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No. 2
course 'heals' for Open
Lane Tredway, plant pathology
State
program gives away hives to restore honeybee population
David Tarpy, entomology
Scientist
digs old newspapers
Morton Barlaz, civil, construction and environmental engineering
Radio
clip
Michael Cobb, political science and public administration; Joe
DeSimone, chemical engineering
University
briefs
Food institute awards faculty; NCSU faculty, staff receive ag awards
Getting
involved
English as a Second Language Symposium
Apply
those brains
Science House
$20,171
Deborah Stallings, facilities
Students
hope for vote on UNC board
Board of Governors
Letter: Unleash UNC-CH creativity
tuition
Armfuls
of passion and fashion
Institute for Nonprofits
Mary
Schweitzer to Discuss Dinosaur Findings at the 2005 ECTS-IBMS Joint
Scientific Meeting
Mary H. Schweitzer, marine, earth and atmospheric sciences
Tick-borne
diseases now more prevalent
Ed Breitswerdt, College of Veterinary Medicine
Event
to aid ailing pooch
Denis Marcellin-Little, orthopedic surgery
Tobacco
buyout conference held
Arnold Oltmans, agricultural and resource economics
Oils,
vitamins help ward off biting pests
Concerns over DEET also prompted researchers to develop plant-derived
alternatives.
Crews
build roundabout on campus
roundabouts
Obituary:
Winifred Marvin Swann
Crafts Center
Letter: Unleash UNC-CH creativity
May 31, 2005
Charlotte Observer
By staff report
© Copyright 2005
From Richard T. Williams of Huntersville, who chairs the UNC Chapel Hill board of trustees, in response to an editorial opposing a state Senate bill that gave UNC and N.C. State, but not the 14 other UNC schools, authority to set their own tuition:
In passing recent budget special provisions on tuition and out-of-state scholarships, the N.C. Senate has given us an opportunity to have a meaningful discussion about how this state is going to fund its research universities. But instead of focusing on the real issues, editorials such as the one published by the Observer May 20 ("Apology required") charge that the special provisions will wreck the UNC system. Such rhetoric risks trivializing serious issues and paralyzes constructive dialogue and solutions.
The UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees is committed to creative thought, dialogue and action -- for we believe our citizens and the state's economic climate demand new funding strategies, particularly for our research institutions. Over the past four years we have worked with the university administration to develop a detailed five-year financial plan, an academic plan, a tuition philosophy that provides a framework for future tuition discussions, a faculty retention plan, a facilities maintenance plan and the like.
This university is proudly public. With passion, we support the lowest possible in-state tuition, a high financial aid component, strong public and private support and a parallel mission of excellence in undergraduate education and research. We have broadly defined "as free as practicable" today as the lowest 25 percent of national public peers. We reject the private/public models more recently adopted by the University of Virginia and Michigan that no longer are confident in the long-term funding ability from their states. They have adopted the high tuition, high aid, low public support models.
I am pleased that the Senate has acknowledged the need to go beyond traditional thinking, to break gridlock and to release the energy of the research institutions for economic vitality. They have acknowledged that the one-size-fits-all approach to funding higher education isn't working and that the state's research universities must be kept strong and made stronger.
Leading research universities face serious challenges in retention of faculty and ability to recruit new faculty as retirement takes a growing number of senior faculty. Competitive endowments are growing and funding models are changing throughout the nation as our competitors seek an advantage in the recruitment wars for faculty and students.
It is time for us to stop focusing on the controversy and start the discussion.
May 31, 2005
News & Observer
By NED BARNETT
© Copyright 2005
PINEHURST -- The site of the U.S. Open is now officially closed.
Late Monday, the last players came off Pinehurst No. 2. Today, maintenance crews begin putting the finishing touches on the famed and feared golf course that will soon challenge 156 of the world's best players in the Open championship.
While closed, the course will be spared the cuts of golf clubs and pocks of balls as it is honed by scores of greenskeepers and healed, they hope, by a much-needed spell of sunny, hot weather. A few Open competitors will play rounds during the hiatus, but mostly the 73 acres of grass will be left to the hawks, bluebirds, red-cockaded woodpeckers and fox squirrels inhabiting the course, which is cut into what was once a pine forest.
This is unusual and expensive treatment. A closure is not required by the U.S. Golf Association, the national governing body that will conduct the men's championship, and it means shutting out hundreds of golfers who would pay as much as $375 for a round.
Pinehurst Resort closed the course for almost three weeks before the 1999 U.S. Open there. This time, the closure has been cut to two weeks, but it's still a welcome luxury for those who tend the course. It will reopen June 13 for U.S. Open practice rounds, and the four-day tournament will begin June 16.
"This gives us time for all the ball marks on the greens to heal over and most of the fairway divots to heal in," said Paul Jett, the Pinehurst No. 2 course superintendent. "It's a pretty pristine golf course by the time they get out here on Monday."
Lane Tredway, an assistant N.C. State professor who specializes in turf grass management, said closing the course is key to ensuring that it is in the best possible shape. A greenskeeper at Oakmont Country Club in Pennsylvania before the 1994 Open, Tredway recalled that the course was never closed and was difficult to prepare for the tournament.
One of the worst things for a golf course's condition, he said, is golf.
"Having that time for a golf course to recover is really essential to producing a top-quality golf course," he said.
Jett and his crew will do all they can to bring the course to its best condition. They'll take off all the markings of ordinary golf courses -- ball washers, ropes and signs to direct golf carts. They'll test the newly expanded irrigation systems, sprinkle a light coat of fertilizer on the famous domed greens, pick up cones dropped by the longleaf pines and mow, carefully and often.
Then they'll hope the sun does its work.
Unseasonably warm weather in January awoke the normally dormant Bermuda grass that covers all but the Pinehurst greens -- the surfaces on which players putt the ball into the cup -- and exposed the turf to winter damage. An unusually cool and wet spring has reduced the run of 80-degree or hotter days that the Bermuda needs to thrive.
It worked in '99
As the weeks count down to the Open, Jett thinks the sun will come out in time, just as it did before the 1999 Open.
"We grew all the rough in '99 in about three weeks prior to the tournament," he said of the higher grass that penalizes errant shots. "We had this same scenario in '99. It was warm and cloudy and cool. When I find myself getting anxious, I just remind myself of what happened in '99 and go about my business."
Work during the final weeks leading to the Open will attempt to bring a crystalline focus to changes long in the making. Since 1999, Pinehurst's bunkers have been filled with a brighter, more playable sand from a site near Rockingham. The Bermuda rough, a feature added in the 1970s, will be allowed to grow to 3 inches, the USGA's preferred height for the Open and about twice as high as usual. The fairways, usually 30 to 35 yards wide, have been narrowed to 24 to 26 yards.
The greens, the hallmark of Pinehurst No. 2, will be cut to one-eighth of an inch. By the first practice rounds June 13, the greens will register about 11.5 feet on the Stimpmeter, a tool that measures the speed of greens based on how far a golf ball rolls off the ramplike device. Some championships, such as The Masters, feature greens as fast as 13, but they do not have the domed shapes and slick sides of Pinehurst.
While Jett and his crew pamper and groom Pinehurst, they'll also be pushing it toward the limits of playability. They want hard fairways and fast greens, but not too hard or too fast.
At the 2004 Open at Shinnecock Hills on Long Island, N.Y., a hot wind dried out the course. The seventh green became so fast that at one point Kevin Stadler saw his 3-foot putt roll 30 feet past the hole and off the green. Greenskeepers intervened to soften the green with water. All of the other greens were watered, too.
Afterward, USGA Vice President Walter Driver defended the course conditions. "We are not trying to humiliate the best players in the world," he said. "We're trying to identify them."
Hot and dry, please
If No. 2 is wound too tight during these two weeks, Pinehurst could lose face. The greenskeepers want sun, but too much could harden the greens to the point that even well-aimed shots roll off.
Geoff Shackleford, a golf writer who teaches a golf-course restoration class at Harvard's School of Design, said, "That course could get away from them so quickly. It could be so much worse than what happened at Shinnecock if it dries out and they push the greens too hard. Every green at Pinehurst is like the seventh at Shinnecock."
Right now, hot and dry weather is a problem Jett would welcome.
