Happy Dancing Blog

What do isotopes in water have to do with soil? One of my go-to podcasts is Down to Earth hosted by The Quivira Coalition.  The Quivira Coalition is a non-profit organization based in Santa Fe, New Mexico dedicated to building economic and ecological resilience on western working landscapes. According to their website, the coalition was formed to preserve the region’s rich agricultural heritage. It states: The Quivira Coalition is based in New Mexico and is dedicated to build

This year, World Water Day occurs on March 22, focusing our attention on one of earth’s most important resources: water. According to the United Nations, we’ll hit a global population of 8 billion by the year 2023. As our population continues to grow, our water resources are becoming increasingly stressed. The World Health Organization shared that 29% of the world’s population still do not have safe drinking water located on the premises and roughly 2.2 million people die fro

HDT was recently invited to attend the We Are Water Summit, part of a statewide traveling interactive exhibit led by the Minnesota Center for the Humanities and statewide partners. According to their website, “We Are Water MN” explores the connections between the humanities and water through an exhibit, public events, and educator resources. Visitors reflect on local stories and the meaning and experiences of water in Minnesota with space to add their own stories. By creating

Summer is in full swing and our lakes are busy.  What is more paramount to Minnesota than summer time at the lake; swimming, fishing, boating, water skiing, paddle boarding, the list of fun goes on and on. But many of our lakes are hurting. Decades of use, and sometimes abuse, have led to water quality declines for many of these precious resources. Just last summer, one of the most popular and enjoyed lakes in our region, Upper Whitefish, had a major weed and algae bloom.  Fo

This month is Lakes Appreciation Month and (besides delving into how awesome our area’s beaches are) we wanted to showcase some methods that may help you keep your lakes the best they can be. So, first things first: It’s important to understand that healthy lakes will be able to support all kinds of wildlife, including fish, waterfowl, insects, amphibians, and even larger creatures such as deer and other large mammals. According to the US Forest Service, wildlife have four th

July 1-7 is Clean Beach Week, and boy does the Brainerd Lakes Area have some doozys! Let’s be frank: They don’t call it the Brainerd Lakes Area for nothing. As we get into the dog days of summer, there’s no better time to make use of the area’s namesake. But before you double-check your packing list and apply your sunscreen, take a moment to see which beach might fit your needs. I grabbed my kids and we spent a hot afternoon doing a little research of the area’s best beaches.

Happy Dancing Turtle is fortunate to be located in the middle of the Land of 10,000 Lakes. Actually, it’s 11,842 lakes, but who’s counting. A person can hardly drive a mile down the road without passing a lake, pond, river, or stream, often seeing one or the other on both sides of the road. With such an abundance of water around us, it can be easy to take it for granted, which is exactly the reason we make it a point to include lessons on water in all of our youth educational

One of the most difficult problems that gardeners face is proper use of water. They either use too much or too little. The ones that use too much will set a sprinkler on and forget about it during the day (wasting way too much water) and the ones that use too little simply forget to set the sprinkler out (for those keeping track, I’m one of ’em!) So, what do you do if you are either of these bad examples? Do you simply wait for the rain? No! You prepare your garden with a dri

On Friday, August 3rd, the Honor the Earth Riders made a stop on their journey west to east, trailing where a proposed oil pipeline is scheduled to be laid. With much delicious food and lots of uproarious music, the group made their stop on campus for their third straight year. You can find out more on their site, http://www.honorearth.org. Honor the Earth is a group that brings awareness to the way water is used. They are currently dedicated to stopping any oil line going th

Did you know that there are over 700 million people that don’t have access to clean drinking water, and over 2 billion that don’t have access to proper sanitation? This blew my mind! With that knowledge, I wanted to bring awareness to how often we take for granted how easy we can have clean, drinkable, potable, flushable, water just at a flick of a wrist. The average daily water use in America is 80-100 gallons per person. This includes drinking, cooking, bathing, teeth-brush

Minnesota is the land of 10,000 lakes. We are home to more shoreline than Alaska, Hawaii, and California combined. We take pride in the fact that we have pristine, clean, usable water for drink and play. We base our lifestyles around it. We base our livelihoods on it. Clean usable water is so ingrained in our Minnesota culture. HDT’s hometown of Pine River utilizes it’s water sources for drinking and recreation. With our overabundance of great water, do we take it for granted

We are now accepting Vendor/Exhibitor proposals for our January 2018 event!  Vendor/exhibitors must have their proposal in by Saturday, November 4th to be included in our event promotion. Proposals will be accepted up until the event, as space allows. Note: we typically fill our vendor area well in advance of the event, so submit your proposal early!! For more details, feel free to check out our Vendor/Exhibitor Guidelines. Vendors will need to fill out an ST-19 form, which c

I found out that Crow Wing County only has four “public” beaches in the county limits: Gull Lake, Lum Park, Whipple Beach, and Serpent Lake Beach in Crosby. That’s it. You would think that with how much the BLA relies on our lakes for business and recreation, that there would be a larger emphasis on public beaches. With that in mind, I wanted to take a closer look at the beaches that are a bit outside of town on the east side of Crow Wing County. Serpent Lake “Kahnah’ bek” is

As May comes to end, we’ve seen a dramatic transformation of our landscape. I was out of town from May 12th-20th and was shocked by the changes upon my return! It’s a jungle out there! Everything has leafed-out, the grass is green, and the flowers are blooming. The woods are filled with birdsongs and are wetlands are alive with the chorus of the frogs. It’s a busy time in the animal kingdom; animals are finding mates, laying eggs, giving birth, and/or raising young. Our turtl

The indoor gutter system my wife put up last month is going well, but it wasn’t perfect. With a busy schedule (you wouldn’t believe how much time kids take!), watering every day was proving to be difficult and we wanted these plants to survive this time! We added a reservoir system that automatically watered the plants with a minimal thought on our part. Using vacuum pressure, we only need to “water” our gutter system every other week now. Here’s how it looks! We added PVC pi

#WorldWaterDay is today, March 22. This is a day where we take a closer look at our water consumption habits and see what we can do to increase reduction (that makes sense, right?) However, looking at my driveway currently covered under a foot of snow and ice, I can make a general statement that we are nowhere near using up our allotment of earthly freshwater (less than 1% of all water, btw). Therefore, I declare that we must drink and use up as much water as we can. In fact,

How can we have more birds, cleaner water, better food, and a healthier planet? That seems to be the questions a lot of people are asking now days. You can watch one documentary after another about all the environmental problems we face, many because of or food system. What’s harder to find is examples and stories on how agriculture can provide the food we need, for some nine billion people, and protect the natural world we so enjoy and need. The good news in agriculture is o

World Water Day is March 22… What comes to mind when you hear the words “Flint Michigan”. As of late, it is probably WATER. Lead poisoned water, sick children, an outraged community, and a swarm of citizens and media asking a beleaguered government: “How could you let this happen?” followed by “You need to fix the problem!” That is a fair question and a fair expectation. The leadership should be accountable for their actions and lack of actions. To compromise water/health-saf

March, in the minds of many, marks the arrival of spring. Locations all across the US have shattered record highs this week, with the warmth scheduled to continue this weekend. Spring has sprung – fast and furiously. But spring isn’t the only thing arriving in March. As our days continue to lengthen and temps continue to rise, our landscape undergoes a magical transformation, with more and more wildlife returning to the area each day. Of course most of this is due to increase