May 2015 Volume 5 . Issue IV

the GREEN OBSERVER

INS IDE TH I S I S SUE :

MAHOMET AQUIFER DESIGNATED SOLE SOURCE

EXPLORING VEGANISM

HOW TO GET RID OF ANTS

THE RED OAK RAIN GARDEN

GROW IT YOURSELF: CITRUS PLANT

...AND MUCH MORE!

2 g r a b i t . r e a d i t . G ! O

check us out online: www.greenobservermagazine.comprinted on 100% recycled paper

LE T TER FROM THE ED I TOR j e s s t angThis issue wraps up yet another amazing year for the Green Observer. We are proud to have welcomed

new, enthusiastic writers to our group, connected with many RSOs on campus, and become an amazingly close group of friends. And as I prepare to say goodbye to our wonderful graduating staff, I am also so excited for what next year and our newly elected officers will bring to the table!

This month, our delightfully successful Trivia Night set the tone for next year with great food from the Red Herring and new friends from various organizations. To everyone who came out, we appreciate your support and look forward to further col-laborations! In the coming semesters, look for more GO newsstands, co-sponsorship of events, a greater online presence, and engaging stories about local sustainability from our remarkable writers.

Before moving on however, I would like to take a moment to thank the people who tirelessly supported the Green Ob-server and helped get us where we are today: Maddie, Andrew, Jola, Alana and Olivia. Thank you for introducing me to the organization that I have come to love so much. You all worked unbelievably hard to support the GO and help it grow to be the amazing publication that I am so proud of today. Good luck in everything that you aspire to accomplish and I know I speak for the whole Green Observer staff when I say, “Thank you and we love you!”

Stay tuned readers; next year is going to be fresh and exciting! Co-editor Catherine Kemp and I have so much in store. Thank you for all of your support and enjoy the last issue of this year!

Jess Tang

READ I T. S IGN I T. PASS I T ON!Sign your name below and stick this issue back on the rack for someone else to enjoy!

THE GREEN OBSERVER SIGNATURE SPOT

3 The Green Observer Magazine

LIZ COLE

OLIVIA HARRIS

ALANA HEIER

ANDREW NOWAK

MADELINE SCHUETTE

JOLA SZKODON

ADDITIONAL STAFF

TABLE OF CONTENTS

MEET THE G !O T EAM

Q&A WITH KEVIN WOLZ

MAHOMET AQUIFER DESIGNATED SOLE SOURCE

PICKING YOUR PLATE

ANTS IN MY PANTS... DRAWER

SNEAK PEAK: ONLINE EXCLUSIVES

SCIENTISTS AS ADVOCATES

RAIN, RAIN, THE GARDEN WAY

GIY: CITRUS PLANT

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CATHERINEKEMP

co-editor-in-chief

KATIEKLAUS

layout editor

JEETHSURESHwebmaster

REMYCROWLEY-FARENGAYMCA liason

NIKKIEVANS

copy editor

RACHELLAUTER

distribution chair

NORAROCHE

social media chair

ELISESNYDERtreasurer &

advertising chair

GUEST CONTRIBUTERS

JOANNA KRUEGER

MEGHAN MCDONALD

4 g r a b i t . r e a d i t . G ! O

Q&A WI TH KEV IN WOLZOlivia Harris

GO: What does an ideal agricultural system look like to you?

KW: “Well, ideally, if you flew over it, you’d think it was a national park, ‘cause it would look like such a pristine, restored (environment) – you wouldn’t even know there was agriculture happening there. Now, in reality, you might be able to see some straighter lines, some more human influ-ence there, but the goal is for – from afar – our ag systems to be just as functional as a native ecosystem.”

GO: What failing in agriculture is your research in woody perennial polyculture trying to change?

KW: “There’s a lot: habitat, biodiversity, the fact that we only have one hundredth of a percent of the native, original ecosystem in Illinois.

For me the biggest part is climate change. Agriculture is – by many metrics – the single largest cause of climate change. It’s so sad that so little attention is paid to agri-culture from the climate change community, and I think it’s because it’s a large and complex issue; it’s not just ‘make a more fuel efficient car’ or ‘don’t drive this car, drive that car.’

