Subject: Re: [Homestead] AHIPA: Exploring the Potential of a Sustainable Crop as a Food Source
Date: Thu, 14 Sep 2006 09:55:48 -0700
Any time that people who you know hate each other are all nodding like
dashboard dolls over the same catch phrase, evil's got to be afoot. One
day it occurred to a PR type that all agribusiness revolves around crops
that are either "native" (like timber) or decidedly non-invasive, like
corn. So the catchy phrase "non-native invasive" was born. It sound
perfectly environmental, yet it's completely self-serving to
agribusiness. Since then a way has evolved for botanists to stay silent
on the issue of habitat destruction, and thus keep their jobs, by
scapegoating us.
I think it's fair to say that in Western culture farms always seem to
expand to be as big as one guy can plow in the spring. This is
inevitably bigger than "one guy" can actually take care of. I wonder
how much of the tumbleweed problem in Missouri is actually due to that.
I'd really love to have some growing. They seem as though they'd make
the best choice of all for compost. You need material that's stiff
enough not to mat down, but thin enough to decompose along with manure
in a timely manner. I wonder whether a different sort of farming model,
one that optimizes the use of small plots of land and leaves the rest
undisturbed (along with those common sense tillage practices I was
talking about) would have made a difference in the tumbleweed population.
Bill
S. Oregon coast
Re: [Homestead] AHIPA: Exploring the Potential of a Sustainable Crop as a Food Source
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