Road salt: the bane of winter

In my previous post, I wrote about the aesthetic problems of road salt, and how the slush it creates makes winter in the city so unpleasant.

Here's the rest of the story: Road salt came into common use in Canada in the 1940s as a melting agent to clear roads of ice and snow.

Growing urbanization, longer commutes, and the decline in the use of winter tires in favor of all-season radials has led to "bare pavement" policies on roadways, and ever increasing dumping of salt onto our roadways and parking lots.

Road salt is, of course, bad for plants and the soil. Salts disrupt absorption of nutrients by plants and can be toxic to plant cells. High salt concentrations also degrade the soil and can be harmful to micro-organisms and other soil organisms.

Salt runoff from roads, parking lots and salt storage facilities pollutes creeks, rivers and lakes and affects aquatic life. The salt can also poison birds and harm other wildlife.

Our dependence on road salt is rather depressing, but here's a link to an organization working to change things in Ontario: http://www.lowsaltdiet.org/

Dirty secret: Winter is easier in the country

After last week's almost record snowfall, I was stuck by how lovely the snow was on our farm, and how easy it was to manage - and how ugly it was in town.

The big reason? In a word: salt. Here, we simply used the snowblower to clear the lane and now we have nice crunchy, hard-packed snow, which is easy to walk on and not the least bit slippery.

But in town, the post-snowstorm scene was quite different: the parking lots at the grocery store and drug store were filled with nasty, dirty slush because of all the road salt that was spread, supposedly for safety reasons.

Not only does the salt wreck your boots and eat away at cars, ruin plants and pollute waterways and poison wildlife, but I find that the slush it creates actually makes pavement more slippery to walk on. So much for safety!

No wonder most Canadians hate winter. I did too until I discovered that when you live in the country, winter is beautiful, and stays beautiful, even after a snowstorm. It's also way easier to clear snow (esp. with a tractor) because there's lots of space to put it, and you avoid salty, dirty, slippery slush.

Another benefit of country living: Because there's no need to look at all fashionable, you can wear boots, a coat, tuque, mittens, flannel-lined jeans and outdoor protective pants, and go outside and stay toasty warm.

And the biggest reason for country gardeners to love winter? You get a rest from weeding and mowing, and there are no deerflies.