Want to eat healthy, local, and organic this summer?
Knob Hill Farms in Breckenridge County, Kentucky is now accepting subscriptions to its 2024 Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program that will provide customers a delivery of fresh, organic, seasonal produce available for pickup on both UofL campuses each week:
Belknap Campus: Tuesdays 4-6pm at a farmstand on Cardinal Blvd. at 3rd Street.
The 16-week season will run from June 4th through September 17th. Knob Hill is a black-owned, organic farm growing a variety of produce including but not limited to: potatoes, tomatoes, pole beans, peppers, zucchini, squash, collard greens, and kale. Three different quantity options will be available, and customers can always go in on a share with friends, colleagues, and neighbors:
Tier 1 – provides produce for a family of four for one week $25/week
Tier 2 – provides produce for a family of six for one week $35/week
Tier 3 – provides produce for a family of ten for one week $45/week
Knob Hill will be setting up a farmstand to sell extra produce to CSA customers and the public during weekly pickups throughout the season June 4 – Sept. 17, 2024 on Tuesdays 4-6pm on Cardinal Blvd. at 3rd Street, and on Thursdays 10:30am-1:30pm at the Gray Street Farmers’ Market. Explore your options and complete an interest form online here. For questions, call Keith McKenzie at (502) 541-9051. The sign-up deadline is May 10th.
University of Louisville anthropology student Shelby Robinson has made her impact on campus through a unique practice – beekeeping. Robinson is UofL’s dedicated beekeeping intern and cares for the university’s beehives managed through UofL Sustainability.
Honeybees have always been a part of Robinson’s life as she first learned about beekeeping from family members who’ve cared for beehives through generations, starting with her grandfather, and then her father. Beehives bring nostalgic scents and sounds to Robinson, whose earliest memories include following her grandfather around their family hives in Meade County, Ky., harvesting honey for their “Bee Happy Farms” honey jars.
“My grandfather had this big garden and orchard with apple trees, so he had the bees to pollinate them,” Robinson said. “I just remember playing around the garden and being close to the bees. They weren’t ever interested in me because I wasn’t bothering them, so that fear kind of got eliminated when I was pretty young.”
After the death of Robinson’s grandfather, her family kept a hive on his property to support the orchard. She and her father now tend to the inherited bees. “It’s crazy that it’s a family tradition that can carry on, beyond someone like that,” Robinson reflected.
The UofL’s beekeeping internship, too, has brought Robinson closer to her father who she now asks for advice when dealing with new obstacles facing UofL’s beehives. His insights keep a heritage of beekeeping knowledge from disappearing.
Everything about beekeeping can be done in a variety of ways, from how the hive is built and how to handle the bees to the protective clothing worn by beekeepers.
Shelby Robinson carefully tends to the beehives.
“It’s like a dance to specifically move with the bees and see which frame they’re mostly on and which one I should touch and which one I shouldn’t,” Robinson said.
As a beekeeper, Robinson has developed her own style under the guidance of her father and the UofL Sustainability mentorship.
“I read somewhere that bees can remember their beekeeper’s face, so I always try to talk to them when I get in the hive and just see how they’re doing,” Robinson said. “There are old folktales about the ‘telling of the bees,’ so there’s a strong connection between beekeepers and their bees.”
A Spring Sting
Beekeeping isn’t always comfortable, even for a legacy beekeeper.
“I have gotten stung a few times, but after the second time it’s no big deal,” Robinson said. “And every time I do get stung, I never blame the bees. It’s not their fault that they’re stinging, they just think I’m like a bear trying to get their honey.”
Bees often face a fear from people, much like snakes or bats, and many believe that their presence always means potential danger. However, bees are defensive, not aggressive, so their sting is a last resort. Like other animals, bees fear humans more than people fear them and prefer keeping to themselves.
According to Robinson, even with wasps and hive beetles, honeybees defend the hive by surrounding the pests to block them from an area or to overheat them with their wing movements.
