Wednesday, March 12, 2014 at 8:13PM On Saturday, the world celebrated International Women’s Day, a day when Women’s essential contributions to our well-being were celebrated. In recognition of that celebration, this week’s article is focused on the role women play in sustainable development.
Wednesday, March 12, 2014 at 8:07PM Last week in this column, retired beekeeper David Dawson drew our attention to the alarming collapse of bee colonies around the world. This is also occurring in southeastern Manitoba. As David made very clear, we should all be alarmed. I want to make a few more points with regard to this problem:
Tuesday, February 25, 2014 at 8:06PM You may have heard of the huge decline of pollinating insects in recent years. There are dozens of kinds of native solitary bees as well as different species of bumble bees and ‘honey bees’. All are in serious decline. Remember, a large part of our human diet relies on insect pollination, that includes most fruits, vegetables (seeds in the case of vegetables) and nuts, to list a few.
Tuesday, February 25, 2014 at 8:04PM Wherever you are in the world, complaining about the weather is a favourite topic. Across the world in 2013, we had a lot to complain about – it was quite a year. Here in Manitoba, we had a long winter, although it was warmer than normal in northern Canada and Greenland. USA broke records for cold, and across Northern Europe a cold spell killed unprecedented numbers of people, spring was late, then a wet summer came early. Parts of USA broke more temperature records and experienced serious drought in the summer. Europe was battered by a series of massive storms, tidal surges, and strong winds and heavy rains that have continued into 2014. It was just as extreme in the southern hemisphere – remember what happened in the Philippines?
Wednesday, February 12, 2014 at 8:10PM The windchill is -40 C. I just got back from running a few errands. I did the necessary running around, fourteen kilometres in all today, with my bicycle. This is what I have typically done throughout December and January.