APPROPRIATE 'TECHNOLOGY Rat Warfare Harried by hundreds of rats, the small city of Satellite Beach, Fla., acquired two red-tailed hawks and a barn owl a month ago and turned them loose. "From what I've read," City Manager Richard Shinn said of the birds, "they should be very effective. Rats and mice are their favorite dishes." Mr. Shinn reports two confirmed kills since then-one in a drainage ditch and one in a backyard-and "almost daily reports from reliable citizens" among the 8,000 residents as to where the birds are operating. "The owl covers the night shift, and the two hawks cover the day shift," the City Manager explains, adding: "I'm real pleased. I think it's working. But I think we need more birds." The city will be getting "a dozen or so" more hawks and owls from the Florida Wildlife Service, he says. -Richard Haitch, New York Times via Gigi Coe ( GOOD THINGS ) Night Train at Wiscasset Station, text by Lew Dietz, photographs by Kosti Ruohomaa, 1977, $7.95 from: Doubleday and Company, Inc. Garden City, NY 10017 A beautiful combination of photographic impressions and prose that borders on poetry. The combined vision of these two men has created a portrait of Maine, a place in transition in the complexity of political and economic growth and change. It is a legacy created in love and admiration that explores the relationship of its history, its people and their relationship to the environment. It talks of and with a rural wisdom that knows the value of self-reliance. The tone of Dietz's writing is one of concern that Maine's past and future will be bought by those "outlanders" who are drawn by the romantic vision of its rural life. But he is hopeful. "Always there has resided at the heart of the native consciousness the wisdom to know that those who own the land own the people, and only a people who own and honor its land can control its destiny." A beautiful book that I know I will want to go back to. -JM Light Energy, monthly, free from: Cascadian Regional Library 454 Willamette St. Box 1492 Eugene, OR 97401 Some NCAT money finally came through to help our friends in Eugene provide this a.t. supplement to their regional networking journal, Cascade. It's a good way to keep in touch with what's happening on many fronts here in the Pacific Northwest and a good way to get the word out about what you 're doing. Keep in touch with them. Also write to them for information on their well-dome conferences, including the upcoming Spring Equinox Gathering. -LdeM January 1978 RAIN Page 11 Mid-Atlantic Appropriate Technology Network (MATNET) c/o Citizens' Energy Project 1518 "R" St., N.W. Washington, DC 20009 Send a stamped, self-addressed envelope (SASE) for details which other a.t. groups now forming would find especially useful in developing organizational goals, programs, services and funding sources. A newsletter, conferences, directories and regional surveys are proposed. Contact them if you are in New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, District of Columbia Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky or ' Ohio. -LJ Dr. E. F. Schumacher Memorial Foundation Pentre Ifan Felindre Farchog Crymych, Dyfed, Wales U.K. The good people at Resurgence and Mrs. Varena Schumacher have set up a foundation to provide financial assistance, information and advice to groups and individuals carrying on Fritz's work in appropriate technology development. They need our contributions. -LdeM
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