Author: Al Skoropa

I call it “Zoop,” fertilizer from the plethora of exotic animals that poop daily at your local zoo. You can imagine collecting, transporting and disposing tons of daily waste represents a fairly large zoological capital expense. Is waste management of this scope a subject for budding zookeepers to study in college? The care and feeding… [Read More]

And what is that scent after an early Summer rain? Short answer:  the scientists call it Petrichor.  The internet definition: a pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm, dry weather….and there’s a much more interesting, albeit a bit longer, answer. Rain is one of the most beautiful, and… [Read More]

Saturday morning and it’s off to the garden center for topsoil to get the planting started.   Go ahead, pick out a likely bag from the selection. After all, you’re a gardener and you know your dirt. In grabbing a handful of topsoil, what sort of rating process do you apply? For example, does it look… [Read More]

When we look at a field of dairy cows chowing down on alfalfa and clover, think of all the milk products they give us — butter, cream, ice cream and ingredients for our favorite chocolate bars, to name some. But their diets of all that roughage produces a totally unexpected cash crop: manure. Today’s dairy… [Read More]