songbird wrote:
FarmI wrote:
Billy wrote:

Well, in this case, it would be prairie grass (reflecting Salatin's
pasture),

What sort of species are you talking about when you say 'prairie
grass'? The reason why I ask is that the You-tube clips of Salatin's
place doesn't look like anything I'd call a 'prairie'. He looks like
he's got a farm on quite rich land in a well protected area.
'Prairies' to me suggest very open and exposed locations and the
grasses there would, TMWOT, be much tougher and less nutritious than
in good pasture land. I might be talking through my hat 'cos I
haven't got a clue about US farms, but that's what I'd expect here in
Oz if we were looking at farms of differing capacities.

right, anyone talking about grassland production in
the eastern seaboard of the USA being equivalent
to what happens on the prairies is full of it. the time
scale difference isn't minor and probably heavily
depends upon the average annual rainfall.

the soil of the prairies was probably produced over
the period of time after the last ice-age. it isn't that
thick. if it could accumulate at a rate of an inch a
year it would be much deeper...

ok, so let's return to the eastern seaboard and
wonder why the topsoil in unmolested places isn't
deeper? if it can be so productive why isn't it?
because it is woodland and not grassland and
unmanaged woodlands cycle carbon but do not
sequester once it's reached maturity. very little
is sequestered and that would be because of fires
that char and thus turn the carbon into a form not
easily consumed...

if trees and forests were so good for carbon
gathering and keeping the soils of the Amazon would
be deep and fertile, but they are not unless you
find the places that were altered by the natives in
prehistorical times.


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the nutrients are
actually in the trees. Saying that this environment doesn't accumulated
soil and therefore no forest will do so does not necessarily follow.
Particularly where temperate forests were cleared for crop land you can
certainly increase the amount of carbon stored by converting them to pasture
or back to forest. But your point about reaching a maximum and then not
storing any more is correct. Evan so I don't think carbon sequestration is
anything more than a side show when it comes to managing climate change.

so this says that reforestation is barking up the
wrong tree when it comes to CO2 sequestration
and rebuilding topsoil. (but i won't argue that
it's bad for species preservation and diversity
because that's needed too in many places -- so
there has to be the tradeoff there).



You are right that it is not a panacea but wrong in saying we cannot build
soil or sequester carbon by altering land use.

David

In article ,
"David Hare-Scott" wrote:

songbird wrote:
FarmI wrote:
Billy wrote:

Well, in this case, it would be prairie grass (reflecting Salatin's
pasture),

What sort of species are you talking about when you say 'prairie
grass'? The reason why I ask is that the You-tube clips of Salatin's
place doesn't look like anything I'd call a 'prairie'. He looks like
he's got a farm on quite rich land in a well protected area.
'Prairies' to me suggest very open and exposed locations and the
grasses there would, TMWOT, be much tougher and less nutritious than
in good pasture land.
It worked for the buffalo and those that tended them.
I might be talking through my hat 'cos I
haven't got a clue about US farms, but that's what I'd expect here in
Oz if we were looking at farms of differing capacities.

right, anyone talking about grassland production in
the eastern seaboard of the USA being equivalent
to what happens on the prairies is full of it. the time
scale difference isn't minor and probably heavily
depends upon the average annual rainfall.

the soil of the prairies was probably produced over
the period of time after the last ice-age. it isn't that
thick. if it could accumulate at a rate of an inch a
year it would be much deeper...

ok, so let's return to the eastern seaboard and
wonder why the topsoil in unmolested places isn't
deeper? if it can be so productive why isn't it?
because it is woodland and not grassland and
unmanaged woodlands cycle carbon but do not
sequester once it's reached maturity. very little
is sequestered and that would be because of fires
that char and thus turn the carbon into a form not
easily consumed...

if trees and forests were so good for carbon
gathering and keeping the soils of the Amazon would
be deep and fertile, but they are not unless you
find the places that were altered by the natives in
prehistorical times.


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the nutrients are
actually in the trees. Saying that this environment doesn't accumulated
soil and therefore no forest will do so does not necessarily follow.
Particularly where temperate forests were cleared for crop land you can
certainly increase the amount of carbon stored by converting them to pasture
or back to forest. But your point about reaching a maximum and then not
storing any more is correct.

