we are on our way to a park in cornelia, georgia. we arrive and stumble out. it’s cool. much cooler than athens where i live. i hook the leashes on the dogs and get them ready to go.

there are three of them. laney, a young, brown, curly haired dog with no manners and a nose for exploring places—and people. lily, slightly older and brimming with confidence. she has curly, light brown, almost gray hair. she loves to pull and sniff and wants the attention of anyone walking by. penny, the old lady of the pack, is small, stocky, and shy. she loves her sisters and will follow them anywhere, but she won’t make the first move. penny has short, tan hair with a tuxedo white chest, a white stripe down her snout, and stinky breath. i hand the dogs leashes to my boyfriend one by one, and we are ready to go.  

we always start our walks in the same place: by the dog park. all three of the dogs pull towards the poop bag dispenser and of course, the trash can. as every dog owner knows, they cannot help but pull you towards the dirtiest thing around.

as we walk by, i see multiple piles of forgotten feces just steps away from the trash and bag dispenser. i scoff and we continue our walk, dogs pulling us in every direction. we come across a small stream about one third into the walk where i see two more piles of “forgotten” feces – then laney squats to poop. i begin to empathize a little more with the owners that had left their dogs’ “marks” behind, but i then begin to think about the impact of the forgotten feces.

my background is in ecology, so my mind immediately begins to imagine the impacts on not only this stream, but the environment around it too. i pick up laney’s poop and take one for the team, continuing to pick up the other two piles and discarding them all in the appropriate disposal bins. as we got on with our walk, i was reminded of a program that was discussed in a lecture during my freshwater ecosystems course. it is called enviro pet waste network (epwn), and it’s an entire program dedicated to reducing the impacts of pet waste on the environment.

according to epwn, dog poop contains not only excess nutrients, but pathogens as well. when mixed with storm water, this can lead to the transmission of pathogens or nutrient deposition into our lakes, rivers, and streams. this deposition of excess nutrients, specifically nitrogen and phosphorus, can contribute to algae blooms in water bodies, which then leads to declines in biodiversity and the viability of the water and areas surrounding the water.

it’s another form of littering. if one person leaves their pet’s poop, it most likely will not cause a disturbance in the ecosystem, but when it happens over and over again, the ecosystem faces the consequences.

so from laney, lily, penny, and i: please pick up your pup’s poop!

for more information, please visit: https://epwn.org/information/environmental-impacts-of-dog-waste/

a few people come over to the table and langston guides them through the second half of their surveys; she sifts through a 6-inch tall stack of papers trying to match people to their original surveys and periodically answering clarifying questions. langston’s surveys are designed to capture the change in people’s perspectives on marine debris before and after their participation in a beach clean-up event, such as this one hosted by the surfrider foundation on the north shore of oahu. the scale of the event is impressive, and i admire the ability of langston and other members of the surfrider foundation to organize the community, including numerous newcomers, to remove so much of the debris that was covering the beach just hours before.

as we stand there, langston explains the full process of her study to me. along with the surveys she distributes at beach cleaning events, she similarly conducts these surveys using only written educational materials presented to people who have not participated in these events. in these cases, she approaches beachgoers lounging beneath their umbrellas and asks them to participate in her simplified survey that includes an educational brochure for folks in lieu of actual beach clean-up participation.

for the final piece of her study, langston conducts the surveys online, distributing them via email blasts and newspaper articles. the goal here being to reach individuals who are not actively on a beach tangibly connected to the environment but are rather sitting in their offices or living rooms. the comparison between these three surveys, she points out, is useful for showing the disconnect that is growing between people and the natural world. this approach helps address the psycho-social side of the marine debris problem by utilizing a human-centric approach for understanding the perspectives of people exposed differentially to marine debris. langston’s research targets the environmental psychology associated with marine debris, an often understudied aspect, which guides our ability to conserve the environment and has world-changing potential.

the specific goal of this project is to address the growing lack of connection between people and place that has allowed the marine debris problem to become unmanageable. langston is hopeful that her study will present a potential solution towards curtailing these issues. bringing social science into the natural science laden world of environmental conservation is a growing field and, one that is gaining progressively more steam as people like langston prove that community engagement is a crucial piece to conservation narratives. it is not hard for people directly involved in conservation to recognize that we are losing sight of the world around us and getting sucked into an increasingly technological era of mass production.

“getting personally involved is a great way to improve one’s personal connection to the place and the issues,” langston says. “it can really open your eyes.”

langston’s novel approach to addressing marine debris does just that. it reaches people on an individual level through education and awareness to reduce their contributions to plastic pollution. this is an important distinction because, rather than fixating on simply removing plastics from the ocean (an issue not to be overlooked), she is actually trying to curtail the use of plastics and minimize the future impacts of this debris entering our waterways. this approach is also accessible to people from all walks of life, regardless of their education or background.

with looming environmental issues including climate change, the depletion of the earth’s natural resources, and mile-wide gyres of trash floating in our oceans, one of the simplest way for people to individually help improve the state of the environment is to implement changes in their own plastic consumption. avoiding single-use plastics like straws and take-out containers is an easy way to reduce personal inputs to marine debris; helping to spread awareness about marine debris issues, and voting for legislation that limits the use of plastics are other ways for people to help. perhaps even you, the reader, will now consider your individual choices, the impacts you have on the environment you love, and how even the smallest personal changes can have huge benefits.

arizona state university is harnessing the power of the sun to turn its campuses into a solar laboratory. through partnerships with utilities and private industry, asu has created the largest single university solar system in the country. asu is capturing solar energy from building rooftops, parking garages and lots, and from the powerparasol, an innovative, 24-foot-high platform that spans more than five acres.

by the end of 2012, asu will generate 17 megawatts of solar power. our leading solar program not only allows us to utilize our abundant natural resource within the valley of the sun, but also teaches our students about their environmental impact and empowers them to change the world.

vote now to help this idea win!

every commercial is an advertisement trying to convince people that they need to buy things that they really don’t. it would be utterly relieving to see a commercial that focused on something other than human greed, gain and entrapment of society. i bet 95% of what people see on t.v. makes them dumber, so having educational commercial would be great to combat the vast majority of non-educational media.

i have seen what seemed like environmental commercials play at theaters in st. louis mo, guess who sponsored them? monsanto and a big coal company.

why and how can the very companies who are responsible for polluting our air and water be the ones feeding society information about what is environmentally friendly and what is best for our environment?

green washing is seriously setting back real environmental change. did you know that in a store the other day a water bottle company was advertising its product to be ‘green’ because if you bought 2 large water bottles you get a re-usable bag for free…

please, please let’s get actual environmentalist (people who truly care about the long term sustainability of this planet, not just profit) to create and show informational environmental commercials!!!

i know that it is very expensive to run commercials, but we can make anything happen! we could all pitch in, get sponsors, get people to donate and more. these commercials should play during every movie in every theater, come on, it’s time to get the ball rolling.

p.s. i like the videos that will teach the public about plastic, about fish in our oceans, about global warming, about tar sands oil in canada, about how we can help and what we can do as people!!!