But keeping also bees comes with its rewards and pleasures. To extract honey from the hive, Robinson first determines how much honey needs to be left behind for the bees. The frames are then removed, and the bees are brushed into an empty super box/hive box. Finally, the beeswax on the frames is uncapped with a blade to release the honey and the frames are placed in a spinner to remove, filter and jar the honey. Beeswax is often collected during the filtering process and can also be used for various products like lip balm.
“One of my favorite things about beekeeping is just the smell of the beehives, it’s this really sweet aroma. I think it’s really special and really cool to introduce new people to that, and the sound of the buzzing from the hives,” Robinson said. “It can definitely be intimidating, but I’ve found it to be a little bit more soothing because I know bees are in there and that they’re happy.”
As UofL’s beekeeping intern, Robinson cares for the beehives year-round. Before the winter, Robinson adds entrance reducers and hay bales around the hive to reduce wind-chill. Throughout the early spring, she visits the hives a couple of times a month to monitor the bees’ behavior, add pollen patties, remove any pests and add more hive frames which are used by the bees to build honeycombs.
After the bees become more active in the spring, honey can start to be harvested through the summer. Robinson dresses in a beekeeping suit that covers her legs, arms and face in one sealed garment to protect her from her buzzing friends. She also burns natural wood shavings to calm the bees down if she’s in the hives for a longer amount of time than normal. Robinson uses a brush to gently guide the bees out from any tight spots or crevices to keep the bees safe as she carefully removes frames and places them on a rack to check the honeycomb’s structure and honey production.
“You really count on every bee to help your hive survive,” Robinson said. “So, it’s a very gentle process.”
Last year, one UofL hive produced about 12-pint jars of honey and grew enough to create a second hive.
Robinson says there’s no negative aspect in harvesting the bees’ honey when done properly.
Tending to the hives functions like a symbiotic relationship where the keeper protects the hives from pests, cold, moisture and hunger while harvesting honey for consumption. Seeing the hive thrive and overcome obstacles is as rewarding for Robinson as collecting honey.
“Seeing how much everybody likes the honey is really cool. Not that I made it, but it feels like I helped at least jar it,” Robinson said. “It’s cool to see the different tastes of what this honey is like compared to a different hive’s honey.”
Supporting the Hive
Caring for bees not only ties Robinson to her community and family, but it also fulfills a called duty to the environment and sustainability.
“The responsibility as UofL’s beekeeping intern to me is to show kindness and consideration toward ecology, urban agriculture and every little pollinator that comes my way,” Robinson said. “To help our bees is an honor because I’m also helping our local and community gardens, wildlife and student outreach on sustainable, eco-friendly practices.”
Honeybees are an important keystone species as pollinators and their success could be directly tied to the success of future generations. Keeping beehives helps secure a sustainable future and protects an important species from eradication. In trade, beekeepers can harvest honey and beeswax from hives to use for various purposes.
“It’s just important for everybody to know that you can absolutely be a beekeeper wherever as long as you have a yard and some plants nearby,” Robinson said. “You just have to know some pretty basic things about bees and how to use the equipment.”
Justin Mog, assistant to the provost for sustainability initiatives, created the beekeeping internship to help connect student learning with sustainable agriculture and nature stewardship. Mog works closely with Robinson to manage the hives and honey harvesting at UofL. The two also participate in programming on-and-off campus to better connect the Louisville community with honeybee conservation.
“Anyone who cares about sustainability needs an intimate understanding of how nature works, and I find there’s no better way to do that than to crack open a beehive and observe what’s going on,” Mog said. “I learn so much from my bees!”
After graduation, Robinson hopes to continue beekeeping either through volunteering or keeping her own hives. “I would love to have some beehives of my own one day as kind of a family tradition, help my dad still take care of his bees and hopefully get more involved with the Kentucky State Beekeepers Association (KSBA).”
