Why Protecting Species Diversity Is So Important

Protecting biodiversity is even more important than we’ve thought. A study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science found that increasing species diversity decreased both the prevalence and the severity of the disease.

The researchers looked at frogs and other amphibians. They were able place the amphibian species in a controlled environment and found when there were more species, there was a smaller percentage of the animals that died when disease was introduced into the environment.

Having more species in the environment diluted the effect of the disease since some of the species may have been poor hosts to the disease and others may not have gotten infected at all. So…we’d better pay attention because as species go extinct we may be affecting our own survival on the planet.
  

An Unexpected Problem With Monsanto’s Roundup

 There’s another problem with Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup besides it’s encouraging the growth of super weeds, and the need for ever greater applications of insecticide. The unexpected issue is radioactivity.

 It turns out that phosphate ore is mined to produce phosphorus which is used to make glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup.

 To get the phosphorus, Monsanto maintains the only plant in the US that refines the phosphate ore. At the end of the process you are left with molten slag which contains radioactive uranium and radium. Oh, by the way, Monsanto produces over 200 million pounds of the stuff every year. crazy for the environment!

When Is An Item In The Store Healthy, Green Or Socially Responsible

You’re in the grocery store and have several choices you can make on an item you need. So, how can you decide which is healthier, greener or manufactured socially responsibly? Well, there’s a free app for that. It works on an android and iphone. It will give you instant information about which household products are, or are not, healthy, green or socially responsible. All you need to do is scan the barcode with your phone and you’ll see ratings on 120,000 times. To get the app, go to your app store and search for Goodguide.

Another website that can assist you in learning what’s a good food product to buy can be found at www.prevention.com/cleanfood2013. You can search by meal, food category, certified organic gluten-free, and more. This site’s criteria for inclusion are:
No GMO ingredients
No more than 10 grams of added sugar
Less than 200 mg of sodium per serving (400 mg for meals)
BPA-free cans
Sustainable seafood
and even delicious is included in the requirements!

To Telecommute Or Not To Telecommute

Recently Yahoo!’s CEO required employees to show up at the worksite every day. Well a study has been just published pointing out that that might not be the right decision.

Stapes Advantage just released its second telework survey and found that 93% of employers surveyed agreed that telework programs are mutually beneficial. In addition, 53% of business decision makers say telework leads to more productive employees.

From the workers standpoint, 48% of the remote workers say they are less stressed, 75% of business decision makers said they notice their teleworkers are happier and 37% reported less absenteeism.

While teleworking is not all positive and has some problems, overall, it seems a positive experience for companies and employees. So…just because Yahoo! is making a decision doesn’t mean it’s going to prove to be right.

Crazy Sexual Behavior In A Species Of Sea Creatures

The shelled sea-butterfly mates in a crazy way.

First, the all-male population will mate between themselves and will then store the sperm.

Here’s the even stranger part, once this has been done, all the males change into females and then fertilize themselves with the sperm.

So…this is a great example of gay and lesbian behavior all rolled into one species. Pretty wild!

Dangerous Chemicals In Our Water Supply

Senator Frank Lautenberg recently told ABC News that there are more than 140 chemicals in the U.S. drinking water supply that are not even regulated by the EPA. This includes gasoline, pesticides, rocket fuel, drug prescriptions and many more nasty chemicals.

How can you find out what’s in your water? You can get a testing kit from the National Testing Laboratories to test your water. You can get a kit for well water or for city water. So…find out what you are drinking as it can have an impact on you and your family’s health.

(Reported Mercola.com)

Why It’s Important To Keep Wolves In The Wild

As you may know, wolves get a bad rap. A number of Western states want to open up hunting and would like nothing better than to kill them all.

Well, it turns out that wolves have many important functions in maintaining the environment. First, they either kill or scare off coyotes. Coyotes have greatly expanded their range so that they are causing other species to be lost or negatively impacted.

Second, wolves help keep deer and elk populations in check, allowing the recovery of trees, shrubs and streams that are negatively affected by over population. This recovery benefits many other plant and wildlife species.

Today, there are groups like the Defenders of Wildlife that have developed very effective strategies to keep cattle and sheep safe from wolf predation.