Citation, please.

Evan so I don't think carbon sequestration is
anything more than a side show when it comes to managing climate change.

All fixes are temporary, and all analogies fall apart somewhere.
Still, it is something that we could do right now, and have an impact on
environmental, and human health.


so this says that reforestation is barking up the
wrong tree when it comes to CO2 sequestration
and rebuilding topsoil. (but i won't argue that
it's bad for species preservation and diversity
because that's needed too in many places -- so
there has to be the tradeoff there).



You are right that it is not a panacea but wrong in saying we cannot build
soil or sequester carbon by altering land use.

David
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html

Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the
nutrients are actually in the trees. Saying that this environment
doesn't accumulated soil and therefore no forest will do so does not
necessarily follow. Particularly where temperate forests were
cleared for crop land you can certainly increase the amount of
carbon stored by converting them to pasture or back to forest. But
your point about reaching a maximum and then not storing any more is
correct.

Citation, please.


Note that we were talking about changes to land use not sequestering carbon
in less decomposable forms. I was told the amount that can be stored has
limits in a course by Dr Judi Earl who put me on to Dr Christine Jones. The
latter is the local guru on agricultural carbon sequestration. The reason
given is that as decomposable carbon builds up the microbes that break it
down also build up until the rate they are breaking down reaches the rate of
build-up, in other words an equilibrium is reached. The position of the
equilibrium depends on the land use and methods but you will still get one
sooner or later. This is ignoring the carbon stored above ground in forests
etc but you can see that it also has a maximum value depending on what is
grown.

Here is one quote:

"The capacity of soil to store decomposable organic carbon by
physical protection within micro-aggregates or other organomineral
complexes seems to be finite.
Once these complexes are saturated any added decomposable
organic carbon cannot be protected from decomposition.
Even if this capacity has been severely depleted it can be resaturated
rapidly (e.g. within 30 years by growing pasture)."

Which is from he

http://www.amazingcarbon.com/PDF/Lei...N_ARMIDALE.pdf

This site

http://www.amazingcarbon.com

has a huge amount of material on this topic. I haven't read it all. If you
also google on:

carbon sequestration "christine jones" site:.au

you will get much more. She is of the view that paying farmers to do
sequestration is a solution to climate change. I think we must try many
solutions because until you try you don't know for sure what the effect will
be and also there are political, economic and social limits on the extent
that any given solution can be adopted thus we are likely to need a
multi-pronged approach to succeed.

Also I would not want to push only sequestration solutions because the
fossil fuel industry will try to seize on any method of dealing with climate
change (eg "clean coal") as long as it allows them to keep on burning and
that is very undesirable for many reasons apart from the increase in
atmospheric CO2.

David

In article ,
"David Hare-Scott" wrote:


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the
nutrients are actually in the trees. Saying that this environment
doesn't accumulated soil and therefore no forest will do so does not
necessarily follow. Particularly where temperate forests were
cleared for crop land you can certainly increase the amount of
carbon stored by converting them to pasture or back to forest. But
your point about reaching a maximum and then not storing any more is
correct.

Citation, please.


Note that we were talking about changes to land use not sequestering carbon
in less decomposable forms. I was told the amount that can be stored has
limits in a course by Dr Judi Earl who put me on to Dr Christine Jones. The
latter is the local guru on agricultural carbon sequestration. The reason
given is that as decomposable carbon builds up the microbes that break it
down also build up until the rate they are breaking down reaches the rate of
build-up, in other words an equilibrium is reached. The position of the
equilibrium depends on the land use and methods but you will still get one
sooner or later. This is ignoring the carbon stored above ground in forests
etc but you can see that it also has a maximum value depending on what is
grown.

Here is one quote:

"The capacity of soil to store decomposable organic carbon by
physical protection within micro-aggregates or other organomineral
complexes seems to be finite.
Once these complexes are saturated any added decomposable
organic carbon cannot be protected from decomposition.
Even if this capacity has been severely depleted it can be resaturated
rapidly (e.g. within 30 years by growing pasture)."

