By Daniela DiStefano
It’s a warm summer day amidst lush green trees and tall wild grass. You marvel at the interplay of sun and shadow, fog and mist. The sea rushes in, crashing against the jagged rocks of the cliff and gently caresses the sands of the cove over and over again.
After 10 minutes or so you get up from the bench, grab your coat and bag, and venture back outside into another London, Ontario day. But in those mere minutes you’ve witness the vivid sights recorded by one of Canada’s foremost contemporary artists – Michael Snow.
“As far as I know, there isn’t another landscape film like this in existence,” Snow [...]
Compressed, Condensed, and Canadian — Michael Snow gets in touch with nature
Rethinking your food
By Marika Motiwalla
Seeking a healthy, environmentally friendly and affordable lifestyle within your community seems like a daunting task for regular Ontarians. But Londoners may be starting to realize that it does not have to be.
“There’s a movement going on in the [London] community…people are trying to get control of their food supply,” said Gil Warren, a community activist in London.
Warren has a plot of land in a community garden in downtown London where he can grow his own food, herbs and flowers. He is one of many Londoners who are leaning towards local production and sharing of food.
The Ontario Healthy Communities Coalition (OHCC) is an organization that
Roundabout way to reduce carbon footprint
By Geoff Turner
If you’ve ever driven in Europe, there’s a pretty good chance you’ve driven through a roundabout. Roundabouts are those big circular intersections where multiple lanes of traffic converge without the aid of signals or stop signs. To Canadians, they sometimes seem like the embodiment of anarchy. Here, we’re accustomed to the strict order of the green, yellow, red. The idea that thousands of vehicles could merge and flow seamlessly without stopping seems preposterous and even scary.
Yet there is mounting evidence of the environmental and safety benefits of replacing signalled intersections with roundabouts. Several jurisdictions around North America have already begun to adopt them as a way to reduce [...]
Waste reduction and guilt
By Joel Tiller
Waste Reduction Week is less than two weeks away and I am left wondering how I can get involved. You see, I am already a conscious recycler – thanks to my overbearing mother – and I have even jumped on the re-usable-bag bandwagon for those weekly trips to the supermarket. Yet, I still don’t feel like I am doing enough. Admittedly, I have brought on this added pressure myself, but when you take into consideration that we, as Ontarians, left close to one million tonnes of refuse along our curbsides in 2008 alone, I feel this newfound obligation for wanting to make a difference is nothing short of [...]
Her favorite creatures
By Steve Howard
Juliet Nagel has spent the last two months living in a trailer along the shores of Lake Eerie and Lake Ontario.
The small unit contains a pull-out bed along one side where Nagel spends her nights next to her dog Zeus. The opposite wall of the cramped space is lined with computer equipment. Monitors display readings taken from radar sensors outside. Nagel and Zeus have spent long hours in the tailor working well past sunset and into the morning.
Juliet doesn’t mind the long hours though, or the cramped trailer. She gets to share her nights with her favorite animals: bats.
“Bats are awesome,” Nagel says.
Her interest in bats began [...]
Tracking the night creatures
By Brittany Seki
When everyone else is sleeping, Juliet Nagel is out tracking the night’s leathery-winged creatures under the protection of her wiener dog Zeus.
“I quite like the night,” she said. “I have my dog, and even though he’s small, he lets me know when something’s around.”
Nagel, 28, is a bat biologist with EchoTrack Inc., a company that uses radar and acoustic technology to track the night migration of bats and birds. Currently, she is working with the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) to measure the affects wind turbines have on the airborne species.
Nagel records migrating birds and bats using radar to reveal the height, speed and direction the animals [...]
One Tree at a Time
By Maria Ionova
Londoners and university students from Western Serves threw on their rubber boots, grabbed their shovels and prepared to be covered in dirt from head-to-toe in the spirit of ReForest London’s fifth annual Plant a Tree event. Even the final and gloomy September weekend was no match for these volunteers. They were determined to plant 400 trees – come hell or high water.
“In an urban setting I think it very important that people are involved in physically planting trees, because what we hope happens here then will be taken home. Attribute after 1st sentence We want this experience to be empowering so that it raises people’s awareness about their [...]
A new buzz for London restaurants
By Jess Brady
A London ON restaurant is taking a do-it-yourself approach when it comes to making a naturally sweet treat.
Garlic’s of London quite literally set downtown London abuzz this spring when they installed their very own beehive on top of their restaurant in order to harvest their own honey supply.
The move is anything but conventional as Garlic’s is the first establishment in London to take on such a project. But it does speak to the commitment of the restaurant’s management and head chef to use as much locally produced food as possible.
Since Chef Wade Fitzgerald came to Garlic’s just over two years ago, using local produce and foods has become [...]
London Hydro brings energy efficient lighting
By Laura Schober
For small, commercial businesses, reducing their carbon footprint is not always a top priority. But London Hydro is pleased so far with the positive response it has received towards the Power Savings Energy Blitz, an energy conservation program that provides environmentally efficient lighting retrofits to local businesses.
Hans Schreff, London Hydro’s project manager of conservation activities, says that the majority of participating businesses did not initially have the resources or money to make the switch to the latest energy saving options.
“We like to call them the mom and pops or the storefronts and those are typically a very difficult segment of our marketplace to get involved in conservation measures. [...]
Bat migration studies may mitigate wind damage
By Alana Power
Wind turbines in Ontario have the potential to kill thousands of bats every spring and fall.
Bat biologist Juliet Nagal is studying the migration patterns of bats along Ontario’s shores so that she can suggest locations for turbines that would be less harmful to the nocturnal creatures.
Nagal, 28, works for EchoTrack Inc., a company that tracks migrating birds and bats using radar which detects height, speed and direction. Microphones allow for species identification. The focus of Nagal’s research is to find out if bats are migrating in the same pattern as birds along Ontario’s shores.