Engage with Fairfax County’s Community-wide Energy and Climate Action Plan

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The Fairfax County Office of Environmental and Energy Coordination is currently working with county residents and stakeholders to develop the first-ever Community-wide Energy and Climate Action Plan, or CECAP. Here is some information about this initiative and why it matters.

It’s a fact: 97 percent of climate scientists agree that human-driven climate change is taking place now. Climate change occurs when greenhouse gases build up in our atmosphere and trap heat that might otherwise escape, causing shifts in global temperatures and weather patterns over time. In the United States, and in Fairfax County specifically, the two greatest sources of greenhouse gas emissions are the burning of fossil fuels to provide electricity for buildings, and the burning of fossil fuels by vehicles on our roads.

Fairfax County is not immune to the effects of climate change, we already experience stronger storms related to climatic shifts. A single severe storm in 2019 cost Fairfax County taxpayers $14 million. That is money that could have been spent on other county services, programs, and projects. Extreme weather events pose a risk to life and property as well. Many residents stand to lose personal property and real estate as the result of flooding and other weather impacts.

While there are limits to what the Fairfax County government can do to address climate change locally, individual residents can make a major difference. More than 95 percent of local greenhouse gas emissions come from sources other than local government operations – like energy use at home, business operations, and cars and trucks on our roads. The CECAP will define actions we can each take to be a part of the solution.

You can learn more about climate action in Fairfax County. Later this month, online surveys will be available, and the county will host public meetings to gather community input on climate change mitigation strategies and actions. FMN will share more information about opportunities for you to participate in the coming weeks.

RVA Environmental Film Festival – February 12-26, 2021

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Friday, February 12, 2021, 6:15 pm to Friday, February 26, 2021, 8:15 pm
All films are free but require advance registration for each one.
Includes winning films produced by filmmakers from the Old Dominion. That showtime is February 14, 2021, 4:05 to 5:20 pm. Register here.

The Richmond Environmental Film Festival (RVA EFF) showcases films that raise awareness of environmental issues relevant to the Richmond region, our nation, and our planet. There are national, international and Virginia produced films about Africa, the Mexican border wall, and the rising water challenging the military in Tidewater, Virginia, among others.

Review of The Secret Life of Flies, by Erica McAlister

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Reviewed by Kristine Lansing

“Flies. A nuisance at best, a harbinger of death at worst. Regarded by many as a disease-carrier that vomits on our food, it earns nothing more from us humans than feelings of disgust. The little we know about the fly we don’t like.”*

Now, really, doesn’t that introduction just grab you? As master naturalists each of us probably spends more time around flies than we do around any other plant or animal. And yet, what do we really know about these incredible little creatures?

In a mere 240 pages, entomologist Erica McAlister introduces us to the life cycle of flies and to the many varieties we’re likely to encounter in the field, from the pollinators (some closely resemble bees), to the detritivores, the coprophages (yes, there’s dung!), necrophages (and death!), vegetarians, fungivores, predators, parasites, and sanguivores (and even blood!).

“The Secret Life of Flies” is not only packed with information, but it is brimming with humor. Ms. McAlister’s enthusiasm for her tiny subjects is infectious, and leaves the reader wanting to observe them “flirting with one another in front of a good dung pat,”* or dancing and gifting one another during courtship, or locking horns in competition. And if all of this isn’t enticing enough, just wait until you read about flies’ dining habits.

For all of you bibliophiles out there, this BBC Wildlife Book of the Month is beautifully illustrated and lovingly printed on high-quality paper.

Ms. McAlister is a curator of diptera at the Natural History Museum in London.

*All quotes from The Secret Life of Flies, Erica McAlister, 2019, Natural History Museum.

Broadcasting Live Every Other Tuesday: The Circular Economy Show

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Five Universal Policy Goals to Enable a Circular Economy at Scale

Tuesday, February 2, 2021

8 am EST 

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation is excited to announce the return of The Circular Economy Show — where guest speakers join live to discuss circular economy solutions to global challenges. The show will be broadcast live at 15.00 GMT (8 am EST) every other Tuesday on the EMF YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter channels. Join them on February 2, when speakers from the World Bank and Inter IKEA will discuss universal circular economy policy goals.

Learn more here

Life in your Wild Garden webinar, February 11th

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Laura Beaty, photo courtesy of VNPS

Thursday, February 11, 2021
7:30-9 pm
Register here

Growing numbers of gardeners are incorporating native plants into their landscapes in an effort to mitigate the growing loss of pollinators and leafeaters. This loss is global and compromises interactions in natural habitats worldwide. Here at home, many gardeners have been surprised by what they are observing in their wild gardens. Join the Virginia Native Plant Society to see inside a wild garden — then look deeper into yours. Presented by Laura Beaty.