Even if you stop driving your gasoline powered car and start driving an electric car, the best that can do is have a net zero effect on the climate or the environment. There’s no way we can make a car that as you’re driving it you’re actually sequestering carbon and having a positive effect on the climate. Whereas if you look at agriculture, not only can we stop (the negative effects of ag), we can also use the soil and use the trees to sequester carbon and bring (the envi-ronment) back to a better state. To me, that’s a win-win.”

GO: What is the most common skeptical response you see to your work and ideas? How do you respond?

KW: “The first one always is ‘how’re you gonna get farmers to do this?’ The people we actually need to con-vince are the landowners. The farmers really don’t own any land, they just own the equipment and they come and they farm it. The problem is, for example, in Champaign County, most of the actual land owners live in other states, like Cali-fornia or Texas or Florida. The people we need to convince are not the crotchety old farmers, it’s the people that are living in other states who just want to make sure they get a return and that their land is being maintained healthy over time.

GO: Am I correct in assuming that sustainability is something important to you?

KW: “Sustainability? I think sustainability is a total load of crap.”

GO: Seriously?

KW: “Yeah! So if we change everything, and we have wind turbines and we have electric cars and all that stuff, we’ve now made our society “sustainable,” which (to me) means maintaining the status quo, and we’d be sustain-ing where we are now. It’s not gonna work. We need to be recreating and regenerating and retooling.”

“More important than sustainability is resiliency, meaning that something can stay the way it is under a lot of different stresses or factors. Agriculture right now is not resilient at all to drought, to climate change, to pest and diseases. If we can create ag that puts carbon back in the ground but that is doing so under a lot of different scenarios, a lot of differ-ent natural issues, that’s more important.”

Agriculture is a hot topic among climate and environmental sciences. Notorious for its high greenhouse gas emissions, land use demands and use of chemical inputs, agriculture can disturb the natural balance of ecosystems.

Kevin Wolz, a Ph.D. student in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Cham-paign, is confident he’s found a solution to the problems of modern agriculture. Equipped with Bachelor’s degrees in Civil and Environmental Engineering and Biology, Kevin designed an experimental agricultural field. He planted rows of Illinois-native nut-producing trees alongside other nut and berry producing shrubs and vine fruits. As opposed to the corn and soybean monoculture of Illinois, this perennial polyculture mimics the kind of landscape that Illinois had hundreds of years ago. For this reason, it requires fewer high-energy inputs to produce large amounts of food. Kevin says it could completely replace the corn-soybean rotation of today.

The Green Observer sat down with Kevin to learn more about polyculture and his unique philosophy about agriculture. Kevin’s answers are edited for clarity and brevity.

WOODY PERENNIAL POLYCULTURE

5 The Green Observer Magazine

EPA G IVES MAHOMET AQU IFERSOLE SOURCE DES IGNAT ION

Nikki Evans

The EPA did what?

The US Environmental Protec-tion Agency gave sole source designation to the Mahomet Aquifer. This means that the EPA has formally recognized that at least half of the local population relies on the Mahomet Aquifer for its drinking water. It also means that federally funded projects must now be reviewed by the EPA to ensure that they do not impair the aquifer’s water quality. Feder-ally funded projects include the building of highways, treatment plants, and some construction and agricultural projects.

Don’t have enough time between classes, work, and a social life to keep up with environmental policy news?

No problem! Here is the skinny on some recent legislation and why you should care.

Image courtesy of: http://www.mahometaquiferconsortium.org/

So why should I be excited about this?

It means that the water you rely on is more heavily protected from dangerous contamination. Unless you like the taste of gasoline or septic waste, this is good news.

What can I do to help protect the Mahomet Aquifer?Sole source designation is a good thing but it is not full protection from toxic

contamination or groundwater depletion. To find out more about important cam-paigns, events, and water saving tips, check the website for the Mahomet Aquifer Consortium: http://www.mahometaquiferconsortium.org

What is an aquifer again?Basically, an aquifer is an underground layer of porous rock that contains water

(aka groundwater). Much of the world’s drinking water comes from aquifers. Your drinking water comes from the Mahomet Aquifer.

