Mother Nature

Mr. Piette's letter on carbon tax ("Carbon fee is a tax to redistribute wealth," Aug. 15), demonstrates how far we have to go in environmental education. The carbon fee is not for the government, it is a payback to Mother Nature herself for the rape, burning and slow destruction of our environment that we have been doing for centuries (at no cost) and for which we show no signs of abating. For the free market to realize the damage and to be incentivized to move to better renewable energy, the true cost of fossil fuel burning to the environment must be included in the cost to consumers.

Mother Nature brought relief to a parched Baltimore on Sunday, but the persistent rain didn't dampen the spirits at the Earth Day festivities in Hampden. "We had a few hundred people come through today," said Don Barton, 29, an organizer of Sunday's Localize It! 2012, one of a series of events during the week to celebrate Earth Day in the Baltimore area. "People are braving the rain and seem to be having a good time. " Localize It!, sponsored by the Baltimore Free Farm, promotes local food, music and vendors.

Dogs & Company Snowden Center 6925 Oakland Mills Road, Suite R Columbia 410-997-5888 www.dogsandcompany.com Dogs & Company, which carries all-natural and nontoxic products for dogs and cats, opened Jan. 22 at Snowden Center. Owner Terri Lewis also offers chiropractor, acupuncture and animal communicator services, animal training and doggie day care. A self-serve dog wash provides the space and supplies to make tub time easy. Mother Nature's 6955 F Oakland Mills Road Columbia 410-381-4351 www.wildbirdlady.com Feather your bird's nest with supplies from Mother Nature's (formerly the Wild Bird Center of Columbia)

Mother Nature is in the news of late, and she doesn't seem happy. Monsanto, the Great Satan in the eyes of the environmental movement, is making headlines with huge profit increases and yet another David-versus-Goliath lawsuit in Manhattan filed by organic and family farmers who fear the health consequences of the company's genetically modified food crops. Scotts Miracle-Gro, a lesser Satan in the garden, tried to polish its image with an arranged marriage with the National Wildlife Federation, only to have the nuptials hastily canceled when Scotts pleaded guilty to knowingly selling tons of bird seed tainted with pesticides.

More than 1,950 Howard County residents remained without power at Friday afternoon, as many struggled to regain a sense of normalcy after enduring a new twist in Mother Nature's winter repertoire. Tales of marathon commutes home Wednesday night, more than 120 abandoned vehicles — including on major highways — and cracking tree branches burdened with the heavy, frozen, wet snow set back many people who thought 2010's February storms would be the worst snow experience they would see. Howard County's public schools opened two hours late Friday due to the conditions.

Washington. -- One hundred and thirty Julys ago the president, referring to the Mississippi, said, ''The father of waters again goes unvexed to the sea.'' Lincoln was pleased, the occasion being the triumph of the siege of Vicksburg by a general from the Mississippi River town of Galena, Illinois, U.S. Grant.It would be nice if that willful river -- today 16 miles wide on some Illinois and Missouri plains -- would be more vexed by human ingenuity. But the big river, by riveting our attention on the unpredictable and uncontrollable sphere of life (which is almost all of life)

I was in the kitchen, canning tomatoes, when Mom phoned with the bad news."Cousin Fred died," she said."How?""Heart attack. In the garden."Cousin Fred was 87. He had a weak heart, ailing joints and failing eyesight, but there was still enough spunk left in Fred to tackle garden chores at his home in Halethorpe. His grandson found Fred lying amid the raspberry bushes, where he had been thinning out the old wood in midafternoon.Halfway through his work, Fred Meeth just keeled over and died onthe soft, gentle loam that he had struggled for so long to create.

How early in life can children learn to preserve the earth's fragileenvironment? Gerry Fraim is convinced the process should start even before they begin school.Fraim presides over "Mother Nature, Mom and Me," a Piney Run Nature Center program that meets once monthly for three months to inspire pre-schoolers to give Mother Nature lots oftender loving care."Some kids will pick up the ideas from the program, although I amsurprised some of them are already far beyond what I tell them," Fraim said.

IT WOULD BE easy, comforting even, to attribute the roaring fires ravaging northern Arizona and Colorado to the scourge of Mother Nature or the handiwork of an irresponsible forest ranger. But that would be too easy, and very wrong. As Arizona Sen. John McCain said recently, "There's plenty of blame to go around." Mother Nature has done her share: seven years of drought contributed to the dry, fire-hungry forest beds present today. High winds and lightning storms have exacerbated an already dire situation.

Mother Nature is such an entertainer.In July, she brought us daily onslaughts of thunder, lightning and torrential rain. In August, mushroom colonies sprang from the dampness, marched across our lawns, multiplied beneath the shade trees.Her latest practical joke is crickets. They hide under anything we are likely to move, spring belligerently in our direction, and sing their insect song just out of range of our swinging fly swatters.Not to worry. Mother Nature, with her warped sense of humor, will soon move on to her next trick: frost.

