Tag: Water

Planting for Tomorrow

 

“Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”
― investor Warren Buffett, known as the “Oracle of Omaha”.

If you have to be outside in the heat of a summer day, there is no sweeter relief than the shade of a large, spreading tree. Even staying indoors you can benefit from a shade tree if it helps cool the building you’re in, reducing the need for air conditioning. The first six months of this year have been the second warmest on record in the lower 48 states, after 2012. The National Weather Service accounts for climate data from 1895 onward, and according to their records 2016 was the warmest year of all.

Trees and shade - panoramio
Trees and shade in London, England; photo by TomasEE.
Drought has not developed as widely this year as in the recent past. The northern Plains states and southern Arizona have been hit hardest with drought this year, but elsewhere rainfall has been adequate. When it’s very hot, sufficient rainfall to keep plants, and especially trees, alive is crucial to mitigating high temperatures in the short and long terms, and maintaining trees as counterweights to further warming. A mature shade tree such as an oak can transpire over a hundred gallons of water in a day, drawing it up from it’s roots and losing it to the atmosphere from it’s leaves. Drought stresses trees and makes them vulnerable to pest problems, and if dry weather continues for several years in a row, the decline and death of trees can be due as much to pest damage as to lack of water for metabolic processes.
Summer is not the best time to plant trees because heat stress makes keeping up with watering difficult, but it is a good time to plan for planting in the best season, autumn. Balled and burlapped trees have been grown in a field, dug up with a root ball at least two or three feet wide and tall, and then the root ball wrapped in burlap to retain moisture until replanting. Such trees are tempting to buy because they promise shade sooner since they are bigger than container-grown trees. There are a number of reasons to resist the temptation.

 

Balled and burlapped trees are more often than not never root-pruned in the field, with the result that when the nursery digs up the tree, they cut off almost all the fine, fibrous roots at the outside of the tree’s root zone, and those are the roots which do the bulk of water and nutrient uptake for the tree. Because they are bigger than container-grown trees, balled and burlapped trees are more expensive to purchase. They are also more expensive to maintain for the first several years after replanting because they need intensive care on account of having to regrow fibrous roots. Until then, balled and burlapped trees will often not grow at all, and will even be surpassed in size and vigor in many cases by initially smaller container-grown trees.
Trees provide shade at the plaza
Trees provide shade at the Santa Fe Plaza in New Mexico; photo by WikTalksmart.
The reason is trees grown in containers have all or most of their fibrous roots. You can check this with a gentle tug on the trunk to see if there is some resistance to coming out of the container. Some unscrupulous nurseries will dig undersized field-grown trees and pot them up, knowing they could not sell them as balled and burlapped trees. Such trees will give little resistance to coming out of the container unless one or more of the large anchor roots is stuck in the side. There will be minimal fibrous root development. Another, perhaps simpler way to check for fibrous roots is to brush away some of the potting soil, making sure to replace it (when doing these tests, be gentle and put things back the way they were).
Artist.painting.at.Central.Park.New.York
Artist painting a picture in Central Park, New York City; photo by SpyON.
Whatever tree you buy and however it was grown, when you get it home, dig a ten dollar hole for a five dollar tree, but don’t overdo it or the tree will never try to extend its roots beyond the hole. Give it a little compost in the backfill and keep a light hand on the fertilizer. Water deeply and mulch lightly, and don’t pile the mulch up against the trunk, no matter how many “professional” landscapers you’ve seen do it! For as long as you take care of your tree, keep grass and other plants at least several feet away from the trunk, which will not only reduce competition for water and nutrients, but eliminate the possibility of mechanical damage from mowers and trimmers. Planting the right tree for your location will help reduce its need for extra water as it matures, though when absolutely necessary in the hottest, driest part of the summer, by all means give it water if you can. In time, your tree will reward you or someone in the future with cool relief from summer heat.
― Izzy

 

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Drink Your Fill

 

With the arrival of hot summer weather, people give more consideration to how much water they are drinking. It’s peculiar that such a basic survival and health issue has received as much medical and layperson attention as it has in the past forty years. It appears to coincide with the rise of the bottled water industry. Before that, people had a common sense approach to drinking water, as in drink when you’re thirsty, and drink a lot when you’re sweating. Not much too that. Certainly not enough to warrant the expenditure of millions of dollars in studies.