"If we've got to get out and hand-water a green during the week, we will do that, and the USGA will expect us to do that," he said.
Jett hopes it doesn't come to that.
"Saturday or Sunday [June 11 or 12], we'll hit [the greens] with a light application of fertilizer," he said. "We do want them to grow during the week."
Jett also doesn't want the course so tight it can't be eased back for normal golfers two days after the Open ends.
"We've got to have a golf course on Tuesday that resort guests and members can play," he said.
CLOSING FOR THE OPEN
Starting today, Pinehurst No. 2 will be closed to the public as maintenance crews prepare it for the U.S. Open, whichstarts June 16.
The hiatus allows the course's turf to heal and helps workers apply the finishing touches.
TO-DO LIST FOR CREWS
* Remove the stuff of amateur play: ball washers, cart signs, tee markers.
* Install new pins and flags.
* Set first cut of rough at 1 1/2 inches, second cut at 3 inches, standard U.S. Golf Association length for Open championship.
* Lightly fertilize greens to avoid burnout.
* Test irrigation system.
* Make sure all sprinkler heads are marked with correct distances to holes.
* Collect grass clippings from fairway; pick up pine cones.
PINEHURST'S GREEN ARMY
Pinehurst's regular crew of 28 turf maintenance people will be increased to 88 for the Open. Most of the additional workers will be superintendents and assistant superintendents from other courses who volunteer to help. Among them will be Gordon McKie, superintendent at Scotland's famed St. Andrews, where Donald Ross, the architect of Pinehurst, once worked the greens.
THEIR TOOLS
Pinehurst equipment will also be increased to ensure daily mowing is complete by the first tee time each day of the four-day tournament (7 a.m. Thursday and Friday, 8 to 8:30 a.m. Saturday and Sunday). The mower manufacturer Toro is lending Pinehurst extra equipment, including four fairway mowers.
HERE'S THE LINEUP:
11 greens mowers
6 fairway mowers
6 triplex mowers for around the greens
3 tee mowers
3 walk mowers
(PINEHURST RESORTS, U.S. GOLF ASSOCIATION, STAFF REPORTS)
State program gives away hives to restore honeybee population
May 31, 2005
Greensboro News & Record
By Mark Binker
© Copyright 2005
RALEIGH -- In February, a neighbor stopped by Jim Beeson's house with an advertisement for a state program that would give beehives to prospective amateur beekeepers.
A few months later, Beeson was one of 250 people across the state to take home a pair of honeybee hives, courtesy of the N.C. Cooperative Extension and a grant from the Golden Leaf Foundation.
"I don't expect to get any honey from it this year," said Beeson, who also tends a half-acre fruit and vegetable garden on land on which he plans to build a house on Thacker Dairy Road in Summerfield.
State agriculture officials hope that hobbyists like Beeson will help bolster the number of honeybees, which have been plagued by diseases and parasites, particularly mites that feed on bee larvae.
"Nationwide, we lost about half the honeybee colonies we had going into the winter," said David Tarpy, an assistant professor at N.C. State and the N.C. Extension apiculturist. "It's been a real agricultural crisis."
That's because honeybees help pollinate many fruit and vegetable crops, including cucumbers, apples, blueberries and melons. To boot, bees and bee-related products -- beeswax and honey -- account for a $10 million-a-year industry in the state.
Commercial beekeepers sometimes lease their bees to farmers, placing hives in the middle of fields that need pollination. So do some hobbyists.
"I'm a sideliner," said Kurt Bower, a Julian resident who describes himself as halfway between a hobbyist and a professional. "I'm trying to make sure my bees pay for themselves."
Bower, who has been keeping bees for seven years, heads the Guilford County Beekeepers Association. He said there were more than 90 members in the club.
Under the state plan to give new beekeepers hives, experienced apiculturalists were paired with the novices. Bower serves as Beeson's mentor.
Beeson doesn't plan on leasing his bees anytime soon, but the interest sparked by the state program has already prompted him to acquire additional hives.
Hearing that more than 2,700 people applied for 250 spots in the program, Beeson and a friend bought four hives on their own before finding out he would get two from the state.
After collecting a loose swarm this week, the two have five hives plus the two from the state.
Besides increasing the honeybee population, the new beekeepers may help figure out how to breed hardier bees. Each of the two hives has a different species of queen.
Tarpy said the new beekeepers will report on which hives resist mites better.
"It's been all new to me," said Willis Carmichael of Greensboro, another new beekeeper to get hives through the program. "I'm 75, and there's not a whole lot that's new to you when you're 75."
Five days after picking up his new hives from the state, Carmichael was pleased last week when he found that the queen bee in both his hives had emerged from a protective box to take up her throne.
Carmichael keeps his bees at property owned by Holy Trinity Episcopal Church that is used to grow food for the needy. Besides pollinating the garden, the bees should start making honey next year.
"We'll probably give it away to people when we start collecting it," Carmichael said.
Neither Beeson nor Carmichael seemed worried about the prospect of getting stung.
Beeson has two grade-school-aged boys who have been interested in his work with the hives.
"It's more dangerous for my kids to be in an automobile than stand in front of a beehive," Beeson said.
Tarpy said honeybees don't sting unless provoked to defend their hive, and most die immediately after they do. But they often get the bad rap for their more aggressive cousins, wasps and yellow jackets.
Carmichael said he hasn't been stung often but remembers his first one, which he got after opening the lid to a friend's hive too quickly.
"So they say people who keep bees aren't bothered by arthritis, and I know why now," Carmichael said. "A bee sting makes you forget about everything else."
Contact Mark Binker at (919) 832-5549 or mbinker@news-record.com
About the Bees
The N.C. Cooperative Extension office gave away 250 pairs of hives to new beekeepers
across the state this year. The program hopes to bolster the population of
honeybees, which have been hurt by disease and parasites.
For more information about bees and beekeeping, go to:
• www.cals.ncsu.edu/entomology/apiculture/
• www.ncbeekeepers.org
Senate's tuition foray rare, dicey
May 31, 2005
Durham Herald Sun
By ERIC FERRERI
© Copyright 2005
CHAPEL HILL -- In wading into the delicate matter of public university tuition, the N.C. Senate has gone where few state legislatures have dared to, a higher education expert says.
A special provision in the N.C. Senate's recent draft budget would allow the state's two major research institutions -- UNC Chapel Hill and N.C. State -- to set tuition rates without the approval of the UNC system's Board of Governors.
Though similar initiatives have been proposed in recent years in other states, none have come to fruition without significant alteration, and legislatures have been slow to pit public university campuses against their governing boards.
"I think there's a real hesitation on the part of legislatures to get between the campuses and their systems," said Travis Reindl, director of state policy analysis for the American Association of State Colleges and Universities. "You can create some real havoc in terms of who's in charge. Frankly, it promotes end-runs around systems."
In fact, just that sort of end-run had some members of the UNC system's Board of Governors grumbling in recent weeks following the revelation that members of UNC Chapel Hill Chancellor James Moeser's cabinet helped craft the legislative provision.
Several high-ranking administrators at the state's flagship campus helped staffers in Senate President Marc Basnight's office put the legislation together; they did so at Basnight's request, but clearly wouldn't mind a little more freedom to set their own tuition. Leaders at the Chapel Hill campus have been extremely vocal in recent months about the need for higher tuition as a way to raise revenue. The system's board opted earlier this year not to request a tuition increase for in-state undergraduates.
Moeser has not taken a public stand on the special provision that would give his campus autonomy, since doing so would place him in a delicate political situation. But Richard "Stick" Williams, who chairs the Chapel Hill campus's board of trustees, was less wary in his recent comments.
Speaking at a recent board meeting, Williams offered effusive praise for the senators who pushed the plan through.
"I am very happy that leaders of the Senate realized what we're trying to do for the state and weighed in on it," Williams said last week. "I gotta tell you, that was leadership."
In other states, similar proposals -- usually generated by campuses and not by politicians -- have proven too dicey for legislators to support unless they benefit all state universities and not just a couple of elite institutions.
In Florida in 2003, officials at the University of Florida and at Florida State University asked legislators for a fixed amount of funding each year, a move that would allow those institutions to avoid sweating through the budget process each year. In exchange, those universities promised to serve a specific, minimum number of students each year while also guaranteeing that all graduates of their teaching and nursing programs would receive jobs -- or their tuition money back.
