Environment

There will be The Lunch Box and Easy Slider food trucks as well as educational and fun activities the whole family can enjoy. 

Info: Rebecca Grassl-Petersen, rlpetersen@tarrantcounty.com or 817-321-4988.

Professor Wayne Meyer of Austin College will discuss painted buntings, one of North America's most colorful birds. Learn more about their unique songs, male plumage and feeding and foraging habits. Bird ID session prior to the meeting at 6:50pm.

The Blackland Prairie Raptor Center presents, a program featuring live hawks, owls and falcons native to North Texas. Meet our non-releasable education ambassadors up-close and learn about their unique characteristics necessary to survive and their importance to our environment.

This is a very interactive presentation so bring your questions (and camera - they don't mind their picture being taken). Please consider making a small donation toward this program cost (suggested $3) since support for the Blackland Prairie Raptor Center comes from these presentations.

Air quality watchdog Downwinders at Risk is urging residents to attend this meeting on DFW air quality. It's an opportunity to grill TCEQ employees about the state's plan. 

Info: Jim Schermbeck at schermbeck@aol.com.

State Representative Lon Burnam and Downwinders at Risk are hosting a brainstorming session regarding the region's newest anti-smog plan.

A recently publicized UNT graduate student study shows why this anti-smog plan is the largest regional fracking fight that no one is fighting right now. It's also the best chance to get more action on coal plants and cement kilns, public transit, energy efficiency, renewables, etc. For the next year and a half we have a chance to wage a truly regional clean air fight that could benefit a lot of different causes and campaigns and unify our energy. But we need your help to pull it off.

Join Rep. Burnam, members of Downwinders, the Sierra Club and other local air quality activists as we do some short-term and long-term planning to make sure we get as much out of this anti-smog effort as we can.

If you can't attend on the 6th, come to NCTCOG's Air Quality meeting April 17 at 10 a.m.

http://greensourcedfw.org/events/north-central-texas-council-governments-air-quality-meeting-arlington

Info: Jim Schermbeck at schermbeck@aol.com.

Presenters Dustan Compton, Arlington's conservation program coordinator, and ACC board president Danny Kocurek will explain how to hook up that nice rain barrel you made or bought, how to use it when it gets full, how to deal with common problems like overfill and how to scale it up.

They will demonstrate a 55-gallon rain barrel, a 600-gallon homemade approach and a 3,000-gallon professionally installed system. They also will show how to deal with gutter debris and overflow, how to calculate how much water to expect, and how to attach devices to use your free water. All of this can be done with a few simple implements, which will be available for a little hand tool hands-on.

Refreshments will be provided, to complement the self-satisfied glow of accomplishment.

Meet fellow vegan and veg-curious folks for a great evening of drinks, fun and discussion on vegan goings-on in the Metroplex.

This is a new German-style bar that happens to have vegan brats and other vegan goodies. This place just opened, so let's show them early on how adding vegan options to their menu is quite beneficial!

Join other greenies at this monthly gathering. See website for parking info.

Food, music, demonstrations and expo. Free.

The Earth Day fest features local environmental vendors. Good Kitchen Karma food truck will be serving up vegan and vegetarian food. Herb plants and reusable water bottles will be handed out. Earth Day T-shirts will be sold $5-$10. Free.