Neither the cold weather nor the busy schedules of Rye residents could keep large numbers of people from attending two recent environmental programs.

By Bill Lawyer

Neither the cold weather nor the busy schedules of Rye residents could keep large numbers of people from attending two recent environmental programs.

On February 2 the Rye Garden Club presented a program at the Rye Free Reading Room about the world’s rainforests and what can be done to protect them. And on February 10, Rye’s Sustainability Committee and Rye Nature Center co-presented a program at Wainwright House about why healthy yards are crucial to protecting the earth’s vital functions.

Both focused on the well-known principles that we should: 1) be the change that we want to come about in the world; and 2) think globally but act locally.  

Speaking at the rainforest program was Mark Moroge, who directs the Rainforest Alliance’s “Landscapes and Livelihoods” program in Latin America. The Alliance works to conserve biodiversity and ensure sustainable livelihoods by transforming land-use practices, business practices, and consumer behavior. Their vision is to bring about “a world where people and planet prosper together.”

Established in 1987, the Alliance employs over 300 people, with offices in nine countries and an operating budget of nearly $53 million in 2015. Their approach is to use training and certification to promote healthy ecosystems and communities in some of the world’s most vulnerable ecosystems.  

Using slide and video presentations, Mr. Moroge described the Rainforest Alliance’s approach to conserving biodiversity and improving the lives of local communities in Africa and Latin America “by changing the way that some of the world’s largest companies do business.” He stressed that their focus is on what can be done, rather than on the problems that deter progress from being made.  

And what can we do? Mr. Moroge pointed out the Alliance’s rainforest tree frog logo, and he urged people to look for the frog to ensure that forest products have been certified as sustainable.

The Sustainability Committee’s Healthy Yard Program was entitled “What’s Under Your Lawn? The Secret of Healthy Soil.” The program was launched in 2015 to promote awareness about the health and environmental benefits of using natural landscaping practices in a coastal community.

This was the first in a planned series of programs on the subject. Using a sort of “tag team” approach, Max Apton, founder of The Farmer’s Garden, and Taro Ietaka of Rye Nature Center took turns going from the technical aspects of cultivating healthy yards to the broader, more global view of how healthy yards can bring about global environmental change.  

Mr. Apton was formerly the field manager at Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. He now provides gardening consulting, planting, and maintenance services to homeowners and institutions. Mr. Ietaka is the Nature Center’s Director of Conservation and Land Stewardship and a former curator in the Westchester County Park system.

Using slides, they introduced the audience to the vast array of micro and macro organisms that live in every handful of soil in a healthy yard.  

The theme they stressed is that non-organic yards are not safe to humans, they kill off healthy organisms, and they result in nutrients and pollutants running off homeowners properties and into Long Island Sound, where they result in damage to aquatic ecosystems.  

The program was especially timely for Rye residents who are trying to wean their yards away from dependency on chemical, non-organic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides.  

In addition to the speakers, there were two yard-care professionals in the audience who spoke about their own experiences working with homeowners. One mentioned that on very large properties it might take several years before the transformation can occur.  

As to who should take the first step — the homeowner or the yard care professional — the consensus was that it should be the homeowners who must require the professionals create a healthy environment around their homes.

Another yard care professional suggested that the agreement be spelled out in written detail, so that there can be no doubt as to what will be done.