On October 10th, a beautiful morning even if the slightly overcast sky and the occasional drips of water threatened more rain, I set out for Prospect Park in Brooklyn. I took part in a group hike through the park with the goal of foraging and learning about foraging in this urban parkscape. The group was led by Leda Meredith, author of “Botany, Ballet, and Dinner from Scratch,” as part of Green Edge NYC’s urban foraging series.

Stepping into the park, I wasn’t sure what to expect for the next 2 and half hours. What I came to realize, though, was that this city is not devoid of edible plants even though it is not as “natural” as people may perceive it to be. My own family members were skeptical that we would find anything when I told them about it later.

The parks of New York turn out to have not only edible greens, but species that are good for medicinal and seasoning purposes too. Leda told us about dandelion leaves, epazote, gingko leaves and nuts, and many others.

For a better look at what we did, watch this video I made:

Check out Leda’s website here and Green Edge NYC’s here.

It was big! And green! And solar-powered!

You might be confused right now. I seem to be on a theme of cool life-changing inventions since that post about the Slingshot, because the Big Belly is a solar-powered trash compactor.

I saw one yesterday while walking on the East Side in Manhattan. I almost missed it because it was on the side of the street under the shade of a tree (how does it get enough sunlight? Go figure!). I had to stop and take a picture.

Here are the cross streets too (I thought I might forget so I took a picture to remember):

I only read about the Big Belly in a news article last week, so I may not have even known or noticed what it was if I hadn’t! It is a pretty cool machine because it runs completely on a renewable source of energy and it helps with an important issue: solid waste management.

The trash compactor helps the most by cutting trash collection costs. Since the trash compactor is a trash can that compacts the trash it receives, it can cut the number of trips needed to transfer trash from one site to the landfill.

The company, Big Belly Solar, estimates that the City of Philadelphia will save $13 million over 10 years by using 500 Big Belly solar compactors. That money can go to other projects such as recycling programs and green urban space development!

I hope I see more of these around the city soon, but I also hope that people do not throw recyclables into them. There should be a recycling bin or station next to each Big Belly, since after the trash has been compacted, recyclable materials would be difficult to retrieve.

On Labor Day weekend a few weeks ago, I made a trip up to the Catskills for a few nights of camping in the yard, campfires, and walking in the mountains.

The weather was pretty amazing and I had fun doing outdoorsy things. Sleeping in a tent is so fun! It was really cool to see the Ashokan Reservoir also. This is one of three reservoirs that send New York City all of their tap water. These structures were built in the early part of the 20th century, with some of the reservoir being in service as early as 1915.

All of the water that reaches NYC comes from the Ashokan, Delaware, and Croton Reservoirs and none of it needs further filtering. So NYC tap water is really like natural spring water!

Check out some of my favorite pictures below.

(me! at the reservoir!)


Bald eagle!


I found these beautiful flowers on the ground at the reservoir and thought it was a great photo opportunity

Here is a 7-legged spider I found on my bag right before we left.

Special 50th Entry!

Female fans often mob their favorite male celebrities, many of them screaming and crying along the way…often at airports, concert halls, hotels, and any other place they can stalk their targets to. Somehow, “favorite” doesn’t seem to be a strong enough adjective in these cases.

This phenomenon isn’t something that is just characteristic of humans. From a biological and ecological point of view, male celebrities may represent all the high quality traits that are desirable in a mate. It would seem natural that the females would congregate around the high quality males so that their offspring would have all the good genes. The scientific term that goes with this idea is sexual selection.

This thought came to me when going on a walk with my younger sister, who, at the time, was attempting to find a male celebrity who was visiting New York City. She followed his Twitter feed, hoping for clues for where he would be next. He announced through tweets that he would be in Times Square, as well as another location, but my sister never found him. She claimed that all she wanted was a hug from the guy, but if it were just a hug she wanted, what would make a hug from him any different than one from a guy friend or even a stranger?


She defied answering this question, which makes me think that these feelings that fan girls are expressing are more inherently instinctual than they seem.


Why do girls cry and scream when they line up to see the objects of their obsessions? Also, what kind of group mentality is happening?


My sister made the point that you never see male fans do this for their favorite female celebrities, and it is true. You will see them drool and fantasize about them, but never screaming in a crowd. Male fans are just as likely to obsess about their favorite celebs, but they do not express it in the same ways.


What kinds of characteristics make this behavior more or less adaptive for males and females?


