Jim Chamberlin
- 2 days ago
- 3 min
Meat that Meets the Cut
Plant based diets are all the rage, and for good reason. Livestock is responsible for much of the environmental damage caused by...
Jenny Hill
- Nov 6
- 4 min
Adventures in Sustainability: Prevent Holiday Food Waste
The abundance of produce that is available in late summer through fall inspires many gatherings, special dinners and celebrations, of...
Jim Chamberlin
- Nov 6
- 4 min
Know the Land You Call Home
The woodlands on the Hunt Utilities Campus are dominated by pine and oak trees, with scattered birch, red maple, and aspen. But they are...
Quinn Swanson
- Nov 3
- 3 min
Plastics and Recycling
For decades we’ve been hearing and answering the siren call of recycling. Simply seeing the “chasing arrows” symbol triggers an ingrained...
Delaney Dahl
- Oct 27
- 5 min
Nature Notes: Eight-Legged Wonders
Spiders are one of those species that tend to get a bad reputation, being the subject of many myths and folklore throughout history....
HDT Team
- Oct 12
- 3 min
Getting Your Pollinator Friendly Yard Ready for Winter
The population of pollinators is declining worldwide. Habitat loss and lack of food for pollinators are the primary reasons for the...
Michelle Hoefs
- Oct 6
- 4 min
Decluttering for Your Mental Health
With World Mental Health Day approaching, now is a great time to take stock of your well-being and how you care for yourself. One aspect...
Jim Chamberlin
- Sep 26
- 3 min
Long Game of Soil Health Reduces Drought Impact
Well into the drought this summer, I drove by a corn field east of Brainerd and was surprised how healthy the corn looked. Just a mile or...
Jenny Hill
- Sep 15
- 4 min
Air Quality: The What and What You Can Do
There has been no shortage of examples lately on why you might be thinking about air quality. The summer of 2023 saw a record number of...
Jenny Hill
- Aug 25
- 4 min
Rs for Resilient Living: Back to School
I was a school-loving nerd, so all the late August back-to-school rituals were memorable and fun for me. Until college, when I started to...
Jim Chamberlin
- Aug 7
- 2 min
Digging Into the Lives of Dung Beetles
Dung beetles came late in my soil health journey. More than three decades after becoming an “organic” farming advocate, the dung beetle...
Jenny Hill
- Jul 3
- 3 min
Adventures in Sustainability: Food Waste and Some Great Alternatives
The numbers are sobering: According to the Environmental Defense Fund, 160 billion pounds of food goes uneaten every year in the United...
HDT Team
- Jun 15
- 3 min
Garden Tips: Recipes with Nettles and Chive Blossoms
“Use what you've got" is a phrase that is a building block for sustainable living. In this post we share two recent examples of seasonal...
HDT Team
- Jun 2
- 4 min
Watersheds 101
Minnesota sits atop a triple, continental-scale water divide. As one of the exhibit pieces in We Are Water MN describes it: “This means...
Jenny Hill
- May 18
- 2 min
Garden Updates
Gardeners Dave and Anna brought in the first harvest from the hoop house this week! It was made up of lots of greens: spinach, arugula,...
Jim Chamberlin
- May 5
- 3 min
Keyline Design Works with Water
Happy Dancing Turtle recently hosted journalist and National Geographic Explorer, Erica Gies, to discuss Water Always Wins, a book in...
Jenny Hill
- Apr 21
- 3 min
Garden Tips: Seeding, Thinning, Tamping
While hardy (and understandably grumpy) Minnesotans weather yet another rain/snow “event,” steadfast gardeners like Dave and Anna at...
Jim Chamberlin
- Apr 14
- 3 min
Grazing Update for the Pine River Watershed
Jim Chamberlin is a long-time member of the Pine River Watershed Alliance. Below is his most recent update on grazing initiatives. The...
Jenny Hill
- Apr 7
- 4 min
Laundry Tips: Dos, Don’ts and Maybes
I recently bought a new-to-me pair of Levis at one of my favorite consignment stores. When checking out the instruction tag (one of...
Jenny Hill
- Mar 24
- 3 min
Garden Tips: Soil Blocks, Watering, Succession Planting
The HDT garden crew, Dave and Anna, recently took a video and some photos as they worked on soil blocks. The resulting blocks were moist...