Got Ice? Get Grit!

The winter of 2009-2010 has been treacherous in terms of sidewalk ice in Minnesota. December rain initiated the slickest sidewalks in memory which was followed by periods of melt...snow...melt plus more icing. For a household trying to be earth sensitive, the options for deicing and sanding do not meet the grade.

To some degree, all deicing salts have impacts to pets, plants, concrete and even more alarming, on watersheds. Salinity of urban waterways are of increasing concern, so much so that the City of Saint Paul has just decided that deicing salts will no longer be used on city side streets (intersections and grades excepted). The commonly used sand isn't without issues either. Sand has small enough particles that it washes from our driveways, streets and sidewalks directly into rivers via city storm sewers.

How to avoid these eco-pitfalls? Timely shoveling is really the ounce of prevention. Try to be aware of what precipitation is coming your way and make the effort to move it off and treat right away. Also, make sure you have access to a good chopper. Ice choppers are a necessary tool in the battle of slick sidewalks.

Still slick? Try CHICKEN GRIT for good traction (pictured above)! Grit is generally too heavy to wash into storm water systems. Further, the little bits of angular granite that chickens use to break down food in their crops are great for biting into icy surfaces. Finally, once the snow and ice are gone, you can sweep up your grit and save it for the next season. Chicken grit can be found at farm stores.

As a last resort, reach for the deicing chemicals, only after implementing timely shoveling, ice chopping and grit. But, know your salt because not all deicing salts are equally damaging and different salts work at different temperatures. For example, in extreme cold, calcium chloride is the only product that will work and using any other product is not effective. However, under most circumstances, grit and elbow grease will suffice.

What a great idea! The Midway Barter Market

In the Hamline Midway neighborhood, neighbors long for a local co-op grocery store. While the community waits to have a walkable venue for locally grown food, they have come to their own devices; setting up a dropsite for Whole Farm and creating the Midway Barter Market.

Whole Farm Co-op is a network of 30+ farms near the Twin Cities. By getting together to do orders, marketing, and delivery, they are able to be small producers who really know & care about what they offer us as consumers. Customers order online; products include meats, dairy, groceries, crafts, garden produce in the summer, and more. Midway deliveries will be monthly on the 3rd Wednesdays at the drop site at Hamline/Thomas SuperUSA. This means ordering at www.wholefarmcoop.com by the second Wednesday.

At the Midway Barter Market, neighbors exchange handmade goods, garden grown produce, softly used items and plants without the use of money! All sorts of items have been exchanged and its a fun time! There are even the occasional garden and henhouse tour, or impromptu juggling lessons in a kid friendly space. Come on down on Sunday to hang out with your neighbors and swap your goods and have a great time! The Midway Barter Market is now on Sundays 1-3 pm on the boulevard at the Anderson Oaks place, 1724 Englewood Ave until the season ends. See photos of the market here.

These great options have been brought to fruition by community members who participate in the Hamline Midway Environment Group, Mighty Midway Greening and Growing, LISN (Leasdership in Support on Neighborhoods) and specifically due to the efforts of Nine Dodge.

Worm Bin Washout

I have been trying to get the last worm bin task for weeks now. In fact, others want worms and are waiting on me. The bin was now too heavy to tote in and out every time I think of digging in, so it sat in the backyard waiting until I could harvest the last of the worm castings. Then the big rain came. I had thought of this scenario, and while my bin's lid has some small holes in the lid for ventilation, the tarp I kept over the works should keep the rain out. Well, not so. When I opened up to finish the belated harvest with my daughter's help, the worms were in the top of the bedding trying to find some air with puddles encroaching all around. The whole bin was sogged out, the bedding had the consistency of a too-thick brownie batter.

What to do? The bottom-side spigot was already open. The bin's bedding had so much water holding capacity that tipping to pour off water only dislodge the whole mess. The bin contained too much dense mass to even consider that evaporation could dry it out.

I needed to add something that would absorb excess moisture. Since we augment our gas furnace with a wood pellet stove, the pellets themselves jumped into mind. These pressured bits of sawdust are handy when cleaning spills and turns out they can sop up a soggy worm bin too. I added them slowly and carefully incorporating as I went. Laverme's Worms warns of using sawdust in vermicomposting because they can dry out the bedding too much. In the end, the pellets turned out to be a save and my original bin is now three.

Rain Barrel Time!

The rain barrel is in action here at the homestead. Most of the rainwater I collect is used on my compost piles, ornamental plantings and trees. I would like to add another to my front porch, but first have to install a gutter on that roof. Here is an informative pdf on rain barrels written by the U of MN Extension Service.

Using collected rainwater is very satisfying, knowing your landscape can be sustained by what falls from the sky. They do require their own attention however. Making sure the barrel's overflow doesn't impact your foundation, making sure your barrel doesn't grow mosquitoes, and getting your barrel drained before the next big rain are examples of such attention. Some of this can be taken care of through your design, but if this type of maintenance is not for you, then installing a rain garden is a good alternative. The costs for a rain garden will be higher (unless you get financial support from your watershed) but its maintenance is less.

In Saint Paul, the Hamline Midway Coalition and the Hamline Midway Environment Group is co-sponsoring a ‘build your own’ rain barrel workshop for neighbors on Tuesday , May 19th. A $30 fee covers all materials, including a recycled barrel and hardware. To reserve a spot, please contact at 651-646-1986. Space is limited.

In Minneapolis, as a follow-up to the rain barrel sale at Green Village Day, SECIA is also starting a waiting list for SE Como residents interested in receiving a rain barrel that SECIA interns will construct for only $15 using recycled 55 gallon drums. Quantities are limited. Contact the office at 612-676-1731 for more info.

Captured stormwater protects the Mississippi river!

Bag Laundry

Its an odd picture. This is a shot of my Bag Laundry. As far as I know, Bag Laundry is a term coined by members of the Hamline Midway Environmental Group (HMEG). This group of eco-volunteers spend a lot of time thinking about waste reduction. Plastic waste is a current obsession.

Ziploc bags just appear in my life. Have not bought any in a long while because many foods from the grocery store are coming in ziplocs and we seem to get them from other folks too. To get more out of the zip bags we have, our family set-up a bag laundry line above our kitchen sink. Washing and reusing allows us several of uses of the same bags.

The zip feature of a ziploc bag is not recyclable, so bag recycling around here (if you can find them) frowns on zip bags. So instead of tossing after a single use, we wash the Bag Laundry, hang on the line and reuse.

We have found that washing is done easiest (and least water required) by putting all the zips into a larger zip bag that is filled with hot soapy water. Swish and slosh each bag inside and then cycle through hot rinse water. Turning each bag inside out works best for this method. Note: we do not generally have meat products stored in zip bags and would never use this method with bags that contained raw meat.

ideas to reduce plastic bag waste:

• cloth shopping bags- they are ubiquitous now
  
• reuse food packaging- tortilla packages are a favorite here
  
• use other types of reusable containers, glass even i.e. your old peanut butter jar
  
• encourage stores to at least ask customers if a bag is needed
  
• stop using lawn & leaf bags, instead find a big sheet or tarp and bundle your yard waste inside. I can recommend garden containers like Fiskar's Kangaroos, which have been used for 6 years now in SE Como's community gardens. They loose their toggles for collapsing, but otherwise have held up to kids, sticks, compost, trimmings etc during endless trips to the compost piles.
  
• Bag Laundry!