Greenschools Community Fair

Come Meet us In Person!On March 21st 11:00-2:00, at the Woburn Memorial High School. Located at 88 Montvale Ave, Woburn, MA for greenschools (wwww.projectgreenschools.org), community fair. Greenschools is non-profit organization whose mission is to create Greener & Healthier learning environments through education and awareness.Robin Organ, President and Founder, was named, Conservation Teacher of the Year, by the Mass Audubon (one of our favorite organizations!). Very cool! For more information go to the web site above. Hope to see you there!

Go Green Web Directory: An Interview w/the Ecosavvykid

http://www.gogreenwebdirectory.com/msgreen.html

For the Birds!

Every year Audubon has the Great Backyard Bird Count and here on Cape Cod we had the Focus on Feeders Program, all to help them find out how populous certain species are and acting like a citizen scientist, we are happy to help! They use the amount of birds counted in each state which is collected by the states Audubon group to figure out how wide spread a bird is and its population. This year we participated in the Focus on Feeders program count and it was a great way to watch birds in your backyard and something fun to do in the wintertime. Every morning my sister and I love to sit in our kitchen and watch the birds at our bird feeders while we eat breakfast (we have 3 feeders and 3 suet feeders.)
According to Mass Audubon , “In the more than 40 years since Mass Audubon began asking Massachusetts residents to report their observations, much has changed in the bird and birding landscape. More species characteristic of southern climates have expanded into the state (Carolina Wren, Red-bellied Woodpecker), the World Wide Web has revolutionized communication and data reporting and analysis, and numerous other organizations have added their own "feeder watch" programs.”
The Peterson’s Field Guide for Young Birders says, “Birding is one of North America’s fastest growing and most popular hobbies. There are as many as 44 million bird watchers in the U.S.”
We sometimes take pictures from our kitchen window of our bird friends. Here are a few we have taken we even named some that visit us often:


If you want more information about birds watching and bird counts go to these links:
http://www.massaudubon.org/Birds_and_Birding/FoF/
http://www.massaudubon.org/Birds_and_Birding/
http://www.virtualbirder.com
http://massbird.org/Features/Massbird.htm
http://www.enature.com/home/Finall, here is a word seacrh Jamie and I did for you, For the Birds. Have fun!

A haiku: The Fern

A bushy bouquet

Monarch of the mountainside

It's green leaves waving

By Colin Caton (age 10.5)

Leave the Packaging Behind!

John has some great advice about reducing your mark on our planet.

By John Bergdoll
Chair of the Sustainability Committee (Green Team)
john@allcreativesolutions.com

Here's a new behavior pattern I have been embracing. After I make a purchase like toner cartridges at Staples, anything at Home Depot or similar places, I ask, "If I give you this box, will you recycle it?"
They say, "Of course."
I say, "Great."
Here's why I would do this change in behavior. I give the store the packaging at that moment because I'm told it will get recycled, I don't have to cart it to my recycling station which saves me time and money on gas adding to traffic congestion making our communities more pedestrian-friendly and it lessens my carbon footprint (CO2 pollution) by keeping one car off the road.
When enough people do this "Leave the Packaging Behind" behavior pattern, it encourages store owners to put more pressure on their retailers to lessen their packaging because stores don't want to spend their time and money being a storage facility for recycling. By reducing the packaging needs, you are helping preserve our diminishing resources like trees for paper and your saving the energy it takes to make the packaging and avoiding the transportation it takes to create unnecessary packaging that just gets thrown away.
Change happens from the ground up. It's simple, it's easy and it makes a difference. Try it and be part of the solution.