If things look a little greener around here this April, there's a good reason. Our editorial staff is busy expanding the ideals of Earth Day into a month-long celebration of energy conservation, alternative transportation, recycling tips and about a million ways you can be a better friend to the planet. Welcome to Green Month, Milwaukee.

A generation ago, the daily afternoon paper printed its weekday comics in The Green Sheet.

Today, once again, the comics go green.

King Features Syndicate heads an effort in which nearly 50 comic strips go "green" for Earth Day today. King Features provides comics and other items for nearly 5,000 newspapers and has had good success in rallying cartoonists to go "green" today, USA Today reported.

"The number of cartoonists who responded to this call is thrilling. We have a few cartoonists who are green all the time," the syndicate's comics editor, Brendan Burford, told the newspaper.

"Arctic Circle," a strip by Alex Hallatt, follows the journeys of endangered polar bears and penguins.

"I try to see the funny side of being green. But whenever there's that conflict between modern life and going green, there's a great potential for humor," Hallatt told USA Today.

Participating comics include "The Amazing Spider-Man," "Arctic Circle," "Baby Blues," "Barney Google and Snuffy Smith," "Beetle Bailey," "Between Friends," "Bizarro," "Blondie," "The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee," "Crock," "Curtis," "Dennis the Menace" and "The Family Circus."

Also: "Funky Winkerbean," "Hagar the Horrible," "Hi & Lois," "Judge Parker," "A Lawyer, A Doctor and A Cop," "The Lockhorns," "Mandrake the Magician," "Mark Trail," "Mallard Fillmore," "Marvin," "Mary Worth," "Mother Goose & Grimm," "Mutts," "My Cage" and "Ollie and Quentin."

Also: "On the Fastrack," "The Pajama Diaries," "Pardon My Planet," "The Phantom," "The Piranha Club," "Redeye," "Retail," "Rex Morgan, M.D.," "Rhymes With Orange," "Safe Havens," "Sally Forth," "Sherman's Lagoon," "Six Chix," "Tina's Groove," "Todd the Dinosaur," "Zippy the Pinhead" and "Zits."