Which is from he

http://www.amazingcarbon.com/PDF/Lei...N_ARMIDALE.pdf

This site

http://www.amazingcarbon.com

has a huge amount of material on this topic. I haven't read it all. If you
also google on:

carbon sequestration "christine jones" site:.au

you will get much more. She is of the view that paying farmers to do
sequestration is a solution to climate change. I think we must try many
solutions because until you try you don't know for sure what the effect will
be and also there are political, economic and social limits on the extent
that any given solution can be adopted thus we are likely to need a
multi-pronged approach to succeed.

Also I would not want to push only sequestration solutions because the
fossil fuel industry will try to seize on any method of dealing with climate
change (eg "clean coal") as long as it allows them to keep on burning and
that is very undesirable for many reasons apart from the increase in
atmospheric CO2.

David
The pdf was a good romp with soil "C" saturation rates varing from 30
years to 20,000. Part of Salatin's putative success with topsoil
building would have to be that he is returning more "C" to the soil than
"N", so it would seem that this isn't a rudderless enterprise.

I share your concern about coal, and since we have already breached the
Rubicon for the CO2 greenhouse effect at 450 ppm, if you factor in the
influences of the other greenhouse gasses (CH4, NO2, O3, H2O). If our
politicians weren't such whores, it would be a simple matter of
maximizing those activities that ameliorate greenhouse gases, and the
continuous reduction of those activities that aggravate it (fossil
fuel). Of course this would need to factor in, transitioning those
employed in fossil fuel extraction into different employment, and the
screams of "socialism" from the lunatic fringe.

Building topsoil would still have the salubrious effects of:

1) cessation of the use of chemical fertilizers, which encourage some
bacteria to devour the organic material in the soil (topsoil)
2) stops the release of NO2 from the fertilizer, which is a greenhouse
gas.
3) stops the pollution of ground and run off water, thus improving
the quality of drinking water, and cutting off the cause of ocean
dead zones.
4) At the very least, what remaining topsoil would be protected by the
permanent ground cover, and there is the expectation that we may add
to it.
5) Additional topsoil (because there is more of it, and it is made from
organic material) would effectively sequester CO2 to some extent.
Again the question is where to put the decimal point, not "if one is
needed". Peter Bane (google the name) puts the sequestration
potential at being equivalent to the US production of CO2.
6) Increased topsoil leads to increased absorption of rain fall,
recharging aquifers, and reducing chances of flooding.
7) Increased meat production on grassland instead of in CAFOs, means that
70% of antibiotics in this country won't go into meat animals,
thereby creating antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria.
8) Less grain will be needed to divert into CAFOs
9) Fewer CAFOs means fewer stinking lagoons of animal excrement, that
won't be dumped into public water ways, or find its way into ground
water.
10) Gives us a good source of complete proteins (beef and chickens), for
healthy, growing kids.

Hopefully the above would also inspire more small farmers to return to
mixed use farms as Community Supported Agriculture (CSA).

This is the first time that I have heard of "Phytolith Occluded Carbon".
Unless we can grow sugarcane it in Ohio, to make methanol as a
replacement for fossil fuel, it sounds as it it is of limited utility. I
don't think the plant is suited to the weather in most of this country,
and I would hate to see farmland given over to just CO2 sequestration.
It seem to me that fast growing forests that can be converted to
charcoal would give both habitat, clean water and air, and sequestration.

Anyway, thanks for the citation.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html

David Hare-Scott wrote:
songbird wrote:
FarmI wrote:
Billy wrote:

Well, in this case, it would be prairie grass (reflecting Salatin's
pasture),

What sort of species are you talking about when you say 'prairie
grass'? The reason why I ask is that the You-tube clips of Salatin's
place doesn't look like anything I'd call a 'prairie'. He looks
like he's got a farm on quite rich land in a well protected area.
'Prairies' to me suggest very open and exposed locations and the
grasses there would, TMWOT, be much tougher and less nutritious than
in good pasture land. I might be talking through my hat 'cos I
haven't got a clue about US farms, but that's what I'd expect here
in Oz if we were looking at farms of differing capacities.

right, anyone talking about grassland production in
the eastern seaboard of the USA being equivalent
to what happens on the prairies is full of it. the time
scale difference isn't minor and probably heavily
depends upon the average annual rainfall.

