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And now for the topic everyone's been dying to read about-pet feces. Thought you'd peruse Planet Green for some fun, environmentally friendly tips to brighten up your day, did you? And here you get pet turds. Well, bear with me—this isn't going to be as gross as you'd think.
Why Greening Pet Waste is Important
Properly disposing of pet waste is actually quite important to environmental preservation. According to Slate's Green Lantern, "Pet waste contains bacteria that can contaminate local waterways if it washes from your lawn into storm drains. In large enough quantities, this pollution can remove oxygen from streams and rivers and contribute to algal blooms, threatening marine life."
So what's one to do to greenly dispose of pet poo? (You'll have to excuse me while I indulge my inner 3rd grader and leap at the opportunity to use as many juvenile euphemisms for feces as possible.) The answer is plenty.
There are a number of things you can do to ensure that the waste is greenly dispatched.
- Flush it. Sending the dog doo (see?) into the same sewage treatment system that we humans do will adequately get rid of the dangerous bacteria.
- Compost it. This might seem like an unseemly task, but there are very real advantages if you compost your pet's poop.
- Bury it. If you bury the excrement under in a hole at least 12 inches deep, and cover it properly, you'll safely quarantine the bacteria.
- Keep it out of the trash. I know that walking home with a bag full of steaming dung is hardly appealing, especially when there are probably plenty of trash cans to drop it off in. But if you really want to go the extra eco-mile and keep the bacteria laden mass out of the landfill, you'll have to grin, bear it, and bring it home for flushing or composting.
- Use biodegradable bags to collect it. Chances are you won't be reusing your pet dropping collection bag any time in the near future-so use a recycled paper bag, or a specially designed biodegradable pet waste bag like this one made by Oops I Pooped! (Looks like I'm not the only one with a flair for the juvenile, eh?)
- Green the Kitty Litter. According again to the trusty Green Lantern most kitty litter is made of bentonite clay or fuller's earth; both of which are obtained through an environmentally taxing process of surface mining. And it's not biodegradable. Which means it'll be sitting in the landfill next to a sea of plastic bits for the foreseeable future. Invest in wheat based biodegradable litters like Swheat Scoop or the World's Best Cat Litter.
More on greening pet poop:
Dog Poo Power in San Francisco
Reduce Your Cat's Carbon Paw Print With CatGenie's Self-Flushing ...
How to Go Green: Pets
Animal Planet's Victoria Stilwell helps owners whose pets that eat poop
Want to know what you can do to reduce your carbon footprint? Find out on Planet Green TV's Wa$ted.
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