Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Pete Vukovich <pvukovic1@yahoo.com>]

Yes they put a show about this on TV a couple years ago (never heard of EuroFresh though), it seemed implausible and not particularly useful then as well. I'm all for growing things in cities, who isn't impressed by green roofs, there are plenty of nooks and crannies in urban areas which should be planted.

Its a completely different matter to think a few nooks and crannies will contribute substantively to the consumption of a city that doesn't know or care how to grow anything. Its fine to have dreams like the USDA's magical mechanical farms (dating back to the 1960's I think) or Mit's star wars crop tending robots (I think I read about those on this list a year ago or so), everyone should have daydreams. The human brain does need its creative time, which shouldn't necessarily be published, let alone suggest invested in. I guess fantasizing about buildings with giant erosion trapping devices, futuristic soil-less soils, structures which tilt to follow the sun, complete with roman-esque acquaducts for watering hooked up to the local sludge factory for fertilization could brighten a wall street tycoons day - but it doesn't blur the distinction between city dweller and rural lifestyle for me one iota.

So how do the miniature robotic pollinators know which floor to work on? I've seen a statement of the pollinator optimization problem in a math text at one point, but the solution seemed a little hokey to me.

--- On Mon, 5/3/10, Tradingpost <tradingpost@lobo.net> wrote:

From: Tradingpost <tradingpost@lobo.net>
Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Farms in Skyscrapers Won't Solve Our Food Problems
To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
Date: Monday, May 3, 2010, 9:22 PM

I've got a lot to say about this - anyone want to jump in?

paul tradingpost@lobo.net


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