In article
,
RichD wrote:

On Jul 30, dejure wrote:
Is it really
superior to petrochemical fertilizer, or is it
guilty conscience liberal feelgoodism?

No, the petrochemical producs are better. They sell better
and the market doesn't lie.

In support of your smile: *When farming, we would dump around seven
hundred tons of compost on a single one hundred acre unit. *This
reduced our dependence on [incomplete] chemical fertilizers (heck, it
was winter, we had nothing else to do). *The biggest "upside" was we
were not growing nutritionally hollow food. *People often commented on
the better taste of things grown with compost and mineral
supplements. *For example, try a garden fresh tomato with good soil,
then try one from a hot house supplier. *The only reason we turned to
chemical (e.g., thousands of gallons of nitrogen pumped through the
irrigations circles) was to survive/compete on the market and, in the
end, the corn looked damn good. *Still, just like us humans, plants
are more than just a little nitrogen, potassium, and ....... *On a
side note, go look at the soil on many of the farms. It's dead.
FungiCIDES, pestiCIDES and so forth kill everything. *Everything works
together, but we have a better way.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/19/sc...v.html?_r=1&em

"If everyone switched to organic farming, we couldn't
support the earth's current population - maybe half."

--
Rich

Nina V. Fedoroff' job is to support her boss, Condi "The Butcher" Rice.
She isn't going to say we could fix the food problem when the
administration won't. GMO crops don't produce more food. Large harvests
were possible with chemical fertilizers but as the top soil is destroyed
by them, more and more chem ferts need to be added to maintain
productivity. Organic farming from what I've been able to find can
produce more food per acre with mixed crops than chemical farming can
producing monocultures. Chem ferts and pesticides are killing the
fertility of our soils, polluting the environment, and they are made
from oil. We are already producing a third more grain crops than we
need and as a result, food processors spend billion$ every year to get
you to eat empty calories, usually with the hot buzz nutrient of the day
added.

Eat local as much as you can because it is fresher and is better for the
environment. Pesticides reduce bioflavonoids. Chem ferts attract insects
and reduce yields, whereas crop rotation doesn't let a pest get
established.

Michael Pollan is a very readable way to get started but there are many,
many authors that have knowledge of this subject. Unfortunately I
haven't the time to respond more fully but I shall try to add to this
response this week-end.
--

Billy
Bush and Pelosi Behind Bars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KVTf...ef=patrick.net
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009916.html