Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] Tillage is tillage

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost AT lobo.net>
  • To: market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] Tillage is tillage
  • Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2007 21:42:35 -0700


My point was simply that people have to be able to make a good living at
it, to stay on the land. Sure, husband the soil, but your point about
irrigation pumps escapes me. Let's hear about making a good living at it.
Let's hear how new market farmers can get into the business and grow
sustainably without having a fat trust fund to get started. I'm sure you
have more to add.

paul tradingpost AT lobo.net


*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********

On 2/6/2007 at 11:19 PM David Inglis wrote:

>Mr. Tradingpost said:
>> No amount of green philosophy is going
>> to make people work 40 hours a week on an outside job to pay bills, and
>> then work another 40 in the garden just because they believe in it.
>
>... and no amount of 40 or 80 hour work weeks on the farm without a 'green
>philosophy' will sustain the 'bottom line' of a farm enterprise beyond the
>first few decades, or even years.
>I learned my farming on a place that had been worked continually for over
a
>thousand years. This was not achieved by focusing exclusively on annual
net
>margins or the like though they knew exactly what they were.
>
>You have asked "I want
>> to know all the ways people cut inputs and costs and raise production on
>a
>> yearly basis -"
>To which I have replied: husband the soil. Well, this is my experience and
>I
>could elaborate endlessly on it, but just because it is not the answer you
>were looking for does not mean it is not a thoughtful and sincere response
>to your perfectly valid question. It is true that it is an approach that
is
>not Annual which is what you were requesting but neither is Agriculture.
>There is no annual fix for problems that are perennial.
>I, like anyone else who has been doing this for a while, have endless
>'techniques' for making a success of any one season but I learned a long
>time ago that putting a bigger pump on the irrigation line will only drain
>the pond quicker unless I find a way to get more water to flow into the
>pond; and that comes first.
>David
>Mahaiwe Harvest CSA
>Massachusetts
>
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Market-farming mailing list
>Market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
>http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/market-farming








Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page