permaculture

[Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com>]

The Anasazi, including those at Chaco, are firmly considered by
anthropologists to be agriculturists. They farmed corn for their mainstay
and had large irrigated fields. Farming in a desert is very risky. No
horticultural society generates the surplus necessary to build a settlement
the size of Chaco; it's way over Dunbar's number. And, sure, every society
is vulnerable to climate change, or any number of dangers. I'm not sure that
horticulture is sustainable, but it's more sustainable than plow
agriculture. We only got about 10,000 years out of agriculture before we
trashed a planet. We might get 100,000 from horticulture, which might be
enough time for us (all of us, I mean) to figure out how to live here.

I'm reading a great book right now called "The First Farmers" by Peter
Bellwood. He cites data showing that from about 90,000 years ago until
11,500 YA climate was incredibly unpredictable, cold, dry, and volatile
(picture a really jagged graph of temp and rainfall, with generally cold
temps). Then, boom, 11,500 years ago the graph smooths out, things get
stably warm and moist. And that's when farming started. There's evidence
that several grains were domesticated and farmed about 14,000 years ago, but
climate was too  unstable for those cultures to make it work. They reverted
to gathering. It's possible that farming was simply impossible until the
climate allowed it. So if we lose both a stable climate and a massive fossil
fuel subsidy that lets us ride out drought and low fertility, farming isn't
going to be viable. Plant your trees now.

Toby
__________________
Learn permaculture in at a tropical food forest in Belize this February.
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On 1/19/07 7:14 PM, "Rain Tenaqiya" <raincascadia@yahoo.com> wrote:

> While I agree with Toby's promotion of horticulture, and appreciate his
> sociological distinction between it and agriculture, most horticulural
> socities are (mostly were) not inherently sustainable, either.  A classic 
> and
> extreme example is in the US Southwest, where most of the areas inhabited by
> pre-Columbian Native Americans were deforested and turned to bare desert 
> after
> a few generations of farming (the Anasazi and the people that built at Chaco
> Canyon are the most famous).  It appears that the only people that survived 
> as
> horticulturists are those that were lucky enough to occupy ideal sites, with
> dependable water sources and a forgiving ecology.
>  
> Small-scale integrated farming dependent mostly on humun labor and no major
> inputs (off-site energy, biomass, nutrients, poisons, or water) is 
> definitely
> part of the solution, I believe, but only along with ecologically informed
> decisions based on long-term monitoring and self-restraint, especially with
> regard to population reduction and control.  The scientific method, and the
> technology we now have to implement it, is relatively new and is crucial if 
> we
> are to properly understand and manage the ecosystems of which we are a part.
> Past societies generally couldn't perceive the creeping changes that took
> place over generations, though warnings from prophets such as Plato and
> Mencius (who saw massive deforestation turning the hills into eroded rocks 
> in
> Greece and China, respectively) didn't seem to have any more effect than
> modern scientists warning about global warming, today.  Without
> self-restraint, there is no hope.  I guess we need a new religion (which 
> will
> probably
> create more problems).
>  
> Rain
>  
> 
> 
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> Today's Topics:
> 
> 1. Re: VABF Conference (Keith Johnson)
> 2. Re: "How to Save the World" - Biodynamics in India (Steve Diver)
> 3. Keeping up with the Colemans (Toby Hemenway)
> 4. Re: "green" affiliates (Martin Naylor)
> 5. Ode to Indian Farmers Whose Land Was Confiscated For
> Industrialization (sustain_ability@123mail.org)
> 6. Re: Ode to Indian Farmers Whose Land Was Confiscated For
> Industrialization (Lawrence F. London, Jr.)
> 
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2007 12:57:09 -0500
> From: Keith Johnson
> Subject: Re: [permaculture] VABF Conference
> To: permaculture 
> 
> Message-ID: <45AE6375.9010805@mindspring.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
> 
> Peter Bane attended this event last year and said it was very good. This
> year he will be a keynote speaker (and book / mag seller).
> Keith
> 
> Steve Diver wrote:
>> The VABF conference is excellent, so if you're within
>> 3-5 hours it can be worth the trip.
>> 
>> Often the biggest thing you get from these bio-regional,
>> sustainable ag, and organic ag conferences is the opportunity
>> to meet kindred spirits and fellow land managers, as well as
>> to share stories that range from living on the land to raising
>> little kids and nanny goats, onwards to organic farming methods
>> including tools and equipment and composting and keeping
>> chickens on pasture.
>> VABF
>> http://www.vabf.org
>>