Image provided courtesy of: http://www.cartoon-clipart.com/

6 g r a b i t . r e a d i t . G ! O

P ICK ING YOUR PLATEJess Tang

It’s not every day that a class reading sticks with me for weeks like Michael Pollan’s An Animal’s Place. In it, Pollan discusses his qualms with veganism as it relate to animal rights, land-use and human health.

If you are not familiar with Michael Pollan, he is an environmentally oriented author who has written The Om-nivore’s Dilemma along with many other books and articles on the industrial food chain, consumerism, and agribusi-ness.” In An Animal’s Place, he makes a very convincing ar-gument in favor of meat consumption. Instead of large-scale agribusiness and factory farming, Pollan introduces a world of small and local farms; farms that believe in free range, natural diets and having well-treated animals. He describes these farms as mimicking a natural ecosystem in the excerpt below:

“Once cows have finished grazing…the hens fan out over the pasture, eating the short grass and picking the insect larvae out of the cowpats-all the while spreading the cow manure and eliminating the farm’s parasite problem...Their nitrogenous manure feeds the pasture and …the chickens move out, and the sheep come in, dining on the lush new growth as well as on the weed species that the cattle and chickens won’t touch. Meanwhile, the pigs are in the barn turning the compost…the pigs, whose powerful snouts can sniff out and retrieve the fermented corn at the bottom get to spend a few happy weeks rooting through the pile, aerat-ing it as they work. The finished compost will go to feed the grass; the grass, the cattle; the cattle, the chickens; and eventually all of these animals will feed us.”

This is a very different form of American farming than what commonly exists today. Additionally, Pollan emphasizes that animals originally benefitted from domestication. He writes, “opportunistic species discovered through Darwinian trial and error that they were more likely to survive and prosper in an alliance with humans than on their own”.

To top it all off, Pollan argues that eating meat is not un-healthy for us. In fact it is a natural part of who we are as a species, “reflected in the design of our teeth and the struc-ture of our digestion. Eating meat helped make us what we are, in a social and biological sense.”

All of this made me skeptical. I have spent quite a few years struggling with whether or not I should become a vegetarian. And all of the reasons that I had for chang-ing my diet had just been addressed and reversed in one short article. Then I thought, how would a dedicated vegan respond to the points that Pollan raised? I took my questions

to the only place I could think of and found myself sampling some nutritional yeast and turning down a handful of raisins at the Red Herring, the vegan restaurant here at the Univer-sity of Illinois.

Emmett Silver, manager of The Red Herring who also has a degree in nutrition, provided some very different insights into why we should eat a diet that is free of animal byprod-ucts.

First, he addressed the impact that farming and agriculture have on natural ecosystems and landscapes. Specifically, Emmett pointed out that “ecosystems using forest agronomy (fruits and nuts) would come back if we stopped developing land for corn and soybeans to feed animal”. In fact, about 30% of all of the Earth’s land is used to support livestock. Think about how many different ways we could be using al-most one third of the Earth’s surface, if it was not dedicated to growing corn to feed cows to feed us. That seems like a rather inefficient use of land and energy to me.

In addition, Emmett brought up that eating vegan does not harm your health. Instead, it makes you seek nutrients in more diverse forms of food. Specifically, he pointed to ancient grains and seeds as some of the healthiest: “Sesame has more calcium per weight than milk or cheese does. A big reason people don’t go vegan is because they are wor-ried about a calcium deficiency”.

7 The Green Observer Magazine

Acid: Ants are discouraged from seeking entry to your place of residence when they encounter acidic media. You can utilize this tidbit by wiping your floors with vinegar, Borox, or Citra-Solve. Further, you can concentrate deterrents like lemon oil and peppermint oil in places where the ants seem to be entering the vicinity.