The leaders of Florida's nine other public universities balked at first, then lobbied to be included in the plan. But legislators never took to the proposal, and college presidents, wary of the inevitable public relations battle facing them, backed off, according to several Florida news reports.
In Virginia last year, the state's three most prominent public universities -- Virginia Tech, William & Mary and the University of Virginia -- pushed legislation that would let them set their own tuition and make some other administrative decisions.
Virginia's legislature approved the measure earlier this year, but not before changing it to include benefits for all state universities.
"This issue of greater flexibility for certain campuses can be very sticky," said Reindl, the policy analyst. "Legislators, generally around the country, don't like to own tuition?setting decisions. You can be very popular one day and very unpopular the next."
Students hope for vote on UNC board
May 30, 2005
Greensboro News & Record
By Chris Coletta
© Copyright 2005
Dara Edelman says she feels the rumblings of change. Victor Landry feels them, too.
Edelman is the outgoing UNCG student body president. Landry is a master's degree student at Fayetteville State University who's been active in student advocacy.
Both support a plan that students say would give them more of a voice on the UNC Board of Governors -- the body that sets policy for the system's 16 campuses, including UNCG and N.C. A&T.
The bill would give the board's student representative a vote, a power denied to that post since students first won a seat at the table in 1991.
It has the co-sponsorship of 23 of the 50 members of the state Senate, including all four Guilford County senators. It passed through the state House in a push led by Democratic Rep. Alma Adams of Guilford County.
Edelman and Landry are excited.
"I think we have a pretty good chance this year," Landry said.
Somehow, though, the bill is stuck in the Rules Committee of the Senate -- a place where legislation goes to die.
How did that happen? Ask Phil Berger -- the Senate minority leader whose district includes Guilford County -- and he's unequivocal in his response.
"I think you ought to talk to Senator Rand about that," he said.
That would be Tony Rand, the Senate majority leader from Cumberland County.
For years, Rand has opposed giving students a vote on the Board of Governors. Every time such a bill has made it through the House, he's used his position as chairman of the Rules Committee to table it.
The question is whether this year will be any different. Repeated calls to Rand's legislative office and his workplace weren't returned Friday. However, Landry said the large number of senators supporting the bill has made the majority leader more amicable to change than in the past.
"(Rand) has said that he's going to talk to some people as opposed to just flat-out saying no," he said.
Local UNC-system students say efforts to get Rand to cooperate resonate at least as much here as they do in Chapel Hill and Raleigh, the system's twin centers.
The past five presidents of the system's Association of Student Governments -- the student who usually assumes a post on the Board of Governors -- hailed from either UNC-Chapel Hill or N.C. State.
Edelman said that when about 20 students from UNCG went to Raleigh in February and met with members of the local delegation, the student vote was one of their key concerns. Berger said they came off as well-informed, though he wasn't sure whether the issue was as important to them as to other students.
"Students, especially students in our student government, are very concerned about not having a voice on the Board of Governors," Edelman said.
But board member Ray Farris of Charlotte, who has publicly expressed his opposition to the student vote, said students' ability to advocate actually would be diminished under the plan.
Voting board members are required to be impartial policy-makers, he said, and can't advocate for one group as students now do.
"I think it would be difficult for a student representative to take a certain position (and have a vote)," he said. "They are expected to advocate for students. We lose the whole purpose of having a student on the board by having them do as others do."
The current student member, N.C. State graduate student Amanda Devore, has a busy board-related schedule. She serves on its educational policy committee and Chairman Brad Wilson recently tapped her to help pick a successor for outgoing UNC President Molly Broad.
Devore was on vacation Friday and was unavailable for comment. Wilson called her work "effective and helpful" and said it shows that students are fully capable of participating in the university's affairs -- even without a vote.
As for the proposal now in the Rules Committee, Wilson said: "I don't think the likelihood of success is very great."
NCSU students tackle the Mississippi by canoe
May 30, 2005
News & Observer
By TIM SIMMONS
© Copyright 2005
When John Pugh finished hiking
the Appalachian Trail in 2000, he promised himself he would do "something cool" at
least once every five years.
Canoeing the entire Mississippi River in 75 days is cool.
Which explains why Pugh and girlfriend Jessica Robinson -- both N.C. State University students earning doctoral degrees in parks, recreation and tourism management -- were having fun canoeing through northern Minnesota in a hail storm recently.
For those of us inclined to seek shelter when it hails, Pugh and Robinson had an even cooler idea. They are inviting anyone with an Internet connection to join them on their 2,350-mile trip down the Mississippi -- an adventure that promises to be a mix of wonder, challenge, humor and a bit of the unexpected.
It is not, however, a journey of man against nature. Nature, as Pugh points out, can squash people like a bug if it wishes.
"I'm not a big believer in 'conquering' the outdoors or nature," Pugh writes in his online journal. "The only thing that will be conquered on this trip will be some anxiety about the unknown and a scorching addiction to Dr Pepper."
Before Pugh gets to the part of the story where he talks about the amazing wildlife and the rigors of paddling day after day, he answers the question many people ask straight away. How can a young couple expect to spend more than two months in an 18 1/2-foot canoe without killing each other?
He considers this a logical question with a simple answer.
They enjoy each other's company. They enjoy it so much they lived together in a straw bale yurt while he was in grad school in Ohio. A yurt is a little one-room house -- in this case about 256 square feet of little -- where the rent is incredibly cheap.
Having successfully lived in a yurt for two years, Pugh and Robinson got the idea of paddling down the Mississippi while leading a canoe trip through Georgia's Okefenokee Swamp in 2002.
Their idea blossomed into a plan after visiting a friend in Mississippi a short time later. The plan then took on an educational bent -- and the name "Source to Sea Expedition" -- thanks to the Audubon Society and the NCSU College of Natural Resources.
Audubon is in the midst of a program called the Upper Mississippi River Campaign, designed to help people see the connection between a healthy river and healthy communities. By mixing hours of paddling and camping with online reports and occasional interviews, Pugh and Robinson hope to do their part in the awareness effort.
A winding start
But at the Mississippi's headwaters, about 125 miles south of Canada, there really was no river to paddle. What Pugh and Robinson found there was little more than shifting channels in a creek filled with cattails and rushes. The depth of the near-freezing water could be measured in inches. The only way to find the path of the Mississippi was to look closely at the river grass swaying in the current.
"Lose your patience or take the wrong channel and you find yourself wandering around the wetlands," Pugh said. "Channels open and close so often that a map and compass are pretty useless."
It didn't take long before the waters that run from Lake Itasca became a river that revealed the importance of this waterway. The Mississippi River basin drains more than 40 percent of America's waters and serves as the migratory flyway for 60 percent of North America's birds.
The two paddlers have already found themselves staring at eagles, pelicans and trumpeter swans that stop, then stare back at them.
"The wildlife is phenomenal," Robinson wrote in her online journal the first day. "Birds and fish everywhere. Also lots of little animal homes."
While Pugh and Robinson share an appreciation of how little humans are in the grand scheme of the universe, it is Robinson who is less likely to dwell on the detail of things. Her entries make a grand elliptical swing from simple observations to old memories to expectations for the future -- all in one paragraph.
"The wind at this campsite sounds like we are at Grayson Highlands in Virginia on the top of some bald," she wrote. "I find that somewhat comforting in this flat, remote and foreign landscape.
"Every time I have visited the Grayson Highlands/Mount Rogers area I have seen hypothermic Boy Scouts. I don't know why, but there is always at least one, but usually many, Boy Scouts in 40-degree weather decked out in soaking wet T-shirt and jeans, no jacket. Although the weather here is much cooler currently, I do not expect to see Scouts with blue lips and loud voices.
"Tomorrow will be a good day. NOAA says it will be nicer. We will hit some Class I rapids and beaver dams. I am hoping that the wind will die down a bit."
High wind, heavy load
The wind did die down, but only temporarily. By the time the pair reached Lake Winnibigoshish about four days into the trip, the winds were blowing at 30 mph, and the waves were far too large to tackle. Although Pugh and Robinson both love a challenge, neither is fond of outright danger. It was time for a break.
