On 5/24/03 11:25 AM, in article , "Archimedes
Plutonium" wrote:

Recently I posted a thread about the use of the regular concrete block
of 16 X 8 X 8 for gardens and farming. It is a great idea and now want
to talk about it
in detail as I am running experiments on this approach. In the future
when
petrol is scarce this is (I feel) the maximum means of farming. I am
always
talking about the Optimal Strategy in VonNeumann Gametheory in
mathematics.
And I believe all of agriculture has an OS of farming. In the future
when petrol is rare and expensive and when fusion engineering realizes
there will never be
Fusion Electric Power Plants (Fusion Barrier Principle). Then in that
future time
agriculture will have to become MAXIMIZED for efficiency. And that is
when
I believe Concrete Block will be the theme and focus of farming. Also,
this
planet Earth needs to have a limited amount of human population where I
am
guessing the magic number is 2 billion people. I just wonder how many
concrete
block this planet needs for agriculture for that of 2 billion people.
What a beautiful quantization of agriculture. Quantized by concrete
building blocks.

WHAT IT IS: It is the placement of concreteblock on land surface wherein

one of the holes of the block is placed the seed or small plant. The
block thence
protects the plant and marks the plant where it is. The block are spaced
such
that a human driven push mower, either human muscle or draft animal so
that
the block protects the plant whenever the pushmower is drawn through the

spacings. The clipped weeds and grass become the fertilizer. So, in this
future
farming there never needs be applied fertilizer for the clippings
provide all
the fertilizer. There never needs be applied herbicides because the
weeds are
encouraged to grow for more clippings as fertilizer. There is the
problem
of more people working on the farm to hand weed the block where the
plant is in. I either hand weed or use a shears carefully.

What IT WILL Change: In this Concrete Block future farming there will
be no need for farm equipment such as tractors or combines or any other
heavy equipment. There will be no need to buy any petrol. No need to
buy any fertilizer. No need to buy any herbicides. There will be more
people
working in farming. There will be a need for horses and donkeys again.
And it may also eliminate the need for most insecticides because the
fields
can be diversified instead of one kind of crop.

A couple things come to mind. The grass and weeds take valuable
moisture so your idea would work only in areas with plenty of rainfall.
They also take nutrients out of the soil.
Farmers had horse drawn planters and cultivators before tractors. Tin
shields protected the plants as the cultivator shovels went by. The same is
true today with tractor drawn equipment.
There used to be something called check planting. A wire was stretched
the length of the row. This wire had evenly spaced knobs or knots on it.
The planter would drop a seed at each knot. The wire had to be moved after
the planter completed a pass. This planting method would allow a field to
be cultivated east-west and north-south to help eliminate the weeds.
Crop rotation used to be regular practice. The U.S. Farm program and
economics put and end to that for awhile. Rotation is being practiced more
now since the Freedom to Farm Act (1996) and the invention of Roundup ready
soybeans.
There used to be migrant workers that would come through to weed the
soybeans before RR beans were invented. The workers did fine with their
hoes without an obstacle in the way.
What happens to your concrete enclosed plants in a heavy rain? That might
be something to test. What if a worker trips and bangs his head against one
of those blocks? I smell lawsuit. Just askin.

Dean





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