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Here are some tips to protect the environment

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Here are some tips to protect the environment

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10 Simple Steps to Save our Environment! -Hamilton County Public Health

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1 Wrap gifts in fabric and tie with ribbon; both are reusable and prettier than paper and sticky-tape.

2 Start a compost heap to reduce the waste you send to landfill sites.

3 Buy your own hive: without bees the planet would last for only 60 years (and honey is good for your health).

4 Use a nappy washing service: they use 32% less energy and 41% less water than home washing.

5 Slow down. Driving at 50mph uses 25% less fuel than 70mph.

6 Wash your clothes with your flatmates' instead of wasting water on half-empty loads.

7 Turn down your central heating and put on a jumper.

8 Take a brisk shower, not a leisurely bath, to save water.

9 Hold a Tupperware party. Airtight food containers can be reused; sandwich bags and plastic wrap cannot.

10 Choose energy-efficient appliances when you replace old ones.

11 Buy compact fluorescent light bulbs. They last eight times as long and use a fraction of the energy.

12 Join a library instead of buying books.

13 Get to know your neighbours; they are more likely to keep your home safe than energy-guzzling security lamps.

14 Recycle your car oil at a recycling depot or petrol station; it contains lead, nickel and cadmium.

15 Get on your bike instead of driving.

16 Let them carry you off in a biodegradable cardboard coffin, saving trees.

17 Use low-phosphate washing-up liquid and washing powder. Phosphates stimulate algal growth when discharged into the water supply, lowering oxygen levels and killing plants and fish.

18 Buy local, or better still, grow your own food, so energy is not wasted on transportation.

19 Raise your glass to organic beer; conventionally grown hops are sprayed up to a dozen times a year.

20 Use recycling facilities. If there aren't any, ask your council for them.

21 Ditch the air-conditioner and buy an aspidistra; plants help cut pollution.

22 Take the plunge and move in with your partner so you light and heat one home rather than two.

23 Give a colleague a lift to work; if no one is going your way, join a carshare scheme to find a passenger.

24 Cook for friends. Large quantities of food use less packaging than the same quantity in individual portions (and take less energy to cook).

25 Copy ministers by holidaying in Britain (but unlike them, skip the follow-up trip to Tuscany).

26 Give your garden a good breakfast; coffee grounds and eggshells are ideal for composting.

27 Refuse plastic carrier bags, or at least reuse them. Cloth bags are better.

28 Donate your leftover paint to a community project; Britons fail to use 6.2m litres of the paint they buy each year.

29 Drink tap or filtered water, not bottled.

30 Invest in a washing line; tumble dryers devour electricity.

31 Buy chocolates from proper chocolate stores, so they are not individually wrapped.

32 Turn off TVs and stereos instead of switching them to standby.

33 Lighten up: paint your walls a pale colour, so you need less artificial light.

34 Only flush toilets if really needed; follow the Australian maxim: "If it's yellow that's mellow, if it's brown flush it down."

35 Improve the ambience and dine by candlelight, saving electricity.

36 Insulate your home. Cavity wall insulation can cut heat loss through the wall by up to 60%.

37 Buy from companies with eco-friendly policies; boycott those without.

38 Soak up the sun; even in Britain, solar panels can produce a surprising amount of energy.

39 Clean the back of your fridge. Dusty coils can increase energy consumption by 30%.

40 Avoid air travel; it produces three times more carbon dioxide per passenger than rail.

41 Pretend Christmas has come early; turkey is more likely than chicken to be produced in the UK, while British-grown brussel sprouts require less transport than Kenyan mangetout.

42 Grow plants to give to friends instead of cut flowers.

43 Choose a car with a 3-way catalytic converter, to reduce nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons emissions by 90%.

44 Ban blinds. Heavy curtains keep in more heat in winter.

45 Change materials as well as rooms; MDF and chipboard release formaldehyde, a carcinogen. Buy sustainably produced wood instead.

46 Cut up the plastic rings from packs of beer; they are invisible in water so wildlife can choke on them or trap themselves.

