Eco-Advocate Events with LMCC

LMCC’s Eco Advocate What’s On is published fortnightly and is dedicated entirely to the latest environmental events and opportunities in Lake Macquarie. You can subscribe to receive the eco-advocate directly into your inbox.

Make your own worm farm: 

Saturday 14 May, 10am-noon Toronto Hub, 97 The Boulevarde:

Reduce your local food waste and create wonderful organic garden fertiliser.
Join Lachlan Storrie from Treefrog Permaculture to make your own worm farm from reclaimed materials. This workshop will take you through the steps to create your own worm farm (including worms) to take home.
All materials and worms are supplied. Please bring a pair of gardening gloves. Suitable for adults and supervised children aged 10+.
Registrations are essential at events.humanitix.com/make-your-own-worm-farm.

National Volunteer Week celebration with Landcarers, Sustainable Neighbourhood groups, and Community Ecosystem Monitoring volunteers: 

Saturday 21 May, 10.00am – 12.30pm. Blackalls Park picnic shelter.

The day will feature a talk on Seagrass by Landcarer and Community Ecosystem Monitoring volunteer, Janet White. There will also be a nature walk.
Morning tea and lunch will be provided. Please BYO water bottle and coffee cups.

Visit humanitix.com to register by Tuesday 17 May.

Pay It Forward (M) Free movie screening 

Friday 20 May, 5.45 for 6.15pm screening. Rathmines Theatre, Stilling Street, Rathmines

As part of National Volunteers Week, LMCC are holding a series of events that celebrate and recognise our wonderful volunteers and your valued contribution to our community.

All Lake Macquarie volunteers are invited to this free movie screening, to say thank you for volunteering your time and your skills to enhance our neighbourhoods, our people and our environment.

Pay It Forward. Rated M

Like some other kids, 12-year-old Trevor McKinney believed in the goodness of human nature. Like many other kids, he was determined to change the world for the better. Unlike most other kids, he succeeded.

Registrations essential at eventbrite.com.au. Complimentary popcorn and soft drink on arrival. Cash bar available.

Chemical CleanOut: 

Sunday 15 May, 9am – 3.30pm Rathmines Boat Ramp off Dorrington Rd, Rathmines

Problem waste such as oil and water-based paints, car batteries, gas bottles, motor oil, as well as chemicals including pool chemicals, garden chemicals and poisons are accepted.

Only household quantities (20L or 20kg), except for paint. Up to 100L (in 20L containers) of paint accepted. For more information call the Environment Line on 131 555 or visit cleanout.com.au.

FREE Biodynamic Workshop 15/9/19

FREE Biodynamic Workshop, Facilitator, Daniel Piason at the Toronto HUB on Sunday, 15 September

2019 from 10am to 3pm.🍍🍓🌶🍇🍅 

Toronto HUB, 97-99 The Boulevarde, Toronto

Contact Linda 0427 519 900 to book or for further information.

Plant a seed - grow the future!

Come to learn and help the Toronto HUB in setting up it's Backyard into a vegie feast!

enjoy – fresh – local – seasonal – ripe – high nutrition

Basic gardening practical ‘hands-on’ techniques using premium biodynamic practices:

• Premium soil fertility
• Experience using simple and inexpensive biodynamic preparations for total soil care and protection from pests and diseases.

What will your World Environment Day awesome action be?

Join the SunCrowd

Australia’s first energy storage Bulk-buy campaign.

SunCrowd and Climate Action Newcastle are partnering in launching a local bulk-buy campaign to make rooftop solar and storage easy and affordable. The bulk-buy removes the decision-making complexity and confusion associated with solar and energy storage, whilst using the collective purchasing power to lower prices.

An important focus of the regional campaign is to assist solar households whose 60c/20c feed-in-tariff is coming to an end. They provide an easy changeover by offering multiple energy solutions in one place.

Make sure you RSVP for the Newcastle launch event on Thursday 23rd June.

During the event they will:

•Reveal the solar and storage bulk-buy offers.

•Present the selected technologies.

•Provide expert guidance to match your personal energy needs.

•Assist NSW solar bonus scheme customers with choosing the right energy solution that makes your changeover easy.

For more information visit the website
http://newcastle.suncrowd.com.au

The Green Thing

This came through the email and is worth sharing...

In the line at the store, the cashier told an older woman that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.   

The woman apologized to him and explained, "We didn't have the green thing back in my day." 

The clerk responded, "That's the problem today.  Your generation did not care enough to save our environment." 

He was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.  

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over.  So they really were recycled.  

But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.  

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.  

But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day. 

Back then, we washed the baby's nappies because we didn't have the throw-away kind.  We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry the clothes.  Kids got hand-me down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But 

that old lady is right; we didn't have the green thing back in our day.  

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of movie cinema.  In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.  

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used a wadded up old newspaper to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.  Back then, we 

didn't fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power.  We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a gym to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.  But she's right; we didn't have the green thing back then. We drank from a bubbler when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water.  We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.  But we didn't have the green thing back then.  Back then, people took the tram or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their mums into a 24-hour taxi service.  

We had one power point in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances.  And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 3,200 kilometres out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.  But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?