the soil of the prairies was probably produced over
the period of time after the last ice-age. it isn't that
thick. if it could accumulate at a rate of an inch a
year it would be much deeper...

ok, so let's return to the eastern seaboard and
wonder why the topsoil in unmolested places isn't
deeper? if it can be so productive why isn't it?
because it is woodland and not grassland and
unmanaged woodlands cycle carbon but do not
sequester once it's reached maturity. very little
is sequestered and that would be because of fires
that char and thus turn the carbon into a form not
easily consumed...

if trees and forests were so good for carbon
gathering and keeping the soils of the Amazon would
be deep and fertile, but they are not unless you
find the places that were altered by the natives in
prehistorical times.


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the
nutrients are actually in the trees.

right, why is that though? you'd
figure that if it was truely good for
the ecosystem to have deep soil
that it would have figured that out
by now (millions of years of selective
pressure).


Saying that this environment
doesn't accumulated soil and therefore no forest will do so does not
necessarily follow. Particularly where temperate forests were cleared
for crop land you can certainly increase the amount of carbon stored
by converting them to pasture or back to forest.

again true, but only to a point and i think there
is a need now to go beyond what can be
accompished this way.


But your point
about reaching a maximum and then not storing any more is correct.
Evan so I don't think carbon sequestration is anything more than a
side show when it comes to managing climate change.

i'd change my statement to "not storing much more" because
i do think that periodic fires do store some more. just not
that much at a time.


so this says that reforestation is barking up the
wrong tree when it comes to CO2 sequestration
and rebuilding topsoil. (but i won't argue that
it's bad for species preservation and diversity
because that's needed too in many places -- so
there has to be the tradeoff there).



You are right that it is not a panacea but wrong in saying we cannot
build soil or sequester carbon by altering land use.

yeah, i mispoke somewhat there, but what i meant
was that the need for carbon storage is now more than
what is going to be achieved using either of those two
methods. building soil would help out all around, i won't
argue against that.

my wondering about topsoil is that if it is so good
for overall life then you'd think that by this time (after
millions of years) it would be selected for and there
would be much more of it than there is instead of
what we do find. so my curiousity is engaged on
the topic of the disappearing topsoil.

so much topsoil is lost to erosion and biological
processes that it ends up in the ocean and then
turned into coal and oil but the timescale for that
process is geological (not historical). the balance
needed is the use of the energy to match what the
ocean is capable of storing. we're way past that
(i'm not sure what that amount is), but we'd
know we've gotten there if the ppm of CO2 stablizes
and then starts falling and the ocean acidity does
the same.


songbird

In article ,
"songbird" wrote:


my wondering about topsoil is that if it is so good
for overall life then you'd think that by this time (after
millions of years) it would be selected for and there
would be much more of it than there is instead of
what we do find. so my curiousity is engaged on
the topic of the disappearing topsoil.

so much topsoil is lost to erosion and biological
processes that it ends up in the ocean and then
turned into coal and oil but the timescale for that
process is geological (not historical). the balance
needed is the use of the energy to match what the
ocean is capable of storing. we're way past that
(i'm not sure what that amount is), but we'd
know we've gotten there if the ppm of CO2 stablizes
and then starts falling and the ocean acidity does
the same.


songbird

Think of modern agriculture or logging etc as nothing more than strip
mining. Cheap and easy but short term.

http://www.wsu.edu/gened/learn-modul...oil/soil1.html

--
Bill S. Jersey USA zone 5 shade garden
globalvoicesonline.org
http://www.davidmccandless.com/

songbird wrote:
David Hare-Scott wrote:
songbird wrote:
FarmI wrote:
Billy wrote:

Well, in this case, it would be prairie grass (reflecting
Salatin's pasture),

What sort of species are you talking about when you say 'prairie
grass'? The reason why I ask is that the You-tube clips of
Salatin's place doesn't look like anything I'd call a 'prairie'. He
looks like he's got a farm on quite rich land in a well
protected area. 'Prairies' to me suggest very open and exposed
locations and the grasses there would, TMWOT, be much tougher and
less nutritious than in good pasture land. I might be talking
through my hat 'cos I haven't got a clue about US farms, but
that's what I'd expect here in Oz if we were looking at farms of
differing capacities.