So…maybe the people who are against wolves need to take another look at having wolves in the wild. For information about the assault on wolves, you can check out their website: http://www.cbn.com/media/player/index.aspx?s=/mp4/LJO190v1_WS
(Defenders)

Tapeworms, No One Pays Attention But They’re Deadly

While tapeworms are not a major problem in this country as probably only 1,500 to 2,000 people are affected a year. Regional Prevalence of Tapeworm in US Animals is depicted in the map.

Worldwide, it’s an epidemic with a minimum in just Latin America of 11 to 29 million people infected. Multiply this by the rest of the world and you have disaster.

Tapeworms can cause comas, paralysis, blindness, violent seizures and much more. An adult tape worm can produce up to 50,000 eggs in a human’s intestines. While the parasite can pass from pigs to humans, its eggs can pass from contaminated foods directly to humans.

These eggs can actually get into our brain where they are protected from being detected by our immune system. The eggs form cysts and as they grow the cysts can press upon and damage the part of the brain where they are located.

Preventing tapeworms from getting into the human brain is the place to start. People with tapeworms can be given drugs to kill the parasites and it is also possible to vaccinate the pigs so that the tapeworm is destroyed before they can lay their eggs.

(Reported Discover 2012)

This Week on My Internet Radio Show: What's in your Kids and Grandkids Schools

Go here: WebTalkRadio to listen or download the program.

My guest this week is Kim Martin. Kim is Co-director of Grades of Green, a non-profit organization that helps parents and educators create a healthier environment in their kid’s schools. 

The organization also empowers the kids to become advocates for positive changes in their schools.

Prior to founding Grades of Green, Kim Martin practiced environmental law for more than 15 years. Her practice included all areas of environmental law and her specialty was enforcing the laws.

Grades of Green has been honored with many awards, including the US EPAs prestigious Environmental Award. You’re going to learn about the programs that Grades of Green offers to help parents; teachers and administrators make their schools greener and safer for the children. You’re not going to want to miss this one!

Since I do this show weekly, we can inform you of each show with an email reminder.  Just click here to register.

Grades of Green Website: http://www.gradesofgreen.org/

Protect Yourself and Your Family From Mosquitoes

It's mosquito time again and I’ve printed this information before, but in case you missed it or forgot it, here it is again.

I want to share with you some natural steps you can take to prevent mosquito bites. Yes, you can buy bug spray loaded with poisons, but do you really want that in or on your body when there are much safer options?

One option has recently been approved by the Center for Disease Control. Oil of eucalyptus offers a protection level that is similar to products with low concentrations of DEET. You can find it in Repel's Lemon Eucalyptus.

Two other options were reported in a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The researchers found that a soybean based product called Bite Blocker was the most effective and another product called Buzz Away was also effective.

Another natural alternative that I have written about in a previous Teplitz Email Report is a vitamin supplement called Vitamin B1. When you are going to be outside, all you need to do is take 100 mg every six to eight hours and it will protect you from being bitten.

The Army did the original research on vitamin B1 a number of years ago. They sent two groups of soldiers out into the bush for two weeks. One group was given bug goop and the other group took only Vitamin B1. When they came out of the bush, the group using the bug goop was covered with bug bites. The Vitamin B1 group had hardly any bites on them.

A couple of years ago, I went camping with some friends who have hiked the Appalachian Trail. They were willing to experiment and they took the Vitamin B1. Boy, were they surprised when they had no bites at all at the end of the weekend. Another friend was working as a camp counselor in Maine. She wrote me and said the B1 worked great for mosquitoes, and what did I have for gnats?

So you now have more tools to put into your prevention quiver.

An Unexpected Problem With Monsanto’s Roundup

There’s another problem with Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup besides it’s encouraging the growth of super weeds, and the need for ever greater applications of insecticide. The unexpected issue is radioactivity.

It turns out that phosphate ore is mined to produce phosphorus which is used to make glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup.

To get the phosphorus, Monsanto maintains the only plant in the US that refines the phosphate ore.

At the end of the process you are left with molten slag which contains radioactive uranium and radium.

Oh, by the way, Monsanto produces over 200 million pounds of the stuff every year. crazy for the environment!

Understanding The Impact OF Electronic Pollution

We are being exposed to more and more radio-frequency radiation and high frequency transmissions from cell phones, transmission towers, terrestrial antennas, Wi-Fi and Wi-Max telecommunication systems, broadband connections being sent over power lines and our own personal electronic equipment.