Mother Nature smiled on Monday's Christmas Open House of 19th and 20th Century Historic Havre de Grace Churches, helping the annual event reach record attendance, according to its organizer. "It was wonderful," Ray Astor of Havre de Grace said. "We had more people than we've ever had - a big turnout. The weather was beautiful. " Unlike a year ago when snow and ice intervened and forced postponement, the sun was shining Monday, a slight breeze was blowing and temperatures approached 50 degrees.

In Ann Patchett's new best-seller "State of Wonder," a woman scientist travels from Minnesota to the Amazon to find a missing colleague and to determine the status of a miracle substance that appears to allow native women to bear children into their 60s and 70s. The pharmaceutical company for whom she works is betting millions on this new drug, which would allow women to extend, or postpone, motherhood for decades. It is a terrific book, but a really bad idea. I am just back from a week with a 9-month-old grandchild, where I was able to catalog all the reasons why women shouldn't have babies past 40, and my knees are just one of them.

If this past week was not a wake-up call to make sure you are financially prepared to survive a natural disaster, what is? Marylanders barely had time to get over the earthquake last Tuesday before they had to brace for Hurricane Irene over the weekend. While we survived these disasters relatively unscathed, that might not be the case next time. So before nature strikes again, make sure you have the necessary insurance coverage and your papers in order. After all, hurricane season lasts through the end of November, and nature could throw us another curveball.

Mr. Piette's letter on carbon tax ("Carbon fee is a tax to redistribute wealth," Aug. 15), demonstrates how far we have to go in environmental education. The carbon fee is not for the government, it is a payback to Mother Nature herself for the rape, burning and slow destruction of our environment that we have been doing for centuries (at no cost) and for which we show no signs of abating. For the free market to realize the damage and to be incentivized to move to better renewable energy, the true cost of fossil fuel burning to the environment must be included in the cost to consumers.

Joie Chitwood is a weather guy this time of year, constantly checking for updates online. Will it rain? Will there be lightning? Will bad weather steal the thunder from his nighttime spectacle Saturday night? "Those are the elements that you have to deal with," Chitwood, president of Daytona International Speedway, said Tuesday. "You can come up with every plan you want to, but the weather is the wild card. It's very frustrating. As I start looking at weather updates 10 days out, all it does is create more concern, but hopefully we'll get lucky.

Dogs & Company Snowden Center 6925 Oakland Mills Road, Suite R Columbia 410-997-5888 www.dogsandcompany.com Dogs & Company, which carries all-natural and nontoxic products for dogs and cats, opened Jan. 22 at Snowden Center. Owner Terri Lewis also offers chiropractor, acupuncture and animal communicator services, animal training and doggie day care. A self-serve dog wash provides the space and supplies to make tub time easy. Mother Nature's 6955 F Oakland Mills Road Columbia 410-381-4351 www.wildbirdlady.com Feather your bird's nest with supplies from Mother Nature's (formerly the Wild Bird Center of Columbia)

BEING FINANCIALLY prepared for a natural disaster is one of those things that many people know they should do, like flossing and exercising. But it can take something like Isabel to remind us of the need to have insurance and documents, so we aren't in a mad scramble to rebuild homes and lives after the next disaster. "People have the best intentions to take steps to protect their property before disasters and to take financial steps, but it's always one of those things that sits on the back burner and nothing is done about it," said Larry Rockwell, senior associate for disaster public affairs for the American Red Cross.

Thousands of passengers were stuck in airports around the country last weekend -- many of them here in Florida -- after bad weather in the Midwest and Northeast forced flight cancellations and delays. I'm thinking of using the same excuse when it's time to return to Baltimore next week. Or maybe not. Lest anyone turn green with envy over the sunny weather here, a storm dumped several inches of rain on Fort Lauderdale yesterday. I guess with the first day of spring just ahead, Mother Nature was just being counterintuitive.

More than 1,950 Howard County residents remained without power at Friday afternoon, as many struggled to regain a sense of normalcy after enduring a new twist in Mother Nature's winter repertoire. Tales of marathon commutes home Wednesday night, more than 120 abandoned vehicles — including on major highways — and cracking tree branches burdened with the heavy, frozen, wet snow set back many people who thought 2010's February storms would be the worst snow experience they would see. Howard County's public schools opened two hours late Friday due to the conditions.

You can add to a bison herd about as fast as you can add to your own family. There's no rushing Mother Nature. Bison meat has been selling so well in the Baltimore and Washington area that the people at Gunpowder Bison & Trading Co. in Monkton are wishing they could better keep up with demand. "It's not like we can turn production around very fast to create more product," said Nathan Stambaugh, Gunpowder's director of sales and marketing. "We're trying to — slowly — but trying to do it the right way."