Lines: People have success-fully barred entry to ants by using lines of various materi-als. Lines of chalk across ants’ pathways have been shown to confuse those pesky insects. Sprinkling baking soda, cay-enne pepper, coffee grounds, and several other household items around areas of ant activity should deter them from scurrying about.

Bags: Placing peppermint tea bags or bags of instant coffee in areas of high ac-tivity will let you enjoy the nice weather without feeling like your room is someone’s experimental ant farm. Simply place the bags in the affected area, open them, and let the scent work its magic.

Bottles: Spray bottles of various liquids will kill the ants if you’re looking for an im-mediate result. Fill up a spray bottle with vinegar, soap, diluted peppermint oil or peppermint soap and simply get to spraying! These materi-als rely on the acidity of the media to kill and deter the ants from trying to hang with your crew.

Interestingly though, Emmett eats vegan most of the time. “Honestly, I’ll eat any food you put in front of me if I’m hun-gry enough.” In his defense, he brought up one of the most characteristic features of vegan and vegetarianism: the phi-losophy behind it. “I would like to think that I can live without harming other creatures and that laws of nature would work in human favor if we could leave animals alone…People would simply benefit from the inspirational culture of vegan-ism. The sense of morals and values that people appreciate in this culture and the global consideration and ethics that we live by”.

Even though Michael Pollan and Emmett Silver live on very different diets (most of the time) I saw an extremely common system of beliefs between the two of them: a value of the natural landscape and ecosystem functionings and the belief

that animals should not be subjected to cruel treatment solely for our eating habits. In my mind then, it is not so difficult to consume meat but still have the global consideration of ethics and values that vegans tend to live by. Particularly, the growing market of free range, grass fed/vegetarian fed meat offers diverse ways to eat meat responsibly.

After all my searching and research, I decided to replicate the common thread I saw between the two philosophies. And while I plan to continue my meat-eating ways, I hope that by being conscious of the farms my food is coming from, I can still embody the values of respecting animal life, supporting sustainable land use and eating healthily that Emmett de-scribed.

1. Time Magazine

ANTS IN MY PANTS . . . DRAWER Remy Crowley-Farenga

Finally, winter is over. It was long, and cold, but you made it! The days are getting longer, the sun is getting higher in the sky, and you no longer involuntarily cry while walking to class. Now, all these great changes make you want throw open the windows, kick back and relax with your friends. Unfortunately, you have uninvited guests: ants. Look at them, scuttling around your neatly folded laundry, eating your hard-earned food. If you want those pesky little insects to leave you alone, here are some natural tips that might help you regain your privacy.

D Recycle ?

Take a step in the right direction

RECYCLE today with

Urbana’s U-Cycle program !

Green recycling carts are located

at all Urbana apartment complexes

Visit www.urbanaillinois.us/u-cycle

or follow us on Facebook at 2ucycle Use your newfound knowledge to make your place your own. It doesn’t belong to ants, it belongs to you…until your lease ends.

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THOUGHTS ON FOOD

TRASH ION FASH ION

Many political decisions are often made for communities individualisti-cally without true consideration for the people effected. As the community in question, we should not tolerate this sort of behavior. We must readjust our perceptions about our potential to change the food production system. One local Champaign resident, Sue Wiebel, has done just that in order to secure a more conscientious lifestyle for her family through the adaptation of at-home food cultivation. Pictured to the left are her chickens, a recent opportunity made possible for Champaign residents thanks to Karen Car-ney, after whom one of her chickens is named...

To read more about the power of conscious decisions and at-home food cultivation, check out Joanna’s piece online

at greenobservermagazine.com.

Guest Writer: Joanna Krueger

Find exclusive online content at: www.greenobservermagazine.com

Nikki Evans

Want to know what this picture is all about?

Find out online at greenobservermagazine.com

THANK YOU FOR YOUR GENEROUS

CONTR IBUT IONS TO THE GREEN OBSERVER :

Michelle Harris

Phil Harris

Carolyn Kemp

Laura Ketchum

Charles Klaus

Katie Klaus

Rick Klaus

Patricia Mueller

Kasey Umland

Jennifer Walling

Judy White

9 The Green Observer Magazine

SC I ENT I S TS AS ADVOCATESLiz Cole

Whether we realize it or not, scientific communication shapes the way we behave on a daily basis. It’s incredibly im-portant to our well-being and has the possibility to shape our future. Not only that, but our understanding of science greatly affects which laws and regulations get passed. For these rea-sons, scientists are trying to change the way they communi-cate. They are going to greater lengths to make their writing more accessible and to get their research out to the public.

