Phasmid Friend

Check out this fantastic little creature I encountered earlier today. Glad it decided to stick around (tee hee) long enough for me to get the camera despite the fact I was in the garden reading the Insecticides chapter of a Pesticide Use and Safety text!

If you build it...

...will they come? Hopefully!!

The Hamwich

I'm speechless. More here.

Updates

Hello readers.

Lots of important things have happened while yours truly has been trying to master some techniques for deciphering rye from barley from oats from... lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Here are a few updates:

• Congratulations to Sarah Backhouse and Planet 100 on their 200th episode milestone! To celebrate we've added the automatic Planet 100 feed to JustSaying. Find it over on the right. Yay!!
• A new book about food localisation came out. MEAT: A Benign Extravagance by Simon Fairlie. Read Permaculture's take here and some other discussions here. 
• Nicholas Kristof wrote a strong column on the egg recall.
• Mark Bittman posted about the new study linking obesity and school lunches.
• Chez Panisse celebrated 39 years.

The Majestic Plastic Bag

"...co-existing with billions of other petroleum species before breaking into ever-tinier plastic pieces."

Ugh.

Poodwaddle

I've been trying to embed this very cool source for startling statistics for 15 minutes and have finally waved the white flag and hyperlinked. Sorry.

http://www.poodwaddle.com/

Baltimore's Redefining "Seedy"

Baltimore is highlighted in the Grist's Feeding the City series. Christine Shenot reports:

"For many Americans, any mention of Baltimore conjures up images from two popular TV dramas set in the city: NBC's Homicide: Life on the Street and HBO's The Wire. For nearly two decades, those glimpses of Baltimore's drug trade and violent crime helped define the city.
But that era is fading. In some circles, there's now a lot more talk of sustainability and green living than of the murder rate, and it's an agenda that goes beyond the traditional focus on parks, transit, affordable housing, and other longstanding goals.

Likewise, the hand-wringing over Baltimore's unimpressive high-school graduation rates -- about half those of its suburbs in recent years -- is starting to give way to ambitious planning around workforce training and job opportunities in what some tout as a promising new economic niche for the city's youth.

The common denominator is farming. Baltimore's urban agriculture movement has quietly taken off in the past couple of years, with the twin forces of sustainability and economic benefits providing the boost. Under the eyes of hundreds of visiting school kids, two new multi-acre farms are flourishing at the hands of teenagers who come back to tend seedlings, turn compost, and harvest produce to sell at farm stands. The city also has seen a growing cadre of entrepreneurs launch smaller-scale projects, from container gardens on restaurant rooftops to earthworm-fueled composting, with residents discovering the benefits of worm castings as a nutrient-rich fertilizer that can turn a small garden patch into a prolific source of fresh fruits and vegetables."

(DEFINITELY) Read entire article here.

Somewhat Topical

A few articles from earlier in the year that just surfaced and since blog = web + log and most of our readers are friends and family... I am logging my newly discovered web creds here for your reading enjoyment and my record-keeping.

How to Lower Your Blood Pressure Naturally

Home Detox Strategy

WWOOFing

JustSaying just found out about WWOOFing: World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms. We're going to recruit an experienced WWOOFer to write first-hand about their volunteer experience but until we do, here is the website.

"Sprouting Everywhere"

Earlier this year we learned that rising levels of atmospheric CO2 (along with higher temperatures and longer growing seasons) are accelerating the growth of trees, specifically in Maryland and the Eastern United States. So I suppose it should come as no surprise that poison ivy is experiencing a boom around here as well. The Washington Post reports:

"...According to a report in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives last year, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has grown by 22 percent since 1960, which may not be so good for humans but is great for poison ivy and other vines. Mohan has been tracking poison ivy since 1998. In a study in the Duke Forest in Durham, N.C., she simulated the carbon dioxide content in the air 50 years ago, today and using projections for the year 2050. "Tree seedlings grew 8 to 12 percent more, with more C02," said Mohan. "Poison ivy grew 149 percent more. Poison ivy is getting bigger, faster and nastier..." "

Read more here. And here are some tips for fighting an ivy rash.