all we can as individuals to not add more to this mess.  Recycle, pick up your trash, go on clean-ups, and get informed and spread the word about this destructive issue whenever, wherever you can.

Natural Nutmeg Is Now On Facebook

I posted all the links above on my Natural Nutmeg Facebook page and many, many more.  It’s the Natural Nutmeg Facebook page with posted Connecticut events and news about nature and the state’s environment every day.  Interesting, relevant and fun.  Go LIKE the page to get your Nature in a Nutshell !

If you have a question or comment please post below. If you’d like
to know when my next blog is posted, send me an email at madelinedennis@optonline.net. Check out my list of CT nature
and environmental web sites to the right on this page.

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The circus is coming to Bridgeport as it does every October.  If you care about wild animals, you can join the protest rallies to be held there against circus animal abuse.  See below for the details on the protests.

For an informative summary on animal abuse in circuses and its history in Bridgeport, I hope you will read my previous blog  “Will The Circus Ever Leave Town? – Bridgeport Elephant Abuse”

Protests of Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus at Bridgeport’s Webster Bank Arena, 600 Main Street,  Thursday, Oct. 20 – Sunday, Oct. 23. Animals used by Ringling are brutally trained to perform unnatural tricks, chained and confined to small cages. Rally to educate circus-goers about circus animal abuse.

Protest Dates:

Thursday October 20 at 6:00 pm for Opening Night
The Barnum Museum is having its $100/person benefit gala at the circus Oct. 20 thereby condoning this terrible animal abuse.

Friday October 21 at 6:15 pm

Saturday October 22 at 4:45 pm

Sunday October 23 at 2:45 pm

Contact Deb Robinson of In Defense of Elephants at cicuses@idausa.org 860-836-7761 for more information.

Also check out my Natural Nutmeg Facebook Page
where I post events & news every day.

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April 22 is Earth Day. 

What can you do to bring Earth Day home in a real proactive way?

Check out a couple of my previous blog posts. I’m recycling them in honor of the day.

Wacky Ways To Recycle outlines 14 unique ways you can recycle.  Much more interesting than collecting bottles and cans.

Celebrate Earth Day talks about easy things you can
do to save your little part of the planet.

Happy Earth Day !

“When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it
attached to the rest of the world.”    -  John Muir

       

     NATURE

     N ature is
     A sking us
     T o care for her and all in the
     U niverse
     R emembering where we live
     E very single moment

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Male Ruby-Throat

April 5 – Hummingbirds are on their way back to Connecticut. One was sighted in in Connecticut on April 3rd and one was seen in Massachusetts yesterday.  The hummers seem to be coming back to us earlier each year. It used to be early May, but now it seems to be sometime in April. So be on the look out for them around any flowering plants that may be in bloom. It is just so fun to watch them dart around searching for plant nectar or a feeder to dine on. So it is also now time to clean your old hummingbird feeder and put it out there in your yard.

The hummingbird species that is found in CT is the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. They spend the winter in Central America. From March through May, they migrate north. Arrival time on the breeding grounds tends to not occur until food plants are blooming. To find out how far they have come to date, take a look at the excellent  migration map on the Hummingbirds! web site.

Female Ruby-Throat

What do they look like?

Hummingbirds are the smallest bird in the world. With an average length 3.5 inches and weight of one eighth of an ounce, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird gets its name from the color of the male’s ruby-red throat, although in some lighting situations it can appear to be black. The female is totally different, with its throat being covered in white feathers. The male has a forked tail while the female has a rounded tail with white-tipped tail feathers. The emerald green feathers covering their backs are Continue reading →

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I am NOT going to talk about how to recycle plastic or metal or paper.  How boring!  Plus you know how to do all that already, right?  I want to tell you about  the  fun and quirky ways to recycle things like grass, leaves, food, your old computer, your old clothes and rain water.  Now this is interesting !

If you are a baby boomer like me, you remember that when you were a kid your trash and everything used, old and unneeded went one place – into the kitchen garbage can. Then in the 1980s recycling laws started getting put into effect. Now the actual trash I throw away has got to be at least one quarter of what it was in the old days.  It is amazing what I recycle now.

