Food waste reduction: It’s everyone’s job!

Our society wastes food at every point in the food chain from farms and gardens to home kitchens, restaurants, supermarkets, food service companies, and large institutions like universities that feed  thousands of people daily. Last December I was astonished to lean about the extent of food waste at the MD Food Recovery Summit organized by the Maryland Department of the Environment. 

Surplus food is the term used to describe unsold and unused food, like crops that don’t go to market because prices are too low, perishable items tossed into supermarket dumpsters, and groceries and restaurant meals bought and not eaten. 

In 2019:

  • 35% of all U.S. food went unsold or unused 
  • 23% of all surplus food is fruits and vegetables 
  • Only 15% of Maryland’s 900K+ tons of food waste was recycled 

Why it’s a problem:

  • Huge economic and environmental costs of producing surplus food
  • 1 in 6 U.S. residents are food insecure. Surplus food can feed hungry people
  • Surplus food is the #1 landfill material (24% of landfill space) 
  • Food waste in landfills generates methane, a potent greenhouse gas that can trap 28X as much heat/mass unit as CO2
  • The value of wasted food at the consumer level is $161 billion/year
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The Cure for All Your Ills Might Just Be A Native Plant

You may know Yarrow as a great garden plant for attracting small pollinators and beneficial insects. But there’s a lot more to it than that!

Yarrow, Achillea millefolium, has been used as a medicinal for a very long time. No, we’re not talking about your great-grandmother, we’re talking about Neanderthals. Archeologists have identified yarrow among the medicinal herbs that were buried with a Neanderthal 65,000 years ago. From Asia to North America, cultures of our own species have used yarrow medicinally for longer than records have been kept. In Greek mythology, the warrior Achilles was schooled on the medicinal uses of yarrow, for whom the genus has since been named. In recent decades, ethnobotanists noted that numerous indigenous cultures around the globe were using yarrow to treat the same types of ailments, an indication that an herb is in fact probably medically active for those conditions (see table). In this millennium, these suspicions have been borne out by recent clinical trials showing: more rapid healing of flesh wounds; decreased menstrual pain; improved kidney function; improved liver function; and improvement of dry mouth in chemotherapy patients. Gee, those Neanderthals were on to something!

But is Yarrow a native plant? Again, research conducted in the new millennium has shown that what we once called Achillea millefolium is actually a cosmopolitan complex of species and subspecies. Among those, American Yarrow (Achillea borealis), arrived in North America via the Alaskan land bridge during a period of low sea level, probably within the last one million years. Since that time, it has spread across the continent, using a powerful bag of evolutionary tricks to adapt to diverse environments such as dunes, mountain tops, and mesic meadows. Populations from these different environments are genetically distinctive, and there are likely to be multiple ecotypes even within a local area. According to Weakley (2015) if you encounter Yarrow in a native meadow in the Mid-Atlantic, it is most likely the native American Yarrow. However, the similar-looking aliens A. millefolium and A. filipendulina are sometimes found in disturbed areas, especially near port cities like Washington, D.C. and Baltimore.

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Sustainable Landscaping on the Eastern Shore

Sustainable Landscaping on the Eastern Shore

  • Do you have property on the Maryland Eastern Shore?
  • Are you looking to revamp — or just add finishing touches — to your home’s landscape?
  • Are you interested in having a landscape that is both ecologically-friendly and low maintenance?

If you said yes to any of these questions, then you need to attend this event!

What: Sustainable Landscaping on the Eastern Shore

When: Saturday, September 23rd | 9:30-2:15pm | Optional field walk 2:15-4:00pm

Where: Eastern Shore Higher Education Center | 1000 College Cir Drive | Wye Mills, MD 21679

Who: Barbara Ellis, Sylvan Kaufman, and Christina Pax

Cost: $25

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