This Thanksgiving, Haligonians are gobbling up turkeys. “We’re really crazy right now, prepping turkeys,” says Rae Lutz of Pasture Hill Farm, near Waterville. As of Tuesday, Lutz has received 400 orders for holiday turkeys, up from last year’s 350. She attributes the increased demand to new interest in Pasture Hill’s grass-fed and free-range turkeys. It’s […]
Green Halifax
Posted inNews + Opinion
Zero sum game
“People don’t have any idea about the scale of this problem,” says Andrew Weaver. “You can’t just go and do a little conservation here, and do a bit of recycling there and deal with it—that ain’t gonna cut it. We have to find a path toward zero emissions. The only way to stabilize the atmosphere […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Wind power breaks down in Nova Scotia
Breaking wind: Just one percent of Nova Scotia’s electricity is generated by wind. Monopolistic energy policies, a dilapidated power grid and broken promises from the new NDP government are making it difficult to get more wind power. We can do better, but it will take rediscovering our cooperative history and forming a new relationship with the wind.
Posted inNews + Opinion
Sloane wants more garden time
Halifax councillor Dawn Sloane wants the Public Gardens to be more public. At Tuesday’s council meeting she asked that the city consider lengthening the season for the park. “I understand it can’t be open when there’s three feet of snow on the path,” she says. “But there’s no reason we can’t keep it open until […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Worm finds a new fisheries hope?
Three years ago, Dalhousie marine biologist Boris Worm made international headlines when he warned that all the world’s seafood could disappear by 2048 unless drastic measures were taken to protect fisheries. Worm’s paper, “Impacts of Biodiversity Loss on Ocean Ecosystem Services,” which was published in the journal Science, was hotly contested by other scientists, including […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Milking it
Cows are simple. There’s no other way to put it. They stare. And right now there’s a good two dozen staring at farmer Rick Rand. Staring, chewing, staring, chewing. It’s not love. At least not on the Holsteins’ part. Cows respond to being fed and being milked, which takes Rand, for his herd of about […]
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Alien fire ants invade Halifax
Last Monday the St. Mary’s Boat Club filled with 150 residents with ants on their minds, and in their Tupperware. The west and south ends are infested with stinging and biting European fire ants. Many residents brought samples. “The complaints have been escalating,” says councillor Sue Uteck. Andrew Hebda, a zoologist with the Maritime Museum […]
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Stephen King agrees: climate change contributed to fires
Last year, a forest fire consumed nearly 2,000 hectares near Porters Lake. Last week, a fire burned 800 hectares near Spryfield, destroying eight homes. Stephen King looks at those fires and sees climate change. Before retiring last year, King was manager of HRM’s climate change department, and won wide acclaim. One of King’s many accomplishments […]
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Moose River gold mine’s crushing environmental impact
As long as people continue to want gold rings, Mark Parent said in early 2008, there will be a place for mining. The former provincial environment minister was referring to his department’s controversial approval of the Moose River gold mine in the Musquodoboit Valley district of HRM. This month, however, Haligonians are getting a closer […]
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Canning, preserving and drying
A century ago, fresh strawberries would have been unheard of in the depths of winter. Instead, each fall our grandmothers worked for hours on end over hot stoves, sterilizing Mason jars and canning, drying and pickling to preserve their harvest and ensure their families had food on their plates when farm fields were white with […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
100 Mile Diet
It started only 5 years ago, with a couple in Vancouver. Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon, who, discovering that the average North American eats food with ingredients that have travelled at least 1,500 miles (2,414 km.), set out to spend a year only eating food that came from within 100 miles of where they live. […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Green Guide 2009
What has changed since last year? That was the main question when we began planning this second edition of Green Halifax, a guide to sustainable and environmental living. The answer: lots. We’re in a recession. The good work local businesses are doing to exercise their ecological conscience is now so much harder. But the need […]