With the Alice in Wonderland craze in full force now, an “unconference” might sound like something the Mad Hatter would organize.  If he celebrated unbirthdays, we wouldn’t put it past him to organize an unconference.  But alas, no.  The green unconference coming up next Friday, April 23rd has been organized by the Greeks (aka, the green geeks).

This is the second unconference put together by the Greeks, who had their previous one in 2008. So what exactly happens at an unconference?

For starters, the content is completely generated and let by its participants.  Participants can be allotted 10 minutes to present an idea and brain storm with their audience.  Those wanting to make more elaborate presentations can also petition the Greeks.

Some of the current discussion topics on the unconference agenda are: green and lazy, saving energy, and green applications on mobile phones and the web.  The slightly longer brainstorming session topics will include: water heating in shared houses, saving 100 Gigawatt hours per day worldwide, recycling computers, computer games with green topics, and reuse of condensation water from air conditioners.

The even longer workshops will discuss: home brewed wind turbines and a compost workshop.  As of now, talks will be about: trees and their contribution to urban life, sustainable energy in Israel, and geothermal heat resources.  Lastly, the presentations will include: Comet-ME (Community Energy Technology in the Middle East), Israel’s most promising cleantech startups, and tools for green engineering.

Think something might be missing?  It’s not too late to add your own session to the unconference.

The Greek Unconference is taking place on Friday, April 23rd at the Ramat Aviv Seminar Hakibbutzim.  Visit the unconference’s website for more information.

Sound interesting?  Read more about other interesting conferences we’ve featured:
Environmental Conference for Imams Challenges Israeli Muslims to Go Green
FoEME to Hold Conference on Shared Mountain Aquifer
Middle East Water Security Worries the Prince of Jordan

This fact was confirmed by scientists, and reported on the environment news site Grist. According to reports, not a single item on the Mickie D’s menu is disposable.

Scary or what?

If that plan would have worked, McDonald’s could have kept more than 1.5 billions tons of food from landfills every month, in their bright green composting bins.

Some smart and savvy scientists at the University of California-Berkeley found out though, that none of the McDonald’s food (fries, burgers and pies) would actually decompose over the next 500 years, or even 1,000 – the lifespan of a plastic bag.

Grist put in a call and reports:

“To be honest, this food is better off in a landfill.” said lead researcher Donald MacGregor, from the University of California-Berkeley, on a press call early this morning. “It would get in the way of perfectly good compostable materials. Additionally, gardeners disliked the highly acidic leaching of the non-composting Big Macs in field tests.”

Now incineration and outer-atmospheric storage is on their agenda. Can we suggest that scientists find a catalyst to decompose it faster, or even better suggest a way to ban the stuff forever. I have fallen prey to a (kosher non-cheese) Big Mac attack now and again, but would probably be a better (and healthier) person if no McDonald’s were in sight. Food pollution for your body and the environment.

Greenpeace, alas, finds the news to be “extremely disturbing.”

::Grist

More food news from the Middle East
Colon Cancer Increase in Cairo Linked to fast Food
Jeddah Gets Fusion Organic Pizza
Israel’s Premiere Slow Food Chef Moshe Basson

Image via freakingnews

Update: this is an April Fool’s joke. Grist just wrote us.

Hazelnut which is otherwise referred as filbert and has its origin in North America. This tree produces wonderful nut that is greatly liked by many people and is one of the important ingredient in many of the exotic dishes. Hazelnut is also a wonderful diet supplement which provides great nutrition to human body. This tree can reach a height of 14 meters and mostly will grow to an extent of 9 meters. The tree initially takes four years to produce first hazelnut. Every year there will be large quantity of nuts that will be produced varying from six to seven quarts. In order to make sure that the output of trees is good enough for many years it is essential to take special care of plants during winter months to prevent the plant from getting dormant.

Protecting sensitive flowers

Thought hazelnut tree is capable of tolerating cold conditions up to temperatures below 17 Fahrenheit the flowers are greatly sensitive to cold conditions and requires special care. The flowers which open up during the winter time can be greatly damaged by colder conditions and thus there should be proper efforts that should be made to provide extra care. Warmth should be provided to tree during winter with the use of walls that provides proper shade and also prevents the flowers from getting damaged from higher velocity of winds. The tree should not be completely cut down from wind since some level of wind is essential to carry out the process of pollination.

Appropriate soil conditions and compost

Hazelnut Leaves

The most preferred conditions for growth of hazelnut trees during winter are between the pH range of 6 and 7. The roots of this tree are shallow and thus filling up the soil with good fertilizers are essential to boost the growth of plant. While planting the tree the soil should be provided with good amount of compost. If there is not sufficient amount of rain then manual watering of plants should be carried out during winter period also. Another important necessity is to pluck out the leaf that have either dried up or showing poor growth in certain regions of tree. To maximize the reach of water the soil should have proper penetration and should have a depth path of about 6 to 1o feet to ensure proper and adequate supply of water which will make the plant drought free.

Pruning

Pruning is one of the important processes which must be done before the start of spring to make sure good yield is obtained from this tree. All the dead leaves and branches should be removed from the tree. You should also monitor the leaves for any infestation of tree by pests. In most of the cases this tree remains unaffected but there are chances that bug may eat the leaves and lay eggs. Thus it becomes essential to remove bug eggs and remove bug attacked leaves.

Thus proper care of hazelnut tree during winter will ensure proper growth of tree during rest of season and will also provide wonderful yield of nuts with high quality.