Is there a way to turn the clock back to see the difference now versus years ago in the impact of this electronic pollution?

Well, there is. Dr. Samuel Milham has found that Old-Order Amish people, who don’t use electricity, had lower rates of diabetes, heart disease, suicide and cancer.

They also have uncommonly low levels of neurodegenerative disease and not one case of ADHD.

Amazing Facts About Our Ocean

Scientists have recently discovered a new deep-ocean current starting in Antarctica and flowing north which carries oxygenated water into the Indian and Pacific oceans.

Here’s the amazing part. This flow is 3.2 billion gallons per second. This is the equivalent of 40 Amazon Rivers.

Even more amazing is the amount of water flowing in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current–34.3 billion gallons per second! The things were don’t know about our world are simply astounding.

In addition, take a guess as to how many bacterial cells are in a cubic centimeter of ocean water. How about 1 million? These vast numbers of cells produce half of the oxygen in our atmosphere.

Collectively, these bacteria cells weigh more than 240 billion African elephants. And we view ourselves as the top species on the planet!

Federal Government To Purchase Environmentally Friendly Products

By an Executive Order, the government is now required to purchase environmentally friendly products.

According to the order, 95% of new government contracts must contain recycled content and sustainable materials.

By fiscal year 2015, the goal is to increase the quantity of sustainable products from 41,000 to 250,000. Hurray for the environment!

That’s quite a commitment. This Executive Order should have a major impact on the development of new sustainable products.

Speaking of commitments to the environment, there is a website that rates companies by their commitment to fighting global warming. There are 22 criteria that the organization uses.

The top six companies in the household products area are L‘Oreal, Proctor & Gamble, Colgate-Palmolive, Kimberly-Clark, Clorox and Avon.

Congrats to those companies. To read about the scores in many industries, go to http://www.climatecounts.org/scorecard_overview.php.

Think About Summer Sun…Now, Think Of No Damage From The Sun

Two things about this sentence stand out. One, it’s March and it’s still cold, and two, too much such can cause damage to the skin. Well, it being March is true, but sun damage may become a thing of the past.

It turns out humans lack a key enzyme found in many animals and plants that reverses severe sun damage. Research published in Nature reported that scientists were able to observe the enzyme photolyase inject a single electron and proton into an injured strand of DNA.

These subatomic particles healed the damage in a fraction of a second. After the repair is done the electron and the proton are automatically ejected out of the DNA and back into the photolyase enzyme so it’s ready to use again.

For readers who are old enough to remember it, the statement comes to mind of…”who was that masked man” or in this case…”what was that enzyme.”

We’re Not The Only Ones With Social Networks -Think Plants

Botanists have tried to figure out why some trees don’t grow well near members of their own species while others do.

It turns out that newly sprouted seeds respond to soil-dwelling microbes near the tree’s roots. These microbes can harm a tree’s seedlings so the seeds need to get away from the mother tree.

This has caused trees to evolve methods of dispersal of their seeds by using fruits that get eaten and seeds that get blown on the wind.

There are also plants that fare better when they are surrounded by their own kind. Sagebrush, for example, sends out airborne chemical cues from its foliage and branches that play a vital role in protecting the plants against insect attack.

One study showed that two genetically identical sagebrush plants grown next to each other were more effective fending off caterpillars and grasshoppers than two unrelated plants.

So…the notion of “friending” started a long time ago.

Combining Green Ideas

A reader of OnEarth, Charles J. Cole, wrote a letter to the editor that I thought had some great ideas. He suggested that when we focus on developing renewable energy that we need to use a multipronged approach for conservation. He then gave examples of this approach and I thought one was brilliant.

He’s from Tucson, Arizona, where he’s found that some people are starting to use rainwater for various uses and others are setting up large arrays of solar panels. His idea is to put gutters on solar panels and pipe off the rain into storage areas.

He’s figured since water is scarce in Tucson, which only gets about 12 inches of rain a year, a square mile of solar panels could collect over 208 million gallons of water.

Pretty cool idea!

(Reported in OnEarth Summer 2010)

Kids Brains Are Impacted Just By Seeing Domestic Violence

Researchers at Harvard and Kumamoto Universities found that children aged 3 to 17 years old who saw severe domestic physical violence at home showed reduced development of the visual cortex in the right hemisphere of the brain by an average of 20.5%.

