Green Living

Breeding Local

Dale and Debbie Jones want you to know what you eat, where it came from and how it was raised

What are you eating and where did it come from? That’s Dale and Debbie Jones’ mantra. On Windy Willow Farm in Sunderland, the Joneses raise pastured, grass-fed beef, lamb and goat. Theirs is a relatively new business venture: they’ve been selling meat for only two years. Spend just a while talking with them, and you know what they do is more than a business. It’s a mission.

article – Green Living

– by Margaret Tearman – 6/2/11

Ditching Bottled Water

Opening the tap can save you big bucks while helping the environment, too.

Come close because I have a secret to tell you. It’s not a secret you need to keep. It’s a secret you need to spread. Want me to spill it? Listen up. That water that comes out of your kitchen sink or bathroom faucet, you know the stuff. The same water you use to brush your teeth or wash your dishes. The same water you fill your dogs’ bowls with. Yeah, that water.

article – Green Living

– by Matt Driscoll – 4/28/11

The Carnivore’s Conundrum

Locally grown and ethically treated livestock brings meat you can trust to your table

Growing your own veggies is one thing; raising your own livestock is entirely another. That’s the lesson of my friends’ rabbits.

article – Green Living

– by Sandra Olivetti Martin – 4/21/11

SLAMMED by Mother Nature

New website gives an eye-opening look at the effects of sea-level rise

Dobbins Island in the Magothy River is a summertime attraction for boaters. On a warm summer weekend, the sandy north-facing beach becomes crowded with enthusiasts dropping anchor and floating languidly in the gentle current. Sooner rather than later, though, Dobbins Island will be reduced to a skeleton by rising sea levels. Water will cover the sandy shores, and the beach will turn into an obstacle course of submerged trees.

article – Green Living

– by Matt Driscoll – 4/14/11

Joining Hands to Fill The Breach

An army of volunteers give a rare Chesapeake marsh a second life

A boardwalk leads through pinewoods to the water. From its beginning, you see a sliver of shining Bay. As you walk along the worn planks raised over marshland, the Dominion Cove Point Liquefied Natural Gas facility — the industrial campus, the seven vast blinding-white storage tanks — disappear. At the end, the marsh and the tall reeds give way to the low dunes of Cove Point Beach.

article – Green Living

– by Matt Driscoll – 3/17/11

Is Bigger Better?

Anne Arundel County hopes larger containers amount to a greater recycling haul

The bigger, the better. That seems to be the theory behind Anne Arundel County’s push to distribute 65-gallon recycling containers throughout the county. “Recycling is a budgetary priority of this administration,” says County Executive John R. Leopold. “I’m always looking for ways to enhance the convenience of our recycling plan.”

article – Green Living

– by Diana Beechener – 3/17/11

Beat Back the Bag Monster

We’d get two sticks under Maryland’s Clean the Streams and Beautify the Bay Act

This is how you’d look if all you had to wear were the plastic bags you toted home all year long. You’d look like a plastic imitation of New Orleans’ legendary Mardi Gras Indian tribes. But you’d be warm.

article – Green Living

– by Sandra Olivetti Martin – 2/17/11

Heroes of Sustainable Agriculture

Meet the Farmer, Green Grocer and Buy-Local Restaurant of the Year

Wilderness, farmland, paved land: That’s the trajectory Maryland has followed since its founding as Lord Baltimore’s colony 376 years ago. So a county that can keep its farm traditions alive does so with pride. Thus Calvert County, where 55,000 acres of land are zoned as Farm and Forest Districts, made its First Annual Sustainable Agriculture Awards this year. Citizens voted awards in three categories: Sustainable Farmer, Green Grocer and Buy-Local Restaurant of the year.

article – Green Living

– by Margaret Tearman – 11/18/10

My Six-Month Vegetable Journey

While touch and go at first, I now know my veggies — and how to cook them

Remember me? And my journey? For the past six months I’ve navigated Solomon’s Island Road every Thursday to restock my kitchen with the week’s produce that came in my share of the Community-Supported Agriculture farm I joined in April.

article – Green Living

– by Amy Russell – 11/11/10

From Vine to Wine

2010 was a very good year for Maryland grapes

It’s been a wild weather year — record winter snowfall followed by record summer heat followed by record daily rainfall. Weather that’s been inconvenient for most us has been terrible for Maryland farmers who grow conventional crops like corn and soybeans. But for Maryland grape growers in all corners of the state, 2010 has been a very good year.

article – Green Living

– by Margaret Tearman – 10/14/10