permaculture

["Golden Love" <goldenlove@cruzio.com>]

Rain,

It is not just industrial toxins, it is stuff the people here in Santa Cruz
and other parts of this country dump down the drain, like Draino to unclog
drains, paint (washing out their paint brushes), 409 Cleaner, Comet
Cleanser, Tub and Tile Cleaner, etc. There is a huge amount of this stuff
being dumped down the drain every day. It will require people to learn there
are alternatives to all this junk and that they can even use things like
Papaya enzymes and Ceramic Cleaning Capsules to wash their clothes in.

Golden Love
Love's Gardens
Creating and Maintaining Sustainable Urban Landscapes
California Licensed Contractor C27 363672
127 National St.
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Phone  (831) 471-9100
Fax  ( 831) 471-9200
goldenlove@cruzio.com
 
-----Original Message-----
From: permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Rain Tenaqiya
Sent: Saturday, September 25, 2004 1:33 PM
To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [permaculture] farms as nutrient exporters 2

There were a couple of points I'd like to "correct:"
 
1.  Municipal sludge is nasty-  If the waste stream is properly designed so
that industrial toxins are not entering it and if the sewage sludge is
composted properly with a good C:N ratio so that it gets hot, there will not
be significant toxins or harmful organisms in it.  King County (Seattle
area) has been doing this for years and uses it for growing wheat,
landscaping, and forestry.  They report that the level of heavy metals in
the soil is actually diluted by adding the composted sludge.  Unfortunately,
most of the nitrogen in sewage is in the liquid part, so it is not being
recycled.
 
2.  Exporting crops from farms can be sustainable because plants are mostly
water, carbon, and nitrogen-  It is common knowledge that soil fertility
declines after only one to three seasons of exporting crops, and this is not
just because of the loss of nitrogen.  Phosphorus, potassium, and other
nutrients are mined out of the soil by plants and must be returned (a basic
permaculture principle).  Furthermore, in cases where a nutrient exists in
sufficient quantities only in a certain strata of the soil or bedrock
profile, it will be lost forever once plants that are being exported have
integrated the nutrient into their tissues.
 
Most of the "solutions" to agriculture involve the use of fossil fuels to
move stuff around.  Very few advanced horticultural or agrarian cultures
have been able to sustainably farm for more than a few hundred years, and
this is without the use of fossil fuels.  Besides the rape of the planet
that fossil fuel use entails, we need to come up with ways of providing for
ourselves once fossil fuels run out.  It is pretty sobering when you start
to look at alternatives.  It takes a lot of space and work to grow enough
apples to produce ethanol for even very modest transportation use, for
example.
 
Rain

                
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