What are the Environmentally Active Kids of Tuc -El- Nuit up to this year?!
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Transcript of What are the Environmentally Active Kids of Tuc -El- Nuit up to this year?!
What are the Environmentally Active Kids of Tuc-El-Nuit
up to this year?!
The first problem startswith salt and water…
The Senior E.A.Ks are the SALT of the earth!
The town of Oliver has a secondary sewage treatment system.
Reclaimed water from this system is used to irrigate a golf
course, 2 vineyards & other green spaces around town.
That’s a GREAT idea, isn’t it?
Think again!
There’s too muchsalt
in the waterAnd it’s killing
the trees!
The E.A.Ks got involved when they discovered that reclaimed water was going to be used on
the school grounds.
Worried that their trees would be dead before they got to grade 8, the kids started:
Googling!
Calling!
Touring!
What they discovered was not what they expected…
“Mineral salts are always
present in the soil in
different amounts”
“Through history, too
much irrigation always
leads to salinization of
the soil, which leads to
desertification and the
collapse of civilizations!”
Salinization is the build
up of salt in the soil.
Desertification is when an
area turns into desert
due to too much salt
killing the plants
“Adding NaCl (sodium chloride) speeds up this process...and industrial and residential water softeners are the main source of these salts.”
Too much NaCl kills plants in 3 ways:
1. It causes dehydration
2. It blocks photosynthesis
Too much NaCl kills plants in 3 ways:
3. It creates a waterproof salt pan
Too much NaCl kills plants in 3 ways:
There is NO GOOD WAY to remove salt from the
ground!
Salt also can’t be removed by sewage treatment systems!
Back to Oliver, turns out that the golf course has
tried to plant new maple trees, but they can’t
survive in the salinized soil.
The pines are also dying, from too much salt and overwatering. The old
maple trees are not expected to last much
longer either.
The E.A.Ks concluded that there is no safe amount
of salt that can be added to reclaimed water.
There are only 2 solutions:
Ban water softeners
Stop using reclaimed wateror
The E.A.Ks sent their results to the paper and the town.
They have also visited a school board meeting
and talked to the trustees about the
problem.It’s a work in progress!
Project Two: Flushed Away!
Problem: Find an alternative to the continual flow urinals
in the school toilets!
Solutions:
Install a timer
Buy dry urinals
Put motion sensors on the urinals
The E.A.Ks have decided on the timers, but Tuc-el-nuit may be closing down soon so that project is on
hold for now…
The Junior E.A.Ks areWinging It!Project 3
Did you know that 14 of the province’s 16 species of bats can be found in
the Okanagan Similkameen?
And did you know that 6 of these species are listed
as being at risk?
The Junior E.A.Ks decided to help the bats out by
building 14 summertime homes!
Bats can eat up to 1000 insects a night!
We hope they eat lots of mosquitoes, because
they can give us the West Nile virus.
The 14 bat boxes will provide the bats with a safe and cozy place to
spend the summer.
The Junior E.A.Ks are also responsible for Tuc-el-nuit’s Western Bluebird
trail. This is the 15th year!
Over 1,000 Western Bluebirds have been
fledged over the years!
The Junior E.A.Ks have concluded that winged
critters are very effective insect munchers.
They are:
Environmentally Friendly!
EntertainingInteresting to learn aboutInexpensive
and
So skip the insecticides and pass me another
piece of plywood!
Thanks for watching!