On Wed, 30 May 2007 09:52:11 -0700, Bill Rose
wrote:


Charlie,
It appears that the "New Deal" for farmers was laid to rest in the 70s
after it had been whittled at for a generation. The original deal was
where the government would loan the farmer money to hold the crop off
the market until prices went higher. If they didn't go higher, the
government kept the crop and they called it even. The reasoning being
that it was in the nations interest to lay away food for bad time and to
support the farmers who grew it. In the 1970s the above got changed to
price supports. The government decided what a fair price was and paid
the farmer the difference. Thing is as the government determined price
has dropped, farmers raise more to cover expenses, causing in turn a
lowering if price supports. By now the farmer gets about 4 cents to the
dollar for their crop, uh, commodity.

The main benefactors of the commodity price collapse for corn is Archer
Daniel Midlands and, Cargill.

The price collapse realy started in the 50s with the introduction of
chemical fertilizers. Previously, farmers had used crop rotation and
manure to invigorate their land. Now there is no need for crop rotation,
meaning more corn and lower prices.

And until this point, much af what was produced on the farm remained on
the farm. I can't recall the percentage of produce that left the farm,
but it was fairly low.

Nearly every forty or eighty had a farm and family. Most, if not all
of the family food was produced and processed on the farm.

Stock was taken to a local or regional processing plant and was
processed and distributed to local stores. Stores sold local eggs and
produce, in season. You see what we have now. People were trying to
make a living and life for their families and communities, not trying
to become quadrazillionaires.

I well remember the taste of real pork and beef, real eggs and real
milk. Ever notice how pork and chicken kinda taste the same nowadays?

Back in the fifties and sixties, the local farmers also provided good
summer jobs for us kids. Before Monsanto, we walked bean fields,
cutting out the weeds. We made hay all summer.

Now there is little work for our young, even less meaningful work.
Gardening can be return to this, a reconnection with the natural world
and the natural rhythms of life. To the quietness of nature and mind
the working the dirt can bring.

According to Michael Pollard's book,"Omnivore's Delimma"
http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/r...1_pollan.shtml
it takes a little over 1 petroleum calorie to produce 1 calorie of
edible corn (pg. 46, 1st paragraph). There is the possibility of using
the entire plant by converting the cellulose back to sugar but I don't
know what energy investment that would entail.

Funny thing though, before using crop rotation and farm manure, you got
2 food calories out for everyone put in and the environment was a hell
of a lot healthier.

How you making out with your clay?

Ha! Always one to make me think, aincha? I am holding off to see some
results on my friends pastures and research a bit more.


- Bill
Coloribus gustibus non disputatum (mostly)

Care Brudda
Charlie

On Wed, 30 May 2007 14:51:21 GMT, "Michael \"Dog3\" Lonergan"
wrote:


I swear to Gawd I'd be much happier if we went back to the horse and buggy
days.

After I left the bright lights and tall buildings behind, I spent
several years going broke by helping the local farmers and doing other
odd work, like cleaning chimneys (like that wasn't hazardous). This
was in the area in which I grew up.

One older farmer I regularly helped work cattle, still kept a team of
Belgians and would always work about ten acres of corn with them along
with giving the neighbors sleigh rides in the winter. It was *so*
peaceful watching them and hearing only the squeaking of harness and
implements. Nothing to drown out the sound of everything else in the
vicinity.

For sure, it would have been hard work, but I think that was better
than today's alternative. And healthier.

Care, and thanks for bringing this to mind
Charlie

In article ,
"KW" keith_warrennospamatallteldotnet wrote:

I am involved with a client that is breaking in to the biofuel world. They
have perfected a process that turns meat-processing sludge (they are working
primarily with chicken plant sludge which is basically everything that is
left over at the end of the production run) into the appropriate amino acid
base for a biofuel blend. This sludge is run through a *cleaning* process
which has a yield rate of roughly 80% usable material to garbage and then it
is refined which drops the final yield another 10%. The end product is then
blended with diesel at varying rates depending on the needs of the final
consumer. It's an up and coming industry and they are very secretive about
the processes, etc so I don't have any idea what kind of energy use is
required to render the final product, but was told that the rendering
process does require more work than does Palm or Corn (the 2 most prolific
oil bases currently used) , but that overall, their cost per gallon is quite
a bit less due the to cost of raw material and transportation vs the other
2. (Most of the Palm oil is shipped in from Africa and there is not as great
a density in farms producing corn for fuel as compared to the relatively
high density iseen n the poultry processing areas.

