Resources for Eating Sustainably from Foodprint.org

Your “foodprint” is the result of everything it takes to get your food from the farm to your plate. Many of those processes are invisible to consumers.

Industrial food production — including animal products like beef, pork, chicken and eggs and also crops  — takes a tremendous toll on our soil, air and water, as well as on the workers and the surrounding communities.

Learn more about what a foodprint is and why you should care about yours here and in this video.

A Special Evening Program with Dr. Drew Lanham, Feb 27

Explore the convergence of conservation and culture with Dr. J. Drew Lanham at a special evening program and book signing on February 27th at the Chapel on the campus of Sweet Briar College.

In this intimate evening, Dr. Lanham will reflect on his lifelong love of birds and wildlife and the part they play as connectors across time, place and cultures throughout our history. Dr. Lanham persuasively argues that conservation of wildlife can only be successful if it generates a deep appreciation for the cultural ties that link people of all backgrounds to the natural world and its power to unite.

Dr. Lanham is the author of The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature, which received the Reed Award from the Southern Environmental Law Center and the Southern Book Prize and was a finalist for the John Burroughs Medal.

Tickets are available to the General Public for $25.00 and for area students at a discounted rate of $10.00. Buy them online at https://vaee.wildapricot.org/event-3623910

Participation in the VAEE conference is not required to attend this talk. However, the talk is included in Full Conference or Day 2 Registration for the 2020 VAEE Conference.

Download this flyer about the event to share with your friends.

Getting to Know and Love Your Ferns, Feb.13th

A talk by Kit Sheffield

Green Spring Gardens 
4603 Green Spring Road 
Alexandria, VA 22312 
Thursday, February 13, 2020
7:30 – 9:00 pm 

Please join the Potowmack Chapter of the Virginia Native Plant Society for a talk by Kit Sheffield, who will answer the following
questions: What is a fern and what makes it different from other organisms? What is a “fern ally”? How do ferns grow and reproduce? How can you tell ferns apart from each other?

Kit Sheffield is a Virginia Master Naturalist who has led fern-related hikes for the Virginia Native Plant Society, the Audubon Naturalist Society, the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club, the Fairfax Chapter of the Virginia Master Naturalists, and the Appalachian Trail Conservancy.

2019 Annual Report from Fairfax Chapter of Virginia Master Naturalists

Article by Fairfax Master Naturalist President Joe Gorney

We recently submitted our annual report to the State office in Charlottesville. During 2019, we reported a total of 14,862 hours of Education/Outreach, Citizen Science, Stewardship, and Chapter Administration! That’s an increase of more than 2,000 hours from the previous year. Activities included both long-standing and new projects, including stream monitoring, kayak tours, animal care, native landscaping, invasives removal, school programs, data collection, and bluebird and purple martin houses. In addition to reaching many people (more than 1,200), we also helped many partner organizations, such as the Fairfax County Park Authority, NOVA Parks, Earth Sangha, the Northern Virginia Soil and Water Conservation District, and many more, to achieve their missions. It’s amazing what a relatively small group of dedicated volunteers can do in a county of over 1.1 million.
Our chapter succeeds based on the efforts of many people, each contributing in their own way to the betterment of our communities. 2020 is filled with opportunities to increase our knowledge and to enhance those communities. Thank you for making a difference.

View the report in its entirety here.

Earth’s Climate: Present, Past, and Future, VNPS Annual Workshop, Mar. 14th

Piedmont Virginia Community College
V. Earl Dickinson Building Theater, 444 College Dr., Charlottesville VA
Saturday, 14 March 2020
9 am – 3:15 pm

Many are concerned about climate change and no longer need to be convinced that it is real. But we can always learn something new about the study of climate and its changes and impacts on Earth’s ecosystems. This Workshop will focus on climate changes at different periods of time, how it might relate to our current climate, and inform our thoughts about today’s changes.

The speakers this year will cover more than 50 million years of Earth’s climate history. From the present state of our coastal ecosystems, to climate perturbations during the historic period, to the glacial ages and their influence on eastern forests, and finally to the fossil record far in the past, we will explore environmental changes in our world.

More information, workshop brochure and registration here. Brought to you by the Virginia Native Plant Society.

Mount Vernon High School needs Science Fair Judges, Feb. 4th

Mount Vernon High School
8515 Old Mt Vernon Rd, Alexandria, VA 22309
Tuesday, 4 February 2020
(Snow date Monday, 10 February)
8 am – 12 pm

IB and Honors science students have been working on their projects since September. Volunteer to be a part of their Science Fair experience. Judging is easy! Previous experience as a judge is not needed, however, judges should have in interest in science. Judges will listen to student presentations, ask questions, and evaluate student work using a simple rubric. Refreshments will be served.

Please contact Alexander White at [email protected] for further details about Science Fair judging.

Master naturalists earn service credit using code E152.

Certified Interpretive Guide course, Feb. 24-27th

Green Spring Gardens
4603 Green Spring Road, Alexandria VA
Monday, 24 February – Thursday, 27 February
8:30 am – 5 pm
28 February a possible snow make-up day
$230

A Certified Interpretive Guide course is being offered by the Fairfax County Park Authority. This certification workshop focuses on the skills needed to interpret natural and cultural resources to an audience allowing them to not just learn about resources but connect to and care about them.
This is a national certification program offered by the National Association for Interpretation hosted by the Fairfax County Park Authority for its staff. It requires no prior knowledge or training.
There are 5 spots open to the public. You can register online.
Here is the link:

https://www.interpnet.com/nai/nai/_events/Event_Display.aspx?EventKey=CIG022320

The course is 32 hours and meets 8:30am-5pm for 4 days, more details will follow after registering. Remember to indicate whether you want the certification option.
For more information about the course, please contact Patricia Dietly at [email protected] or call (703) 642-0128.

