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permaculture - Re: [permaculture] The Loss of Our Trees

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  • From: "Kirby Fry" <peace@totalaccess.net>
  • To: <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] The Loss of Our Trees
  • Date: Fri, 2 Aug 2002 07:40:07 -0500

Hi Mark,

>> I find this post, while interesting, peripheral to the current tension
between those who would manage for grass and those who would manage for
trees. <<

When one considers that grassland ecologists and ranchers often take
historical accounts out of context (e.g. looking back only 100 years rather
than say 200 years) in order to justify clearing the woods and torching the
land I don't see how clearing up this historical misunderstanding is
peripheral.

>> Obviously they both have value, but a strong case can be made in
grazing situations to keep trees very limited. <<

As well, a strong case can be made to use trees extensively in a grazing
system. There are farmers' trees, mostly legumes such as acacia, locust and
mesquite, which offer a dappled shade and sugar rich seed pods throughout
the summer. This source of sugar and protein (via the seed pods) is
essential for digestion late in the summer when most grasses are nothing but
dried up cellulose and livestock need the extra sugar for fermentation in
their ruminant gut. The dappled shade allows grass production right up to
the trunk of the tree.

Thirty farmers' trees per acre is quite conventional in many countries where
chemical fertilizers and round bailing aren't available. This ratio of
trees per acre is just enough to ensure a return of minerals, nitrogen and
other essential nutrients and enzymes to the upper levels of the soil.

Wooded hill tops are also essential for shading livestock, and giving them a
breezy place where the bighting insects are not so thick. Shaded hill tops
are also key birthing sites.

>> Trees tend to attract animals into the shade in the hot parts of the
day, limiting their grazing time and concentrating manure, often killing the
trees. <<

Sounds like this scenario would make a tree cutting aggie happy. "We don't
have to worry about kill'n them trees, 'cause the cattle'l do it for us."
Oh right, but then the dead limbs will get caught in the throat of the
bailer. But I see that your point is that you would rather provide no shade
for livestock in order to force them further out into their pastures. Why
not use reverse psychology on the poor beasts and lure them to other parts
of the paddock with other mottes of trees? Ah, once again, though, we're
managing the landscape in order to accommodate machinery and economics and
it would be difficult to have to steer around a motte of trees.

>> When we try to influence the way this land is treated the economics have
to work. <<

Right, and in Texas, I would venture to say that many, many ranchers east
and south of the central US plains and north of the coastal plains are
mainly hobby ranchers allowing their livestock to lackadaisically graze (an
Alan Savory term) primarily in order to obtain their 1-d-1 Ag tax exemption.
Fortunately, the state has a new 1-d-1 Wildlife tax exemption that finally
gives folks more options than hay and livestock production, so maybe we can
start to get away from managing the land simply from an economics approach.


Kirby Fry

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