Small Steps tp Sustainability

By John Brush, Urban Ecologist, Center for Urban Ecology at Quinta Mazatlan

If there’s one core concept of ecology, it’s that everything is interlinked. Whether directly or indirectly, how one organism interacts with another has ripple effects on its environment.

For example, let’s visit the Pacific coast of the United States. In the kelp forests that grow in the cold waters of the Pacific Ocean, how a sea star (specifically, Pycnopodia helianthoides) interacts with sea urchins plays a strong role in maintaining kelp forest health. The sea stars eat the sea urchins (which eat kelp), which leaves the kelp forests in place to support the livelihoods of thousands of other species.

For another example, let’s spend time with beavers and how they interact with water systems. Specifically, they dam rivers, creeks, and other waterways by deftly (and gnawingly) blocking water flow with trees, reeds, and branches. Modifying the environment – restricting water flow and making ponds – creates a habitat for hundreds of other species. Some conservationists have called for bringing beavers back as an effective ecological restoration method!

That idea of how individuals (individual species made up of individual organisms making individual actions) can have massive cumulative effects on their community is energizing and sobering. It’s energizing because it means that we can make our shared spaces better for people and wildlife even at a small scale, whether adding a 50-square foot wildflower garden or a single Texas Ebony tree. It’s sobering because every action we make matters, adding weight to our choices.

Here are some small actions that make a big difference when added together.

Small Steps, Cumulative Benefits

Start composting. This is nature’s way of recycling organic matter (food scraps, tree trimmings, lawn clippings) to keep our soils healthy and waste out of our landfills. A personal benefit to composting is that you can grow happier and healthier plants in your garden!

Grow native plants. Native plants in the Rio Grande Valley are often very drought tolerant (helping to conserve municipal water supplies), able to withstand our occasional freezes, and provide habitat for pollinators and other wildlife. If you don’t have much space, try container gardening!

Recycle plastic, aluminum, and tin. All these items can take hundreds of years to decompose or break down in a landfill. As much as possible, stick to aluminum when you can (pun intended) - Recycling aluminum uses as little as 5% of the energy it took to make the original product.

Remember the 7 R’s. They are to: reuse, rethink, reciprocity, reduce, recycle, repurpose, and reforest.

Join us in October for the educational Sticks & Bones trail —wear your costume for great photo ops! Come back in November for RE-FEST, a month-long educational focus on creating a more sustainable world. Mark your calendar for REFEST on November 2nd, 9 to 3! The “Texas Recycles Day” is sponsored by H-E-B with fun activities, a live birds of prey show, a marketplace, and food. Follow Quinta Mazatlan on social media and visit us for more inspiration on opportunities to take positive action for our communities.