Wood products, paper products, and natural cloth fibers are biodegradable and will decay and deteriorate over a relatively short time.

To decrease the impact on our environment, whenever possible, insist on paper instead of plastic, and if plastic is all there is, try to find a way to recycle as much waste as possible.

Many communities, and the number is growing, are offering recycling centers to take these waste products and reprocess them into new, usable products.

Schools, food service establishments such as fast food restaurants, and many other entities use Styrofoam containers to serve food in. Encourage your school to use paper instead of Styrofoam for serving meals. Also, when visiting fast-food restaurants, encourage their managers to be more eco-friendly by requesting paper instead of plastic and Styrofoam to serve their meals.

Plastic soda bottles take up a large amount of space in landfills simply by being thrown away with the cap on. If you must throw them away, take the cap off so they will compress to a smaller size in the landfill. Better yet, find a recycling center for these.

One simple form of recycling that just about anyone can do is to shop at your local resale shop for clothing items.

Another is to just donate unwanted items that are in usable condition to your local charities, resale shops and even give them to someone having a yard sale if you are just going to throw them away, anyway.

If you would like to see more recycling in your community, don't hesitate to contact your local city, county and even state government offices and ask. . .

We are in the process of finding ways to collect, process and distribute recyclable items in our community.

If we work together as a community, we can help to keep these types of non-biodegradable items out of the landfills!