Great Lakes Echo (https://greatlakesecho.org/author/haleywalker/page/4/)
Areas of low oxygen are 30 times more prevalent in the nation’s waterways now than they were in 1960, according to a recent federal report.
And climate change means they’ll continue to worsen.
“This is our city. It is our town, and this is how we are going to turn it around. Plant the seeds and watch them grow, for our community and economy, our destiny and family.”
A group of Michigan natives have created an innovative way to help empower people with knowledge about where their local food comes from. Realtimefarms.com provides a way for individuals to find locally sourced food items using a variety of maps.
When, a coalition of public health and environmental organizations recently had 50 canned food and beverages analyzed, they discovered what they believe to be the highest levels of Bisphenol A ever found in the United States. And the sample responsible for setting this record came from a home pantry in Wisconsin.
The can of DelMonte French Style Green Beans contained 1,140 parts per billion of BPA, a chemical often used in plastic baby bottles, water bottles, printer inks, receipt paper and as a lining inside cans.
Detroit native Mark McInnis is giving away seeds to help introduce his new film on the explosion of urban gardening in his home city. In Urban Roots, McInnis connects the decline of the city’s auto industry to the rise of vacant lots that now provide space for gardens. McInnis’s mother worked for Ford Motor Co. in Detroit throughout his childhood. “That job put braces on my bother’s teeth, paid for our skateboards and our weekend trips up north,” he said.
A Milwaukee aquapoinics company was recognized this week in the “Energy and Environment” section of the New York Times. Save Water Organics was featured in a story about raising fish while growing water-based plants at the same time. The plants are grown on top of the fishpond. The fish waste supplies the plants with fertilizer, and the plants filter the water for the fish. While the story came out of London, the writer focused on the techniques used at Sweet Water.
Michigan could save billions of dollars if the state’s children weren’t made sick by toxic chemicals, according to a recent report by the Michigan Network for Children’s Environmental Health.
There is a new online campaign dealing with fisheries that people concerned about fishing in the Great Lakes might be interested in. It has a strange but catchy name: Who Fishes Matters. The campaign promotes awareness about who is fishing in the ocean and asks regulators to stop consolidating fishing permits for big businesses. Campaign officials say such consolidation gives control over fishing to those with money and fosters a corporate buyout of the industry. The Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance is behind the campaign and has created a particularly intriguing strategy to influence policymakers.
Today is the first annual National Gleaning Day
To me, it is a celebration of homegrown food, harvest and an action against food waste. But when I looked up what was happening locally, in Michigan and around the country, no celebrations could be found. A quick Google search of the term “National Gleaning Day” gave me practically nothing. In fact, the search engine even tried to change the term by stating, “Did you mean National Cleaning Day?”
No, I didn’t mean National Cleaning Day. Gleaning is collecting unwanted, extra or leftover crops from fields after harvest.
There are 75 places where you could buy local honey in Michigan, 26 places to get local goat cheese and milk in Wisconsin, and 22 places to buy Grassfed Beef in Ohio, according to a mashup on Localharvest.org.