According to the Chicago Pets Examiner, Susan NC Price, a San Fransisco based group (Matter of Trust) has come up with a way that you and your pets' hair can help with the oil spill clean up. Seems like an interesting yet strange idea, but if it can help, great! Here's the information on how you pet owners out there can help.

"Dog fur to help clean up oil spill?

Thanks to a group based in San Francisco called A Matter of Trust, anyone and everyone—salons, groomers or individuals—can sign up to donate hair and fur clippings and nylons to make booms to help absorb the oil leaking from the pipe below the damaged BP oil drilling platform. The hope is that most of the oil can be soaked up before it reaches shore along the Gulf of Mexico.

The Excess Access donation program sign up is FREE, fast and helps coordinate the masses of donations coming in through A Matter of Trust. Go to the Excess Access registration page to get a delivery address emailed to you. Their warehouses are small, so the Matter of Trust folks are orchestrating how much goes where, sending hair or fur directly to assembly points.

Booms are being assembled along the Gulf Coast near threatened beaches and marshes. The group has even posted YouTube videos on collecting hair and making booms. Turns out hair or fur, whether stuffed in recycled nylon hosiery or manufactured into felted mats, had a huge affinity for oil, absorbing large amounts very quickly.

Hey, warm weather is coming. If you've been wondering what to do with all the fluff you're brushing off your dog, now you know. Or check with your dog groomer(s) to see if he/she/they will be joining the Matter of Trust oil spill cleanup effort by sending fur from their shop." - Susan NC Price

We can only hope that this oil mess is taken care of quickly before any animals or people are affected more than they have been already. In the mean time, let's do our part to contribute to the cause. It is going to be a super hot summer and our long-haired furry friends may appreciate the shave, so why not just donate the hair.

It is actually a very creative process that they are using. According to The New York Times, oil containment booms made of hair are being used to sop up oil at the BP spill. Hair-booms are a product that Matter of Trust has been producing for almost 10 years. For these hair-booms, they do not only use animal or dog hair, but human hair as well!

As stated on the Matter of Trust website, "Stylists and barbers are generously mailing in hair clippings to us and excited about this program and cleanup of oil spills. Salons are sweeping up their hair clippings into plastic garbage bags, reusing the large boxes they get from shampoo deliveries and mailing us the hair. As well as for emergency oil spills, the mats are extremely efficient for drip pans during oil changes or under leaky cars, machinery, pipelines, even as booms for storm drains."

"Booms will lie along the beach, the waves come up, and they'll go through the hair and the nylon. And the hair will grab the oil and then the wave goes back out and it's cleaner." stated Matter of Trust co-founder Lisa Gautier, to NPR (National Public Radio).

Inventor and stylist Phil McCrory explains further how the process works on the Matter of Trust website. He states, "You shampoo your hair because it gets greasy. Hair is very efficient at collecting oil out of the air, off surfaces like your skin and out of the water, even petroleum oil. Hair is adsorbent (as in "clings to" unlike absorbent which is to "soak up.") There are over 370,000 hair salons in the US and each collects about 1 pound of hair a day. Right now, most of that goes into the waste stream, but it should all be made into hair-mats."

I am truly impressed with and fully support the donations. It's good to know that there are economical and efficient ways to help when bad things happen. If you or anyone you know would like to donate, contact A Matter of Trust on their website: www.matteroftrust.org, by e-mail at team@matteroftrust.org or call (415) 242-6041.