Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

Yes, in normal living we're exposed to pathogens all our lives.

It's been a rough week with my wife/partner in hospital here, and my daughter 
taken off life support in FL today leaving a nine month old baby.

paul tradingpost@lobo.net


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

On 7/22/2010 at 12:33 PM Dieter Brand wrote:

>I absolutely agree, pathogens are not a problem.  I have used our
>humanure for nearly 10 years and never had a problem.  I let it compost
>with dry leaves, saw dust, soil, grass, weeds or whatever is available.
>After a few months it turns into crumbly soil that smells as good forest
>soil (probably because of the leaves).  I usually wait for two years
>before I use it on root vegetables or things like salads that are eaten
>raw just to be on the safe side.  I would never use night soil from other
>households or from the city because people consume all sorts of
>pharmaceuticals and pour chemicals down the drain.  I even separate the
>toilet paper because of the bleaching agents.
>
>The human body and our surroundings contain billions of microbes, most are
>beneficial, a few are potential pathogens when the conditions are right,
>but our immune system even needs these potential pathogens to build its
>defenses.  There is only about half a dozen of dangerous pathogens like
>tuberculoses that are always harmful, but most of these have been
>eradicated in the West.
>
>Dieter Brand
>Portugal
>
>
>
>--- On Wed, 7/21/10, John D'hondt <dhondt@eircom.net> wrote:
>
>> From: John D'hondt <dhondt@eircom.net>
>> Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Using Human Waste
>> To: "Healthy soil and sustainable growing"
><livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
>> Date: Wednesday, July 21, 2010, 10:15 PM
>>
>> In my experience I think that pathogens are not at all a
>> problem. We have a septic tank overflowing into a small
>> water purification area. I have seen all kinds of animals
>> drink from that water at different places and not one sign
>> of disease has been seen.
>> Under good circumstances pathogens are eaten out of a
>> living by an overwhelming mass of non pathogens. The only
>> way you can select for pathogens is by using man made
>> chemicals that often kill off the others. And onfortunately
>> that is the paradigm we have been fed with our mother's
>> milk. Don't try to kill bacteria for you will fail and don't
>> be too clean so as to keep plenty of non pathogen species on
>> standby.
>>
>> The water that comes out of the wetland shows no signs of
>> nitrate or phosphate loss. It is clear and even in little
>> pools no algae show up.
>>
>> We harvest plants like comfrey and bullrush there and maybe
>> 10 more species for animal food. Again never seen a problem
>> and how could it? Pathogens are not taken up by plants in a
>> cold swamp to be transported to an edible part. That simply
>> does not happen.
>> john
>>
>> > Several people on the list have mentioned the use of
>> human waste for agricultural purposes. I'm interested in
>> what peoples experience has been with this and what kinds of
>> precautions people are taking to break the pathogen-human
>> cycles in order to avoid disease transmission. The World
>> health Organization has done a lot of work on this and their
>> guidelines are available online.
>http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/wastewater/gsuww/en/index.html
>> >
>> > This appears to me to be one of the crucial linkages
>> that will have to be established in a steady state economy.
>> Nutrient recycling is a fundamental ecosystem
>> function/service which must be integrated in the closed
>> human-earth system. Of course pathogens have evolved to
>> exploit this system and we have to assure a reasonable level
>> of safety.
>> >
>> > Phil Bunch