KSBA offers resources, workshops and programs to help create new beekeepers and share knowledge.
Listen here On this special Pledge Drive edition of Sustainability Now!, your host, Justin Mog, digs deep into Extraction Politics with University of Louisville professor of Communication, Nick Paliewicz, author of the brand new book “Extraction Politics: Rio Tinto and the Corporate Persona” (Penn State Press – Series in Transdiciplinary Rhetoric). The book argues that Rio Tinto is a global extractive colonial actor that creates different place-based rhetorical personae to pass as a valued member of the public without having to settle in these communities and bear the costs of extraction.
Nick studies argumentation and public discourse with emphases on environmental rhetoric, public memory, and social movements. He is co-author of three previous books: 1. The Securitization of Memorial Space: Rhetoric and Public Memory; 2. Racial Terrorism: A Rhetorical Investigation of Lynching; and 3. Memory and Monument Wars in American Cities: New York, Charlottesville, and Montgomery. Catch up with Nick at www.linkedin.com/in/nick-paliewicz-13423224/
Two hardcopy versions of Nick’s new book, Extraction Politics, will be available for bidding at the Silent Auction taking place during Forward Radio’s 7th Birthday Party on Saturday, April 13th from 5:00 to 8:00pm at Logan Street Market! Don’t miss this chance to take home a copy of Nick’s thought-provoking text while supporting the station that made you aware of it!
As always, our feature is followed by your community action calendar for the week, so get your calendars out and get ready to take action for sustainability NOW!
Sustainability Now! is hosted by Dr. Justin Mog and airs on Forward Radio, 106.5fm, WFMP-LP Louisville, every Monday at 6pm and repeats Tuesdays at 12am and 10am. Find us at forwardradio.org
For eight weeks from January 28th to March 23rd, UofL students, faculty, and staff engaged in another year of friendly competition during Ecolympics 2024 to see who could take the most action to advance sustainability!
We had an incredible number and diversity of green actions submitted from across the university community, but as we all crossed the finish line together on March 23rd, there was on Ecolympian who clearly rose to the top!
The UofL Sustainability Council extends our warmest congratulations to Fine Arts professor, Rachel Singel, for being named the Grand Prize Ecolympian and taking home the amazing Peace of the Earth Refillery prize pack!
Rachel composts, recycles, and donates regularly, in addition to helping out on the urban farm where she lives.
She is most proud of her daily biking commutes and her work in teaching others about invasive plant species, especially in the papermaking workshop she led earlier this year.
We want to shout-out everyone who participated in Ecolympics this year. Thank you ALL for striving to make our planet a greener, more sustainable place. Through little choices every day, we can make a difference!
Got a passion for the environment & justice? UofL’s Sustainability Council is hiring paid interns to take the lead on campus projects in 2024-25 for 5-10 hrs/wk.
Positions available:
Sustainability Communications
EcoReps
Sustainable Dining
Renewable Energy
Applications due April 15th. Position descriptions and application information available online here.
At a special ceremony during the March 22nd Engaged Scholarship Symposium, the University of Louisville Sustainability Council bestowed the 2024 Josh Smith Memorial Sustainability Award on Fern Creek High School teacher, Lauren Niemann, for her outstanding collaboration with UofL in launching and operating a Dual Credit Sustainability 101 program wherein JCPS (and JCTC) students can earn college credit for taking an Introduction to Sustainability course. Alongside their environmental science teacher, Lauren’s students have created an outdoor learning space at Fern Creek that solves campus stormwater management issues and provides habitat for wildlife, while being accessible to all students. The space even has wheelchair accessible picnic tables created from a community wide plastic bottle cap collection.
The Award was launched in 2017 after the untimely death of UofL alumni Josh Smith to honor outstanding individuals and groups who, like Josh, give their time and resources to work in concert with UofL’s sustainability efforts to strengthen university-community relationships.