KW

Chicken plant sludge? We call that sausage. There is nothing left over.
Nothing but the horrid smell of a charnel house. Even the feathers are
feed to cows for protein.
The way this works is that cattle and chickens are basically corn,
because corn is cheap. The corn in turn is based on petroleum
(fertilizer, insecticides and fuel for the tractor) that is owned by
people who hate us because we are trying to take it away from them (and
have been since [1953?], when we sent Kermit Roosevelt (CIA) to Iran to
over throw the legally elected government of Dr. Mohammed Mosaddeq and
install our ruthless puppet the Shah. [ and people wonder why they don't
like us]). I presume that this isn't a pitch and, that you are just
trying to pass along information, for which I appreciate the thought,
BUT you don't make biodiesel from amino acids. You make protein from
amino acids and, fuel from carbohydrates, like sugar or, hydrocarbons,
like oil.

Your friend might want to get his money back. Bush SAYS he is pushing
for fuel cells.

- Bill
Coloribus gustibus non disputatum (mostly)

On Wed, 30 May 2007 11:33:58 -0700, Bill Rose
wrote:



Chicken plant sludge? We call that sausage. There is nothing left over.
Nothing but the horrid smell of a charnel house. Even the feathers are
feed to cows for protein.

Looks like the price of beef is going to skyrocket, if'ns we feed both
the corn and chickenshit/feathers to our cars.

Holy shit, horrid doesn't even describe it. I've driven by these
places, in southern MO and northern ARK. In our end of the state
someone is always fighting with, and usually losing to, the pork
producers and the state. Premium Farms has emptied a large part of a
neighboring county with the stench and pollution. I shit you not, if
you even walk in one of those buildings for a few seconds, the reek is
nigh on impossible to remove from your skin and clothing. I don't give
a crap what they claim and "verify", they are destroying large areas of
the environment, let alone the independent producers, of which there
are few left. Money talks and pigshit reeks.

There would be a whole lot less fast food eaten if people could drive
by and see and smell these places. Tyson? Hormel? Patooie.

Your friend might want to get his money back. Bush SAYS he is pushing
for fuel cells.

*snork*

Charlie

"Michael \"Dog3\" Lonergan" wrote in
6.121:

FragileWarrior was forced to post
this in: rec.gardens

Omelet wrote in
news
In article 1,
"Michael \"Dog3\" Lonergan" wrote:

Charlie was forced to post this in: rec.gardens

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/27/1485/

Excerpt from article:

"Almost a quarter of this year’s US corn crop is expected to be
turned into fuel. Drought in Australia has added to the food prices
spike, which is feeding through to world inflation."

I swear to Gawd I'd be much happier if we went back to the horse
and buggy days.

Michael

But it still takes "fuel" to feed the horse. G

You put them on the lawn. (I do that with all three of mine.) What
they produce from trimming the lawn gets fed back to the garden in
time.

Don't think that a good buggy and harness and horse cost any less
than a car, though, those days are pretty much gone. And my big boy
produces more than his share of methane -- and it's usually when I'm
grooming his tail.

I just got back from riding Jonsey. He hates the indoor ring but it's
just too wet to jump outside. Same old routine. He dances around and
plops a few big dollops and then tries to throw me. He is definitely
an outside boy. He has yet to emit any methane while I'm gooming him
but I'm not about to give him any ideas.

Michael


D'argo has always saved his best... er... ERUPTIONS... for the
farriers. He does it to be funny, I swear. It's his own personal
commentary on things. And he always has a look on his face like the
little boy who farts loudly in church -- totally embarrased but obviously
he couldn't control it, Mom. Really, it was just an accident.

On Wed, 30 May 2007 16:32:10 +0000 (UTC), FragileWarrior
wrote:

"Rachael Simpson" wrote in
:

AMEN!!!!

Of course, that would work for me cause we already have the wagon and
horses.........

In our town horses are still considered transportation. I kid you not.

Must be those of Swiss-German descent?

Several groups have come to our area as well. It's like really kinda
weird when met, like a step back in time.

Drive Carefully
Charlie

Charlie wrote in :

On Wed, 30 May 2007 16:32:10 +0000 (UTC), FragileWarrior
wrote:

"Rachael Simpson" wrote in
:

AMEN!!!!

Of course, that would work for me cause we already have the wagon
and horses.........

In our town horses are still considered transportation. I kid you
not.

Must be those of Swiss-German descent?

Hell no. These are Indiana born and raised for generations and
generations.


Several groups have come to our area as well. It's like really kinda
weird when met, like a step back in time.


