Eco Yoga Day Recap

Today’s Eco Yoga Day was definitely a look into the future – as well as a way to practically address the present. Karen McDonald of SERC (Smithsonian Environmental Research Institute) did a wonderful job of drawing us into the world of biomimcry. As Karen explained, bio means life & mimicry is to emulate. Basically biomimicry is the science of solving human problems with solutions already present in the natural world.

Karen brought in many practical examples such as enhancing our wind power by applying the design of while fins to our windmills (read more). Or using the texture of shark skin on the bottom of boats to keep barnacles from growing and attaching themselves to the underside of boats. And there are no shortage of examples. Here is more about biomimicry.

So what did we do? We started with yoga to attune our minds and bodies by applying nature’s solutions to the human experience. After all yoga is also a form of biomimicry where in our poses we emulates mountains, trees, fish, cats, and so much more. This solves our problems brought on by day to day living – such as stiffness and back pain – and allows us to feel physically vibrant and mentally sharp.

After yoga, Karen talked about biomimicry and we brought it to light using prisms, bubbles to see how colors form through reflected and refracted light. So we all got to blow bubbles outside!! Actually this took birth from a discussion about butterfly wings and how the color of their wings changes in the light. We talked how we could apply this to automobiles to get rid of the noxious paint. Imagine driving a car that was blue from one angle and pink and orange from another!!

The last aspect of the afternoon involved planting seedlings into newspaper pots which we made. Everyone got to plant tomato seedlings (all different kinds of heirloom tomatoes even purple ones!). Plus we had lots of other kinds of organic heirloom seeds such as sunflower, cone flowers, eggplant and more!!

I still have lots of seeds and seedlings which will be available to all in class.

All in all Eco Yoga day was a most inspiring afternoon. Finally Dave Pecor of Patch.com was on hand to shoot pictures and write an article.

See everyone at next year’s Eco Yoga Day!!

UPDATE 4/24/11:

Here is the article that Dave Precor of Patch.com wrote about Eco Yoga Day.