In nominating Ms. Niemann for this year’s Award, Brent Fryrear, Director of the Partnership for a Green City and Chair of the UofL Sustainability Council, said “Over the past six or seven years, I have witnessed how Lauren Niemann is an early adopter, collaborating with UofL on initiatives that benefit students. Since summer 2021, I have worked very closely with Lauren as Jefferson County Public Schools (JCPS), UofL and Jefferson Community & Technical College (JCTC) signed a dual credit agreement for Introduction to Sustainability – SUST 101. I teach the course at UofL, and we started with three JCPS teachers in the pilot year, but Lauren was the only one to enroll students and teach the college-credit course. She has run head-on into the course content, working closely with me as we discussed topics and readings, to ensure that her students have the option to graduate from school with valuable college credit-hours. She has about 20 students again this year – the third year of dual credit – and her students keep getting better and better. They are socially conscious and committed to changing the world in a good way!”
In her own words, Lauren describes her experience this way: “Early this school year in my dual credit Introduction to Sustainability course we had conversations surrounding what people often believe sustainability is, and what sustainability actually is. Caring for the environment is probably the sustainable action best marketed to the public.
But sustainability is much more than composting food waste or planting pollinator habitat – by the way each are initiatives Fern Creek students have influenced decision makers at Fern Creek and at JCPS to support. But as students now know, sustainability is more than saving the environment. How can our actions reduce human impact on nature while simultaneously increasing social ties and providing economic benefits? Actions that meet these criteria are truly sustainable.
Through classes like mine, Fern Creek students are committed to building a compassionate school culture where systems center care and the environment.
The Fern Creek students I have worked with are committed to questioning policies or decisions not in line with the tenets of sustainability, while also being determined to provide realistic solutions, not simply complaints. The Fern Creek students I know are committed to sustainable action by setting positive examples for others to help build a culture of sustainability. These cultural changes do not happen overnight and at times sustainable action is met with tremendous barriers. But my passion and the passions of my students drive us to seek a better, more sustainable version of ourselves, Fern Creek, and JCPS.
I remember back in 2018, Fern Creek alum Jack Leppert was about to be surprised with a $5000 check to help bring to life a vision of our senior courtyard. His vision was unique among the solutions of others, in that it tied the mental health benefits of green spaces to the need to manage stormwater. I distinctly remember Julie walking Jack over to be interviewed, and looking over at me wide eyed and smiling as if to say “HE HAS NO IDEA!” I know if Julie were here she would be so proud of all that students at Fern Creek have continued to pursue and accomplish since students like Jack walked our halls. We are completely humbled and honored to accept this award, and will continue to bring honor to Julie’s name through our continued pursuit of more sustainable schools.”
As the seventh recipient of the Josh Smith Memorial Sustainability Award, Lauren Niemann joins an illustrious group of community partners who continue to make a tremendously positive impact on the sustainability of Louisville.
Nominations for the Josh Smith Award are due by March 1st each year via email to the UofL Sustainability Engagement Committee Chair, Dr. Brian Barnes, at brian.barnes@louisville.edu, who can answer any questions about the award or the nomination process.
Congratulations to residents of Unitas Tower for winning the Ecolympics Drawdown competition for the second year in a row!!
Unitas residents reduced electricity use 6.4% from February 5-25, 2024.
Second place goes to Belknap Village North (3.8% reduction) and 3rd to Louisville Hall (0.6% reduction).
Across all nine residence halls, students saved 2,939 kWh (1.1%) of electricity, or the carbon emissions from 1,665 average U.S. homes each year, according to the EPA Greenhouse Gas Emissions Calculator!
Ride the wave of conservation – continue to unplug, turn off, take stairs, line dry clothes, do laundry in cold water, etc. Anything you do to conserve can help you win weekly Ecolympics prize packs through March 23rd!
