FIRST, SINCE I won’t get to talk with you again until Dec. 27 — Merry Christmas everyone!

I wish for you a joyous holiday and may Santa bring you all good health and well being.

The Christmas spirit is upon us — a time of goodwill and reflection, a time to ponder what blessings we have and to look forward towards a new year with vision and resolution. I shall, too.

I want to reflect on a fault I have been perpetuating and give praise to who helped me see the light (and it wasn’t the Bethlehem star).

I cannot say enough how much I love my super duper, more power, mega leaf blower! So many times it is the best employee I have and it works for gas.

Gasoline — dirty, oil mixture, highly polluting, two cycle gas with the force of a hurricane.

There is the rub and here is where Neil Conklin steps in.

Neil, a citizen of the Peninsula and promoter of great organic, sustainable Northwest cuisine, just happens to live next door to a magnificent property and sculpture garden that I have the privilege of maintaining.

Neil sees me regularly and straightaway came to talk with me about my employee “Mr. Stihl Blower.”

I knew the dangers of this machine, but the efficiency and effectiveness of this tool, coupled now with my senior citizen age (62) had me look the other way.

It’s just so easy to rationalize. Besides, electric blowers just do not have the “garden power” needed. Oh, how old school. So, so old school.

Neil, rightfully so, asked if I knew about the new battery technologies available?

I still have a hard time with copy and paste, but a little research and wow! A variety of powerful products exist.

Now in all fairness, this electric blower can only handle 65 percent to 70 percent of the jobs, but that reduces my gas clunker’s use by that same amount.

It also means, by using an electric blower, I’m not louder than a Whidbey Island Growler.

It really is 400 percent to 600 percent more efficient in time, by far, when I do — even though I use that gas blower for many a job.

Mitigation

If an 8 hour job is done in an hour or two, I do not have to drive back to these job sites again and again just to finish the same task. I therefore achieve a carbon savings.

Two more gallons of oily mix for the blower, but 40 less gallons of gas in my van.

If any of you like or agree with the carbon credits idea, well then every gardener has carbon credits to spend for sure. But be wise, grasshopper.

The point I really want to make is we, as gardeners, are connected to the Earth.

We till the ground and we have nature nurture our work.

Because of how dependent we are on a healthy ecosystem; we, more than anyone, should understand our ramifications when we are out in the yard.

Bigger impact

This is precisely why I rail against chemical fertilizers so often.

They are mostly water-soluble and thus trans-locate (move) feet and yards, if not miles.

They are toxic and kill worms, fungi and various microbes way more often than not.

Weed killers do the same thing.

They trans-locate and spread their damage over great distances.

Unfortunately for Mother Earth, there is no vaccine now or in the near future for her.

But just as we have recently come to learn through this pandemic: Altering our actions can be greatly beneficial.

Let’s keep this knowledge and move it into our own gardens.

Always think about the collateral damage you maybe causing.

Using boiling water or vinegar to eradicate weeds may sound like a good idea, but the collateral damage is worse than a single application of Roundup because these items trans-locate much further than Roundup for a single application.

Cutting away trees on the bluff might make for a million dollar view, but might also cause a million pounds of soil to erode away as the reinforcing roots that hold the banks together die.

“For every action there is an opposite and equal reaction” said some wise person.

So let us react to a new year and the emergence of a “new normal.”

Yes, gardeners, let us become even better stewards of the land we so love to work.

Grow healthy, organic food, use organic fertilizers, incorporate biological controls and use sound cultural practices.

Articles on this will be my New Year’s resolution.

I don’t want to just be blowing in the wind here and if I am, it is with my electric blower — a fantastic last minute Christmas gift, by the way.

So Neil, thank you, and thank you to my readers for continuing to support this column.

But most of all … stay well all!

Merry, merry Christmas to everyone.

________

Andrew May is a freelance writer and ornamental horticulturist who dreams of having Clallam and Jefferson counties nationally recognized as “Flower Peninsula USA.” Send him questions c/o Peninsula Daily News, P.O. Box 1330, Port Angeles, WA 98362, or email news@peninsuladailynews.com (subject line: Andrew May).