Nature, on the other hand, gets nature to do the work that nature requires...for free. A natural landscape is humming with efficiency on multiple levels, and everything usually serves more than one purpose at once. Once gardeners and landscapers begin to think more like nature and less like consumers, bringing back species that might seem inconvenient to us but are absolutely necessary in the natural world, our landscapes can once again flourish. And nature can thrive everywhere, even deep in an inner city, even in a desert, even in your own backyard or apartment balcony.

The biggest idea individual people need to adopt and share is the idea that nature has immense value, not as a commodity or a means to an end, but in its own right. A plant we may once have deemed a weed might be a life-giving oasis for a bird or a ladybug, and the species that make up the complex symphony of life matter to the natural world in ways we cannot even imagine. We must take our place firmly inside the intricate web of life and begin weaving a more inclusive, thoughtful future for all species rather than just our own. Indeed, our own survival depends on it.

Our Diet

Everyone has an opinion about the modern diet and why it's unhealthy for us. I'll leave that for other activists, doctors, and celebrity influencers to discuss, because I want to talk about a few different ideas pertaining to the modern diet. When we think about our diets, we should think not only about what we eat, but how it was grown, how it was preserved or processed, and how it was packaged.

Our diets may not have been a problem when there were only a few billion of us around the world, but just in the last 100 years alone, our species has become voracious in size, appetite, and expectation. In November 2022, the global population is expected to surpass 8 billion in a world where livable land is rapidly shrinking to the sea, flood, fires, and desertification. We have established a daily recommended caloric intake that is likely more generous than many of our ancestors ever could have ever hoped to achieve (and that too many today cannot possibly attain). We expect there to be enough, we expect there to be variety, and we expect to have what we want when we want it, regardless of the season.

The human appetite is an insatiable yawning maw serviced by millions of square kilometers of farmland. It takes massive equipment, millions of kilograms of fertilizer, pesticides, and herbicides, and extensive irrigation systems needing constant maintenance as well as an ever-shrinking supply of potable water. Every year in developing countries or vital places like the Amazon, additional acres of natural landscape is still continuously devoured by our need for more. This means native and natural plant species are increasingly removed from the environment, and the animals and insects that relied on those species for food, habitat, and reproduction also suffer from collapse. Migrating birds and butterflies that used to have plenty of "rest areas" to snack at during their long flights are now starving on their journey because we still somehow surprisingly really don't have enough cornfields and three-bedroom houses. I get it, there's a housing crisis, but we can still develop land more responsibly.

These can be mitigated. Farmers and ranchers are increasingly employing more sustainable practices and inviting biodiversity back to their landscapes, and you can, too. Homeowners can make space on their properties for threatened plant species or species beneficial to pollinators and small mammals to restore the base of the natural food chain, especially if you live along a migratory route for birds and butterflies . We can also diversify our palates by trying local fruits and vegetables not typically sold in grocery stores. In the US, things like paw-paw, serviceberry, elderberry, and many other fruits and vegetables have been replaced by the usual 20 or so suspects we always see year-round at the grocery store (which have been bred for looks and shelf-life instead of flavor, or have been shipped in from thousands of miles away). Increase demand for local, more sustainable products and reduce demand for things with a higher global cost.

100 years ago, modern grocery stores did not exist, and electric refrigeration techniques were only just being developed. For thousands of years prior to this, our ancestors had methods for food storage that included drying, smoking, and fermentation. These methods generally give food a much longer shelf life without additional energy inputs compared to refrigeration. Once a food item is prepared for refrigeration or freezing, that item will continue to consume energy at a warehouse, during transport, at a grocery store, and in a person's home until it is itself consumed or, unfortunately, thrown away. If the power supply is interrupted, the food goes bad fairly quickly. Food waste and the intensive amount of energy that goes into preserving today's food is a major inefficiency that indirectly causes environmental degradation and loss of wealth, and this is part of what I mean when I say "global cost".