Lake Winnie -- as the locals call it -- eventually turned out to be one long day of skirting the shore while paddling directly into a 15-mph wind for most of the trip.
It would be several days before the pair approached the northernmost point of the journey, not far from Grand Rapids, Minn. Traveling north for days on a river that flows south to the Gulf of Mexico is just one of the oddities of the trip.
But first, they were greeted by a portage -- a four-letter word used by many canoeists that means carry all your gear and your boat around a dam or obstacle.
This portage was the longest of the trip, at more than half a mile. But on the other side was 100 miles of open river with good current. Neither Pugh nor Robinson knows exactly what to expect, but they have a good sense of what's happening.
"This trip is not me," Robinson wrote in her journal. "It is bigger than me."
FOLLOW ALONG
The News & Observer will catch up with John Pugh and Jessica Robinson, above, at several points during the trip, but you can follow more closely at www.source2sea.info. The site contains journal entries, e-mail addresses, pictures, links to the Upper Mississippi River Campaign and other information.
May 28, 2005
News & Observer
By RYAN TEAGUE BECKWITH
© Copyright 2005
When you're done with this newspaper, Mort Barlaz would like to take a look at it -- in about 18 years.
Don't worry about saving it for him, though. Unless you recycle, he may just find it among your trash at a Wake County landfill.
Barlaz, a professor of environmental engineering at N.C. State University, is a connoisseur of garbage, and lately his interest has drifted toward paper.
Most kinds will do: old photocopies, used envelopes and fading newspapers are all fair game.
With a team of 20 researchers from across the United States and Canada and as far away as Australia, Barlaz went digging for paper Thursday in the North Wake landfill off Durant Road.
His mission: to determine how rotting paper contributes to global warming.
When buried in a landfill, paper products decompose, releasing carbon dioxide and methane, greenhouse gases that trap heat from the sun in the Earth's atmosphere.
There's not much anyone can do about carbon dioxide, but landfill operators try to capture as much methane as they can before it gets into the air.
At the Wake landfill, a system of pipes collects about 1,500 cubic feet of methane per minute -- enough to supply 3,000 homes with electricity. The gas is used by the pharmaceutical company Mallinckrodt to run boilers.
Scientists aren't sure how fast paper rots in a landfill.
If it only takes a few years, landfill operators will need to do more to capture methane up front. If it takes decades, they will have to plan for longer-term maintenance on the pipes.
To find out, Barlaz put on a pair of thick gardening gloves and spent several hours picking through trash from a hole the size of a small car.
Rotting leaves. An empty cigarette carton. A can of White Rain hairspray.
Finally, Barlaz found what he was looking for. A copy of The News & Observer from Nov. 7, 1987, and an Elderhostel catalog from that year. An article about the proposed "Star Wars" missile defense system and smiling seniors on vacation were still legible.
Barlaz was not surprised.
Because it is not as heavily processed, newsprint lasts longer than most other paper in a landfill. White office paper, which has been reduced to almost pure cellulose, decomposes quickly in the presence of anaerobic bacteria.
"The bugs just love cellulose," said Sam Bateman, a landfill operator from Melbourne, Australia. "It's like Big Macs to them."
Because of that, office paper decomposes relatively quickly -- perhaps in less than a decade. During the morning dig, the only white paper Barlaz found was a lined sheet from a notebook.
After a brief snack, the team went to look for more paper in another part of the landfill. Along the way, they discussed what they had found, posed for snapshots and traded jokes about garbage -- or "rubbish" in the words of the Australians.
"Hey, David, what do you call a landfill with three lawyers' heads sticking out?" Barlaz asked.
Australian wood researcher David Gardner shrugged.
"Insufficient ground cover."
After a brief lunch, the team began a second dig at a newer section of the landfill. The garbage smelled stronger, but the dig was more successful. Within minutes, the team found discarded memos and an old newspaper from 2000.
Barlaz put the paper and his other finds into 10 large Ziploc bags and a 20-gallon plastic bin, bound for cold storage in his lab at N.C. State. Eventually, he will test them to see how much of the paper has been converted to methane and carbon dioxide.
The other researchers joked that Barlaz should get a refund for removing garbage from the landfill. In that case, an even bigger refund would be on the way, Barlaz explained.
For a separate project, he'll stop by next week to pick up about 500 pounds of fresh trash, including, perhaps, this newspaper.
May 28, 2005
News & Observer
By CATHERINE CLABBY
© Copyright 2005
The question Garrett Love recently posed to a group of high school biology students will never appear on a test. But a correct answer might save lives.
Love described how UNC-Chapel Hill scientists discovered a chemical compound that may help people with the lethal lung disease cystic fibrosis. "How can we test that it works?" he asked the students, gathered in a Meredith College classroom in Raleigh.
The students, from faraway North Iredell High School and nearby Raleigh Latin High School, threw out idea after idea about what must be known. "Hold on," Love said, trying to capture each on a white board. "I can only write so fast."
This high school brainstorming came courtesy of the Contemporary Science Center, one North Carolina group pushing for expanding high school science lessons that move beyond book learning to hands-on discovery.
Such an approach, advocates hope, will improve North Carolina student performance in the sciences. Nationally, the state still ranks among the mediocre.
"One of the reasons we have so many high school students dropping out of high school is that they are bored to death from reading textbooks and answering questions," said Brenda Evans of the N.C. Infrastructure for Science Education. "That is not the way to learn."
Pamela Blizzard of Raleigh created the nonprofit Contemporary Science Center to expose students statewide to real science conducted in Research Triangle Park. Evans' group, and others such as The Science House at N.C. State University, focus more on enriching what occurs in classrooms back home.
Blizzard's approach grew out of early planning for Raleigh Charter High School, a college prep school she helped found in 1999 that favors hands-on learning. Backed by private companies and science-related nonprofits, the center offers free, daylong programs in which students encounter the same kind of challenges as real laboratories.
Students can't just listen, they must act. They apply the mathematical and science skills acquired back home. To fully participate, they must think.
"The kids are taught at their maturity level and intelligence level. We're taking their fundamental knowledge where they can apply it," Blizzard said.
Stoking inquisitiveness
Love, a high-voltage Shodor Education Foundation educator, started with some basics during a recent daylong program developed with help from Inspire Pharmaceuticals.
He let girls swat boys with long strips of neon-colored foam to demonstrate the way cilia -- microscopic hairs -- are supposed to sweep mucus from the surface of lungs.
That process doesn't work well in people with cystic fibrosis. A genetic mutation robs them of water needed by their lungs, so bacteria-laden mucus sticks and creates dangerous infections. A new drug under development by Inspire, using UNC-CH research, holds promise of moving more water where it is needed.
But how can science measure its effects?
"It's exciting that we don't know the answer," said Ashley Talley, a junior from North Iredell, an hour west of Charlotte, as she absorbed the sum of what Garrett shared.
Talley and the other students donned blue paper lab coats, safety glasses and purple gloves to perform tests on real human lung cells to find things out. Using pipettes normally found in research labs, the students applied different doses of different compounds to their cells to see what happened.
Throughout the day, North Iredell Advanced Placement biology teacher Crystal McDowell did what the students did, step by step.
Unlike some teachers, McDowell embraces inquiry-style instruction in her class. She tries to get her students to as many good off-campus programs as she can afford. The fact that the Contemporary Science Center's program was free made the trip easier.
"My job is to provide the best opportunities I can find. But I have to find the resources to do it," McDowell said.
Some schools lose out
Such resources -- money, materials and inspirational training for teachers -- aren't shared equally by all North Carolina school districts, said Renee Coward, president of the N.C. Science Teachers Association.
Poorer districts are less likely to retain teachers with specialized science training or to buy equipment needed to really dig into topics. They are more likely to depend on textbooks and tests to pass along their lessons.
"You need microscopes, gels, bacteria. That costs money," Coward said.
North Carolina's lackluster standing on science test scores -- eighth-graders ranked 27th out of 50 in the most recent national ranking -- suggests change is needed. So do end-of-course results that find one-third of the state's high school students complete required biology and physical science classes without acquiring the minimum knowledge that's expected.
After a break during the day at Meredith, the students moved from cell samples to computers. Love loaded laptops with results from experiments similar to what they conducted.
