SIMPLE / SMART / SUSTAINABLE / STORIES

This is a San Joaquin kit fox, and he and his kin are thriving in Santa Barbara County, thanks to a local environmental firm that marries renewable energy infrastructure with the conservation of endangered and threatened species. Sounds like a win-win, right? How do the biologists, botanists, geospatial analysts, and project managers collaborate to pull this off? Read on. 

Meet the reusable swap that does it all. These Unpaper Towels from Marley's Monsters are soft, absorbent, washable, and ready for everyday spills, wipe-downs, and cleanups — without the endless waste of disposable paper towels. Easy to reuse again and again, they’re a simple way to make your kitchen routine more sustainable.

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”

–Albert Einstein

• Insects Are Disappearing — Here’s How to Help

• A Bird With a Bodyguard

• Better Bread Storage

• Cleo Carney’s Clean Cat Cuisine

• Gardens for Bats in Austin, Texas

• Dear Dot: Will My Bee Bath Attract Mosquitoes?

• The Beauty of Bugs in Your Backyard

• As the Worm Turns: How to Vermicompost

• Climate Quick Tip: Burn Less Gas and Save $$

• Riffable Ceviche Recipes

• Podcast: You Want These Spices in Your Pantry

FEATURED STORIES

BIG IDEAS AND LOCAL CHANGEMAKERS

Join a community creating real change, one everyday action at a time. Bluedot Living equips readers with practical resources, inspiring stories, and solutions that work—98% say we have helped them make planet-positive changes. Become a member for as little as $5/month to support hopeful climate journalism and enjoy exclusive member benefits.

Bluedot Kitchen

When Matt Pelikan gave up on cultivating a traditional lawn in his Martha’s Vineyard backyard, something amazing happened: Birds, butterflies, and bees made his backyard their home and turned the fledgling meadow into a riotous Garden of Eden.

“Instead of fighting the realities of soil and climate in an effort to grow plants that didn’t want to be there,” he wrote, “I tolerated and even encouraged plants that chose our yard on their own. … A native prickly pear cactus hugs the south side of our foundation, attracting bees to its showy yellow flowers every June. Highbush blueberries buzz with bees in spring and then fatten our local catbirds with berries in July.” 

Pelikan, a wildlife biologist, had long been interested in birds, but now his interests broadened to include the insect world that had settled in his yard. “The second personal shift,” he says, “was one that many others on the Vineyard have experienced to some degree: a growing awareness that our individual choices affect the finite and sometimes surprisingly delicate natural resources of the island we inhabit.”

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Illustration by Elissa Turnbull

Dear Dot,

I've heard that it’s good to put a bee bath in my garden because bees get thirsty and need water. I hesitate to leave out any standing water, though, because I don’t want to invite mosquitoes to hatch. Do you have any suggestions?

–Thirsty for Pollinators

Dear Thirsty,

Dot is delighted to report that your fears are unfounded, assuming, of course, that your bee bath will be well maintained and refilled with fresh water every few days or so. 

Consider this, Thirsty: Birds will likely share this bath with the bees (and why not? There’s no harm in a common water source!). And birds love little more than dining on mosquito larvae. 

Dot offers a few more suggestions to keep this backyard water cooler buzzing with life. Keep reading.

BUY LESS/BUY BETTER: Better Bread Storage

Let your hat do the talking! Bluedot Living’s organic baseball cap is embroidered with one of 13 planet-positive phrases — like “energy efficient” and “regenerative” — so you can wear your values out loud. Made from 100% organic cotton with a brass slider, it’s designed for everyday comfort, durability, and better impact all around.

What You Can Do

If you see an animal that you suspect is injured and in need of help, take a moment to watch and wait. Unnecessary human intervention can pose some risks, especially for babies. The San Diego Humane Society wrote to us to share what steps you should take to keep injured animals safe and comfortable while you contact a local wildlife hospital.

The Keep-This Handbook

Eating planet-friendly foods yourself but stumped about what to feed el gato? Check out Cleo Carney’s Clean Cat Cuisine and you and your cat will be purrfectly content.

For more guides to all sorts of things, check Bluedot’s advice page.

Welcome to the Worm Club

The father approached me with a smile. “I really need to thank your daughter,” he said. “She got my son over his fear of bugs.” Registering my confusion, he asked, “You know about her worm club, don’t you?”

I did not. 

Though I routinely emptied my preschooler’s pockets of worms before putting her down for an afternoon nap, I didn’t realize her love of bugs had been formalized. “Oh yes,” the father explained. “She digs them up at recess and distributes them to the other kids.” 

My daughter confirmed this assessment. “I make sure nobody who wants a worm gets left out.”

I shouldn’t have been surprised. We are a bug-loving family, gently carrying spiders outside instead of stomping on them, dodging anthills on our hikes. We admire the work bugs do — creating rich healthy soil from our food scraps, feeding the bats and birds in our backyard, catching houseflies in their webs (circle of life and all). 

We curled up before bed with Charlotte’s Web, Diary of a Worm, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. 

While my daughter no longer has pockets full of life, she continues to open her heart to the small, the overlooked, the maligned. And her motto has become something of a family mantra: Nobody who wants a worm gets left out.  

Enjoy the weekend, and we’ll see you next week.

– Leslie Garrett (and Jamie Kageleiry, Emily Cain, and Robin Jones)

Editors

Write us at editor@bluedotliving.com

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