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You might check with the towns around you that recycle and find out who comes to haul their recyclables away. Sometimes it's a completely different company than the trash haulers. If you can find out, you can contact that company directly and they may be able to quote you prices or direct you to another company that handles more things.
We live in a small mountain community of about 300 people full time and about 300 more here part time. Some of us want to start being a 'green community' and I am in charge of getting the ideas rolling on things such as recycling, solar, wind, night sky and water conservation. We're having a meeting next month to throw some ideas around with others that have expressed interest.
I know that I come from a city and recycling is pretty easy but I need some input on how to get started doing these sort of things in a small rural area and how to get more people interested.
Input is very much appreciated.
I would emphasize methods that save and conserve money resources.
Presently folks are pretty much self-aligning in that direction.
Countryside magazine has some great ideas and is well worth subscribing to.
I use to have an environmental group and we taught recycling, composting, canning and gardening.
Community gardens are wonderful. The school can do gardens maybe to help provide food for the lunch room. Assisting elderly with gardens, recycling, composting and such.
I will grab a few more ideas up and post them later. I don't have much time right now.
Around here, water is a huge issue and how to save and use it wisely. Most people follow this and save plastic containers for extra water so that's a start. That may be the reason there is no plastic recycling around here because of that.
I've been wanting to talk to one of the local ladies here that has a garden but she doesn't seem to have much of an interest in talking about a community garden or so that's the impression I get.
Anyway, like I said before, I'm having some fun researching and learning this stuff and ideas from you all makes it even more wonderful.
I don't blame her much there. A "Community garden" all too often ends up being the major if not the sole responsibility of one or two people, with the other ones who "don't have as much time" or who "work for a living" or who "have a family, after all!" demanding not-so-equal shares in the others' hard work. Now, if you set up a farmer's market or a local barter system - trading eggs for vegies, or horse manure for kitchen compost or yard cuttings, that might fly. Most people who work their wazoos off in their gardens are danged proud of what they produce, and don't want the "community" skimming off of the top. The road to hell is often paved with the best of intentions - and I'm willing to bet that a longtime gardener there simply doesn't want to get embroiled in that.
I have seen parceled-out "community gardens" actually come down to turf wars, where one proud and hardworking, dedicated gardener is accused of everything from using more than his 'allotted water ration' to poisoning his garden-neighbors' plants. It isn't a pretty picture. I would never participate in anything like that - simply because I have gardened for over 30 years, I know what works and what doesn't, and I'm not going to have some sweet young thing think that they know everything there is to know just because they read a book once, or got inspired by this or that fad or other. And trust me there are quite a few of the latter around... Free trade, yes. Mutual learning experiences - of course. Sharing information, absolutely. Teaching - if I have time. "Community" anything, that means the same output for me but possibly less for others - no. If you were an excellent cook, whose dinner parties were raved about, would you take the time to type up all of your special recipes and guest lists and hand them out to everyone - or expect strangers to show up at your house once a week for dinner, just because you knew what you were doing and they thought you "should" share?
Approach this differently - ask her questions about what and how she grows, ask her what grows well where and why, ask her what she does that makes the bugs stay away or the plants produce more, ask her if she is willing to instruct and to help other folks get started, or even to be the local resource for starter or bedding plants - but don't ask her, even implicitly, to give up her property or her efforts "for the common good".
If the neighborhood wants to go "Green" I hope the first thing everyone does is throw thier dryers out and put up clotheslines in the back yards. So simple, yet for some reason all the "Green" houses on TV they show, not one house ever has a clothesline.
Its only clothes hanging, nothing out of the ordinary.........
LOL some folks are offended by seeing someone's "granny panties" hanging on the line - and do you REALLY want to know which guys in your neighborhood are wearing boxers, briefs, or b***floss? A lot of areas have ordinances against them, and every HOA I've ever known bans them.
Me, I don't care; I've got a great HD clothesline out back. However when it snows I'd prefer to pull my woolies out of a dryer. Standing out in 35 mph winds with a temp of -25 is NOT conducive to anything except clothes that look and wear like cardboard cutouts.
I've never understood the issue with clotheslines... or excessive modesty for that matter... if it's something that you haven't seen before then bark at it or pray to it ROFL!
Whats with "grannie panties, boxers, briefs" are people really that offended to see them?? First off if thier hung with one clothespin, they arent stretched out anyway. But it makes me laugh, is America really that prudish that its almost horriffic to see a pair of underware on the line. really????
I mean we all have underware, ssssshhh! but dont tell anyone......
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