Don’t send your old electronics to the landfill! UofL’s Sustainability Council and the Cardinal eSports Team want to help you Trash the competition, not the planet! From Feb. 14th – March 13th, we have special collection points set up in the following locations:
Duthie Center at Speed School of Engineering (1st Floor Student Study Area, SE corner)
HSC Kornhauser Library (1st floor lobby behind elevators) (426 W. Bloom St., 1st floor central hall by vending).
There will also be a special Drive-up Drop-off Collection on Monday 3/4 from 8am-11am on the south side of the Clinical & Translational Research Building at UofL’s downtown Health Sciences Center (505 S Hancock St.), by the elevators for the 620 Garage. The contact for the Drive-up Drop-off is Skip Hurley (502) 599-6228.
Stop by any time to drop off any of the following types of personal electronics for recycling: all computers, monitors, televisions, printers, copiers, scanners, servers, networking equipment, fax machines, telephones and cellphones, RAM/memory, hard drives, battery backups, and peripherals such as keyboards, mice, speakers, AC adapters, and mixed computer cables/wires.
Separate bins will also be available for recycling of any type of battery, lamps/bulbs, or ink/toner cartridges.
This special collection is for your own personal items.
Departmental eWaste and lab equipment can always be recycled and picked-up for free. Here’s how to get university property picked-up for reuse/recycling: Step 1: One of the following forms must be completed for the e-scrap item(s) to be picked up. All forms are located at the Inventory Control/Surplus Property website: 1. A pick-up request for computer hard-drives and laptop computers must be submitted using the “Computing Device Surplus Certification” form. 2. All other electronic items with a UofL Property tag bar-code must be submitted on a “TRANOVER” form (regardless of value). 3. All other electronic items valued over $1000 must be submitted on a “TRANOVER” form. 4. All other electronic items valued under $1000 should be submitted on a “TRANUND” form. Step 2: After your form has been submitted on-line and has been reviewed by the appropriate department, Physical Plant personnel will come to your location and pick up designated items for reuse or recycling.
Verify that the item is included in the Items Accepted for Electronics Recycling list
If the device functions and powers on, prepare the item by: – Backing up important or sensitive data and information – Removing the battery (if removable) – Conducting a Hard Reset or Factory Reset on the device
Log out of all accounts associated with the device (i.e. email accounts, cloud storage accounts, social media accounts, etc.)
If you have not conducted a Hard Reset or Factory Reset for the device(s), refer to the following instructions according to the device manufacturer: – Wipe Your Android Phone: Settings > System > Advanced > Reset Options > Erase All Data (Factory Reset) – Wipe your iOS [Apple] Device: Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings – Wipe your Windows PC: Settings > Update and Security > Recover > Reset this PC > Get Started. Select Remove All Personal Files when prompted. – Wipe your Chromebook or Chrome Tablet: Settings > Advanced > Powerwash – Wipe your iMac or MacBook: Power up or restart the device. Once the device is booting up, hold down Option + Command + R until a spinning wheel appears on the screen. Release the Option + Command + R keys then select the option ‘Reinstall macOS’ and click ‘Continue’. Follow the on-screen instructions when asked to select main hard drive to be wiped.
Batteries
All battery types are accepted for recycling, including:
Alkaline (A, AA, AAA, C, D, 9-volt)
Lithium hydride, sealed (Li)
Nickel-cadmium, sealed (Ni-Cad)
Nickel metal hydride (Ni-MH)
Lead-acid, wet-celled (vehicle and golf cart type)
Lead batteries, sealed (Pb)
Mercury (Hg)
Lamps/Bulbs
The lighting wastes that can be dropped off for recycling include:
Fluorescent light tubes
Compact fluorescent bulbs, including U-tube and circular
High-intensity discharge (HID) lamps, such as high pressure sodium and mercury vapor
This is a special event of Ecolympics 2024 and the Campus Race To Zero Waste – January 28th to March 23rd. A friendly annual competition among North American universities. During this 8 week period, UofL will compete to reduce waste, increase recycling & composting, and raise conservation awareness across all three campuses! Keep up with the Cards progress at the Campus Race website.