He had the students use basic math to average the measurements taken from cells treated with the same compound. He required them to apply basic algebra to plot a curve to represent their results.
"If one person in your group is doing all the math, you are not doing yourself any favors," said Love, as he whisked from work station to work station.
One by one, kids who hadn't touched a computer started poking at keys, each trying to move their team through one more step of their research.
May 29, 2005
News & Observer
By staff report
© Copyright 2005
Every night at 11 p.m., Deborah Stallings climbs to the third floor of Harrelson Hall on N.C. State University's main campus.
By day, graduate students float through Harrelson's third-floor lounge. Math and history students pour in and out of classrooms.
But at night the quiet corridors belong to Stallings, who is a housekeeper, one of the lowest-paid employees of North Carolina state government. She works the third shift, Sunday through Thursday.
And after nearly 16 years, she earns $20,171 -- 125 percent of the federal poverty level for a family of three.
Stallings' husband, Ken, is a housekeeper in the private sector. But he logs only 15 hours a week and is looking for full-time work.
That means the Stallingses are poor enough for their 11-year-old daughter, Gabryelle, to qualify for Health Choice, the government health insurance program for children of the working poor.
It means Ken Stallings has no health coverage at all. The family coverage available through Deborah's state job, at $427 a month, is unaffordable.
It means the Stallingses can't afford a telephone at their apartment on Trinity Road in West Raleigh. And it means they must share a single vehicle, a 1993 Ford Aerostar, to get to work, run errands and pick up Gabryelle from school.
The Stallingses are educated -- and proud of it. She has a four-year degree in early childhood education from St. Augustine's College; he has a two-year degree in business administration from the now-defunct Hardbarger Junior College.
They blame their financial straits on the economy. Ken Stallings, who lost his machinist's job of 14 years when the company moved overseas, is uncomfortable that the family must survive on little more than his wife's pay.
"Most of my life I've always tried to pull the weight," he said over a fish sandwich recently at the Burger King on New Bern Avenue. "I'm not where I want to be."
Still, the Stallingses lavish attention on Gabryelle, a rising sixth-grader who wants to be a lawyer one day. They send her to Creech Road Elementary School in Garner because they weren't happy with her base school. They know her teachers, help her with her homework.
"You want the cheesecake for dessert?" her mother asked gently at Burger King.
Gabryelle helps them, too. Deborah Stallings began a two-year computer skills program in January. Gabryelle helps her with her studies.
Deborah and Ken, however, fret the bigger problems alone.
"It's hard," Deborah said, her voice soft and tired. "It's really hard."
May 28, 2005
News & Observer
By staff report
© Copyright 2005
Food institute awards faculty
Jon Allen, MaryAnne Drake, Brian Farkas and Donn Ward, faculty members of N.C. State University's department of food science, are recipients of several major awards from the Institute of Food Technologies.
Allen is the 2005 winner of the Babcock-Hart Award given for research contributions in nutrition and public health.
Drake is the 2005 winner of the Samuel Cate Prescott Award given to a young scientist for outstanding research contributions.
Farkas is the 2005 winner of the William V. Cruess Award for excellence in teaching. He is the fourth member of the faculty to win this award.
Ward was elected as a fellow of the institute for 2005. Election as an IFT Fellow is a professional distinction conferred for overall contributions in the field of food science and technology.
NCSU faculty, staff receive ag awards
N.C. State University faculty and staff members recently received awards during the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences State Extension Conference at the McKimmon Center.
The awards, given by the N.C. Cooperative Extension Service Foundation and the N.C. State Grange, recognize and promote professional excellence within all facets of cooperative extension.
Specialist category: Carolyn Dunn, nutrition specialist in the Family and Consumer Sciences Department;
Resource development in family and consumer sciences: Dunn and Sandy Zaslow, department head in Family and Consumer Sciences, along with team member Nancy Abasiekong of the Cleveland County center of the N.C. Cooperative Extension;
Community and rural development and natural resources: William Hunt, specialist, and Jonathan Smith, extension assistant, of the Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department, and team members William Lord, Franklin County center, and Kenneth Bateman, Johnston County center.
May 28, 2005
News & Observer
By Joyce Sykes
© Copyright 2005
LANGUAGE SYMPOSIUM: An English as a Second Language Symposium will be held Thursday and Friday at the Jane S. McKimmon Center at N.C. State University. For more information and a complete schedule of events, visit sasw .chass.ncsu.edu/esl/2005_symposium _index.html.
May 27, 2005
WUNC The State of Things
By staff report
© Copyright 2005
Dr. Michael Cobb, political science and public administration, and Dr. Joe DeSimone, chemical engineering, appeared on WUNC Radio's The State of Things program on Friday, May 27. The show centered on nanotechnology.
Armfuls of passion and fashion
May 31, 2005
Charlotte Observer
By CELESTE SMITH
© Copyright 2005
It's the must-have accessory spotted on wrists everywhere: rubber bracelets letting wearers sport their statement -- or style -- right on their sleeve.
Inspired by last summer's "LiveStrong" yellow bracelet craze for cyclist Lance Armstrong's cancer foundation, the wrist bands now exist for seemingly every cause and color imaginable.
Eleven-year-old Shannon Gerring's collection of 13 bracelets includes "Wave of Relief," founded by her very own Lake Norman Charter School in Huntersville for tsunami victims.
Gerring's purple bracelet vows she'll read over the summer. Another one says "Excellence." She spotted one on the Internet she wants to order: "Jesus Loves Me."
"I have so much, it would go up to my elbow," she said. "I just wear a couple at a time."
Many bracelets represent serious causes. Pay a dollar or more for a band, and the money goes to a charity -- from cancer to heart disease.
But thanks to the power of pop culture, other variations have more to do with fashion than fundraising.
Head into a clothing store targeted to pre-teens and high-schoolers and you'll likely find bands stamped with inspirational messages, such as "Faith" and "Courage." Or defining points, such as "Slacker" or "Princess." Or ones celebrating athletic teams, such as UNC Chapel Hill's basketball championship. Owners will even barter with peers if they can't find one matching the outfit, mood or interest they want.
"They're fun, they're inexpensive, they're glittery. We have aroma ones," said Alana Troy, district manager at Wet Seal, a juniors clothing retailer that sells the bracelets at its Concord Mills Mall store for $1.50 each. All these fashion statements crawling up the arms of students raised eyebrows at one Mooresville school. A recent intercom announcement commended students for supporting causes, but went on to say that "if we shoot them at people, we're not allowed to wear them anymore," according to Chelsie Danyels, 14, who chooses daily among her collection of 12 charity and statement bracelets.
Fourteen-year-old Danny Williamson of Concord, who plays several sports, wears a white "Player" bracelet -- part of the Nike line of "Baller ID Bands." He's also wearing a gray band with the Adidas logo because "I thought it looked cool." His standbys are usually bands that match his blue and white school colors, along with his yellow "LiveStrong" bracelet.
The proliferation of rubber bracelets has some warning buyer beware, since many brands are made and sold for profit instead of charity. And some purchasers buying charity bracelets are more concerned with being trendy than donating to a cause.
But being chic does not necessarily dilute the compassion message, some say.
Last year's yellow bracelet phenomenon emerged as an important cultural icebreaker, said Sue Heiney, manager of psychosocial oncology at the S.C. Cancer Center in Columbia.
"People are still very afraid to talk about cancer," Heiney said. "The bracelet lets us say something that we don't know how to say with words. They're a symbol of caring."
The bracelet craze reminds Barbara Metelsky, director of the Institute for Nonprofits at N.C. State, of other charitable initiatives that moved into popular culture. In the early 1990s, casual Fridays started as a charity in some companies, Metelsky said, where employees made donations to a charity in exchange for dressing down that day.
Eventually, as more companies allowed casual Fridays, "the charitable donations got lost," Metelsky said.
Even as new themed bracelets emerge regularly, signs are emerging of the rubber bracelet boom going bust.
About 20 of those "LiveStrong" bracelets -- almost impossible to get last summer as Armstrong rode to a record-breaking sixth-straight Tour de France victory -- were stacked near a cash register at the Nike Factory Store in Concord Mills last week.
Jada Jung, 20, an assistant manager at Wet Seal, won't wear her rubber bracelets anymore.
