What are you working on eliminating? Oil-based gas, plastic bags, food from far off continents? Bottled water, dirty electricity, resource-intensive meat? Let us know in the new Go Green Poll.

Results from the last Go Green Poll, Summer is here – what sustainable action are you focused on?, can be viewed after the jump >>

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Paint cans, old rugs, a box of food – this stuff does not belong here. We need to encourage others to use our recycling drop sites with respect, or they won’t be around much longer. I know taking your used paint out to Bee’s Ferry is a haul, but until Charleston County Recycling can provide more drop sites, it’s all we have.

One thing to keep in mind: If you have a compost pile near palmetto trees, watch out for their crawling roots. I went a little too long without turning our pile, and it looks like nearby palm roots have infiltrated the bottom 12 inches, robbing the pile of some of the oldest and best compost. I’m wondering if I should have put a barrier at the bottom of the pile to keep the roots out – any reader advice is welcome.

Here are some other compost notes:

• If you have river birches or other trees that drop leaves early, be sure to collect them for your pile. August always brings our birch leaves down in droves, so this is a great source of brown for our pile – I always rake before I mow.
• Turn your pile! For many reasons, you must do this regularly. Two strange reasons I do: to keep the palm roots from eating from the bottom up, and to keep the fiddler crabs from eating from the top down.
• Look for bugs…you want bugs. If you see worms, that’s good. If you see termites, that’s bad.
• During peek fruit fly season (now), you might need to make more trips to the backyard pile. Our kitchen composter it too tempting for fruit flies, so we take our scraps out right away.

That’s all for now. Here are some previous compost updates:

• Composting Update :: Tis the Season!
• Composting Update :: Eureka, Black Gold
• Composting Update :: Got Brown?
• Composting Update :: We Have Steam!
• Composting Update :: Now with Starbucks!
• Composting Update: Pumpkins are In

And back to the “unneeded” part (every year some phone book advocate shows up touting the greatness of their publication for small business advertising…yawn). Both The Real Yellow Pages and The Talking Phone Book have great online directories, so I think this year I’ll cut the cord and begin using them. Why use 3,800 pages of paper to do something the Internet can do faster, cheaper, and with less impact on the environment? To stop the phone book from being delivered to your home or business, you can simply opt out! Here’s how:

• The Real Yellow Pages: Fill out this form.
• Talking Phone Book: Email their distribution department.

If you want to take it up a notch, here are some great ideas from YellowPagesGoesGreen.org on how you can work with your local goverment to establish better practices for the distribution of phone books.

I also feel that while the drop sites give motivated recyclers an option, they are only part of the solution. I see scenes like the one above on every trash day, and sometimes the cardboard is actually broken down and stacked in a pile – they’re doing everything but driving it to the drop site! I know there is an issue with the trucks/equipment, but Charleston County needs to figure this out. If you feel like I do, and think cardboard recycling rates would soar if it was picked up curbside, then let the Charleston County Environmental Management team know — Call: 843.720.1111 Email: publicinfo@charlestoncounty.org Write: 13 Romney Street Charleston, SC 29403 —

Here’s a shot where it looks like someone had some semi-useful items (wood scraps and a used window?), so they left them for “someone else to pick-up.” I bet they got their wish. I like how the glass window is blocking the public bike path – surprise!

Every time I go to my local recycling drop site in Mount Pleasant, I’m reminded why I started this Recycling Fail column. Too often, people are leaving far more than just recycling: trash, pumpkins, leaves, carpets, giant boxes, furniture – it’s a problem. And while it’s fun to see the photos (check out our growing Flickr set), we’ve got to take care of these drop sites so that our community and Charleston County can continue to recycle successfully.

Zoe is now two months old, and very busy making wet messes in her diaper. It took about two weeks for the diaper to fit properly. The potty diapers are so easy to flush. Now, the poo-poo’s are an entirely different story. Yes, it can be a very messy ordeal. Yes, sometimes I immediately toss the inserts into a diaper Dekor, which uses biodegradable bags. Yes, the white liners are stained, but rarely a leak outside the liner. Because her poo’s are still so wet, I am looking into using cloth inserts in the gDiaper.

The gross factor rarely bothers me, it’s my baby’s poo, and until foods like the grape enter her diet, I am not gagging. I have never had a problem with the velcro tabs, though there was an improvement added about two years ago. I have only clogged the toilet once, though I believe the culprit was a rogue wipe.

I write this with the hopes it won’t be too gross for anyone (Chad included.) I do try to save the wet inserts for times when the toilet already needs to be flushed. With my three year old going potty every fifteen minutes, it seemed prudent to combine flushes!

I do not mind the extra effort, I wanted to have children and feel a responsibility to lessen their impact. The time it takes to prepare for a day with gDiapers is minimal, certainly a drop in the bucket compared to how much time it takes for the disposables we use to decompose.

Certain occasions do seem to be better suited for disposable diapers: sitters, grandparents and daddy times, along with travel. For these times, we choose Seventh Generation diapers. I also have learned that the while gDiapers are manufactured in China, the inserts are made right here for us in the U.S.

I do think that gDiapers are the best choice for babies’ bottoms and would love to see more around town. One can order them online, or purchase them at Earth Fare and Dwell Smart. Did I mention she looks super cute in them too?

On a recent trip to a Mount Pleasant recycling drop site, it was clear that people were making just as many mistakes with their recycling as they were their trash. And since 2008 was the year of the Fail meme, which has generated its own blog and Wikipedia entry, I thought it might be time to start  a new column: Recycling Fail!

I mean, we’ve all been to one of Charleston County Recycling‘s drop sites and seen the piles of trash people have left – what are they thinking? I’ve even blogged about the serious problems they are having at one of the Mount Pleasant drop sites.

The first pic above is the most interesting, only because they made it all the way to the drop site and THEN failed. I mean, after you know what to recycle, one of the only other rules is to flatten your boxes. It even says so right on the dumpster! FAIL!

And what about the person that left a bag of trash and a pumpkin? A pumpkin??? I wish we had county-sponsored composting, but that doesn’t mean I can toss used holiday fruit wherever I please.  Also note that the pumpkin was discarded in a recyclable bag.

The person who left the mess below clearly scoffs at the rules. They probably drive in the left lane, take 2 newspapers, and sneak home office supplies too. Rules are rules peeps, so lets try to keep the trash in the landfill, not in the middle of a parking lot. I mean, that’s someone’s fence/backyard right there…how would that make you feel?

If you’ve seen some Recycling Fail around town, or even have some pics, please let us know!

I have been unable to reach anyone at Waste Industries, so if you’re living in Summerville and have any informatinon, please leave a comment.