right, anyone talking about grassland production in
the eastern seaboard of the USA being equivalent
to what happens on the prairies is full of it. the time
scale difference isn't minor and probably heavily
depends upon the average annual rainfall.

the soil of the prairies was probably produced over
the period of time after the last ice-age. it isn't that
thick. if it could accumulate at a rate of an inch a
year it would be much deeper...

ok, so let's return to the eastern seaboard and
wonder why the topsoil in unmolested places isn't
deeper? if it can be so productive why isn't it?
because it is woodland and not grassland and
unmanaged woodlands cycle carbon but do not
sequester once it's reached maturity. very little
is sequestered and that would be because of fires
that char and thus turn the carbon into a form not
easily consumed...

if trees and forests were so good for carbon
gathering and keeping the soils of the Amazon would
be deep and fertile, but they are not unless you
find the places that were altered by the natives in
prehistorical times.


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the
nutrients are actually in the trees.

right, why is that though? you'd
figure that if it was truely good for
the ecosystem to have deep soil
that it would have figured that out
by now (millions of years of selective
pressure).


Different ecosystems work in different ways. In the case of tropical
forests the very high rainfall leaches the soil and the biota has adapted to
that reality.



Saying that this environment
doesn't accumulated soil and therefore no forest will do so does not
necessarily follow. Particularly where temperate forests were cleared
for crop land you can certainly increase the amount of carbon stored
by converting them to pasture or back to forest.

again true, but only to a point and i think there
is a need now to go beyond what can be
accompished this way.


Yes


But your point
about reaching a maximum and then not storing any more is correct.
Evan so I don't think carbon sequestration is anything more than a
side show when it comes to managing climate change.

i'd change my statement to "not storing much more" because
i do think that periodic fires do store some more. just not
that much at a time.


so this says that reforestation is barking up the
wrong tree when it comes to CO2 sequestration
and rebuilding topsoil. (but i won't argue that
it's bad for species preservation and diversity
because that's needed too in many places -- so
there has to be the tradeoff there).



You are right that it is not a panacea but wrong in saying we cannot
build soil or sequester carbon by altering land use.

yeah, i mispoke somewhat there, but what i meant
was that the need for carbon storage is now more than
what is going to be achieved using either of those two
methods. building soil would help out all around, i won't
argue against that.

my wondering about topsoil is that if it is so good
for overall life then you'd think that by this time (after
millions of years) it would be selected for and there
would be much more of it than there is instead of
what we do find. so my curiousity is engaged on
the topic of the disappearing topsoil.


Two reasons. One: that there are environments where building and
maintaining topsoil is too hard (eg tropical rainforest) so the adaptive
pathway has gone in other directions. Two: humans have been making topsoil
disappear since we started agriculture. We now live in an age where so much
is transmitted culturally instead of genetically you could call it the
post-Darwinian era. This is gross simplification of course because natural
selection still takes place as it always has but now many factors interfere
with it.

ascends soapbox
Typically our cultures cannot deal with issues like topsoil because they
take generations to see change. When motivation is dominated by the desire
to eat today, to make a profit next month and to be elected again in 3 years
time how can you spare any thought for problems that have taken thousands of
years to develop and will take hundreds to fix?

The way things are heading nothing will be done on a large scale until over
population, over consumption, resource limits and climate change form the
perfect storm. People will then cry out to leaders saying "why didn't you
do anything about it?" The majority of leaders will say "elect me again and
I will fix it next year", the few honest ones will say "because you didn't
want me to" and they will be the first trampled by the hungry mob.
descends soapbox


David

In article ,
"David Hare-Scott" wrote:

songbird wrote:
David Hare-Scott wrote:
songbird wrote:
FarmI wrote:
Billy wrote:

Well, in this case, it would be prairie grass (reflecting
Salatin's pasture),

What sort of species are you talking about when you say 'prairie
grass'? The reason why I ask is that the You-tube clips of
Salatin's place doesn't look like anything I'd call a 'prairie'. He
looks like he's got a farm on quite rich land in a well
protected area. 'Prairies' to me suggest very open and exposed
locations and the grasses there would, TMWOT, be much tougher and
less nutritious than in good pasture land. I might be talking
through my hat 'cos I haven't got a clue about US farms, but
that's what I'd expect here in Oz if we were looking at farms of
differing capacities.