47 Bring a mug to the office instead of using polystyrene cups.

48 Snap up a 36-exposure film instead of 24, reducing waste from packaging and processing.

49 Cancel that expensive gym membership and walk to work instead.

50 Buy less. Save time and money as well as the planet.

Suggestions submitted by Guardian journalists and staff, the World Wildlife Fund and The Ecologist magazine's book Go Mad! 365 Daily Ways to Save the Planet. See www.theecologist.org

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You don't have to share the bath water to make a difference

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©Sergey Uryadnikov/Dreamstime.com

They're known as "charismatic megafauna" for a reason. These endangered animals ooze star power, a factor that conservationists have capitalized on in order to fund projects to protect them (and, often by default, the other organisms that share their complex ecosystems). People are far more likely to donate money to save an adorable otter or a magnificent tiger than they are to contribute funds to preserve the limbless worm skink or the Gerlach's cockroach. However, skinks and roaches are integral participants in their ecosystems as well and just as deserving of assistance as their flashier compatriots. You might then consider the animals on this list the A-listers whose box-office draw finances the continued existence of the lesser-known character actors who inhabit the same environments. But if the concept of trickle-down conservation sticks in your craw, then get to work on that "save the Gerlach's cockroach" crowdfunding campaign. I'd donate. Maybe.
(Read E.O. Wilson's Britannica essay on mass extinction.)

vaquita (Phocoena sinus)

Vaquitas, the rarest and smallest of all cetaceans (members of a certain order of aquatic mammals), inhabit only the waters in Mexico's Gulf of California. There were nearly 600 vaquitas in 1997, but estimates of how many survive as of 2022 range from just 10 to 18 of the porpoises. The vaquita's natural range is rich in fish and shrimp, and therefore it is also rich in fishing boats. The gill nets used by the locals are meant to capture the totoaba, a fish whose swim bladder can fetch $20,000 each in China, where it's viewed as a delicacy. The average vaquita is 4.9 feet long, which makes it similar in size to the totoaba. This is problematic because vaquitas can become entangled in these nets and drown. Gill nets were banned by the Mexican government in 2015 but are still used illegally, despite social programs and restrictions intended to deter their use.

Asian elephant (Elephas maximus)

The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species estimates that the current population of Asian elephants, which inhabit 13 countries, is about 40,000-50,000. That number may be far lower; some regions inhabited by the lumbering pachyderms are inaccessible because of the terrain or political volatility. Over 50 percent of the population is concentrated in India. The burgeoning human population there-and elsewhere in Asia-creates conflicts for space and resources. And, while the tusks of Asian elephants are much smaller than those of their African counterparts, the Asian species is still poached for its ivory, meat, and skin.

Javan rhinoceros (Rhinoceros sondaicus)

At first glance, the Javan rhinoceros's fleshy folds of skin appear to be plated armor, complementing the keratinous horn adorning the skull of this lumbering species. Its population faces many threats: natural disasters, habitat loss, disease, and, notably, poaching for its horn. In 2010 the last of continental Asia's Javan rhinoceroses was killed in Vietnam. Today the Javan rhinoceros inhabits Ujung Kulon National Park, which sits on a remote peninsula on the eastern side of the Indonesian island of Java. Historically, the single-horned beasts were found across wide swaths of South Asia and Southeast Asia too. The northern white rhino is nearly extinct, and the Javan rhino, whose population numbers no more than 75 individuals of all ages, appears to be treading a similar path.

gorilla (Gorilla beringei and Gorilla gorilla)

Depending on whom you ask, there are either two species of gorilla, the eastern ( Gorilla beringei) and western ( Gorilla gorilla), or three subspecies, the eastern lowland, western lowland, and mountain gorillas. Regardless of whom you ask, all gorillas are endangered. There could be more than 300,000 gorillas left in the wild, and they're listed as critically endangered. Habitat encroachment and poaching for bushmeat, trophies, and supposed magical talismans have led to substantial losses. Because their social structure is so complex and because they reproduce slowly-females giving birth only once every four years at best-the removal of even a few individuals from a gorilla troop can catastrophically impact its ability to sustain itself.

orangutan (genus Pongo)

Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus) in a tree© guenterguni-E+/Getty Images

Orangutan is Malaysian for "person of the forest." Though morphologically orangutans may resemble melted Muppets more than people, their sophisticated cognitive abilities are very human indeed. Like gorillas and chimpanzees, they have been known to use tools. Threatened largely by logging and capture for the exotic pet trade, orangutans-restricted to the Southeast Asian islands of Borneo and Sumatra-number about 120,000 per the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. A 2011 survey revealed that more than 50 percent of the original Bornean orangutan population had been killed in the previous 40 years. Unlike other great apes, orangutans are usually solitary or live in groups of fewer than three, making them difficult to track and study.

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international union for conservation of nature

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Falling Stars: 10 of the Most Famous Endangered Species

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This Encyclopaedia Britannica Science list features 10 well-known endangered animal species.