Laura Beaty has been working in the great outdoors since she was old enough to hold a rake. She earned a degree in history followed by a degree in horticulture, and worked nearly 20 years for the US Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources and the National Parks Conservation Association.

Laura is VNPS Horticulture Chair and serves as the propagation chair at the native plant beds at Green Spring Gardens. She is a popular speaker about native plants to Master Gardener candidates at Green Spring Park, local garden clubs, and occasionally, propagation workshops at the chapter’s beds.

Laura is converting her own property to a “modified meadow,” which includes some trees and shrubs—all native plants. She hopes that her plant installations will soon become easy maintenance. But as all gardeners know, a garden is a life-long labor of love.

Attend CECAP Energy and Transportation Subgroup Meetings, Jan 27 and 28

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CECAP Energy Subgroup – January 27, 2021

1/27/2021 6:00 pm – 1/27/2021 8:00 pm

The Community-wide Energy and Climate Action Plan (CECAP) Working Group subgroup on energy will meet on January 27, 2021 from 6:00 – 8:00 PM electronically via WebEx. At this meeting, the subgroup will continue the brainstorming discussion begun in early December regarding various emission reduction strategies.

Members of the public can access the WebEx meeting by clicking this link and entering meeting number 179 566 7793, and pass code 520676. Join by phone: 1-415-655-0001 and enter access code: 179 566 7793.

Please note, this meeting will be recorded pursuant to Virginia Freedom of Information Act (VFOIA) requirements. The recording of this meeting will be posted publicly on this website.

MEETING MATERIALS

Please click here to view the meeting agenda.

Please click here to view the strategy discussion starters. The purpose of this document is to provide background information and a starting list of sector-specific strategies to guide and inform sector-specific discussions.

CECAP Transportation and Development Subgroup – January 28, 2021

1/28/2021 6:00 pm – 1/28/2021 8:00 pm

The Community-wide Energy and Climate Action Plan (CECAP) Working Group subgroup on transportation, development, and waste will meet on January 28, 2021 from 6:00 – 8:00 PM electronically via WebEx. At this meeting, the subgroup will continue the brainstorming discussion begun in early December regarding various emission reduction strategies.

Members of the public can access the WebEx meeting by clicking this link and entering meeting number 179 820 1268, and pass code 976488. Join by phone: 1-415-655-0001 and enter access code: 179 820 1268.

Please note, this meeting will be recorded pursuant to Virginia Freedom of Information Act (VFOIA) requirements. The recording of this meeting will be posted publicly on this website.

MEETING MATERIALS

Please click here to view the meeting agenda.

Please click here to view the strategy discussion starters. The purpose of this document is to provide background information and a starting list of sector-specific strategies to guide and inform sector-specific discussions.

NAI Region 2 Spring Workshop, February 23rd-25th

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Tuesday, February 23 – Thursday, February 25, 2021
Cost: $25/person for members, $35/person for non-members
Full schedule here.
Register here.

The Region 2 Chapter of the National Association for Interpretation, Chesapeake, is a society of professionals dedicated to helping visitors make connections at parks, zoos, museums, nature centers, aquariums, botanical gardens, and historical sites. Join them for this virtual series featuring the most knowledgeable professionals in our region as they discuss the ever-evolving role of interpretation in the post-2020 world. In addition to two keynote speakers, they will have six sessions with 13 presenters.

Review of Tales from the Ant World, by Edward O. Wilson

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Reviewed by Don Coram

Edward O. Wilson is perhaps the most famous living naturalist.  He has written more than 30 books on nature, two of which have won Pulitzer Prizes.  He is one of the naturalists mentioned in the FMN Basic Course.  

In this book, Wilson describes the fascinating diversity among the 15,000 (known) species of ants (probably twice that number overall).  The study of ants is called myrmecology.  Ants have been around for 150 million years.  Adaptive radiation, in which a few successful ant species multiply dramatically into many species filling specialized niches, started in the Mesozoic era and led to the diversity that we can observe now.   

Wilson describes the characteristics of a variety ant species, including their physiology, behavior, personalities, and social organization.  His list includes common kitchen ants, carpenter ants, fire ants, army ants, leaf cutter ants, and bull ants.  Ants are the most warlike of all animals and the book describes some of the fiercest ones.  But there are also timid ants who disappear when threatened, only to reform the colony quickly when safe. And the society of leaf cutter ants is surprisingly complex.  You must read the book to learn about other astounding adaptations in ant species.