Inside Out Gardens

Article by Plant NOVA Natives

Before we turn our thoughts to spring, let us take this opportunity to plan for next year’s long stretch of cold and gray. Does your landscape give you pleasure in the winter, as you sit inside looking out? Or is it only designed for curb appeal, with the plants crammed up against the foundation so that all you see from your window is the lawn and the street? Or perhaps the shrubs that were installed with the house are now overgrown and blocking your view altogether. A little rearranging can give you both curb appeal and a vibrant vista from your breakfast table or living room.

The first thing to consider is that movement brings a landscape to life. That can be provided by wind bending the grasses but most importantly by birds and other critters that are making use of your yard. A bird feeder can help you obtain that experience, but to actually support the wildlife, you need to provide them with the plants they need for shelter and food for both themselves and their babies. With rare exceptions, baby songbirds cannot eat seeds – they require insects, which themselves require the plants with which they evolved. In other words, to support life, your yard needs native plants.

If you take out any overgrown shrubs and plant new ones fifteen or twenty feet away from the window, from the inside the effect can be as if you added on a room to your house. Native shrubs can be arranged into a living backdrop where birds entertain you as they eat and shelter. Winterberry, Chokeberry and Elderberry are examples of shrubs that provide colorful berries to feed the birds. Multi-stemmed Serviceberries, with their lovely white flowers followed by berries that are also edible to humans, provide a place for birds to sit while they eat the seeds from your feeder. Native Heucheras and evergreen native ferns and sedges can fill the lower levels, which are also the perfect place to include some small shade-loving species that might get lost in a flower garden bed. Partridgeberry, for example, lies flat on the ground and has adorable red berries from November to January. Not as tiny but still quite small, the spring ephemerals start to emerge just when you need relief from winter.

Spring ephemerals are shade plants that emerge and quickly flower in late winter and spring and then fade away once the trees leaf out. If you plant them in the woods, you will be mimicking nature, but you may miss the whole show. How often do you walk in your woods in cold or rainy weather? On the other hand, if you also tuck them under your deciduous shrubs out front where you can spot these treasures from your window or as you walk by on the way to your car, you can enjoy them the same way we appreciate snow drops, crocuses and daffodils as they emerge in succession. One of the earliest harbingers of spring is Round-lobed Hepatica, whose cute three-lobed leaves peek out in March to be followed by pale purple flowers. Another plant with intriguing leaves is Bloodroot, which starts to flower by late March, around the time that the pink and white flowers of Virginia Spring Beauty begin their long bloom period, providing an important source of nectar to bees as they first awaken. The blossoms of Virginia Bluebells may occasionally start to appear that early as well. A whole troop of other ephemerals burst forth in April. You can find details about spring ephemerals and other native plants on the Plant NOVA Natives website, as well as information about where to buy them.

Fireflies: Hosting Nature’s Light Show into Your Garden, program Feb.3rd

American Legion
400 N. Oak Street, Falls Church VA
Monday, 3 February 2020
7:30 pm
Free

Lightning bugs (aka fireflies) are part of the magic of growing up in the eastern United States, yet most people know very little about them. Nature education specialists Kris and Erik Mollenhauer have studied fireflies, seen “blue ghosts” and “synchronizing fireflies,” and explored some of the dark secrets of the Night Country. This program explores the “fairies of the night” and how we can create habitat in our gardens to keep them flashing for years to come.

BIO: Erik and Kris Mollenhauer are retired educators but committed volunteers. Erik taught high school science for 15 years, then worked as an educational program developer for 24 years. He developed a program with Costa Rica based on songbird migration as well as an international teacher exchange program that led groups to several countries, including Russia, Australia and Japan. For 5 years he helped National Geographic improve geography education in NJ schools; for 30 years, he’s used a portable planetarium to teach the night sky to people of all ages in the US, Canada, Russia and Japan.

Kris was an elementary school teacher for 14 years, then spent 12 years as a Reading Recovery teacher, teaching struggling students how to read. Working with the Monarch Teacher Network, the Mollenhauers have taught monarch butterfly workshops across the US and Canada for the past 20 years and guided groups to the winter monarch colonies in Mexico and California. They’ve also developed many educational projects together, including the East Coast Vulture Festival, the Mad Hatter’s Tree Party, the Gloucester County Bird Quest and, most recently, the Gloucester County Firefly Festival.

Project Drawdown’s 100 solutions to reverse global warming

What if we took out more greenhouse gases than we put into the atmosphere? This hypothetical scenario, known as drawdown, is our only hope of averting climate disaster, says strategist Chad Frischmann of Project Drawdown.

In a compelling TED Talk about climate change, he shares solutions that exist today: conventional tactics like the use of renewable energy and better land management as well as some lesser-known approaches, like changes to food production, better family planning, and the education of girls.

Listen for ideas about how we can reverse global warming and create a world where regeneration, not destruction, is the rule. His talk was presented at “We the Future,” a special event in partnership with the Skoll Foundation and the United Nations Foundation.

For the full list of solutions, click here.

For material on managing refrigerants, click here.

For Katherine Wilkinson’s TED Talk on empowering women and girls an their role in addressing climate change, click here.