Nope. It's just a small town in Indiana. I'm in the heart of town.
There's the post office, town hall, our only restaurant and four grain
silos. Oh, yeah, and the tornado siren. There are no stop signs/lights
on Main Street. I keep my horses in the heart of town and I can ride
them right to the door of the post office if I feel like it.

"FragileWarrior" wrote in message
...
Charlie wrote in :

On Wed, 30 May 2007 16:32:10 +0000 (UTC), FragileWarrior
wrote:

In our town horses are still considered transportation. I kid you
not.

Must be those of Swiss-German descent?

Hell no. These are Indiana born and raised for generations and
generations.


Several groups have come to our area as well. It's like really kinda
weird when met, like a step back in time.


Nope. It's just a small town in Indiana. I'm in the heart of town.
There's the post office, town hall, our only restaurant and four grain
silos. Oh, yeah, and the tornado siren. There are no stop signs/lights
on Main Street. I keep my horses in the heart of town and I can ride
them right to the door of the post office if I feel like it.

Can't take the wagon out much around here - all the big rigs would run over
us!
Can ride the horses though. My husband has been known to "ride" thru the
local Hardee's drive thru. Gets lots of laughs about that.
There is a town here in NC called Love Valley. No cars are allowed there -
horses & mules only!

Bill Rose expounded:

In article ,
Ann wrote:

Charlie expounded:

Full article at:

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/27/1485/

Battle for Biofuels Drives World Food Prices Higher

America’s thirst for environmentally friendly biofuels
is driving up food prices around the world as farmers
scramble to devote more land to corn.


Is the US government still paying farmers to *not* grow crops?

Charlie,

Thank you, Bill, but....I am not Charlie )

(I asked the question, not Charlie)
--
Ann, gardening in Zone 6a
South of Boston, Massachusetts
e-mail address is not checked
******************************

In article
,
Bill Rose wrote:

In article ,
Ann wrote:

Charlie expounded:

[...]

- Bill
Coloribus gustibus non disputatum (mostly)

P.S. Jan I wish I had known that this book was continuation from
Pollard's previous book, "The Botany of Desire". Damn, this is turning
into a serious amount of summer reading.

Bill:

I haven't read the second book yet. The first one is a pretty
fast read, but I read fast...

The chapter about tulips is fascinating, as well as the reason
why Johnny Appleseed planted apples all over the place. To
folks who haven't read the book, he was planting apple trees
to produce apples to make hard cider. A man after my own heart.

Jan

--
Bedouin proverb: If you have no troubles, buy a goat.

On Wed, 30 May 2007 23:45:07 +0000 (UTC), FragileWarrior
wrote:


Must be those of Swiss-German descent?

Hell no. These are Indiana born and raised for generations and
generations.


Several groups have come to our area as well. It's like really kinda
weird when met, like a step back in time.


Nope. It's just a small town in Indiana. I'm in the heart of town.
There's the post office, town hall, our only restaurant and four grain
silos. Oh, yeah, and the tornado siren. There are no stop signs/lights
on Main Street. I keep my horses in the heart of town and I can ride
them right to the door of the post office if I feel like it.

I'll be damned. In Indiana?

Nothing like a small town. Sounds like the town I grew up in, sans
horses in town.

My sons both live about ten miles away, in a town of 250 or so (raised
them boys right, we did! They don't care much for the bright lights
and fast pace either) The town council went and got uppity, thinking, I
guess that they were a suburb of our town of about 10 grand, and passed
an ordinance banning any livestock. Elder son has an acre and a half
in town and was considering a Jersey and chickens. Screwed now.


Charlie, Dodgin' the occasional buggy

In article , Charlie wrote:

On Wed, 30 May 2007 09:52:11 -0700, Bill Rose
wrote:


[...]

Stock was taken to a local or regional processing plant and was
processed and distributed to local stores. Stores sold local eggs and
produce, in season. You see what we have now. People were trying to
make a living and life for their families and communities, not trying
to become quadrazillionaires.

Some of us are still doing that. There are three gals right here in
my little neighborhood who sell our eggs. About 50 dozen eggs a
week, between the three of us, and we can't meet our market demand.

A couple of gals sell raw milk, but do it very quietly, because
it's not legal in this state to sell it.

Another neighbor is a truck farmer and a founding mother of our
local Farmers Market, which has grown exponentially in 5 years.

And all of my Old Believer Russian neighbors grow a huge amount
of the food they need for the year. Literally tons of spuds; cabbage;
carrots; broccoli; lots of beets (for borscht), etc. (Lots of food
crops thrive in our cool Alaskan summers.) They all have greenhouses --
typical size is ~20'x30', although one neighbor just built a new one
that's at least 40' long. (I'm very jealous...)