Modern male celebrities represent wealth, good looks, and success, which may all be signs of superior genetics (but not necessarily so, some people are just dumb lucky). For those who live in the stage of hunting and gathering, a good male would be a fast runner who could bring home the meat. But in modern civilization, my theory is that the more girls scream, cry, and chase after them, the stronger the evidence that this one or group of males is superior to the average non-celebrity male, meaning that their good genes are in higher demand. This attracts more females who are looking for high quality mates and adds fuel to the fire.

The reason that male fans won’t act the same way about female celebrities is because their biological goal is not to find the highest quality female but to get their genes into as many offspring as possible. Males in many species are not as heavily invested in the upbringing of the offspring as the females are, and may even only be interested in “spreading their seed.” Females must be choosy because they must put the bodily resources into creating the offspring, which is expensive in many ways.


So in this light, I think it makes more sense that females would gather around high quality males that have a better chance of having good genes to be passed onto the next generation. I am being skeptical when I say this just because I have seen some of the popular male celebrities nowadays, but let us hope that this (them having good genes) is at least partly true!


Image credit
Flickr user marcel_borsboom

Yesterday, we made a trip up to the Bronx to see the New York Botanical Garden. The weather was great and we got a lot of good pictures while walking around the garden. I didn’t get a chance to look in the Conservatory, but one day I’ll make it there some day. It would be cool to see all the pressed plant specimens in the herbarium, but those are off limits to the public.


Here are a few of my favorite pictures:

This post is coming after the first few real days of summer weather in New York City. This year’s season has been so far unusually mild, and wet (all of June, basically).


NYC’s climate is typically hot and humid by June, but from what I remember this past Thursday and Friday were the only significantly summer-like days so far.

I’m not sure what this means, or if climatologists have any idea if this is abnormal. But it seems unusual and is something that I feel is worth looking into. Post in the comments if you have any links to other interesting tidbits. I will continue to search for more information and hopefully can report back on it.

On July 3rd, I went to Fire Island off the coast of Long Island, NY. While we were there, we took some time to walk through the Sunken Forest, which is a several hundred year-old patch of forest that is protected from the ocean water by dunes.

Bogs! Just talking about them makes me cringe from thoughts of all the bugs that could bite me. Bogs are a type of wetland that is made up of acidic peat. Older bogs will have less water on the surface as the peat builds up. Eventually, the bog may fill up completely with peat and other matter and be completely solid.

I visited a bog when I was at Bucknell University for undergraduate and it was nearly completely covered in vegetation, but mostly shrubs and underbrush. We could stand on the bog and jump to make it undulate and move because underneath the peat was water. Next time I go back, it might be more solid because more peat has accumulated to absorb and overtake the water layer.

The boggy areas in the Sunken Forest had mostly trees that were tolerant to being soaked. The canopy was also pretty much closed with all the branches from the trees extending out quite far.

We took a lot of pictures on the trail through the forest. Here are some of the highlights:

It bothers me that some restaurants that are supposedly trying to educate the public about food choices and farming STILL charge exorbitant prices for their dishes. One example is the Blue Hill restaurants and farms (which are super prestigious and has received special chef awards and recognition).

What is the point of having that goal for the farm and restaurant if you are only going to reach people whose pocketbooks are fat enough to eat there?
Who is your target? And if you can’t grow and serve food cheaply and on a large enough scale, what are you really accomplishing?

This system is just perpetuating the idea that fresh, healthy food is something that only the elite have a chance of realizing.

There are few things to cover today that I have been meaning to talk about!

I recently read this blog on the New York Times website about President Obama’s recent speech to the National Academy of Sciences.

The author of the blog entry makes an interesting point that Obama is encouraging creativity, over consumerism. I think that is an especially important perspective to take on a lot of our problems. People are deathly afraid of changing their lifestyle, but if framed in the light that they can creatively contribute to society, consuming less can make sense while not damaging our very high standard of living.

Which brings me to the Bigger Better Bottle Bill in New York State. (It is almost a reality! It recently passed in Albany.) This bill has been bouncing around for years, and has never had the right amount of momentum to get passed, which is a shame because the Returnable Container Act that is in place is over 25 years old. The update to the Act would allow more types of beverage containers to be redeemed for 5 cents, or more like in Michigan where it is 10 cents.

The redemption rate hovers above 70% in New York state, whereas in Michigan it is 95% or higher. Note that this is not the same as recycling rate, just the redemption of beverage containers that have a deposit on them. (For more info on how deposits work, check out http://www.bottlebill.org/. Also check out a piece I posted earlier on recycling.)