This change is not coming easily. Historically, scientists have been seen as objective authorities who illuminate facts about the world through their research. When scientists act as advocates, there is fear of introducing bias to the research. This causes industry and the public to question the legitimacy of scientific findings.

We now have this paradox where society feels that it is the duty of scientists to warn the public of potential dangers, yet the majority of the public is taught by media to be overly skeptical of scientific findings.

Which brings up the debate of scientists’ role in communi-cation. Should they act as early warners of possible threats that face society? Should they advocate for policy change? And what should they do to regain the public’s trust?

All of these questions and more were answered when I talked with scientist, environmental communicator, and au-thor Mike SanClements. SanClements is the author of Plas-tic Purge, a book aimed towards helping consumers make informed decisions in regards to plastic consumption. Relat-able, understandable, and interesting to read, his book is an example of how beneficial it can be for society when scientists act as advocates.

GO: In your book, you give tons of examples of studies finding that chemicals in plastics have negative effects on humans, yet most people have never heard of these effects. What role do you feel scientists play in communicating their results to the public?

SanClements: There’s a huge debate in science about this, about the role of scientists as advocates and whether they should take on that role. I actually would go against the majority of scientific professionals because I believe that if you do have knowledge and that knowledge reflects a deci-sion for a better outcome for humanity, you shouldn’t just put it out there and then walk away. Rather you should try to be vocal about it and make [the information] as digestible as possible. One of the reasons why I think scientific com-munication doesn’t go over well is because it can be stuffy and difficult to understand, and sometimes condescending.

That’s one thing I tried to avoid when writing my book. I tried to show that I too use plastic, I’m not advocating that we stop using plastic. But an awareness about it can help us make smarter decisions.

GO: Does popular media play a role in risk communica-tion?

SanClements: I think they do. But when I think about journalism’s role, I think that their overall goal is to be true to the evidence and what they are conveying. And I feel like that might not always be the case of what’s happening. Climate change is a good example here. A lot of times you see news stories that try to give equal weight to both sides of this issue, even though, like, 99% of scientific research shows that cli-mate change is happening. So I think that showing both sides to an issue is important, but it’s also important to show the magnitude of both sides of the risk they are reporting on.

To read the rest of this interview with Researcher Mike SanClements and his take on scientists as advocates, go online to greenobservermagazine.com.

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10 g r a b i t . r e a d i t . G ! O

If you’ve ever been to McKinley, you may have noticed the Red Oak Rain Garden. Situated near the health center and Allen Hall, this garden was built in 2006 by University stu-dents, Facilities and Services (F&S), and the city of Urbana. I sat down with Dr. Anton Endress – the NRES professor who oversaw the garden’s conceptualization and construction – to get the story behind the project.

Before we get to the story behind Red Oak, you may be wondering what a rain garden is and how they differ from your mom’s flowerbed. According to Dr. Endress, these spe-cial gardens are depressions on the landscape designed to collect and absorb water. Native plants are commonly chosen because they better tolerate fluctuating moisture conditions.

For example, you might see St. John’s wort, spice bush, purple coneflowers, or black-eyed Susans. Similar to reten-tion ponds, rain gardens are a type of stormwater manage-ment, meant to prevent flooding. The difference between these two types of management is that retention ponds collect water which runs off of properties, while rain gardens keep that water in the location where it falls. This is a low-impact approach that many consider to be more natural.

GO: What sparked the idea to build an on-campus rain garden?

