Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Ken Hargesheimer <minifarms2@yahoo.com>]

Yes, I wrote this several years ago.  The information at the end is my telephone number, address, etc.  I have not taught double digging since 2001.  I teach no-till.  It can be nearly as productive.  My experience is that most people will not double-dig.  It is just too much physical work.  Children and the elderly cannot do it.  It is not necessary, anyway.  I did a lot of it beginning in 1982 when I read Jeavon's book.  Read Ruth Stout's two little books. 

 

Ken Hargesheimer

 

 

Message: 3
Date: Sat, 23 Dec 2006 21:55:12 -0700
From: "TradingPostPaul"
Subject: [Livingontheland] Biointensive Mini-Agriculture
To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
Message-ID: <200612232155120997.01497DDA@mail.lobo.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"


Ken Hargescheimer - isn't this your work? I don't see your name on it tho.

paul tradingpost@lobo.net
-----------------------------------------

Biointensive Mini-Agriculture
http://www.bagelhole.org/?page=114

For home gardening it means: less work, less irrigation, improved soil,
higher yields and no poisons. There are unlimited opportunities in market
gardening, mini-farming and mini-ranching. People can have a comfortable
income, a high quality lifestyle, provide a great service and a great way
to raise children. A lady took a BIMA course, went home to Alaska, prepared
her land and grossed $20,000 the first year. Then had a six months winter
vacation! Houston with over one million people has almost no vegetable
production in the five surrounding countries.

BIMA allows people to feed themselves on a local basis that provides total
community food security and is a proven food production system that is
ecologically sound, economically viable and socially responsible.

It creates a healthy soil for growing healthy plants to provide healthy
food to feed healthy people [KH]. For the human population to be healthy,
we need to consume healthy foods [organic] which come from healthy animals
eating healthy plants grown in healthy soil [C Scheaffer, VMD/holistic].

Food Production: Agriculture is in a crisis worldwide. The Green Revolution
is not ecologically sound, economically viable nor socially responsible. It
makes farmers depend on, even an economic slave to, agribusiness and
multinational corporations, CargillMonsanto, ConAgra, NovartisADM and
others. Their goal is to control the world's food supply from research to
production to consumer by controlling seed, fertilizers and chemicals.
These seed must have chemicals sprayed on them to produce and seed can not
be saved for the next crop. Other corporations are beginning to market
irradiated food which may be dangerous to our health. [Request: ?Who Will
Feed The World? by email, 12 pages of articles; www.nfu.org;
www.moffa.org; www.inmotionmagazine.com; AGRIBUSINESS EXAMINER -Monitoring
Corporate Agribusiness. Free from: Avkrebs@earthlink.net] The Congress,
President, USDA [^partner in a GEg patent?; 30,000 grants; onjy 34 for
organic, family farming], most land-grant colleges and most ag extension
services are part of the problem rather than part of the solution and uses
our tax dollars. The world's farmers can produce all the food the world's
population requires, regardless of how high it goes, using BIMA.

^000200000B1100000AEE^B0B, ?Urban Ag has the potential to provide many
benefits to cities - in nutritional improvement, hunger reduction, income
generation, enterprise development and environmental enhancement. The poor
and unemployed can grow their own food. Farming converts degraded and
unkept vacant lots into healthy, green areas. Waste [grass, leaves, trees,
sawdust, manure, food waste] can be composted and used on the farms as well
as recycled water. City governments must recognize the potential of urban
agriculture and accord it the status given to other industries and economic
activities in the city.? Urban Ag Network, urbanag@compuserve.com. Books:
Urban Agriculture - Food, Jobs and Sustainable Cities; A Patch of Eden, H P
Hynes; www.cityfarmer.org. Urban gardening is very important socially,
economically, esthetically and recreationally. Cultivating Havana: Urban
Agriculture; 1999,Food First

Urban Micro-entrepreneurship: Most urban agriculture is directed by NGO's
but there are unlimited opportunities for private BIMA all over every city.
Employment is limited and most are low pay. Urban homesteading and BIMA are
a realistic option: socially and financially. Book: Entrepreneurial
Community Gardens, G Feenstra, 1999.

Economic development is a major concern for most towns and cities. BIMA is
very effective economic development. It benefits local people. Thirty
experienced families can sell $40,000 each in the local farmer's market.
That is ?created wealth?. That is $1,200,000 added to the local economy
each year. This wealth stays in the city rather than being sent to a
corporate office somewhere; even abroad.

Rural: There is a grassroots movement back to family farming. BIMA is the
answer and is being used by the many ?new' people entering agriculture as
well as innovative farmers. Web: //sunsite.unc.edu/farm-connection;
www.cfra.org.

Micro-entrepreneurship: Employment opportunities are limited and most are
low pay. BIMA is a realistic option: socially and financially.

Organic: Gardeners and farmers have been organic since the beginning of
agriculture until the discovery of certain chemicals in WW II [to kill
people then, insects now]. No one has the right, moral or legal, to poison
the air, soil or water. ?Organic gardening and farming is more than
avoiding chemicals. The organic method requires a change of attitude and a
different thought process.? [H Garrett, DMN;
www.whitehawk.com/dirtdoctor]. Organic does not require the purchase of any
outside inputs except seed and maybe organic fertilizer. The present
generation knows nothing about raised beds or organics because their
fathers and grandfathers have used chemicals since the 1950s. Therefore,
they must be taught. [Read: From The Good Earth, M Ableman; Web:
www,purefood.org; www.foodsecurity.org]

Note: A salesman sales chemical fertilizers, insecticides, herbicides, etc
to a farmer and gets paid by the chemical company from the sale. Promoters
of organic gardening and farming have nothing to sale.