The visual cortex is where information from our eyes is processed. This means that the child may not process clearly what is going on in their environment.

Some other research I read several years ago talked about how children, whose mothers experienced major stress while the baby was in the womb, experienced greater growth at the brain stem. This is where the fight or flight response originates. Children whose mothers experienced a calm pregnancy experienced greater growth in the front part of the brain where higher reasoning is located.

This study on domestic violence further reinforces that our environment affects the way our brain develops.

(Reported : The Virginian Pilot April 26, 2010)

What Time You Go To Sleep May Affect Your Level Of Depression

Brazilian researchers found that people who go to sleep late at night are nearly 3 times more likely to experience depression symptoms than people who go to sleep early and wake up early.

The researchers speculated that there may be an optimal time to fall asleep and to wake up.

My guess is that this may be accurate since it is only a relatively short period of time that we’ve had electricity which has allowed us to stay up far later into the night than our ancestors who had no electricity.

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CONTAGIOUS STRESS

by Keith Wilhelm

Yes. Stress is contagious. Just ask my wife.

What it would be like to come home every day to a grumpy spouse. I used to do this to my spouse. Then I began to notice that she was beginning to become grumpy also. My stress was beginning to affect her. She had finally caught my contagions stress. She was now a grumpy woman.

I am proud to say that if you learn to be stress hardy you can have a much better life. We did and because of it we have now been married for over thirty happy years. We have learned how to deal with our stress together and individually.

Stress can be caught from anyone unless you become stress hardy. This is the process of building yourself up to resist the negative effects of a stressed out person.

You too can learn to deal with your stress and enjoy a happier life because of it.

 

Here are some tips for developing stress hardiness.

Ten Steps For Stress Hardiness.

1. Know that stress hardiness begins with you. Learn to deal with your stress problems and you will be much happier. The happier you are, the harder it is for someone else to cause you stress.

2. Take care of yourself physically. Try this test. Stay up late for a few days and work overtime everyday. Now notice how tired you are, and how hard it is to deal with trouble. What you eat is also very important. A great comparison is putting bad fuel in your fancy vehicle. If you do this it will let you down, run bad and die. Like wise, if you put bad food in your system, your body will give you poor performance and eventually you will die.

3. Counting your blessings. Most of you have heard this before. Well, that is because it works. Begin and end your day by being thankful for what you have and your days will be blessed with feelings of gratefulness.

4. Plan your day. This great little secret will save you enough time in your day to do the important things you need to do for yourself. A plan will help keep you focused and going in the right direction. Don¡¯t forget to plan out of your day things you don¡¯t need to do or can be done by someone else.

5. Start your day off with some peppy, bubbly music. First thing in the morning I like to listen to music that peps me up and gets me going. It¡¯s better than coffee and the only side effects are the bubbly feelings inside. You might find yourself dancing on your way to work.

6. Get involved with helping others. This is the best way to get your mind off your problems. This tip makes you a real blessing to others because we are our brothers¡¯ keepers.

7. Sometimes life deals out a situation that we won¡¯t know how to deal with. Get help from someone before it gets out of hand.

8. Build someone up everyday. Tell them they are great. Say hi and smile to everyone you meet. Spread as many blessings as you can. The reward is unbelievable.

9. Do something for yourself. Start a hobby. I took up drumming and meet some wonderful people in the process. On drumming nights I sleep like a baby and feel great the next day.

10. Always remember that you are a wonderful person. You, like all people, deserve to be loved and respected.”

Author's Bio
Keith K Wilhelm is the Founder of Stresskickers.com and author of an E-book titled "5 Steps to a Stress Free Life."Keith is in the final steps of finishing his new E-book titled "Now What Do I Do With My Life." He speaks on "Stress" and "Discovering Your Dreams." Keith has taught relationship workshops from 1998 through 2000. He has been researching stress, relationships and personal development since 1995. Programs studied include John Gray's "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" and "Personal Success", Anthony Robbins "Personal Power", Jerry V. Teplitz "Switched On Living" and many many more.

Keith’s Latest Book, now at Amazon, “Now What Do I Do With My Life” – Insight into the Future brings Power to the Present.

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