Why compost? Food scraps are the number one material sent to landfills by weight—more than paper and plastic combined. When food sits in landfills to decompose, it’s trapped by tons of other garbage and emits methane and carbon dioxide as it breaks down. Read more about Every Scrap Counts: How to Start Small with Composting
In December, we hosted the first-ever Chicago Community Climate Forum. This event, which took place on the eve of the North American Climate Summit, brought together nearly 1,500 community members and 70 organizations under one roof—an encouraging sign of Chicago’s commitment to take action against climate change. Read more about No Napkin Left Behind: Why Zero Waste Matters
Images: Sean Sherman by Rina Oh for the James Beard Foundation; corn cobs from Cottonwood Canyon, Utah, in the Museum's collection. By Monica Rickert-Bolter, volunteer for the North American Anthropology Program People are growing more concerned with what they put into their bodies, and it’s not just because they’re trying to keep the pounds off. Americans constantly debate which foods should be restricted and which are acceptable to consume to remain healthy. Read more about The Sioux Chef: Reinvigorating Indigenous Food Systems
What does climate change have to do with algae blooms? And what it means for the Great Lakes. Read more about Does Your Lake Look like Pea Soup? Climate Change, Harmful Algae, and What You Can Do
Perhaps you’ve noticed the blue recycling carts around The Field Museum, the customized recycling bins in the Field Bistro, Explorer Café and the Siragusa Center, and if you are here on Members' Nights, a variety of other recycling containers in the halls behind the scenes. If so, we hope you’ve found them easy to use! The Field Museum diverted 53% of its waste from landfills in 2016, with 31 tons of that amount being captured in the blue carts. Read more about Recycling at The Field Museum
There are easy and specific things everyone can do to help out the monarch butterfly and other native pollinators. One action you can take is to beautify your yard: plant native plants, especially milkweeds, in your garden or in containers. Read more about Every Flower Counts: Five Reasons to Add Native Plants to Your Garden
This post was written by Iza Redlinski, a Conservation Ecologist in the Keller Science Action Center. She participated in this recent prairie burn. You may not think of winter as a time to prepare for spring flowers, but our ecologists are working hard to hopefully see some native plants emerge in a few months! Read more about Restoring Plants With Fire in Calumet
Need some gardening inspiration this spring and summer? Robb Telfer of the Keller Science Action Center at The Field Museum shares some native plants that will spruce up your yard and are good for the environment. Read more about Five Native Plants to Grow in Your Home Garden
Cyclists Yana Melamed and Vyacheslav (Slav) Stoyanov, who hail from Bulgaria, will call North and South America home for the next two years as they make an exceptional journey from Alaska to Argentina. Slav originally conceptualized their campaign, Cycle 4 Recycle, to highlight the impact humans have on the Earth. The pair will travel 60,000-kilometers (38,000 miles) by bicycle through 26 countries in (they hope) 731 days. On their way, they will experience climates ranging from the bitter cold of the mountains to the damp heat of the rainforests. Read more about From Alaska to Argentina: ReCycling through the Americas
You know that part in Game of Thrones where the dragon eggs hatch when they’re put in fire? This is like that, but with a super-endangered flower. Illinois’s only native wildflower, the Kankakee mallow, has been missing from this state for years—it was presumed extinct in its native habitat. But this year, Field Museum scientists and volunteers from the Friends of Langham Island group were able to bring it back. Their secret? Setting fire to the ground where the plants once lived. Read more about Born from the Ashes
