Welcome to "Sustaining Seattle's Urban Ecosystems," a guide to community action to protect and restore the natural assets on which our quality-of-life--and that of our children and grandchildren--depends.

What are Seattle's urban ecosystems? They are the basis for life in our city--the water we drink, the air we breathe, our climate, the nature that surrounds creeks, rivers, Puget Sound and its inhabitants--they all sustain us. Yet every day, hundreds of thousands of us make choices that put stress on this beautiful legacy we have inherited.

This guide will help you and your family and neighbors make the best choices, do the right things and become part of a solution specifically crafted for Seattle. This guide is not trying to make you go back to nature or shed life's comforts for an unachievable ideal. Instead, you can leaf through this guide and find 101 things you can do to help protect, restore and care for Seattle's urban environment.

If just half of our city's residents took just half of these actions, the impacts would be exceptional. Please join us in making the choice for a safer, cleaner, vibrant and more livable city! Let's get going!

Look through this easy guide and pick a dozen actions to weave into your life right now. Once they become routine, pick a dozen more. Use this guide. Share it with family, friends and neighbors. The more that you and others use this guide, the healthier Seattle will be, for ourselves and for future generations.

NEXT: We're All Interrelated