Those families average 12 children each. The kids help with the
garden, the milk cows, the chickens (meat & egg), the horses,
goats and other assorted & sundry animals. The kids also go out
commercial fishing with their dads & uncles, and they go hunting
in the fall for moose & caribou. The kids grow up with a real
understanding of where their food comes from and how to make it
all happen.


Back in the fifties and sixties, the local farmers also provided good
summer jobs for us kids. Before Monsanto, we walked bean fields,
cutting out the weeds. We made hay all summer.

We can't get "American" kids to work on the ranch, doing haying.
The Russian kids are happy for the work. I've never heard a single
whimper or whine, bucking square bales.


Funny thing though, before using crop rotation and farm manure, you got
2 food calories out for everyone put in and the environment was a hell
of a lot healthier.


We sell our composted cow manure like crazy this time of year.
The organic truck farmers and my Russian neighbors buy it.

We started selling the cow poop simply because we're always broke
in May. I needed money to pay the light bill & the phone bill.
Now we sell I don't know how many tons of it every spring : )

Jan in Alaska
Zone 3 and time to plant-out, right after this full moon
(we have snow in the forecast for tomorrow night)

--
Bedouin proverb: If you have no troubles, buy a goat.

In article
,
Bill Rose wrote:

Bush SAYS he is pushing
for fuel cells.

- Bill

I'll believe that when I see it...
I think he's just playing lip service if you know what I mean.
--
Peace, Om

Remove _ to validate e-mails.

"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a Son of a bitch" -- Jack Nicholson

On Wed, 30 May 2007 20:52:51 -0500, Omelet
wrote:

In article
,
Bill Rose wrote:

Bush SAYS he is pushing
for fuel cells.

- Bill

I'll believe that when I see it...
I think he's just playing lip service if you know what I mean.

Hmmmm.....thought that was the the Arkansawyer that played that.

On Wed, 30 May 2007 15:34:28 -0900, Jan Flora wrote:

In article , Charlie wrote:

On Wed, 30 May 2007 09:52:11 -0700, Bill Rose
wrote:


[...]

Stock was taken to a local or regional processing plant and was
processed and distributed to local stores. Stores sold local eggs and
produce, in season. You see what we have now. People were trying to
make a living and life for their families and communities, not trying
to become quadrazillionaires.

Some of us are still doing that. There are three gals right here in
my little neighborhood who sell our eggs. About 50 dozen eggs a
week, between the three of us, and we can't meet our market demand.

A couple of gals sell raw milk, but do it very quietly, because
it's not legal in this state to sell it.

Another neighbor is a truck farmer and a founding mother of our
local Farmers Market, which has grown exponentially in 5 years.

And all of my Old Believer Russian neighbors grow a huge amount
of the food they need for the year. Literally tons of spuds; cabbage;
carrots; broccoli; lots of beets (for borscht), etc. (Lots of food
crops thrive in our cool Alaskan summers.) They all have greenhouses --
typical size is ~20'x30', although one neighbor just built a new one
that's at least 40' long. (I'm very jealous...)

Those families average 12 children each. The kids help with the
garden, the milk cows, the chickens (meat & egg), the horses,
goats and other assorted & sundry animals. The kids also go out
commercial fishing with their dads & uncles, and they go hunting
in the fall for moose & caribou. The kids grow up with a real
understanding of where their food comes from and how to make it
all happen.


Back in the fifties and sixties, the local farmers also provided good
summer jobs for us kids. Before Monsanto, we walked bean fields,
cutting out the weeds. We made hay all summer.

We can't get "American" kids to work on the ranch, doing haying.
The Russian kids are happy for the work. I've never heard a single
whimper or whine, bucking square bales.


Funny thing though, before using crop rotation and farm manure, you got
2 food calories out for everyone put in and the environment was a hell
of a lot healthier.


We sell our composted cow manure like crazy this time of year.
The organic truck farmers and my Russian neighbors buy it.

We started selling the cow poop simply because we're always broke
in May. I needed money to pay the light bill & the phone bill.
Now we sell I don't know how many tons of it every spring : )

Jan in Alaska
Zone 3 and time to plant-out, right after this full moon
(we have snow in the forecast for tomorrow night)

Whoa.....are you alive? Is this post originating from heaven?

Hello, is this god speaking? Is this a vision of the afterlife?

Seriously now.....

Charlie, to whom the angel spoke