"Working in retail, you see a lot of trends," Jung said. "When they get big, you know they're about to go out."
Banding Together
Here is a small sampling of rubber bracelet colors and causes spotted on the Internet and around the area:
CHARLOTTE AREA
WHITE AND BLUE: "Keep Pounding," cancer research fundraiser co-sponsored by the Carolina Panthers and Carolinas HealthCare Foundation.
RED AND WHITE: Worn by North Mecklenburg High School students in awareness and memory of classmate Michael Duni Jr., who died in December of alcohol poisoning.
GREEN: "Julian Brown/Finish Strong," honoring the late Myers Park High School freshman and soccer standout.
RED: "Race City USA" souvenir from the Mooresville Convention & Visitor's Bureau.
OTHERS
RED: Be Active North Carolina Inc., promoting healthy lifestyles; tsunami relief.
PINK: Breast cancer awareness
CAMOUFLAGE: Military support
BLUE: "Life Is A Team Sport" bands from Hendrick Motorsports helping bone marrow transplant patients; "Got Guts" for Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America.
New system turns hog waste into clean water
May 27, 2005
CBS News; Columbia Daily Tribune, MO; Globetechnology.com, Canada; Monterey County Herald, CA; Pittsburg Morning Sun, KS; San Diego Union Tribune, CA
By WILLIAM L. HOLMES, AP
© Copyright 2005
AYDEN, N.C. - Don Lloyd dipped his bottle into a tank of water that had been flushed out of three nearby pens filled with thousands of hogs just six hours earlier.
"There, that's pig water," he proclaimed as he held up the bottle and tipped it back for a thirst-quenching chug.
Lloyd's recent demonstration wasn't designed to gross people out, but to show his confidence in a treatment system that he developed to purify the putrid, waste-filled water dumped into so-called hog lagoons across North Carolina.
North Carolina has 10 million hogs at any given time - more than any other state except Iowa - and the hog lagoons constructed to hold hog waste have aroused the ire of environmentalists and neighbors who say the foul smell hurts property values.
If approved, a system like Lloyd's could represent a major development in North Carolina's $1.5 billion hog industry, the state's No. 1 farm commodity in 2003.
"The data that we have seen so far on this system is encouraging," said Mike Williams, a North Carolina State University professor overseeing an evaluation of several alternatives to traditional hog waste lagoons.
Lloyd's pilot system, developed at Little Creek Hog Farms here, cleans out three hog houses four times a day, churning out potable water within six hours. The water is then recycled to water the hogs. Solid waste strained from the water is mixed with high-carbon cotton plant remnants to make compost.
The $150,000 system, developed with help from a state environmental grant, includes pipes that run from flushing tanks through the hog houses and into purifying tanks.
The environmental group Sustainable North Carolina joied with hog farmers to develop the project.
The partnership was an unlikely one: Hog lagoons have been attacked by environmentalists as hazards because they emit airborne pollutants and then foul the soil when farmers repeatedly spray their contents over fields as required.
Smithfield Foods, one of the nation's largest pork producers, and Premium Standard Farms, have agreed to start using the new technologies on company-owned farms when it is economically feasible.
Williams, the professor, said he plans to end all of the study projects by the end of the year and then make a recommendation to Attorney General Roy Cooper. The state will then work with the hog companies to get the approved systems in place within the next few years.
Besides Lloyd's system, several other hog water treatment systems have met environmental requirements, but cost up to six times more than the cost to use a hog lagoon. Only a few treatment systems do away with lagoons and just one or two others make the water potable.
Lloyd claims his system makes the water potable and he estimates it may cost 40 percent less to operate than a hog lagoon.
"I know without a doubt we have the components to do away with the lagoon system," Stokes said.
Mary Schweitzer to Discuss Dinosaur Findings at the 2005 ECTS-IBMS Joint Scientific Meeting
May 27, 2005
I-Newswire.com; PR Leap; FinanceVisor.com, CA
By staff report
© Copyright 2005
i-Newswire, 2005-05-27 - Washington, DC — Biologist Mary H. Schweitzer, Ph.D., author of the ground-breaking research paper recently published in Science on the discovery of soft tissue in dinosaur bone, will discuss how these studies relate to the evolution of modern-day animals during the Second Joint Meeting of the European Calcified Tissue Society and the International Bone and Mineral Society in Geneva, Switzerland, 25-29 June 2005.
“Schweitzer’s research contradicts what we thought to be true about the evolution of dinosaurs and the fossilization process, causing scientists everywhere to re-examine the assumptions of their research,” said IBMS President Gregory R. Mundy. “Attendees will benefit from hearing about her remarkable advances in the field of evolutionary bone biology.”
The discovery of soft tissue in a 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex has been publicized in scientific journals and on television programs around the world. Following her initial discovery, Schweitzer has uncovered additional dinosaur specimens with the same soft tissues.
At the Comparative Endocrinology of Calcium Regulation ( CECR ) workshop on 25 June during the ECTS-IBMS Joint Meeting, Schweitzer will discuss the significance of these new findings with regard to the evolution and extinction of dinosaurs, as well as the link to modern-day animals.
Schweitzer is the assistant professor of paleontology at the North Carolina State University with a joint appointment at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. She will be attending the Geneva meeting with help from an unrestricted educational grant supported by the International Bone and Mineral Society and Roche & GSK: A joint force in osteoporosis.
###
The International Bone and Mineral Society ( IBMS ) is the international society working to promote the generation and dissemination of knowledge about bone and mineral metabolism. Together with the European Calcified Tissue Society ( ECTS ), IBMS is hosting the Second Joint Meeting of the ECTS-IBMS to offer participants the opportunity to enhance their knowledge of bone biology, bone diseases and their correlation to mineral metabolism.
The Joint Meeting, held in Geneva, Switzerland, 25-29 June 2005, brings together some 3,000 researchers, clinicians, physicians and other allied health professionals. State-of-the-art research on bone and mineralized tissue, along with diagnostic and therapeutic aspects of metabolic bone diseases will be presented through symposia, workshops, training courses, lectures, posters and Meet the Professor sessions. For more information, please visit www.ects-ibms-2005.org.
Oils, vitamins help ward off biting pests
May 31, 2005
News-Leader.com, MO
By Nina Rao
© Copyright 2005
Michael Meyer won't use DEET, the active ingredient in most bug repellents.
Even when he's waist-deep in tick-infested fields as he tends beehives all across Greene County. Even when he can see ticks quivering on the tips of grass stalks. Even though he's had Lyme disease.
"I don't trust the stuff," he says. "If I can get something natural to (repel bugs), that's what I want."
Meyer uses essential oils and vitamins, and the Internet is swarming with other tips — from using dryer sheets to building bat houses — for those who prefer to live DEET-free. At the same time, the number of DEET-free repellents on the market has multiplied as overall interest in alternative products increases nationwide.
Despite the many alternatives, DEET remains the gold standard to many experts because of its efficacy in repelling bugs and therefore also repelling the diseases they carry. Ticks can carry Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and ehrlichiosis, among other diseases. Mosquitoes transmit the West Nile virus and St. Louis encephalitis.
DEET "is what's been found to be most effective against mosquitoes and ticks," says Clay Goddard, community health planner with the Springfield-Greene County Health Department. "As long as you're following the recommendations, I wouldn't have concerns about your health. ... I don't see the sense of using anything other than DEET."
Debate on DEET
DEET is the repellent recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Web site, which also notes that caution should be used "on children because adverse reactions have been reported."
DEET is also one of the repellents suggested by University of Missouri Extension's Web site.
But there are some concerns with DEET, particularly at high concentrations. A Duke University study, for example, found that prolonged DEET exposure can lead to "problems with muscle coordination, muscle weakness, walking or even memory and cognition," states Duke's medical center news Web site.
And some people may experience adverse skin reactions.
Canada has banned products containing more than a 30 percent concentration of DEET "based on a human health risk assessment that considered daily application of DEET over a prolonged period of time," says the Health Canada Web site.
Concerns over DEET also prompted researchers at the University of Florida and at North Carolina State University to develop plant-derived alternatives.
And there are enough consumers interested that Sharon Trent, a Springfield business owner, has noticed a trend.
Companies "are coming out with more and more of the DEET-free products," says Trent, who manages Winslow Health & Diet Foods on South Glenstone Avenue. Trent estimates the number of products on the market has doubled over the past year.