Post your sustainable actions and tag @UofLSustainableor submit them through our online form to win the Grand Prize, or one of eight fabulous weekly prize baskets!
Prizes:
Weekly prizes: At the end of each of the eight weeks of Ecolympics 2024, one person who has shared their sustainable action(s) will receive a themed gift basket!
Grand Prize: One impressive Cardinal who takes the most sustainable actions during Ecolympics 2024 will take home our grand prize basket!
Post your sustainable actions and tag @UofLSustainable or submit them through our online form throughout February & March to be entered into the competition! New winners will be picked each week! Enter as often as you can!
Cardinals may have recently noticed buckets appear near trees across campus – all part of UofL Sustainability’s effort to harvest local maple syrup.
Earlier in February, community partner and UofL neighbor, Dave Barker led participants through a maple tapping workshop, installing taps on several trees in the center of campus. Barker instructed participants on the best practices for tree tapping without causing harm to the trees. He explained that sap flows are much more accessible to tap after temperatures swing from below freezing at night to above freezing during the day, creating an internal pressure that carries sap through the tree. After these conditions are met, sap may be seen leaking through natural scars. The only equipment then needed to harvest sap is a drill to make a one-inch hole, a tap to hammer in, tubing and a covered bucket. Once the sap is harvested, it’s then boiled down to remove the water and create syrup.
Justin Mog, assistant to the provost for sustainability initiatives says tree tapping is a sustainable way to create local maple syrup and sugary products while cutting personal emissions. Combining maple tapping with other gardening and farming practices can make an important impact in reducing individual environmental impacts.
“I think the most important thing we get out of this project is a better understanding of sustainability, which is all about tapping into the local resources right under our noses that we tend to ignore,” Mog said. “As we learned at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, what makes modern life so precarious and unsustainable is an over-reliance on extractive economies that pull in resources from all over the place. Rather than spending a bunch of money and burning a bunch of fossil fuels to ship in syrup from Vermont, I’d much rather see us make our own and reconnect with the abundance that nature provides for us right here in Louisville.”
To make a gallon of maple syrup about 30–60 gallons of sap is needed. Assuming weather conditions support the flow of sap, UofL Sustainability hopes to produce a few gallons of syrup from Belknap campus trees. While the workshop focused on tapping maple trees, several other tree species can be tapped for sap to make syrup. Birch, hickory, sycamore and other types of trees can be used to create unique syrups with different flavor profiles from maple syrup.
The annual maple tapping workshop is part of UofL’s Sustainability Garden Commons workshops. The Garden Commons is a collectively managed space open to all students, staff, faculty and community members. Participants who assist in the garden’s projects are welcome to share in the harvest and take their share of organic produce.
The Garden Commons hosts several workshops and events to get volunteers engaged in recognizing the accessible abundance of gardening and foraging. Upcoming events include workshops on orchard care, berry foraging and community gardening in abandoned urban spaces. Garden Commons intern and UofL student Savannah Dowell organized this year’s maple tapping workshop.
“I want everyone who participates in the Garden Commons to walk away with the understanding and confidence that they, too, can grow, forage or learn anything their heart desires. The world of sustainable urban agriculture can be overwhelming, but don’t become debilitated by the plethora of possibilities,” Dowell said. “Whether you start with a mass-scale maple tapping project or a windowsill herb garden – just start!”
Over the coming weeks, Cardinals can help empty sap buckets into collection barrels at the North Information Center and behind Gottschalk Hall by signing up to volunteer.
Taste UofL’s maple syrup and honey at this year’s UofL Maple Syrup & Honey Pancake Party on Friday, April 19, from noon – 1 p.m. at the Cultural & Equity Center 176 (Belknap Village North).
Sustainable UofL 