Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]

Being diabetic I don't eat grains any longer but my family does! And from 
the video I can only make the rough guestimate that we would run out of that 
wheat in a week just for the bread that is made here. I am also fairly 
certain that the corn shown would not feed my poultry for a week or would 
allow us to make corn bread for more than three weeks.

That alone is a long way off for a year long food supply even in a good 
climate. In a cold climate you do need more calories just to keep warm.
john



> Just to be sure I checked 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Alto,_California#Climate & Palo Alto has 
> a Mediterranean Climate. Well, we could all grow more with mild outdoor 
> temperatures all year, couldn't we. That isn't brought out in the article.
>
> As for wheat I'm not big on grains. With other calorie foods like potatoes 
> & beans etc. I don't see grains as absolutely necessary. Cover crops are 
> useful but I'd favor buckwheat there. As for green manure crops, there's 
> plenty of organic waste out there, leaves, grass, large animal manure & so 
> on, usually free for the taking. I see nothing unsustainable about 
> recycling it, importing that waste to the garden from nearby. Myself I 
> don't have room to grow my own grasses for composting, & lots of people 
> are in the same situation.
>
> Somehow being practical in the big picture doesn't get pumped up in these 
> articles.
>
> paul tradingpost@lobo.net
>
> *********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********
>
> On 11/15/2012 at 10:29 PM John D'hondt wrote:
>
> > I think we would all loose a lot of weight if we had to live on what is
> > visible from this 1/10th acre garden and nothing else. In many places
> > people
> > would starve. I saw more sun during that 7 minute video than we had all
> > summer.
> > I also think that the good woman who guides us around does not have that
> > much experience. For instance she found harvesting the wheat a problem
> > while
> > it is really one of the oldest skills known to mankind. Her general
> > enthusiasm is great though and from that comes a little exaggeration.
> > john
> >
> > > What's wrong with this picture - anyone?
> > >
> > > How to Grow All Your Food on a Tenth of an Acre
> > http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-agriculture/how-grow-all-your-food-tenth-acre.html
> > > paul tradingpost@lobo.net
> > >
> > >
> > >
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