Our Purchases

In days gone by, people valued quality, and household items were built to last and passed down through generations. Today, we buy cheap items that will either break or rapidly become obsolete as technology advances. We also don't think about the underlying consequences of our purchases, for example...buying something cheap from overseas: the people who made the item likely made very little money working in inhumane conditions and dirty energy practices, the item was then transported half a world away in an energy intensive process, is perhaps wrapped in plastic and Styrofoam packaging that comes with its own set of problems, and may be of such inferior quality that it won't stand up to 2 years of use. We don't care about carcinogenic chemicals offgassing from our vinyl flooring (which will need to be replaced again in 5 years). We no longer buy furniture with the expectation it will be passed down to our grandchildren. Clothes and especially shoes may only last a year before becoming unfashionable or unrepairable. We no longer buy tools or cookware that will be passed down for 200 years or more. We want it cheap and we want it now, yet this mindset has specific environmental consequences.

This can be mitigated. Perhaps too much doom-scrolling has made us nihilists who don't believe we'll live much longer, but we truly need to start playing the long game again. We need to put value back in our homes and societies and stop filling landfills with the broken detritus of yesterday's fads. We need to support our neighbors struggling to keep a small business afloat while competing with cheap overseas labor. We currently exist in a horrific bubble of inflation, but some of that appears to be driven by corporate greed set loose by the pandemic (I see you, toilet paper rolls that remain one-inch narrower while costing even more, 2 years after the crisis passed).

Our Transportation and Energy

You've heard all the standard arguments, but please consider this. Let's imagine there is a race, and the only way to cross the finish line is to obtain a brand new quantity of anything ready to be used immediately to power a piece of equipment. We are only talking about the commodity of fuel itself, ready to create electricity or heat once you flip a switch, press a button, or turn a knob.

If I walked outside during the daytime, I would cross the finish line as soon as sunlight falls on my face. Standing still in the same place, I would cross the finish line again when the wind blows my hair out of place. If I drove less than 24 hours in any direction, I would use a little energy but cross the finish line again once I found running water anywhere.

If I wanted to cross the finish line with a brand new source of oil;

1. I would have to gather an exploratory expedition. Let's say we'll go sniff around an undersea area near the North Pole. I've got to get funding, staff, equipment, and a means of transportation that will likely involve air, ground, and sea transportation (which burns existing oil). I'll probably also use satellite data combined with computer analysis. All of that takes energy, time, and money.

2. If I was looking on land, I would have to go through an extensive design and permitting process, but as this is underwater, I might also have to garner international cooperation, especially if a hostile country disputes my ability to drill for oil in the place I find it. You know who I'm talking about. All of this takes energy, time, and money.

3. Next I'll have to build a rig to pump the oil. Onesteppower.com estimates an offshore drilling rig costs about $650 million. Plus all the energy used to create the components (like steel made at a coal-powered facility) that will make up the rig before it's built, plus all the labor to run it once it's ready. Building it will burn a ton of fuel and will take extensive amounts of energy, time, and money.

4. Then, I'll have to transport the oil somewhere, which will...burn existing oil. It will take energy, time, and money.

5. I'll have to refine it at some point to remove the impurities. Where do the impurities go? Dunno, but at any rate, that will take lots of energy, time, and money.

6. No matter how hard I try, it's going to spill or leak. Losing it to the atmosphere or cleaning up a spill will mean more lost energy, time, and money.

7. After I refine it, I'll have to begin distributing and storing it in multiple phases before its finally ready for use. Only after it has been shipped on oil tankers, pumped into land-based storage tanks, divided up onto railcars and semi-trucks, and transported hundreds more miles to a gas station (all transportation powered by burning existing oil and coal), will I cross the finish line. Everything I described takes - you guessed it - even more energy, time, and money.

How much energy, time, and money - and actual fuel - was just spent finding new oil energy ready to use at the pump? HOW is all this mind-numbing inefficiency being maintained?

Pollution is causing us to spend billions annually on chronic illness. Carbon dioxide is still in a state of increasing imbalance in our atmosphere. The developed world continues to exploit energy resources at the ultimate cost of the lives and livelihood of the world's poor. And yet...

