permaculture

[Rick Valley <bamboogrove@cmug.com>]

Larry Santoyo, hello! But your "posts and rails" posting came with an
attachment and froze my machine when I tried to open it.

Heide says:
> Yes,  not all plants are equally toxic to all animals, including humans.
> Then there is the matter of quantity ingested
 
Then there is the matter of the Hunter S. Thompson syndrome: if you eat
enough different things they cancel each other out. This fits well with the
Pc principal of fostering diversity. ;)

> Seems to me that animals, including humans, are quite willing to eat
> toxic food that's presented to them,  The horses I was
> designing that farm landscape for had previously routinely poisoned
> themselves by browsing on trees surrounding their old pasture.  One
> should have thought that they would have learned eventually, but they
> didn't.

Marv Hegge had his cows eat too much Garry Oak at times & get in a bad way.
But Marv didn't eliminate his oak woods.

> I don't think we can take animal instincts to avoid toxic substances for
> granted, especially  livestock, or animals living under duress.And just
> because there are no obvious signs of poisoning means nothing.  When the
> metabolism is compromised in some way it will affect overall immunity
> and vitality.

Do you have a list of what's good for horses?


> As for what makes black locust rot resistant: do you know what it is?

My recollection is that it is partly the way the wood is built on a cellular
level. Also, NB, like all the woods mentioned by people, the sapwood rots
quite quickly. I'll consult my books, but that'll be a few days, They're
packed and I'm out of town tomorrow.

> Up here in Maine everyone uses Cedar for posts. I believe it's Eastern White
> Cedar (Thuja occidentalis) I've never looked into establishing a planting as
> I've got a bunch growing on my land. I've even sawn some up and used it to
> make benches for my outdoor hot tub and it's held up well.
> Scott Vlaun

I've been in a White Cedar sauna in da UP (Michigan). It was very nice.
Scott; are you able to grow Locust at all there in W. Maine?

Steve Diver says:
> Osage orange, Maclura pomifera
> Black locust, Robinia psuedoacacia
> Eastern redcedar, Juniperus virginiana

Of these, only Black Locust grows well in W. Oregon. We do have Juniper in
E. Oregon, but the nice stands of tall straight ones got cut out early on. I
saw ONE nice stand once, on a river flat in the Warm Springs Reservation.
I'd guess we might be able to grow a W. Chinese juniper species OK here.
I do like osage orange wood alot. Strong, heavy and beautiful. Too bad it
was so restricted genetically, which is probably why I can't get any to grow
well here. (Before humans arrived and killed off their megafaunal partners
there were 3 species all over N. Am.)

> I see black locust all over the edges of cattle pastures
> around these parts and I've never heard of toxicity
> problems from grazing.   It is faster growing than osage
> orange.  Old agriculture bulletins talk about black locust
> plantations and woodlots specifically geared to harvesting
> for fence posts.

I'll second all this from Steve.

There was a fence post evaluation at Oregon State here once; Black Locust
scored better than Garry Oak (a "white" oak species) or old growth Western
Red cedar heartwood.
For non-ground contact work, second growth W. red cedar isn't nearly as nice
as old growth, doesn't last as well. For non-ground contact, I like sweet
chestnut alot. And it coppices, and yields nuts and honey and tannin? (a
guess) And of course, leaves for wrapping gourmet goat cheeses!
-Rick