Try to answer this question that comes to mind: What is an abundant renewable resource that can stimulate the growth of your garden and remove pollutants from bodies of water?
The answer, according to a Bay Area nonprofit, is hair.
Matter of Trust, a San Francisco green group, has been using hair for more than two decades to clean up oil spills and other pollution from bodies of water. His latest project is encouraging the growth of vegetation in the Presidio of San Francisco, a national park.
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The group started after hearing about Phil McCrory's hairy idea in the '90s.
The inspiration came to McCrory, an Alabama hairstylist, when he was washing a client's hair while CNN showed images of otters covered in crude oil from the Exxon Valdez oil tanker that crashed into an Alaska reef in 1989.
McCrory noticed that there was a fiber on her hands that absorbs oils, according to Lisa Gautier, founder of Matter of Trust. But after the haircut, he would be swept up, discarded and thrown into a landfill.
Gautier and McCrory became partners. He developed a way to turn hair, fur, wool or fleece into mats to absorb oil. Later, they discovered that the material could be stuffed into recycled burlap sacks and pantyhose to make barriers or mats that would absorb the oil.
The idea was put to the test in 2007, when a 926-foot freighter, the Cosco Busan, collided broadside into a support on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The collision opened a nearly 100-foot-long gash in the ship's side, causing 58,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil to leak into the ocean.
Within hours, Gautier said, she and her team coordinated hundreds of volunteers to place barriers and hair mats along San Francisco beaches.
To try to get rid of the debris collected by the barriers and mats, the team subjected them to two composting methods: thermophilic worms and fungi, or heat-loving bacteria and fungi that can kill pathogens by generating high temperatures. After about 18 months, the hazardous waste was turned into healthy compost, Gautier said.
The latest work on the capillary mats, in the Presidio, will test their fertilizing capabilities.
The hair can be formed into mats that absorb oil or used as mulch.
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In a pilot study, pile mats are being used as mulch on the park's uneven terrain. The results surprised Presidio Trust associate director Lew Stringer, SFGate reported.
“The sections we planted using that material as a substrate clearly grew stronger than the control areas,” Stringer said.
Bay Area and Los Angeles residents who compost or want to improve the vegetation on their property can use human or pet hair. It's lightweight and you can place it on top of the soil in your pots and garden, Gautier said. If the hair is longer than 2 inches, bury it in the ground to avoid tangling the birds' feet, he recommends.
If you want to donate hair to Matter of Trust, register on the organization's website, Hum Sum. Gautier said the group accepts all human, pet and synthetic hair, but asks that different types be packaged separately.