Homemade repellents
Meyer stumbled onto one of his homemade bug repellents — a mixture of distilled mint and lemongrass oils — because he was using it against mites in his beehives.
"So this was kind of a sidebar discovery, that it keeps ticks away," he says.
Now he sprays a mixture of mineral oil and various distilled plant oils, called essential oils, on his ankles, shoes and pants. He thinks rosemary, mint and pennyroyal oils are particularly effective because ticks and mosquitoes dislike those smells, but he's still experimenting.
"On the other hand," he says, "ticks are tenacious. They will get in (your clothes)."
So for ticks that ignore the external oil spray, Meyer also takes internal bug repellent: garlic and B vitamin. Those two supplements produce a smell that Meyer then secretes. And ticks don't like it.
Not that Meyer is worried about offending the ticks. Not at all.
In fact, he dislikes them so much that he plays a little game with them. It goes like this: He puts a tick on the hood of his car in the scorching sun. If the tick manages to escape, he lets it live.
"No tick has ever won," Meyer says. "But it won't work on a light-colored car."
Then he waves his arms and legs around like a marionette to show how the tick's legs flail before it dies.
But despite his dislike of ticks, Meyer is willing to live with a few of them if it means avoiding DEET.
Even with the essential oils and vitamins, "I know I'll get some tick bites."
Common-sense methods
Eliminating bug exposure is the only way to eliminate the risk of bites, and reducing exposure limits the risk of bites.
Based on that premise, the health department recommends some common-sense solutions that involve no chemicals at all.
Mosquitoes need standing water to reproduce. Solution? Don't let standing water build up close to homes — for example, in old tires or buckets.
Mosquitoes are most active at dawn and dusk. Solution? Stay inside at those times.
Ticks like brush and tall grass. Solution? Mow lawns and trim brush where possible, and stay out of those areas in the woods.
The CDC suggests wearing light-colored clothing, on which ticks show up more easily. That way they can be brushed off before they burrow under the skin.
Wearing long sleeves, tucking shirts into pants and tucking pants into socks reduces exposed skin. Some people even duct tape pants and socks together for added protection.
More alternatives
Other bug-repelling suggestions clutter the Internet.
On www.ehow.com, a site with the motto "Clear Instructions on How To Do (just about) Everything," several postings recommend building bat houses. Bats, after all, eat mosquitoes.
Other postings suggest using a fan to blow bugs away when you're sitting outside.
Then there's rubbing yourself in vinegar, or dryer sheets, or vanilla. Several postings recommend eating bananas. Another suggests not eating bananas.
The Health Department's Goddard is suspicious: "I think they're old wives' tales."
He refers to another site, www.snopes.com, which is dedicated to exploding urban myths and rumors.
That site ridicules bug-repelling ideas such as eating bananas and rubbing yourself with dryer sheets. It also cites a 2002 study showing that repellents containing herbal oils are far less effective than those containing DEET.
Susie Farbin already knows that. She still won't use DEET, not even on her dog, Jade.
Instead, Farbin, who co-owns Mama Jean's Natural Market on South Campbell Avenue, feeds Jade garlic and brewer's yeast, a good source of B vitamins. And she washes Jade with neem tree shampoo.
It helps, but it doesn't eliminate problems.
"It isn't 100 percent," Farbin says. "It really isn't."
Meyer agrees. But he doesn't mind. He'd rather risk a few bites than risk using DEET.
And, he said, there's only one foolproof method: "If you want 100 percent control, don't enter bug areas."
Tick-borne diseases now more prevalent
May 28, 2005
Macon Telegraph, GA
By Steve Dale
© Copyright 2005
Ticks may spread more disease than previously thought. For example, it's been known for many years that dogs can suffer illness because of tick-transmitted Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and a disease called ehrlichiosis. Now, you can add Anaplasma phagocytophylum to the list, according Dr. Stephen Levy of Durham, Conn. In one study, nearly half of all ticks were carrying this newly identified disease.
It seems ticks also carry Bartonella, according to Dr. Ed Breitswerdt, professor of infectious diseases at North Carolina State University College of Veterinary Medicine.
What's more, veterinarians have only recently learned that one individual tick may carry many disease organisms. It's conceivable some dogs diagnosed with Lyme disease are in fact, suffering from a combination of various diseases, all potentially transmitted by a single tick.
That's bad news. And things get worse. It seems there's an exploding population of ticks spreading all these diseases, according to Breitswerdt.
Several factors play a role in the proliferation of ticks. Ticks like the mild winters most of the America has enjoyed in recent years. Record populations of white-tailed deer and other wildlife offer ticks lots of food. As the sprawl of suburbia intersects with forests, more ticks than ever land in back yards. Dogs walk around their neighborhoods or visit local parks and further disperse the ticks.
Some dogs bitten by ticks may die if left untreated. "Of course, protecting against tick diseases is important," says Dr. Michael Dryden, professor of veterinary parisitology at the College of Veterinary Medicine at Kansas State University, Manhattan. "The truth is that we can do a much better job at protecting our pets against fleas than we can ticks."
Dryden says the over-the-counter products are less proven than those available through veterinarians. He rattles off three choices available through vets: Frontline Plus and K-9 Advantix (both monthly spot on products) and Preventic (a tick collar).
Crews build roundabout on campus
May 27, 2005
Roanoke Times, VA; New River Current
By Kevin Miller
© Copyright 2005
BLACKSBURG -- Virginia Tech officials are taking advantage of the summer slow-down to tear up roads and part of the Drillfield before the tens of thousands of students and Hokie football fans return to campus in the fall.
Perhaps the biggest change around campus for drivers will be a roundabout
at the intersection of Washington Street and West Advertisement
Campus Drive. The intersection now features a stop sign for drivers turning
onto Washington from West Campus Drive.
With the new traffic pattern, motorists will drive counterclockwise around an island in the middle of the roundabout and will bear right onto the desired street. Entering traffic must yield to vehicles already in the roundabout.
Crews are working on the first stage of the new traffic pattern, although the road remains open.
The project is modeled after similar roundabouts at Duke University, North Carolina State University and the University of Maryland.
Tech officials said that while it may take time for drivers to adjust, they believe the new pattern will make the intersection safer for cars and pedestrians.
Dale Huff, manager of transportation planning and design at Tech, said the Washington Street/West Campus Drive intersection has been problematic for years. Two students walking in a marked crosswalk at the intersection were struck by a car and injured last year.
A recent traffic study also gave the intersection a failing grade during peak driving hours.
Huff said the university settled on a roundabout after determining other options, including a traffic signal, would not be as pedestrian-friendly or consistent with the "feel" of campus.
"The administration did not want to impede or impair the rural feeling of campus" with a traffic light, Huff said. "We need to slow traffic down on Washington Street but at the same time keep it moving."
Tech officials are also eliminating parking spots on the Cassell Coliseum side of Washington Street in order to add a bicycle lane and improve pedestrian safety. Work crews recently repainted the Washington Street crosswalks with brightly colored, reflective paint.
A handful of students have been struck by cars while trying to cross Washington Street in recent years, resulting in several serious injuries and one death.
Elsewhere on campus, one corner of the Drillfield near Newman Library has been torn up and is covered with heavy construction equipment as crews replace aging sewer lines with new, larger-capacity pipes.
That construction will consume other parts of the Drillfield throughout the summer. The grass will be replanted after the new sewer lines are laid, said Tech spokesman Larry Hincker.
Work on the sewer lines, which are part of the Blacksburg-VPI Sanitation Authority, will also affect traffic on Kent Street near the university bookstore during the summer, Hincker said.
And road crews will be repaving portions of Drillfield Drive.
All work is expected to be complete by the first day of the fall semester on Aug. 22, he said.
Hincker said renovations to Lane Stadium and construction of the university's new hotel and conference center on Prices Fork Road are also on schedule.
The $53 million upgrade to Lane Stadium's west stands must be completed in advance of the Hokies' first home game on Sept. 17.
The grand opening of the new hotel, known as The Inn at Virginia Tech and Skelton Conference Center, is scheduled for the second week of July.
May 27, 2005
Annapolis Capital, MD
By DEBBIE HOUGH
© Copyright 2005
Hope is here to stay.