Even this can be mitigated. Not everyone can afford to install solar panels on their home or buy an electric car. Some of us don't even own homes OR cars, but we already know the steps we need to take to reduce our energy consumption. Look at your home or apartment heating and electric bill, not just the amount due, but really investigate it. Log onto your account online and look at the information your service provider maintains there about how to reduce your energy bill; if you live in a state where you can opt in for only wind or solar or hydroelectric power, do it! If you still haven't replaced every bulb in your home with energy-efficient ones, do it! I know it's fun or you think it makes you look cool or you're in a hurry, but stop driving your F-150 like it was a Maserati! Next time you have to buy an item that uses electricity, research Energy-Star products. You already know this stuff, you've heard all the ways you can reduce your carbon footprint, there is absolutely nothing new I can say except, what are you waiting for?

If you can afford a new car, please consider this. The internal combustion engine was a magnificent invention in 1860. It was disruptive technology that brought the steam engine era, begun over 150 years prior, to a close (and the same doomsday complaints were bandied about back then). The combustion engine made our current standard of living possible, it literally and figuratively launched our civilization forward exponentially, but its time has come and gone. It now belongs in a museum next to the original cotton gin, steam engines, and horse-drawn carriages. It's way past time for the new stuff, the next thing, but the acceleration of our transportation technology has been artificially hampered by the people desperately trying to maintain control of a ridiculously inefficient and destructive industry. They tell you on nightly news climate change is a hoax and new technology or stricter regulations will collapse the economy, but we've already heard this song before and moved past it.

You know that old-fashioned saying about how you'll love someone "...until the rivers run dry"? Well, it's happening. Literally happening right now, on multiple continents: USA-Mississippi River and Colorado River, Italy-Po River, Germany-Rhine River, Australia-Darling River, China-Yangtze River. The rivers are running dry. You can only keep sitting on the bench until it catches fire, and chances are pretty good that it will. Ok, but we're not panicking. Nobody is panicking. One more point I need to make while I definitely abstain from feeling gut-wrenching, blood-curdling panic, banshee-shrieking panic (maybe don't look at all those links I just dropped, taken together, they are terrifying).

It Really Is About Trees

Before we ever had an oil addiction, we had a tree addiction that went unchecked and untreated for thousands of years. Every piece of pottery, silver, bronze, tin, gold, or iron dug up by an archeologist somewhere got there with the help of burning logs. We cut trees for farming and pastures, to keep warm, to cook our food, to build our homes, canoes and ships, tools, fences, barns, furniture, weapons, temples and churches, piers, shipping crates, and so much more. From the time our ancestors were born to the time they were put in a coffin or a funeral pyre, wood made it all possible. As our population grew from the dawn of civilization, our uses and need for wood grew with it. The invention of paper products like newspaper, wipes, cardboard, and toilet paper, (see how important it is, I've already mentioned it twice on this page) may have been the final blow to our environment.

It simply cannot be understated how quietly important wood has been to the development of mankind. Now, everywhere we look, be it Spain, Iceland, China, Africa, Jordan, the High Plains of the US, Australia, and England, we see lands mostly bereft of trees, rivers running dry, fires raging, and floods, and the collapse of species. Trees provide the foundation necessary for life, and we must stop treating them like mere commodities to exploit or nuisances to exterminate. Trees bear fruit and nuts, which animals share with us. Trees shade the land to reduce the heat island effect. Trees are automatic irrigation systems whose roots help channel water down into the aquifer instead of away from our neighborhood. Trees provide habitat for countless insects, mammals, reptiles, and fungi. There's a reason reverent mythology was passed through all ancient cultures; from Ygdrassil to the Bodhi Tree, the biblical cult of Mamre to the spiteful Iroko trees of Africa, even our ancestors understood that without trees everything dies.

If we're going to mitigate species collapse (including our own species), one of the most important things we can do is get busy planting native species of all types and sizes. Fruit- and nut-bearing species, species that grow fast, species that grow slow, deciduous, evergreen, drought-loving, you name it, everything except Bradford Pears. This is an all-hands on deck situation! Convince your apartment manager, your church pastor, your boss, your school board, city council, the tribal authority, whoever you need to talk to to make trees happen, don't be shy. We can make small and sustained changes throughout our daily lives. We can do this. We must do this. The rivers are literally running dry.