Green Options

University of Costa Rica scientists discovered a new species of frog in a mountainous region of their country. The frog is about 2 cm. in length and lives in the Altamira-Valle de Silencio area at an altitude of around 8,000 feet. The habitat there is rainforest with cool temperatures.

The frog was named Diasporus ventrimaculatus. Females are black and the males are orange, or grey. 

The January 8th, 2009 6.1-magnitude earthquake in northern central Costa Rica places the Crucitas gold mine project in a new light. Crucitas is located about 60 miles north of the earthquake’s epicenter so the Crucitas area was not impacted significantly. But could it have been? The Associated Press reported that the 82 mega-watt Cariblanco hydroelectric dam near San Jose was damaged in the earthquake and will be out of operation for one year. Bridges and highways were also destroyed. So it seems only reasonable to wonder how a tailings dam would hold up, especially considering how a release of a huge amount of toxic wastewater after an earthquake could grossly compound the environmental destruction wrought by it.

The Crucitas project outline calls for an open pit operation with a tailings pond for catching the water used in cynidation. Its tailings pond will have a dam crest 80 meters (260 ft.) high and 18 meters wide with some rock lining for erosion protection. Infomine.com’s project summary mentions no infrastructure measures for prevention of a tailings pond dam failure due to an earthquake, and possible aftershocks. The site’s project profile also provides no information about seismic activity in the region. However, the Observatorio Vulcanologico y Sismologico de Costa Rica website states that the area near the proposed gold mine is potentially dangerous: “Historically, the central region of Costa Rica has been very active seismically”.

I am really excited about the Rain Tee Collection by Andira International!

Not only are these organic tees stylish, organic, fair trade, and beautiful, they were designed by children surrounded by the destruction of their rainforest.

These t-shirts were inspired by children themselves.  Andira International donated school supplies to children living in endangered rainforests in South and Central America.  The children were asked to illustrate what they saw occurring around them. The result is the Rain Tee Collection.

My Rain Tee Collection shirt is the “Tree of Life”. This tree is crying leaves that symbolize tears. It was designed by an 11-year-old girl living in Peru named Mariela.  According to Andira:

The illustrations we feature, such as “Cut Down Trees” (left) are only part of the powerful message given to us by youth living with environmental destruction.

These children are teaching us that we are all connected. What happens in their home absolutely affects what occurs in ours.

For every Andira Rain Tee sold, a child in Costa Rica participating in Kids Saving the Rainforest will receive a tree to plant in an area of their forest that has been destroyed. The statistics on the destruction of the rainforests of Costa Rica are alarming:

Kids love bananas!  In fact, after trying Whole Grain Rice Cereal, I fed both of my children organic bananas as their second food.  I grew up on bananas, and my family loves banana bread; however, after reading Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life (P.S.) I can’t buy a banana without a huge pang of environmental guilt.

I live at 40° latitude, certainly not the climate bananas grow in.  Bananas grow in humid tropical regions and need 10 - 15 months of frost-free conditions to produce a flower. Banana plants stop growing in temperatures drops below 53° F.

The world is hooked on bananas!  Bananas constitute the 4th largest fruit crop of the world, but at what cost to the environment?

A team of researchers in Costa Rica’s Alberto Manuel Brenes Reserve have been searching for plants that might help cure the mosquito-transmitted disease known as malaria. While not a common disease in Costa Rica, the country’s tropical rainforests have a wide diversity of plants that sometimes cannot be found elsewhere in the world– and some of these species might contain medicinal properties to help stop malaria and other diseases. An estimated 1-3 million people die each year from malaria.

A team of scientists on an expedition to study frogs has found the “rarest frog in the world” in Costa Rica. Thought to be extinct for over 20 years, last year hope was renewed when an individual male from the species was found by one of the team’s researchers. Last week the team found a pregnant female, suggesting that this species is still reproducing and has not been made extinct by a deadly skin fungus that is decimating amphibian populations.

Under the watchful eye of the Nature Conservancy, Costa Rica and America have brokered the largest ever debt-for-nature swap in history. The deal, worth $26 million of Costa Rica’s US debt, will go to help revitalize some of the world’s richest natural treasures.

To be enacted on over the next 16 years, the US, in conjunction with Conservation International and the Nature Conservancy, will pool together to forgive $26 million

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