That's the vow of Julie Sparkman of Harwood, who's holding a yard sale tomorrow to raise more money to pay for surgery for her deformed pet poodle, Hope.
Born as a twin, Hope has damaged growth plates in two legs, rendering the 8-month-old puppy, who weighs just 3 pounds, incapable of walking on its hind legs.
Mrs. Sparkman adopted Hope from breeder Shirley Miller of Fairhaven, who doesn't have the time needed for exercise, therapy and care of the high-maintenance pup.
"When I get up in the morning and see her run across the floor, dragging her crippled legs, it makes me realize that my problems are insignificant," said Mrs. Sparkman.
She works part-time as a receptionist at Muddy Creek Animal Hospital in West River, and has three other pets as well: a chihuahua and two cats she rescued from frustrated pet owners.
"We are all working people, and I understand that everybody's money is tight, but if people only have a dollar to donate, that dollar puts Hope closer," said Mrs. Sparkman.
Hope is scheduled for the first of two operations on June 7 at the North Carolina State University Veterinary Teaching Hospital. Dr. Denis Marcellin-Little, a pioneering specialist in angular limb deformities, will oversee the operation, and "he told me the outlook is good for corrective surgery on her back legs," said Mrs. Sparkman.
The vet will perform surgery on only one leg at a time because it's risky to expose the tiny pet to anesthesia for a longer duration. Surgery on the second leg will follow six to eight weeks later. The procedure costs $2,500 for each leg.
"Normally, at a regular animal hospital, the same surgery would be $15,000," said Mrs. Sparkman.
With the help of Ms. Miller and other friends, Mrs. Sparkman has already raised $1,200 through the sale of hand-painted Christmas ornaments at the Southern Anne Arundel Chamber of Commerce holiday sale last year, as well as individual donations from the community.
Mrs. Sparkman said Hope already has a host of friends following her plight, including 100 Southern High School zoology students who met the pooch when she visited their class last month during their studies of fetal development.
"The girls just went berzerk over this cute, adorable poodle puppy who has really compensated for its deformity by adapting in a way that would be comparable to us crawling on our outer wrists," said Carol Cross, the zoology teacher.
She said the students raised ethical questions of whether it is appropriate to spend ltos of money on dog surgery that might be better spent on needy humans.
"It is fairly logical that the sophisticated engineering and complex surgeries used on animals may be similarly applied to humans," said Dr. Marcellin-Little. "Novel approaches and advances in permeable metal implants may potentially help millions of people because junk food creates more amputations (of diabetes sufferers) than bullets."
Hope will be at the yard sale tomorrow, but she'll take frequent breaks because Mrs. Sparkman doesn't want the pup "to get sick or stressed."
The sale, which will run from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 4441 Indigo Lane in Harwood, includes donations from many well-wishers, including glassware, antiques, household items, books, toys, furniture, televisions and stamping supplies.
The rain date is June 18. For more information, call 410-867-4315 or 410-974-9662.
Tobacco buyout conference held
May 28, 2005
Danville Register Bee
By LAUREN CHESNUT
© Copyright 2005
DANVILLE, Va. - Gayle Barts listened attentively as North Carolina State University professor Arnold Oltmans discussed tax implications of the tobacco buyout.
“I think that’s everybody’s biggest concern,” she said.
Barts attended the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research’s “Getting the Most Out of the Tobacco Quota Buyout” program Saturday with her husband, Larry. The Sutherlin couple is growing 50 acres of tobacco this year.
“Though it is a bittersweet time, there is a lot of opportunity,” state Del. Robert Hurt, R-Chatham, told the crowd of about 50 people who attended the program.
Apparently, there are complex financial considerations as well.
Oltmans speculated, as have others, that the $3 per pound of quota that growers receive as part of the buyout will be taxed as ordinary income, while the $7 per pound that quota owners get will be taxed as capital gain.
“This is not something the IRS has said,” he said. “In fact, the IRS has said nothing.”
For growers, buyout money will likely be subject to self-employment, federal and state taxes, Oltmans said. In North Carolina, that will amount to a combined rate of 30 to 51 percent of buyout receipts, he estimated. Grower buyout payments may also affect Social Security payments, he explained.
For quota owners, buyout payments will likely be subject to a capital gains tax of 5 to 15 percent as well as state tax, Oltmans said. In North Carolina, this will likely tally up to 11 to 23 percent of the taxable capital gains portion of what they get, he said.
Oltmans urged attendees to seek professional guidance in planning what to do with the buyout money they will receive.
“This is not a situation where you want to avoid spending a few hundred dollars to get good legal and tax advice,” he warned.
“This is not a ‘let’s wait and do it yourself’ project.”
Oltmans also suggested that buyout recipients begin researching the tax basis of their quota. If the quota was purchased, the tax basis would be the amount paid for the quota, he said. If inherited, it would be the quota’s fair market value at the time of inheritance, and if it were received as a gift, the tax basis would be whatever the tax basis of the gift giver was.
Oltmans further discussed like-kind exchanges that might allow buyout recipients to defer capital gains taxes. He provided a “pros and cons” overview of taking buyout money as a lump sum payment, including what to consider when entering into a successor-in-interest arrangement with a financial institution.
Bobby Wilkerson, president of the Virginia Agricultural Growers Association, said that most growers he’s spoken with are concerned about whether to choose the lump sum option or go with annual payments over the next 10 years.
“Everybody’s situation is different,” he said.
In addition to Oltmans’ presentation, Virginia Tech professor Alex White provided a primer in investment to Saturday’s attendees.
Virginia Tech faculty members John Hall, Joyce Latimer, Andy Hankins, Denise Mainville, Dixie Reaves and Drew Arnn of the Virginia Department of Forestry discussed alternative market development in areas such as beef cattle, greenhouse horticulture, organic products and crops such as sweet potatoes, berries and flowers for cutting.
Obituary: Winifred Marvin Swann
May 31, 2005
News & Observer
SEPTEMBER 26, 1916 MAY 28, 2005
RALEIGH -- Winifred "Winnie" Swann, 88, died May 28, 2005, at Mayview Convalescent Center. She was born in Arlington, Massachusetts and educated at Boston University. She was preceded in death by her husband Dr. Ralph Clay Swann, Chairman of the Chemistry Department at North Carolina State University, her parents Lillian Kirkwood and Joseph Henry Marvin, brother Lincoln Marvin and sister Esther Marvin.
Winnie was a retired crafts artist, associated with the NCSU Craft Center from 1967-1987. She fit this place hand in glove, bringing her indefatigable optimism and energy to the programs, learning and growing with the growth of the Center. She helped establish their annual sale and taught for years. Even after she retired she returned to teach beginning quilting and always to share their gatherings as a lifetime member. She studied at the Penland and the Arrowmont School of Crafts. She taught courses in crossstitch, enameling, ceramics, quilting, stained glass, country wood items, and needlepoint. Membership in organizations included the Raleigh and Cary Small Wonders Miniature Clubs, Wake Weaver's Guild, Triangle Potter's Guild, and the Regensteiner Group.
After retiring she found her passion in miniatures. Her hallmark was a plethora of detail and variety of technique used in the Early American style she loved. Color and clutter in a melange of Winnie-style. She developed many wonderful friendships, took fun and exciting trips with her miniature group and made beautiful pieces of miniature art. She was admired by all for her love of a good time, her sense of humor and willingness to share her talent. The friends she made she kept for life, she had it no other way nor would those who met her.
Survivors include daughters Wendy S. Honeycutt and husband Dr. Fuller Honeycutt of Raleigh, Judy S. Campo and husband Dennis Campo of Atlanta, GA; and son, Ralph Clay Swann, Jr. and wife Vee of Charlotte, NC; grandchildren, Kelly Makgill and husband Steve, Laurie Holt, Blake Campo, Clay Swann, Erin Swann, Michelle Darragh, Christopher Campo, and Dennis Campo; and six great-grandchildren.
A celebration of Winnie's life will be held at Mitchell Funeral Home on Tuesday, May 31, 2005 from 6:009:00 p.m. at Mitchell Funeral Home at Raleigh Memorial Park, 7209 Glenwood Ave., 783-7128.
In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Craft Center, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7306, Raleigh, NC 27695.