 

Ljubljana (7893964904)
Dog drinking from a fountain in Ljubljana, Slovenia; photo by Marjolein from The Netherlands.
One practice that has thankfully been mostly discarded in the past twenty or more years is the idea that restricting water intake helps lose weight, particularly during vigorous exercise in high heat and humidity. That boneheaded practice used to be the norm in outfits like football teams and military boot camps, though now it is suspiciously difficult to find evidence of it on the internet. Memories of survivors and their anecdotal evidence will have to do. The idea behind restricting water intake of a person who needed to lose weight was that a good portion of that weight was water. Sweat away the pounds! In reality, as opposed to just dreaming stuff up, there is more water weight in muscle than in fat.

 

Your body does a very good job of telling you what you need. When you’re outside working or exercising in 90 degree weather, with a heat index over 100 degrees, and you are pouring sweat, and your body is telling you to drink – nay, guzzle – some water, why would you let a moronic theory tell you otherwise? Would it make more sense if the moronic theory was proposed by a coach? a drill instructor? how about someone wearing a white lab coat and carrying a clipboard? Do you think your dog or cat would hesitate a second to listen to those people before lapping up copious amounts of life-giving water? How much more or less sensible are you than your dog or cat?

 

Fat tabby cat drinking water from a pond-Hisashi-01
Fat tabby cat drinking water from a pond; photo by Hisashi from Japan.
Thank goodness that nonsense is all behind us, or should be. Now it seems the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction, with the silly recommendation about eight glasses of water a day. That recommendation appears to have arisen from bottled water industry executives whispering in the ears of select scientists and doctors. Ever since, there have been an awful lot of people striking poses with their high profile branded water sippy bottles. It gets to be like an article of clothing with a visible logo, announcing to all and sundry that you are a fitness-minded person with class. Sippy sippy all day long, eight glasses worth.

 


In this collection of Oompa Loompa songs from the 1971 film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, the Oompa Loompas didn’t address water drinking, but their common sense, didactic advice would have been welcome if they had.

What really matters, again, is what your body tells you. Your age, body type, and regular level of physical exertion are trying to tell you things, too, though sometimes a doctor’s advice may be required for you to properly hear what they are saying. Common sense, listening to what your body wants and responding to it, and a plentiful supply of cool, pure water ought to keep you safe and healthy in the summer heat. Pain doesn’t always mean gain; sometimes it means maybe you should be sensible and take a break in the shade.
― Vita

 

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Sink or Swim

 

“If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”
― Will Rogers*(1879-1935)

 

Last Saturday, April 22, was the 48th celebration of Earth Day, and the first March for Science in Washington, D.C., and in hundreds of other cities around the world. Just when we might have congratulated ourselves that reason and scientific inquiry had pushed aside superstition and muddled thinking, the medieval mind rises again and reasserts itself, now with a in-over-his-head champion in the Oval Office who is quite pleased to indulge the self-interest of his oligarchic cohorts in the fossil fuel industry. The lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder grunt their approval of his policies because those obnoxious policies appear to rile up the fancy pants pointy-headed folks, and that’s always a nice, satisfying feeling. The folks higher up on the ladder are only too happy to let those lower down bear their weight, and the reasons they bear that weight are not important to the higher ups, only that they continue to hold up the whole enterprise without asking troubling questions. It’s worked well for Wayne Tracker, aka Rex Tillerson.

It’s not the fault of these hard-working men and their unfortunate mules they’ve been told to “keep digging”.

The amount of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, in the atmosphere is higher now than it has been in human history, based on what we know from ice cores. Sea levels are high and getting higher as the climate warms, and are already affecting coastal communities. It has been at least thousands of years, possibly millions, since Earth last encountered conditions like those we are entering into now. There is no basis for comparison for humans in the present age, now known as the Anthropocene on account of the profound effect people have had on the Earth, because in the interregnum we have settled the coastlines so densely that in geologic time it would appear as no more than the blink of an eye. Around the world now there hundreds of millions of people living within 100 miles of the sea, and accompanying all that settlement there has been an enormous investment in infrastructure such as housing, office buildings, and roads, along with the economic fortunes and personal hopes of all those people. And all of those people will feel – are feeling – the impact of a warming climate sooner than other groups living in other situations farther inland. Around the world, most of those people living along coastlines are poor. Ironically, in the United States, the richest country in the world and one where having a beachfront property is often a status symbol for the wealthy, the effects of sea level rise will possibly be more severe than average.