right, anyone talking about grassland production in
the eastern seaboard of the USA being equivalent
to what happens on the prairies is full of it. the time
scale difference isn't minor and probably heavily
depends upon the average annual rainfall.

the soil of the prairies was probably produced over
the period of time after the last ice-age. it isn't that
thick. if it could accumulate at a rate of an inch a
year it would be much deeper...

ok, so let's return to the eastern seaboard and
wonder why the topsoil in unmolested places isn't
deeper? if it can be so productive why isn't it?
because it is woodland and not grassland and
unmanaged woodlands cycle carbon but do not
sequester once it's reached maturity. very little
is sequestered and that would be because of fires
that char and thus turn the carbon into a form not
easily consumed...

if trees and forests were so good for carbon
gathering and keeping the soils of the Amazon would
be deep and fertile, but they are not unless you
find the places that were altered by the natives in
prehistorical times.


Tropical rainforest is often on leached soil where most of the
nutrients are actually in the trees.

right, why is that though? you'd
figure that if it was truely good for
the ecosystem to have deep soil
that it would have figured that out
by now (millions of years of selective
pressure).


Different ecosystems work in different ways. In the case of tropical
forests the very high rainfall leaches the soil and the biota has adapted to
that reality.



Saying that this environment
doesn't accumulated soil and therefore no forest will do so does not
necessarily follow. Particularly where temperate forests were cleared
for crop land you can certainly increase the amount of carbon stored
by converting them to pasture or back to forest.

again true, but only to a point and i think there
is a need now to go beyond what can be
accompished this way.


Yes


But your point
about reaching a maximum and then not storing any more is correct.
Evan so I don't think carbon sequestration is anything more than a
side show when it comes to managing climate change.

i'd change my statement to "not storing much more" because
i do think that periodic fires do store some more. just not
that much at a time.


so this says that reforestation is barking up the
wrong tree when it comes to CO2 sequestration
and rebuilding topsoil. (but i won't argue that
it's bad for species preservation and diversity
because that's needed too in many places -- so
there has to be the tradeoff there).



You are right that it is not a panacea but wrong in saying we cannot
build soil or sequester carbon by altering land use.

yeah, i mispoke somewhat there, but what i meant
was that the need for carbon storage is now more than
what is going to be achieved using either of those two
methods. building soil would help out all around, i won't
argue against that.

my wondering about topsoil is that if it is so good
for overall life then you'd think that by this time (after
millions of years) it would be selected for and there
would be much more of it than there is instead of
what we do find. so my curiousity is engaged on
the topic of the disappearing topsoil.


Two reasons. One: that there are environments where building and
maintaining topsoil is too hard (eg tropical rainforest) so the adaptive
pathway has gone in other directions. Two: humans have been making topsoil
disappear since we started agriculture. We now live in an age where so much
is transmitted culturally instead of genetically you could call it the
post-Darwinian era. This is gross simplification of course because natural
selection still takes place as it always has but now many factors interfere
with it.

ascends soapbox
Typically our cultures cannot deal with issues like topsoil because they
take generations to see change. When motivation is dominated by the desire
to eat today, to make a profit next month and to be elected again in 3 years
time how can you spare any thought for problems that have taken thousands of
years to develop and will take hundreds to fix?

The way things are heading nothing will be done on a large scale until over
population, over consumption, resource limits and climate change form the
perfect storm. People will then cry out to leaders saying "why didn't you
do anything about it?" The majority of leaders will say "elect me again and
I will fix it next year", the few honest ones will say "because you didn't
want me to" and they will be the first trampled by the hungry mob.
descends soapbox


David
Wot? A soapbox without anybody standing on it? ascends soapbox, rant on

Since too many politicians are involved in making money, rather than
politicking, it will have to be left to us sheep to change direction, if
we can.
Organic produce increases its rate of sales. year after year, not just
in the U.S. but around the world. Since 1990, the market for organic
products has grown at a rapid pace, to reach $46 billion in 2007. This
demand has driven a similar increase in organically managed farmland.
Approximately 32.2 million hectares worldwide are now farmed
organically, representing approximately 0.8 percent of total world
farmland.

