Journal – Mushroom Collecting and Water Issues

I’m waiting for the trick or treat kids to start arriving this Halloween night. My son and I just came back from the woods from collecting mushrooms for his assignment in school. We found many different types.

When we were walking along I noted this very interesting froth in the water under a bridge and we both went down for a closer look. It kind of looks like beer foam or something - I’m not sure what it is.

Galaxy S7 f/1.7 1/13 4.2mm ISO200

I know so little about water quality issues that I would not be able to tell you if this was a natural type thing or the result of contamination. Water issues have been very high on my mind with all that has been going on with the Dakota pipeline protest.

I look down at the foam and wonder about it. I would drink that water if I was really thirsty and had nothing else - I would like to filter it first though. Water is such an essential thing, it is hard to last more than three days without it.

I little odd looking froth I can overlook but black tar like oil or strange smelling water contaminated from hydraulic fracturing or pipeline spills is much more difficult to deal with. I feel fortunate in some ways yet problems remain.

The puget sound orca populations are facing starvation partly from a water quality issue and in part from declining habitat for the salmon that they feed on. Scientists want to knock down four dams on the Snake River to free up more habitat for the salmon to breed.

All of this seems related to an energy generation issue imho. If we had a clean renewable energy source we wouldn’t need to dam up the water so much and it would be easier to keep it clean. Run off of pollution generated from combustion would be reduced. Everyone seems to focus on CO2 but there are many other toxic byproducts from internal combustion engines that are generated as well. These emissions get into the air and since rain comes down through the air it figures that it would get into the water too.

Oil is non-renewable as far as we know based on how we think it was created. Once it is pumped out of ground and burned up it is not going to be usable by future generations. They might be missing some of the products that we take for granted like pavement, plastic, some medications and over 6000 other items.

Solar power is renewable. For the reasonably foreseeable future the sun will continue to shine as far as we know. (In the next billion years or so it will become too hot for life as we know it to exist on the planet so therefore it will not be a good source of renewable energy at that point)

Just a side thought but we do manage to mess things up so badly that only bacteria or other simple forms of life can survive on the planet there is probably not enough time left for more advanced forms of life to form. If you look at the fossil record it looks like it took 550 million years to go from single celled life to multicellular animals. This would be rather sad - I for one rather enjoy the opportunities of being human at this point in my life. Who knows what a nuclear winter or runaway greenhouse effect will do - Venus might be a better place climate wise, lol. (How’s that for a spooky Halloween tale?)

I’ve heard someone say that solar energy is not renewable because the panels will need to be replaced. This is true, but in my mind that is not how I think of energy production being not renewable. I believe that newer and better panels will be developed probably for much less cost. Replacing your roof shingles in the future with energy generating roofing may be a winning solution to our energy needs and if subsidized perhaps less expensive than conventional roofing.

Lots of our power is wasted in high tension wires that also cause big electromagnetic fields that people do not want to live under because they cause health issues. Solar energy generation could fix this and make clean energy for our cars.

I’ve read other information on Steemit that points out that we are bombing seven different countries right now, yet we have not declared war on anyone. It is hard to imagine and seems very connected to wealth, power and the struggle for the dwindling supply of resources.

If you can drink healthy water out of streams and cleanly generate your own power you are one step closer to personal autonomy. Add some steady self employment income and life goes from being ugly brutish and short to something more tolerable and sustainable. (Maybe I exaggerate things a bit?) ;)

Just up the canyon is a beautiful fern grotto; I take another picture as we leave.

Galaxy S7 f/1.7 1/25 4.2mm ISO200

I hear the kids voices as they play outside. I remember the fun I had as a child running from house to house gathering candies.

I know we can make renewable energy for future generations and solve all these water, economic and social issues. If we do, we all won’t have to work so hard and we can spend more time doing what we want to instead of cleaning up after the problems that have plagued us for so many generations imho.

---

That is my hope. Thanks for reading!