Raised beds: They have been used in Asia [Indonesia, China, Vietnam, PNG],
Latin America [Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, Peru], Europe [France] and USA
[NE Indians] for centuries. I saw a few while living in Guatemala. Because
of chemicals they were abandon but there is a worldwide movement back to
using them. 80,000 km2 are being restored in Peru/Bolivia. They work.

Everyone should use and I teach:

A. Organic, biointensive, double dug, permanent raised beds with green
manure/cover crops/mulch/-compost. This can double or even triple the
yields while reducing the labor by half compared to traditional gardening.
This works [USA: Chadwick Garden & market garden, Ecology Action, MOA,
NFRDC; Mexico, ECOPOL; Philippines, IIRR; Kenya: Manor House Ag Center;
Chile: Centro de Educac^on y Tecnolog^a; Vietnam: VACVINA] and the proof is
there for all to see.

B. Organic, biointensive, permanent raised beds using no-till, green
manure/cover crops/mulch/-compost. This works and the proof [Honduras:
COSECHA, CIDICCO; Japan: M Fukuoka,; IIRR: Philippines; Chile, CET; USA: M
Cain, AR] is there for all to see.

BIMA boasts two advantages no other production system can claim. First, it
is easier on the soil than mechanized methods. Second, it is the least
expensive method in terms of capital outlay. For very small farms
[mini-farms] this method is not only economically viable but superior to
the alternatives. Jeff Rast, Center for Small Acreage Farming, Countryside
Magazine, Nov/Dec 98.

Only hand labor with hand tools are used but with sufficient land use power
hand tools, scythes, wheel hoes with implements, push planters and
spreaders, etc. A plow [moldboard, rototiller, etc] is never used. [Read:
Plowman's Folly, E H Faulker; Weeds-Control Without Chemicals, Walters.
Video: Necessity of Organic Resides, R Parnes]. Transportation can be a
bicycle, tricycle, quadracycle [pickup and/or passengers] with trailers.
[Info: address above].

C. Organic, permanent raised beds [80?-100? wide] with green
manure/cover crops using no-till machinery. Axles are extended to fit over
the beds so the wheels run in permanent tracks. This works and the proof
[Morrison, USDA/ARS, TX; Deep Bed Farming Society, CO; S Groff. PA; EPAGRI,
Brazil] is there for all to see. [Video: No-Till Vegetables, S Groff]

D. Agroforestry: Trees [food, oils, chemicals, medicinals, spices,
beverages, crafts, lumber, forages, firewood, windbreaks, industrials, etc]
should be a planned crop. www.winrock.org; www.treesftf.org;
www.unl.edu/nac.

1. Forestry: Forest must not be cleared but manage-harvested for natural
crop production using raised beds for specific crops. This works and the
proof [Brazil: Instituto de Permacultura da Bahia, Costa Rica, IANI] is
there for all to see.

2. Alley Cropping: Raised beds between rows of trees. This works and the
proof [USA; Nigeria, IITA; Philippines, IIRR, BMRLC; Costa Rica, IANI] is
there for all to see.

Without a water system, bucket drip irrigation should be used. A kit [US$25
ppd] irrigates 200 feet of vegetables by filling a five gallon bucket each
morning and each evening. Two kits will irrigate enough vegetables for a
family of seven on a vegetarian diet during the dry season. [Kenya]. Can be
adapted to irrigate trees, etc. [Video: Third World Irrigation Update, free
with first kit or $5 ppd.]

Financing: Requirements for beginners: handtools, seed, fertilizer, water,
misc for $400 or less. Micro-loan programs [no collateral required.
failures-2%], cooperatives, ag incubators, foundations may be needed.
Contact: The Intervale Foundation, 802-660-3508 fax 3501

Cooperative: tools for loan, purchase in bulk and sell, rent land, farmer's
markets, library, training classes, micro-loans, savings bank, rent
value-added processing plant, etc for members only.

Land: Use land, free, owned by individuals, companies, churches,
governments, schools, non-profits and the tax office [Repossessed land in
Lubbock TX may be farmed free]. People will donate land to non-profit
groups. The food bank in Lubbock TX has been given: various vacant lots, 25
A orchard; 5 A. farm and Jan 99, 48 A urban farm.

BIMA can produce flowers, dyes, vegetables, nuts, fruits, trees, grains,
fibers, herbs, spices, medicinals, oils, teas, sweeteners, fragrances,
seeds, ornamentals, industrials [lubricants, brooms, gums, waxes, oils,
rubber, emulsifiers, chemicals, paper], forages, feed grains, farm animals.
Market gardening has a average gross sales of $8,000 per acre with a few as
high as $30,000 with value-added. A family with 2-15 acres can earn a very
nice income.

Schools/Youth: Most young people do not know enough about agriculture to
know whether they are interested in it or not. They should have some
exposure to all of it. Should feel close to nature. 1. Gardens: Every
school [primary, junior high, high school] should have a gardening project
in every classroom. Foodworks, VT; Mountain School, VT;
www.connriver.org/mountainschool. Home Schoolers should have a cooperative
garden. [Yellowrose School, TX; request: BIMA-Youth; Our Wonderful Youth;
www.ahs.org; www.national.org.

2. Market Garden/Mini-Farm: Every high school should have a BIMA training
program as a career choice. [not part of Vo-Ag/FFA]; www.cityfarmer.org; AR
- anp@iocc.com; Chicago HS for Ag Sciences; Read: Entrepreneurial Community
Gardens,: Growing food, skills, jobs and communities. Freenstra, McGrew,
Campbell, 1999.

3. Mini-Ranch/Dairy: Many students will not garden but prefer livestock. It
is a rich educational experience to witness mating, birth, maturing, dying
and having to nurture animals. Read: Explorations in Urban Animal Ag, HPI

Training: BIMA should be offered in all youth detention centers, prisons

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