Then there are organic gardeners. Organic Gardening Magazine's rate base
will increase more than 5% to 275,00 from 260,000, the third increase
for the magazine in four years and an overall jump of 28% from 2007.
Organic Gardening's relaunch is in response to a changing mindset among
Americans who are choosing to lead healthier, more environmentally
conscious lifestyles.

Nutritious food, free of unnatural chemicals, has a strong appeal, and
we as organic gardeners are its lobbyists. The world needs to return to
a sustainable model, and it is up to us, at least for the time being, to
engage in conversations about organic gardening, write letters to the
Editor of our local papers, and even write to our Congress people to
uphold organic standards, and to make subsidies, at least in part,
dependent on stewardship of the land.

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

rant off, descends soapbox
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html

Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates and some natural
predators. The idea is humans tend to view forest as the natural state
of Europe without humans but how did the herding grass eaters like cows
and horses evolve in a forest? It's a grassland that's not really
natural but more of a deliberate immitation of natural.

Much of the previous discussion has been about ways to conduct small
farming to build topsoil, but only in a specific geography. At first I
easily imagined morphing the concepts regionally to acheive making
topsoil in other regions with adapted methods.

Now I have started to wonder how herd management might be conducted so
it grows topsoil instead of depleting it. Buffalo herds were a part of
the North American grasslands and soil building in grasslands was
discussed. Current herding methods deplete soil - How to change that so
they build soil?

I recall the soil being pretty good in the small farm oriented dairyland
where most of my relatives lived when I was a kid. Small herds of dairy
cattle, crop rotation including legumes, some farms growing feed for the
farms with the bigger herds. I wonder how such a model can be mapped to
beef herding. What comes to my mind is - grass fed beef rather than lot
fed beef, mixed with a smaller heard strategy where the feed is closer
to local than it is with modern large beef cattle herds.

In article ,
Doug Freyburger wrote:

Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates and some natural
predators. The idea is humans tend to view forest as the natural state
of Europe without humans but how did the herding grass eaters like cows
and horses evolve in a forest? It's a grassland that's not really
natural but more of a deliberate immitation of natural.

Much of the previous discussion has been about ways to conduct small
farming to build topsoil, but only in a specific geography. At first I
easily imagined morphing the concepts regionally to acheive making
topsoil in other regions with adapted methods.

Now I have started to wonder how herd management might be conducted so
it grows topsoil instead of depleting it. Buffalo herds were a part of
the North American grasslands and soil building in grasslands was
discussed. Current herding methods deplete soil - How to change that so
they build soil?

I recall the soil being pretty good in the small farm oriented dairyland
where most of my relatives lived when I was a kid. Small herds of dairy
cattle, crop rotation including legumes, some farms growing feed for the
farms with the bigger herds. I wonder how such a model can be mapped to
beef herding. What comes to my mind is - grass fed beef rather than lot
fed beef, mixed with a smaller heard strategy where the feed is closer
to local than it is with modern large beef cattle herds.

Cover crop history.

http://www.google.com/search?q=cover...phic&ie=utf-8&
oe=utf-8#q=cover+crop+history+graphic&hl=en&tbs=tl:1&tbo= u&ei=8V99TIaiJ8G
88gb1lKCcBg&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnu m=11&ved=0CEIQ5wIwCg&fp
=7db4f7af4a13aa89

or http://tinyurl.com/2aeov7u


Looks like we may be getting smarter now if only the department of
defence owned up to being the department of war.

--
Bill S. Jersey USA zone 5 shade garden
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Q0JfdP36kI

In article ,
Bill who putters wrote:

In article ,
Doug Freyburger wrote:

Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates and some natural
predators. The idea is humans tend to view forest as the natural state
of Europe without humans but how did the herding grass eaters like cows
and horses evolve in a forest? It's a grassland that's not really
natural but more of a deliberate immitation of natural.

Much of the previous discussion has been about ways to conduct small
farming to build topsoil, but only in a specific geography. At first I
easily imagined morphing the concepts regionally to acheive making
topsoil in other regions with adapted methods.

