In One Day....

An article is making its way around the Internet, reminding us that our Winter purchase of summer fruits from South America is killing tropical and migratory birds. Why? because migratory birds - who spend the winter months in the tropics, along with local exotics - are landing in southern fields and orchards sprayed with DDT.

It seems that as our American appetite grows for out-of-season fruits, farmers in Latin and South American are responding by expanding their fields and using a pesticide as harmful to humans and wildlife as DDT.

Songbirds and DDT are on my mind this morning because, without much thought, I took a knife and sliced into a ripe cantalope and this morning. It almost tasted as good as Colorado’s Rocky Ford cantalope that floods the local markets in late summer. Cantalope, of course, is out of season in Colorado where we’re just taking our first steps away from Winter.

Winter is still lingering in Boulder. There is snow on Flagstaff Mountain. My storm windows are still up. They won’t go into storage until all of the local ski areas are closed for the year. Although my last ski day for the season was Friday, today may be the last day I eat out of season fruit. And, I’ll take on the wager of the first person who bets that I can’t stick to it.

Remember the book Silent Spring, by Rachel Carson, and its warning about the dangers of DDT? Sadly, it took eleven years, from the date of its publication in 1962 to create a shift of policy. A lot of unnecessary deaths happened during those years. In 1973, the use of DDT was finally banned from the United States.

I’m not waiting that long. I’m betting that with a simple change of mind, I can create a shift of habit, in one day. If you see me eating cantalope between now and August, it will be California organic, or fresh frozen last summer from Rocky Ford.