On Fri, 01 Aug 2003 21:16:44 +0200, Torsten Brinch
posted:

On Fri, 01 Aug 2003 05:38:18 GMT, "Moosh:]"
wrote:
Perhaps he is an Australian like me?

Perhaps, but on check the similarity between John Riley and you
appears to run deeper than that. Substantial equivalence of mindset
if not identity would seem indicated.

The mindset of a West Australian interested in native plants perhaps?
There are thousands of us.
Probably not too many wasting their time on newsgroups, however

E.g. 'soils with almost no phosphorus' is not particularly an
Australian expression.

Sorry, but as most of our soils are thus, I would regard it as a
*very* Australian expression. We've imported whole islands of guano to
remedy this.

Yet, you and John Riley are the only persons
on Usenet who have used those words in that sequence. Furthermore,
looking at the expression in the contexts, striking semantic
similarities appear:

"I would love to know how you would farm "organically" in the
southwest of Western Australia. It has extremely old soils with
almost no phosphorus. There is often a deficiency in copper and
molybdenum (IIRC)" (John Riley 2001)

And? This could have been written by me, and many others. Many in the
different classes I've attended. I don't remember meeting a John Riley
but there you go.

"Tell me then how an Organic farmer in SW Western Australia on
ancient impoverished soils with almost NO phosphorus, and no copper or
molybdenum and very little potassium should function?" (Moosh 2003)

Seems a very reasonable question, from one who has a reasonable
acquaintance with this huge state.

All very interesting (is this your hobby?) but have you considered
that these may be facts which are commonly known to Western
Australians? How else would you express "soils with almost NO
phosphorus"? It is such a well known fact amongst wild flower growers
and botanists. Many native plants are poisoned by normal amounts of
phosphorus. If you look on bags of fertiliser, as I am wont to do, you
will often notice that Super has added Mo and Cu. Trucks and rail cars
full of it sent all over the state. I've even spread it around from
the back of a tractor in several states.