HELLO there! What are YOU doing to save the environment? Better shape up or a pooch from cartoon land named Elliot, will leave you in the dust.

Elliot is a female flying cocker spaniel who stars on the American cartoon panel "Elliot and Friends." She has a nose for sniffing out trouble in the environment and, according to the Environmental News Network, will soon edit an online newspaper--all for Mother Earth!

Expected in October, the online newspaper will provide timely, appropriate US and international news. Kiddie surfers will help create the content, which will include gardening, environmental activities, book reviews and letters to the editor, Elliot.

Elliot was created by award-winning illustrator Debbie McNabb in the early 1990s. "I am trying to do my part and help children learn that they can each make a difference in taking care of the Earth," she said in an interview with ENN.

McNabb graduated with degrees in art and journalism from the University of Florida and spent 10 years working in health care marketing and public relations with much in between time at the drawing board. Now a freelance illustrator for the last several years, McNabb has traveled to schools, special events and day-care centers educating thousands of children about the environment through her puppet shows and interactive drawing sessions.

Elliot will also star in an interactive TV show about the environment. Too bad we won’t have the show here in the Philippines. It’s bound to be lots of fun. Elliot and her friends (who are human) take kiddie viewers on adventures around the Earth, under the sea, to outer space and home to a garden where flowers and trees sing and dance to original music. Viewers learn to be responsible for a fragile planet whether they live in a city or small town, on a farm or in a high-rise apartment, in an elegant house or in a cottage, in the United States or in a foreign country.

Mixing television and computers, animation and puppetry, original music and humor, the interactive television show will be the first of its kind in the United States. Starting at a home base in a secret garden, the show will take children to the farthest reaches of the universe as well as their own backyards to tackle issues of littering, recycling and pollution.

In one episode, McNabb targets water pollution. When Elliot discovers a toxic river poisoning a small town, she and her friends rush to the secret garden from where they are quickly transported into the depths of the river.They soon discover that they are in the dinosaur era, when the waters were clean and clear.

With the help of a laptop computer, Elliot and friends watch the future unfold. Civilization moves in and with it progress starts to destroy the river. The cartoon characters make it their mission to keep the water clean so that the meaning of progress includes improving the environment with drinkable water for all.