For us amateur naturalists, the book describes Wilson’s life-long interest in ants and nature in general.  As an 8-year-old boy, he began collecting and identifying insects in his backyard.  Between the ages of 10 and 12, he lived in Washington DC, near the National Zoo and Rock Creek Park, which were inspiring to him.  By 13, his family had moved to Mobile, Alabama, where he continued observing nature and soon found a colony of invasive fire ants.  His was the first record of these ants in the Northern Hemisphere, and they came to be a serious pest in the South.  The book continues describing Wilson’s field trips over the next 8 decades seeking ants throughout the world.  He finds them atop mountains, in deserts, on isolated islands, and in caves.  The book also describes how Wilson learned to communicate with ants.  He was able to extract and purify a fire ant pheromone and use it to communicate with ants to direct them to follow a particular human-selected trail.   Wilson is a now professor-emeritus at Harvard University.  

Want to review a resource? We’d love to hear from you. Instructions for submission await your click and commitment.

Virginia Legislation: Request for Study of the Sale and Use of Invasive Plant Species

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Oriental bittersweet vines photo by Beverly Rivera

On January 13, 2021, Virginia Delegate David Bulova offered House Joint Resolution No. 527 to Conduct a Study of the Sale of Invasive Plants.  The resolution notes that “an invasive plant species is a plant that originates outside a region and causes damage to the environment, the economy, and human health after its introduction to a region.”  It further notes that “landscaping with invasive plants causes economic and environmental damage and impinges on the rights of neighbors on whose properties the plants encroach.”  Finally, the resolution sets forth that, “Virginia residents, state agencies, and local governments spend substantial amounts of money each year on the removal of invasive plants, many of which are still being offered for sale in the retail, landscape, greenhouse, and nursery industry, which exacerbates the problem.”

The bill would: 

  • Create a work group with broad representation to conduct a study to examine the following:
    • The sale of invasive plants by all entities;
    • The financial burden of controlling invasives on taxpayers and private citizens;
    • Measures to reduce and eliminate the use of invasive plants and to promote the use of native plants, such as labeling invasive plant species at point of sale, taxing the sale of invasive species, expanding the scope of the current noxious weed list; increasing education and outreach, and increasing use of native plants on local and state government properties.
  • Require the work group to report recommendations by December 1, 2021.

View the complete bill here.  Track the progress of the bill here.

Remember, Master Naturalists, we do not advocate for or against legislation or policy using our master naturalist status. 

Public Health Perspectives on Sustainable Diets

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Coursera offers this excellent 7-hour intro-level class from Johns Hopkins (no charge so long as you don’t need the certificate). In addition to the easy-to-follow lectures and short assessments, the class offers downloadable reports and other resources, and enables you to download the videos and slides as well.

Overview

What we eat and how we produce that food have significant effects on human health and the sustainability of our planet. But what is a ‘sustainable’ diet? A sustainable diet, as defined by the FAO, promotes health and well-being and provides food security for the present population while sustaining human and natural resources for future generations. This short course looks at the urgent need to address the sustainability of our food systems, including better understanding the complex relationship between diet and climate change. Learners explore current research on dietary shifts needed in high, middle, and low-income countries to achieve both sustainability and food security goals and discuss evidence-based strategies to promote sustainable diets. This course is offered by the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future and draws from the graduate-level food systems curriculum at the Bloomberg School of Public Health. You may also be interested in our eight-week flagship Coursera course, “An Introduction to the US Food System: Perspectives from Public Health”.

Introduction to Food Systems Sustainability and Public Health 

Our food system is much more than a supply chain that brings food from the farm to your plate. What is a food system? How can thinking about food as a system help us understand and address the messy overlapping issues of diet, food production, planetary health and climate change? What does ‘sustainability’ mean, in the context of food systems, and is it the same as resilience? How has COVID-19 pandemic amplified the many challenges faced by vulnerable workers and consumers? Roni Neff addresses these questions – and many more – in this opening series of lectures. 

Sustainable Diets and Climate Change

What defines a sustainable diet? Why do sustainable diets matter? And what might sustainable diets look like in the US and around the world? The answers may surprise you. In this engaging and thought-provoking set of lectures, Brent Kim will address these questions and explain recent research that compares the impact of different diets on greenhouse gas emissions and water use across 140 countries. 

Strategies for Advancing Sustainable Diets 

The final week explores sustainable diets through the lens of a public health practitioner and registered dietician. They apply the concept of a sustainable diet to different parts of the world, considering the nutritional needs of different populations and why it is difficult to define a ‘sustainable’ diet for everyone. They share evidence-based strategies for communicating about sustainable diets and how different sectors can play a role in advancing change. 

For FMN members: The course has been submitted to the continuing education calendar for credit. check back for information on approval.