Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Dan Conine <dconine@bertramwireless.com>]

> Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] What's better for the farm is better
>         for the planet
> To:livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
> Message-ID:<5308E8F1.1030801@lobo.net>
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>
>
> True, unfortunately. Some of us still have hopes for something civilized
> to survive the Industrial Revolution, to relearn small community self
> reliance and resilience, esp in food. Trying to take part in that larger
> purpose actually brings some peace of mind. It can take many forms, such
> as preserving endangered seed diversity etc.
Thanks, Paul.
    I tend to agree in heart with your reply, and I'm fond of what 
Marcin Jakabowski is doing with the opensourcefarm.org idea of 
establishing some minimum technology for a civilized society.
    I am just getting too cynical, so I try to withhold my responses 
most of the time, now.
Why? Because looking at the climate data, it is apparent that anything 
above about 30 degrees latitude will be completely unstable for some 
decades or centuries to come (probably until all of the ice melts), and 
the areas of the tropics will be too hot for human habitation. By 
"unstable", I mean too unpredictable for the commodity crops that are 
feeding some 90% of the world's population.
    That leaves some narrow bands where grasses will dominate and 
nomadic humans MAY survive by following what's left of grazing animals.

    But we try not to talk about that in polite company, right? Better 
to just keep believing that some miracle will occur and the exponential 
changes in the weather will suddenly level out at the state we are in 
right now: maybe because everyone gets together and prays for it or 
something.

Meanwhile, we live, we eat and we try to be better people than our 
culture has tried to make us.

Good luck,

Dan C.
Belgium, WI

On 2/22/2014 11:44 AM, Dan Conine wrote:
> > From: tradingpost<tradingpost@lobo.net>
> > Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] What's better for the farm is better
> >
> > Along with more farmers, we might add more income from farming, at least
> > minimum wage --
> Ironically, it's the farm income that went away, causing farmers to go 
> away (expand or die). Americans in the early 20th century spent 1/4 to 
> 1/2 of their income on food, plus did most of the preparation 
> themselves. Today, it's more like 1/10th of their income (on average) 
> and they don't put any labor into the preparation. That difference has 
> been "havested" by the food processing corporations, and the "surplus" 
> farm production is used to trade for the oil that enables the 
> button-pushing lifestyle.
>
> People are voting billions of times every day for a shadow government 
> at the cash registers and gas pumps. What can we expect except growth 
> of that system until it consumes itself, as all empires do.
>
> The "EXPAND OR DIE!!" philosophy never stops to contemplate that it is 
> also "Expand to the death."
> ..and as Jim Kunstler says, "Efficiency is the straightest road to Hell."
>
> sigh,
>
> Dan C.
> Belgium, WI