A portion of a BBC Newsnight interview with Noam Chomsky from June 8, 2012. The situation he bemoans has not improved in the nearly five years since the interview.

Whether a person believes climate warming is caused by humans or not is, at this point, almost immaterial. It is happening; it’s here. If scientific evidence is not persuasive to some folks, then common sense should tip the scales for them. Sticking their heads out of air conditioning into the natural environment for more than a few minutes at a stretch ought to help. Too many people unfortunately are willing to ride along with Wayne Tracker, despite their common sense and their personal experience. If the Earth is a lifeboat in the cosmos (and what have we found so far to tell us otherwise?), then we are all in this together, and at this point arguing about how we got here serves little purpose. Certainly there are some people in the lifeboat who seem to feel it’s perfectly fine to flourish their revolvers and shoot holes in the boat, which of course makes things worse. What to do about them? If we can find the political will among our fellow survivors, we take away their revolvers, for they are imperiling everyone’s chances, and their ideology be damned. They should know better than to pound in the stakes of “Global Warming is a Hoax” yard signs in insufferable heat, throwing themselves into a tizzy, giving themselves a paroxysm of the vapors. They are dangerous nitwits.

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1944 masterpiece Lifeboat holds our attention despite the limited setting because of the universal behaviors we can all recognize.

What would you do if you were on a lifeboat at sea and one or more of your fellow survivors exhibited behavior that was detrimental to your own survival, as common sense dictated it? If your children were with you on the lifeboat, and therefore your progeny were endangered as well? It’s hot, and your patience is growing short. What’s particularly annoying is that you notice some of the unhelpful survivors appear to be cynically manipulating the others, the true believers, for their own gain. Besides the danger, this behavior turns your stomach. If there were another lifeboat nearby, you’d dive off this one and take your chances with the sharks until you reached the other boat. But there isn’t another lifeboat as far as the eye can see. You’re stuck with these people. Nevertheless, with water everywhere, it’s good to know how to swim.
― Vita

 

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Cool, Clear Water

 

The ongoing dispute that Energy Transfer Partners, in cooperation with the federal government, is having with several Native American tribes over the Dakota Access Pipeline section that crosses the Standing Rock Indian Reservation in North Dakota brings up questions about water and its importance to everyday existence. Obviously clean water is essential to life, which is apparently why the Army Corps of Engineers moved the original path of the pipeline from north of Bismarck, North Dakota, where it would threaten the integrity of water supplies there should the pipeline fail and leak oil. How is clean water then less essential to life on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation south of Bismarck, because that is where they relocated the pipeline? Besides the issue of trespassing on sacred grounds on the Reservation, there is the elemental matter of maintaining the integrity of clean water for the Reservation’s animal and human inhabitants.
Black Snake in Sioux Country
Dakota Access Pipeline reroute; map by Carl Sack.

 


The Sons of the Pioneers were the first to perform this song written by one of their own, Bob Nolan, in the 1930s, and since then other artists have covered it dozens of times.
The Dakota Access Pipeline stretches from the oil shale fields of northwest North Dakota to an oil tank farm in southern Illinois, crossing much privately owned farmland along the way. The controversial use of eminent domain to gain access for a privately owned corporate partnership is another subject. The issue at hand here is how the elders of Standing Rock Indian Reservation, which technically speaking in the language of treaties with the federal government represent the interests of a sovereign nation within the borders of the United States, can fend off this challenge to their land and their water. Does the federal use of eminent domain apply in their case? The common sense answer would be “no.” History has shown, however, that the “sovereign nation” bit in treaties between the United States and Native American tribes was a mere sop not worth the paper it was written on, and intended only to placate the tribes until such time as we needed their land for one reason or another. All bets were off then, and might made right. That’s what the current controversy comes down to, and after a brief stay from the Obama adminstration in continuing construction of the pipeline across Indian land, the new administration under Supreme Leader has weighed in with a sadly predictable decision.

