environment – Page 4 – Black and White

the sacred and the profane

headstone — Headstone in the oak woods near Jarman’s Gap road.

There are varying ways to interact with the natural world. The graveyard up top is in a harmonious interaction, an elemental gracious return to earth. And then there are the rest of us, the oafs. — There are varying ways to interact with the natural world. The graveyard up top is a harmonious interaction, an elemental gracious return to earth.
And then there are the despoilers. Same woods, same hill, different mindset.

Francis and Nancy

Francis Fife Nancy O'Brien — Mayors O’Brien and Fife, in Riverview Park, walking, bird watching.

Rivanna Renaissance

Rivanna River Woolen Mills — “The degradation of the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem took place more than two centuries; it will take more than three decades to reverse. The newly signed Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement—with its clear, well-defined and achievable goals and outcomes, its flexibility to respond and adapt to changing conditions and its public engagement—sets the course and provides the watershedwide commitment to get us there.”–Nicholas DiPasquale, Director of the EPA’s Chesapeake Bay Program (left, DiPasquale paddling the Rivanna, October 1)
DiPasquale one of the speakers at today’s Rivanna Renaissance conference.

anisota senatoria

yellowstriped oakworms in situ — University of Florida has an excellent write-up about these critters.

q palustis w/ egg cluster — They tend to lay egg masses on the lower leaves. So if you were able to inspect a few thousand leaves…

3 versions of same thing — Hoping the Charlottesville downtown mall isn’t beset by these. They particularly like q. phellos.
Differences between instars can often be seen in altered body proportions, colors, patterns, or changes in the number of body segments. —Wikipedia

A million cubic feet

CAT 740B — Work was paused temporarily Monday at RWSA’s excavation for members of the public to visit the site, the location of the future Rivanna pumping station.

nobody looks good in a hardhat — First up. Schooling from Dr. Richard Gullick on this great project, using gravity to transport waste water to the sewage plant instead of building a massive pump station adjacent to residences, a state scenic river and a park. The influent to the new pumping station will flow through a pipe in a tunnel bored through 1600 feet of bedrock.

big hole — Attendees at the edge of the excavation.

release the Kraken! — The tunnel boring machine, the mechanical star in our community drama of doing the best, not the cheapest, thing. Enduring thanks to the public and the RWSA Board for this outcome.

magical mystery tour

environmental protection area — May 15 Woolen Mills residents take a guided tour of the environmental protection area next to Moores Creek with Andrea Terry of RWSA. Native people lived just north of here. Split when Europeans arrived.

Palustris

wetland — Andrea Terry of RWSA is leading a tour of the Moores Creek Environmental Preservation Area, Friday May 15.
Meet at the Franklin Street wetland gate ( north of the stockyard) at 10:00 AM. (near 706 Franklin ST).
This is the hardwood wetland that was built to mitigate loss of wetlands with
the expansion of Ragged Mountain reservoir.
Rubber boots are advised.
Please RSVP to aterry(at)rwsa.org.

Palustris is a Latin word meaning “swampy” or “marshy”. It is often used in taxonomy for species names
typically in scientific names for animals and plants to refer to the typical habitat of the species.–Wikipedia

what is in a name?

global warming — In 1980, Dominion Resources, Inc., was incorporated as the holding company for VEPCO. For us ratepayers on the ground Virginia Electric and Power Company became Dominion.

transporting fracked gas — Dominion came through the Woolen Mills recently, whacking trees. Line maintenance. They provide the power that I post by here. But what is the price of the power?

North Anna, James — Is it possible for a monopoly to be true to its place of origin? To care about cultural and natural resources? To care about the environment? Here recently, the corporation has been in the news, often. From the outside they’ve been acting more like the Dominator than the Virginian. Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Transmission lines over the James River. New nuclear facility on a faultline.

political clout — Yesterday, people from across Virginia came to speak to the dominator. To date, there is little indication that Dominion has ears.

what remains?

Danny Meeks & homeplace — Once there was a park, a commons and a house on a hill. The hill remains, for now.

where is the light switch?

CHO Mayor Huja silhouette — The City of Charlottesville is a quarter finalist in the Georgetown University Energy Prize, a nationwide competition for small-to-medium sized
communities to compete to win a $5 million grand prize by saving energy.
The Council meets tomorrow afternoon for a budget work session.

While operating 6016 streetlights, the City doesn’t appear to have an IES certified individual (Illuminating Engineering Society) on staff.
Who is in charge of the lighting? Who directs spending in this arena to make sure we get best lighting for dollars spent?
Who knows how many dollars are spent on lighting?
There are forms available to request the addition of streetlights, drop lens, highway-style fixtures, but
no one knows where the light switch is, where the form is to request the removal of lighting.
We submitted a dark-skies petition in 2000 trying to reclaim the night..
Someday…
(read Janis Jaquith’s essay “Turn Off The Lights”)