In 1982 when the Returnable Container Act was passed, the majority of beverages were sodas and beer (both being carbonated). Since then, the types of beverages sold have grown exponentially to include juices, sports drinks, and water.

Going back to what President Obama said, we could creatively pass policy that will promote consuming less. We could be actively reforming old and outdated policy that no longer is adequate or effective for today’s society.

While I agree that young people should be encouraged “to be makers of things, no just consumers of things,” I think this motto can be applied much more widely than just in the sciences. Fresh, creative thinking and innovation should be driving forces in every field!


Incubus – Warning

Image credit: Patricia Pooladi, National Academy of Sciences

I recall the time I spent in China as the hottest and stuffiest days of my life. I was there for a summer study abroad experience, as well as the chance to visit with relatives that I had not seen since I was five years old. At every step of my travels, in the dusty background were the old and the poor. My companions and I would give our leftovers to the man squatting outside of the restaurant. When at the markets, a “good deal” was often difficult to come by because, although my face looks Chinese, everyone could tell I was American and gave me the “foreigner’s price,” resulting in a double emotional stab of sympathy and feeling cheated. Often, on the street corners a tired unkempt old woman would approach me. But unlike all my previous experiences, she wasn’t looking for money; she wanted the water bottle in my hand.

In China, you can buy a bottle of water on nearly every street corner, and sometimes there are just as many people there selling them as collecting them. Many of the less fortunate in the United States parallel those in China by learning to adapt and take advantage of redeemable container policies that allow them to make some daily cash. The biggest difference in container redemption policy between the two countries is that the United States does not have a national law regarding beverage containers that may be redeemed for their deposit. The deposit is a small fraction of the price that was paid on the product bought by the consumer. It may be refunded when containers are returned at a collection center, such as a local supermarket. More specifically, only 11 states, which is about one fifth of the country, have such policies.

In New York State, the Returnable Container Act, also known as the Bottle Bill, states that containers used for carbonated beverages may be redeemed for a cash refund of 5 cents. Emphasis was placed on carbonated beverages because, at the time this bill was passed, most beverages being sold fit into two categories: soda and beer. The lawmakers did not anticipate the market widening so much to include water, juices, and the ever-increasing number of other drinks being sold by the bottle. This has severely limited the potential of the recycling program.

Though the average redemption rate is 73.6%, it only represents an increased rate of recycling of the specific types of beverage containers included in the bill. There are still many more plastic and glass bottles going to the landfills, perhaps because there is no incentive to collect and return the bottles of beverages that are not included in the deposit system. These bottles could take anywhere from 450 to 1000 years to degrade. In contrast, Michigan’s redemption rate is 95%, which could be attributed to the deposit that is a full 100% more than New York’s at 10 cents per container.

One cold Saturday morning in January of this year, I came across a family with several shopping carts full of recyclables while walking through Astoria, Queens. It was a family event, the parents in charge, while the children patiently waited with the carts. Bottle collectors are not a rare sight in New York City. You often see them digging through trash bags, and even recycling bags, to pick out bottles redeemable for the 5 cents, which may add up to a nice hot meal or bed for the night.

There has been an ongoing movement in New York State to pass the Bigger Better Bottle Bill, which is an update of the original 1982 bill. It would finally allow redemption of deposits on many other types of beverages, and could include an increase in the deposit to 10 cents per container. The impact of this bill on families such as the one I came across in Astoria is still largely unpredictable, partly because the increase in income may still be too marginal to make a difference and partly because it is debatable whether infrastructure is capable of processing the larger volumes. However, the increased incentive to redeem deposits could potentially create opportunities for collection services or community empowering organization to develop. Money raised from unredeemed deposits could go towards social programs. Increased rate of recycling could close the resource cycle and make production of new products more sustainable.

These environmental benefits and the social benefits will outweigh any costs or negative effects. Beverage container collecting and collectors have a small role today, but there is incredible potential for expansion. I may never see that old Chinese woman ever again, but she has left an indelible impression in my mind that I cannot shake. I cannot say I felt the same pang of her sorrows, but I cannot help reframing my perspective on the world. My hope is that our societies will take all possible steps to create opportunities that could lessen the burden of poverty for individuals like her and for motivated families such as that one in Astoria, as well as make our stay on Earth a little more environmentally responsible.

Passing the Bigger Better Bottle Bill, or some form of it, is the logical next step for New York State because it incentivizes individuals and communities to take initiative in an important process. In the words of our current President Barack Obama,

A good compromise, a good piece of legislation, is like a good sentence; or a good piece of music. Everybody can recognize it. They say, ‘Huh. It works. It makes sense.’