 

Since the 1980s, when bottled water first started showing up in quantity in supermarkets in the United States, Americans seem to have taken for granted the rare and precious resource that is clean water. Particularly in the eastern half of the country, where (Flint, Michigan aside) municipal water supplies have been plentiful and largely free of problems, Americans have become deluded by the strange idea that the water coming out of their taps was somehow deficient and that the bottled water they bought from the supermarket was better. At first, due to the aura of prestige surrounding European bottled water brands like Perrier and Evian, people bought and sipped bottled water as a matter of status. Eventually it became just a thing to do. This proved to be a type of madness, particularly after the water in bottles proved to be no better, and in some cases worse, than the water coming out of most people’s taps, at least in the eastern half of the United States. People in the western half of the country often have had to cope with tap water that was  unacceptably hard, and have had more reason therefore to turn to bottled water.


The Washita River Massacre portrayed in the 1970 film Little Big Man. Anti-war and anti-government sentiment of the time influenced this film, but its portrayal of Native Americans and their distressing relationship to their conquerors was a welcome corrective after decades of stilted, one-sided inaccuracies in Hollywood movies. The tune is “Garry Owen”, an Irish quickstep adapted as the marching song for Custer’s 7th Cavalry.

 


“You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone.” ― Joni Mitchell
In some cases, buying and consuming commercially produced distilled water, even in the United States, the land of mostly wholesome public drinking water compared to much of the rest of the world, is not a bad idea. Other than that, the idea of giving international conglomerates like Nestlé and Coca-Cola more money and control over water supplies, a resource far more precious than oil, is foolish and insane. The Native American protesters and their supporters at Standing Rock have the sane and sagacious idea of protecting the water that courses through the Reservation, and considering the vital importance of that resource the rest of us had best pay attention now because it will flow our way in time.
― Izzy

 

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Salting the Earth

 

“Carthago delenda est!” [Carthage must be destroyed!] ― Cato the Elder

 

The National Weather Service has forecast an ice storm for the central United States this weekend. Road crews will most likely treat the roads with a brine solution before the storm arrives, and in case ice accumulates nevertheless, they will return to treat the roads with rock salt, sand, and possibly other materials to increase traction for motor vehicles and rid the roads of ice. What happens to all that salt after the storm, and how does it affect roadside plants, soil, and the water table?

Salt from Timbuktu
Blocks of salt from Timbuktu; photo by Robin Elaine.

Salt Crystals
Salt crystals; photo by Mark Schellhase.

Some of the salt dilutes with water from the ice and atomizes into droplets that passing vehicles spray onto roadside plants. The damage can most easily be seen in early spring as plants and trees sprout new foliage which may suffer from scorching on the side that received the salt spray. Most of the salt runs off into the soil and the water table near the road, where it can cause a number of problems, including interfering with water uptake by plants and contaminating residential and agricultural wells. Some salt migrates into city water supplies.
Excessive salt has long been known as a detriment to agriculture. Plants show little need for salt, while animals can’t live without it. Our word “salary” is rooted in the Latin term for salt, which indicates its crucial importance to everyday life for people. It’s ironic then that poor fertilization and irrigation practices can lead to the salinization and ultimate abandonment of agricultural land. With population growth come more roads and development into the countryside, taking over or abutting traditionally agricultural land, and consequently adding more salt to the environment.

Salt from Berchtesgaden
Salt from a mine near Berchtesgaden, Germany; 1951 photo by Roger McLassus.

Some localities across the nation have been experimenting with alternatives to use of rock salt exclusively, such as mixing in cheese brine, beet juice, or sugarcane molasses. Whether or not these alternatives ultimately prove as effective as rock salt and comparable in cost, for auto drivers who need to get out and about in an ice storm personal safety understandably comes first and environmental effects second, or even third after reckoning the tax bill for materials and labor. Considering all that, we might reflect how Cato the Elder’s oft invoked exhortation to vanquish the Carthaginians at any cost led after many years to civil war and then to the dubious distinction of empire, and we might then note how a relentless quest for domination of our perceived foes, in nature or otherwise, as often as not has unintended consequences and unfortunate side effects for ourselves.
― Izzy

 

 

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