Conspicuous Consumption

To the left is a nice shot of the exfoliating bark of the river birch (Betula nigra 'Heritage') that offers wonderful winter interest and will eventually grow to become quite a large tree. Remember that all of our Midwestern gardens should contain winter interest as well!

I had a great time in La Crosse, WI this weekend and presented for the "Spring Into Gardening" symposium for the Bluff Country Master Gardeners. It was a nice turnout of 150+ gardeners and I think the entire event was well organized and well-received. This week I present at the Chicagoland Flower & Garden Show as well as another symposium for Kenosha County.

Great volunteer turnout today. Larry, Marv and Terry continued bringing in the remnants of our holiday lights show while Del and Dick W. continued to paint obelisks. Dr. Gredler and Charlie processed holiday lights inside while the carpenters (minus Jim D.) worked over at the visitors' center. The gardens still look messy but we're tidying up as time and weather allow. Unfortunate news includes the odd loss of some of our koi fish (dead and floating) in the formal pond and continued deer damage. We're looking in to the fish deaths and are hoping to minimize any more losses. We've rarely lost any fish in past years. Another bummer is that Little Jerry, one of our grounds people, slipped and broke his arm in the gardens last week and will be out of commission for awhile. Ugh! We wish him a speedy recovery of course as well as better balance. Nice shot of snowdrops (Galanthus nivalis) at the bottom. They'll be blooming soon with this "heat wave".

I've been recently thinking about how I can minimize my "footprints" on Mother Earth and ran across some disappointing statistics about American consumption. Check these out below:

*Americans eat 815 billion calories per day, roughly 200 billion more than needed (enough to feed 80 million people)

*Americans throw out 200,000 tons of edible food every day

*The average American generates 52 tons of garbage by age 75

*The average American uses 159 gallons of water each day while more than half the world's population lives on 25 gallons per day

*Americans constitute 5% of the world's population but consume 24% of the world's energy