Perhaps a morbid topic but it affects all of us - human or animal and at the end of life we should consider what happens to us and how we can have the lowest footprint as possible.
What stimulated my thoughts on this subject, was an article in The Press Newspaper magazine "Weekend" last weekend. It got me not only thinking about the instructions in my Will but also thoughts about how to deal with animals as part of my preparation of a talk for conference on our future.
There are 3 options for humans, although only the first 2 are currently widely available:
- Traditional Burial
- Cremation
- Natural Burial
Traditional burial involves embalming with toxic fluid - usually formaldehyde based, being buried in coffin that has probably been treated with toxic chemicals such as formaldehyde (eg. fibre board) at a depth of 6ft, which is an place in the soil where there are no worms or bacteria to cause breakdown. It also involves taking a piece of earth forever, when pieces of land are scare and will get scarcer. Cemeteries leach lots of toxic chemicals which need to be managed, including mercury from mercury fillings. Of course the clothing and jewellery worn can also release toxic chemicals on eventual breakdown too.
Cremation still involves a coffin and embalming to allow the family to spend time with the body and for the funeral to be delayed while family arrive, often from far and wide. While it doesn't involve the permanent taking of a small plot in most cases, cremation involves burning at high temperatures, resulting in the emission of toxic and greenhouse gases.
Natural Burial is the emerging alternative in New Zealand, and is widely available in many countries overseas. Choosing not to be embalmed, or embalmed with biodegradable fluids, meaning that the funeral needs to take place soon after death (around 4 days for the unembalmed body).
The coffin needs to be of natural no treated products such as wicker or untreated pine caskets and be lined with natural biodegradable fibres such as linen.
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| Available in New Zealand, Image source: http://gbweekly.co.nz/2010/1/27/business-natural-burials-and-copy-lathe |
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| Available in the US. Image source: http://natural-burial.typepad.com/coffins_and_urns/2009/11/arka-ecopod-recycled-paper-coffin.html |
The person who has died needs to be wearing natural biodegradable clothing and no jewellery or trinkets to avoid toxic chemicals being released. The burial occurs at a depth of 1 m - the place were bacteria and worms can do their thing and return the body to the natural system. Ideally native planting occurs over the burial site and eventually the whole area is allowed to regenerate to native bush. After 10 years everything should be gone except the bones, and after another 10 years, the bones should be gone too. The only reminder of who was there would be a GPS coordinate. Reading about it made me feel quite good - that at the end of life I wouldn't be a burden to the earth if I did this.
For animals there is cremation and there is burial. We don't really distinguish between natural burial and traditional as we don't embalm. From my experience cremation is the option we seem to favour, however perhaps its is a proper natural burial that we should be catering for.
Natural burial is unlikely to be possible for every person to achieve in their own back yard due to small second sizes, older owners and also the need of some clients to carry the ashes with them as they move around. But some quality education about the pros of natural burial, some provision for natural burial plots for animals, whether that be on the property of the veterinary clinic (which may work well for large rural veterinary clinics), or some other area (perhaps the council could provide it or it could be an income stream for a life style block) combined with some attention to detail such as what we bury the animal with (caskets/collars, soft toys and so firth), the depth of burial, and what we plant over our pet would allow us to ensure the burial was as natural and with as lower footprint as possible.
Source: Weekend Magazine, Fairfax media. 4th and 5th May 2012. Article called: Natural Options by Tracey Cooper.
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ReplyDeleteI have been thinking about this a lot recently because my cat is 18 and dog is 15, so I am sure this will be an issue for us at some stage soon. I am going to have both animals cremated (if I can, in Dunedin). The dog's ashes I will scatter at the beach where we spent so many happy hours. I'm not so sure what we'll do with the cat's ashes. I am not keen to bury them in the garden because if we move, we'd be leaving them behind...maybe with someone who wouldn't respect their bodies...I always worry what would happen if their bodies got accidentally dug up!
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