So here is my list of the wackier ways to recycle you may not know much about:

Outdoor Composter

I started a composter bin in my backyard last spring to recycle my vegetable waste scraps into nutrient rich soil for my garden. It’s easy. I bought one of those large black compost bins for $50. Or you can buy a simpler one for $30, but you could just start one in a messy pile in your yard or build a simple wooden enclosure. I have a small covered bucket with a handle that I keep in the kitchen that I dump all my veggie scraps into, then take it outside. Composting has reduced my garbage considerably!  Here is what goes into the composter: vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, some grass clippings and leaves. I stir it once and awhile and sprinkle a little water into it, and that’s it.  Here is a good video on how to do it.   What you get eventually is lots of very rich soil for your garden plantings. Continue reading →

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The other day I found the tail and one leg of a gray squirrel in my backyard in Black Rock.  What could have done this ? !  I put the word out in my neighborhood thinking it was most likely done by a coyote which have been seen once and awhile.  Black Rockers responded to tell me of hearing and seeing fishers in their yards.  I do think that a fisher was most likely the culprit.

These creatures are sometimes referred to as “fisher cats” even though they seldom eat fish, and are not cats – they are actually weasels. Fishers are one of the largest members of the Mustelid family, which includes species like the mink, weasel, otter and skunk. The name may have been derived from “fitch,” the European polecat, a species familiar to early settlers who may have mistaken the fisher for the polecat. Continue reading →

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Everyone loves the circus, right ? Not any more.  Since the late 1990s protests against circuses and their use of wild animals for entertainment have gained momentum. Protesters talk about actual physical abuse of the animals and also protest the very concept of restraining and training wild animals for the sole purpose of entertaining us. Performing animals should have long since gone the way of the circus freak show! The animal most focused upon are the Asian elephants, the symbol of the cirucus.

Every fall the Ringling Brothers & Barnum & Bailey Circus comes to Bridgeport  at the Arena at Harbor Yard. The CT Post, Bridgeport’s hometown newspaper, came out with an editorial against the circus.
And every year protesters will be at the Arena. You can join them. See more details below.

If you were to strike your dog with a bullhook, or keep it chained by a front and back leg, you would be charged with animal abuse. Elephants in traveling shows endure lives of intense confinement, regular beatings with bullhooks, and the inability to satisfy physical and social needs. Continue reading →

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Controlling and Destroying Those Bloodsuckers

I hate mosquitoes!  They seem to be everywhere this summer! What in the world are mosquitoes good for anyway?

Mosquitoes are eaten by lots of other animals.  Mosquitoes really contol human populations by killing 3 million people a year, making them the most dangerous animal in the world. And they provide lots of jobs for lots of people!

There are 49 different species of mosquitoes found in Connecticut !  We all know they are very annoying and the itching and scratching can cause welts and bleeding, but they can cause various illnesses found in the US including West Nile Virus, Eastern Equine Encephalitis, and Jamestown Canyon Virus. The State of Connecticut monitors mosquitoes for diseases. So far this year’s testing of 60,000 skeeters in 70 towns has found West Nile carrying mosquitoes in 2 towns, but the summer is young.  In past years West Nile virus mosquitoes have been found in over 20 Connecticut towns, so no town is immune.

I am tired of getting bitten this summer. I can’t even enjoy my yard. So what can we do to control and destroy those bloodsuckers? What really works ?

Controlling the Skeeters

One of the best ways to stop mosquitoes from biting is to understand a little about their biology and behavior.  I was surprised to learn mosquitoes don’t need your blood for food. They get their food from flower nectar.  But the female needs  your blood for protein that her eggs need for development, so it’s only the females that bite.

She doesn’t bite exactly she saws into your skin and she siphons off your blood.  Both males and females  make a buzzing sound caused by the beating of their wings.  But you don’t often hear the male  because he is not coming around you to bite.   Continue reading →