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  • From: Hugh Lovel <uai AT alltel.net>
  • To: sanet-mg AT ces.ncsu.edu, bdnow AT envirolink.org, market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu, org-grow AT pd.org
  • Subject: Re[2]: Petrik
  • Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 03:54:05 -0500


Dear Douglas,

When I introduced this topic I had a premonition that Petrk Labs, which is
a commercial venture no matter that the level of their science goes far
beyond the conventional, would ellicit a reaction as regards the sale of
their stuff. They're selling it. No doubt there are proprietary concerns
and it was only by conversation with Dr. Petrik on the phone that I learned
as much as I did. Reich's orgone accumulator techniques, indeed. Surely
that piece of proprietary information is not in ANY of their literature, is
it? Judging from your non-plussed reaction to it there is good reason not
to put it in the public access literature. And without that piece of
information it remains an unsolvable mystery why the Petrik products are so
gosh-awful effective. So what you've got is Petrik Labs in a Catch 22. You
can't go for it because you can't find out what is really going on. But if
you did find out, (which if you pursued the Reich thing you might) you
couldn't validate the methods so you wouldn't be able to go for the Petrik
stuff anyway. What CAN you do?

Brother, are you sure you aren't throwing out the baby with the bath water?
I'm just as set off by people trying to sell me crap by means of snake oil
salesmanship and mealy mouthed explanations as you are. No doubt if I
encountered Petrik's site and didn't know any better I'd be inclined to
shine it on too. But this guy was a real genius and a pioneer and Steve
Diver is 100% right to direct you to look again.

The only interest either Steve or I have in seeing you give Petrik a good
look is we KNOW there is something of REAL worth there. Did you read Sal's
post on this topic? Petrik is or if he's dead he was a great man. I haven't
heard from him in the past couple years and maybe he's dead. Too bad he
didn't publish his methods in the technical journals. But in the Reich
information alone you have evidence of why he COULD NOT be published in the
tech journals even if he tried. Reich is a big red flag, a no, no. All
conventional thumbs down on Reich. Good old lock-step intellectualism.

What you don't know is how I came to talk to Petrik in the first place. I
discovered he had a Pseudomonas culture in his compost starter that
markedly reduced gamma readings associated with radioactivity. I got him on
the phone and he confirmed this adding that he possessed a copy of Louis
Kervran's last manuscript which dealt with biological transmutation of
radium. He picked up on the threads of Kervran's work and, yes, he had a
culture that might very well be used in the treatment of radioactive waste.
I felt it my duty to counsel him to use caution in how he presented such a
discovery as this is the kind of thing that really upsets applecarts and
rocks boats. To my knowledge to date he has not gone public with cultures
for the remediation of radioactive waste. But he did develop just such
cultures and they were incorporated in CompoStar. I know this for a fact,
but of course you only have my word for this, whatever that's worth.

Anyway, maybe it's clearer now how necessary it is for Petrik Labs to be
vague about what the microorganisms are in their products. Anyway it
wouldn't be much help to know the genus, species and variety when what
makes these microorganisms really effective is the orgone accumulator type
culture vats that grow out microbes 1,000 to 10,000 times the vitality that
otherwise might be produced from standard culturing of the same
microorganisms. Shucks, man! Are you going to keep your eyes tightly closed
or what? You don't have to spend a lot of money with Petrik. Just know he
is on to something way, way extraordinary. Just as extraordinary as the BD
preps, and in some ways moreso. The only satisfaction I get from telling
you this is giving credit where it is due--to Petrik's achievements.

Best,
Hugh Lovel



Douglas Hinds' reply to Steve Diver of ATTRA

>Hi Steve,
>
>Friday, March 31, 2000, 8:31:03 AM, you wrote in response to my saying:
>
>>> Having taken a look at the Petrik website, first I saw some fairly
>>> good theory that winds up offering 22 Farm and 5 Bioremediation
>>> Products. Therefore, I have to conclude that what I'm looking at is
>>> more of a product oriented rather than a natural systems oriented
>>> approach.
>
>SD> Well you've missed the boat Douglas. Go back and look through the
>SD> Petrik Labs website and print off all the bulletins and leaflets
>SD> relating to soil biology and and humus and *management.* When you
>SD> get done, you will have a big fat stack of useful information.
>
>I've tended to refer to Robert Pharnes "Fertile Soil", but a matter of
>fact I did save 6 pages from the Petrik site to disk, each with all
>the .gif's it had. Never-the-less, their push to sell 27 distinct
>microbial adjuncts whose contents are NOT clearly identified, is a
>product oriented rather than a natural systems oriented approach in my
>book. They may have put quite a bit a valid theory (and I have no idea
>how much of that is due to independent research on their part) behind
>the push to sell their bottles, but the shear number of products
>detracts from the kind of orientation Bart Hall described in his post
>today titled "Microbial innoculants", a perspective that I happen to
>sympathize with and share.
>
>You're still with attra? Does attra beat a drum to sell a load of
>bottled products to the people it deals with? Maybe I didn't miss the
>boat - maybe I just didn't get on it. It too much of a Petrik Product
>boat and not enough of a biological, organism based agriculture boat.
>The guy may well know a lot and could probably do a lot of good, if he
>decided to simplify things rather than promote all those things he
>sells. Are you telling me that all of them are necessary? Isn't he
>exploiting his background (as well as the lack of one on the part of
>many of the farmers he targets)?
>
>SD> Also, get in touch with the company and talk technical stuff, then go
>SD> visit the farms where these products and practices have been
>SD> implemented.
>
>I agree that on the spot, eye witness involvement is best, but I tend
>to favor a more integral, organism based natural systems approach and
>the microbial organisms Petrik's using are not clearly identified,
>apparently for commercial reasons. This makes it hard for me to
>sympathize with what he's doing, regardless of how much he knows.
>
>I had already acknowledged the possibility that some of his products
>may be worthwhile. But I am currently looking to identify organisms,
>not products. One done, if those organisms are available commercially
>(Dale mentioned some), that might save us the trouble of breeding them
>in order to try them out; but if they work, breeding might be the next
>step. Or would you favor a terminator approach to the breeding of
>beneficial organisms? (Admittedly rhetorical question).
>
>SD> A written summary of this investigation would really
>SD> interesting to read about.
>
>SD> Something practical back on Sanet would be great.
>
>My interest in not that academic. We have our own projects that leave
>little time for things not directly related. Maybe we will try one of
>his products and go deeper into it with Petrik from there, just to see
>how far he'll go before reverting to fomenting a dependent,
>proprietary relationship for personal gain. That's exactly what I
>don't like about these things.
>
>Douglas
>
>
>
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  • Re[2]: Petrik, Hugh Lovel, 04/01/2000

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