E: Historically, that site flooded every spring and after every large summer rainfall event. It went across the walking path, and people usually don’t like walking through water. I taught a class on restoration ecology which was project-based, and the students worked for real clients. There was a group of students in this particular class that formed their own little consulting firm and generated a proposal for that site. The folks at F&S received their reports and decided that they would make some funds available for a rain garden. By then the students in the team had for the most part graduated, so we then offered a summer internship and brought in a whole new group of students. Their job was the final planning and the beginning implementation. Then the following fall semes-ter there was another group of student interns that built it.

GO: How is the rain garden designed?

E: There are two major trees are at the site: one is a sycamore-type tree and the other is the red oak. Sycamores are floodplain trees and oaks are upland trees. We needed to do something to assure that any impoundment of water took place at the sycamore and not at the oak.

RA IN , RA IN , THE GARDEN WAYKatie Klaus

11 The Green Observer Magazine

The lowest topography on the site is at the oak, but you can’t very well raise a tree. Some excavated soil was used to make a ditch, and there are elevational changes so that any of the water which falls around the oak runs towards the sycamore. So that’s where the greatest water-holding capac-ity is.

GO: Some rain gardens have a drain to carry away excess water. Does this rain garden have a drain?

E: There is no drain; there is no overflow. The philosophy behind these is that if the volume of rainwater exceeds the garden’s capacity to store it, you want to be able to let it out. Our philosophy was that if you design it right in the first place, then that shouldn’t be the issue. I don’t think it has ever flooded over the paths.

GO: There is a sculpture that accompanies the garden. Can you talk a little bit about that?

E: That sculpture was a student competition. It is called “Prairie Fire” and it symbolizes a fire going across a tallgrass prairie. These fires were usually stopped only by encounter-ing streams. So you see the flames only on one side of our “dry stream.” That’s the symbolism that goes with that.

GO: One final question: do you consider the rain gar-den a success?

E: If you’d asked that question within the first 2-3 years, I would have jumped up and down off the ceiling and floor telling you how successful it was. There was the pure excite-ment of giving students an opportunity to do something on

the campus that others can see, enjoy, and benefit from. Urbana’s arborist was out there donating tools and supplies. The Urbana Streets Department helped us move rocks. It’s not often that city government groups and university student groups get together like that. Boy, that was wonderful! Every year in the fall there was a campus event for cleaning up the garden. That was also a responsibility that the university said they would assume; they would take over the maintenance of the garden – presumably forever. The disappointment is that forever lasted a very short period of time. A lot of the plants are gone. A lot of the rock is gone. I know that the budget demands are tight and the University may not have the necessary manpower or resources. However, that’s the disappointing part of it –it lacked sustaining power. Unless there’s a group that can generate that interest again.

*This interview has been printed with minimal edits*

visit us online at: www.greenobservermagazine.com

GROW I T YOURSELF : C I TRUS PLANTElise Snyder

Don’t throw your citrus seeds in the trash – save them and grow a new plant for your dorm, apartment, or house.

Materials:

• Plastic zip lock bag

• Paper towels

• Water

• Citrus fruit (with seeds)

1. Eat a citrus fruit and save the seeds. Lemons and grape-fruits are great because they have lots of seeds to pick from, but you can use any kind of fruit.

2. Choose the seeds you want to grow and soak them in water overnight. How many seeds you choose to soak de-pends on how many plants you want to grow. In my experi-ence, larger seeds are better because they are more likely to sprout and thrive.

3. Moisten a paper towel and fold it in half. The towel should only be slightly damp, not dripping.

4. Place the seeds on the towel and fold it in half. Make sure the seeds are spaced a few inches apart. Put the towel inside the plastic baggie.

5. Leave a little air inside the baggie and seal it. Place the bag in a warm environment, like in a sunny window or near a heater.

6. The seeds may take anywhere from a few days to two weeks to sprout, depending on the temperature. Periodically re-moisten towels if they start to dry out.

7. Once the seeds have sprouted roots and leaves, you can transplant them into a small container with soil. I like to use the plastic cups from yogurt, then transplant the seed-lings into pots once they get bigger. This way you save space initially and make it easier to transport them if you are going home for the summer.

8. Enjoy your brand new citrus plant!

READ GREEN . L I VE GREEN .