It is not uncommon for me, the author of Sierra’s “In Case You Missed It” weekly roundup of environmental news, to later encounter one of Peter Arkle’s delightful illustrations on his lively Instagram account and have no idea what the story was about. A dead salmon with its bones merging into a tire tread, for example—looks like a Sierra kinda thing, but what exactly? (Turns out it was about toxic material from tires killing salmon in the Pacific Northwest.) France as an ashtray? (France telling cigarette manufacturers they had to deal with the 30 billion butts thrown away in the country each year.) That’s why we always put the item that Arkle illustrates first in the lineup: Not necessarily because fumes from the Jack Daniels distillery spreading a fungus in Tennessee was the most important story in mid-March, but because (we presume) readers will be demanding an explanation for the whiskey-sipping gent being enveloped by creeping growths. 

You think you can do better? Here then is our little holiday gift to you, dear reader: a smorgasbord of unpredictable environmental developments that have been laundered through the rich imagination of our favorite illustrator. Curl up with the family next to your renewably powered holiday decor before a blazing heat pump and try to divine what exactly is going on here. Clicking on the “?” will reveal the answer. 

Happy holidays from all of us at Sierra. 

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