Now I have started to wonder how herd management might be conducted so
it grows topsoil instead of depleting it. Buffalo herds were a part of
the North American grasslands and soil building in grasslands was
discussed. Current herding methods deplete soil - How to change that so
they build soil?

I recall the soil being pretty good in the small farm oriented dairyland
where most of my relatives lived when I was a kid. Small herds of dairy
cattle, crop rotation including legumes, some farms growing feed for the
farms with the bigger herds. I wonder how such a model can be mapped to
beef herding. What comes to my mind is - grass fed beef rather than lot
fed beef, mixed with a smaller heard strategy where the feed is closer
to local than it is with modern large beef cattle herds.

Cover crop history.

http://www.google.com/search?q=cover...phic&ie=utf-8&
oe=utf-8#q=cover+crop+history+graphic&hl=en&tbs=tl:1&tbo= u&ei=8V99TIaiJ8G
88gb1lKCcBg&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnu m=11&ved=0CEIQ5wIwCg&fp
=7db4f7af4a13aa89

I'll look at this soon, when I have more time.
or http://tinyurl.com/2aeov7u


Looks like we may be getting smarter now if only the department of
defence owned up to being the department of war.
"While President Obama is claiming the war is ending, the US still
maintains a large presence in Iraq. Fifty thousand US troops remain in
Iraq to help with training and logistics. In addition, the US is keeping
4,500 special operations forces in Iraq to carry out counterterrroism
operations. Tens of thousands of private contractors will also remain in
the country."

"White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs has said President Obama may
also talk tonight about how the the US is expanding the war against
al-Qaeda by carrying out strikes in Africa and other areas beyond the
battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq."

Robert Gibbs: "I think you have seen a commitment to taking our fight
directly to the leadership throughout the world, all over the world, in
different places, be it in and around Africa, be it in Southeast Asia. I
think the President made a commitment to increase the tempo of that
fight, and that¹s exactly what he¹s done."
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/31/headlines#1

So while the Iraqi War winds down, we will be ramping up the Obama/Bush
wars in Africa and in Southeast Asia. Even if they have democratically
elected governments.

I would have sworn that "peace" looked different than this.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html

In article ,
Doug Freyburger wrote:

Billy wrote:

Actually this thread started with the observation that, besides Salatin,
others have created intensive food producing systems.
"In Bangladesh a new chicken coop produces not just eggs and meat, but
waste that feeds a fishpond, which in turn produces thousands of
kilograms of protein annually, and a healthy crop of water hyacinths
that are fed to a small herd of cows, whose dung in turn fires a biogas
cooking system.


In Malawi, tiny fishponds that recycle waste from the rest of a farm
yield on average about 1,500 kilograms offish. In Madagascar, rice
farmers working with European experts have figured out ways to increase
yields. They transplant seedlings weeks earlier than is customary, space
the plants farther apart, and keep the paddies unflooded during most of
the growing season. That means they have to weed more, but it also
increases yields fourfold to sixfold. An estimated 20,000 farmers have
adopted the full system.


In Craftsbury, Vt., Pete Johnson has helped pioneer year-round farming.
Johnson has built solar greenhouses and figured out how to move them on
tracks. He now can cover and uncover different fields and grow greens 10
months of the year without any fossil fuels, allowing him to run his
community-supported agriculture farm continuously.

Then it morphed into CO2 and topsoil.

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.


There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates and some natural
predators. The idea is humans tend to view forest as the natural state
of Europe without humans but how did the herding grass eaters like cows
and horses evolve in a forest? It's a grassland that's not really
natural but more of a deliberate immitation of natural.

Much of the previous discussion has been about ways to conduct small
farming to build topsoil, but only in a specific geography. At first I
easily imagined morphing the concepts regionally to acheive making
topsoil in other regions with adapted methods.
An assertion was made by Peter Bane
http://www.permacultureactivist.net/design/Designconsult.html
that using Joel Salatin's methods and converting existing farmland to
permanent pasture would allow the U.S. to more than sequester the CO2
that we produce.

Now I have started to wonder how herd management might be conducted so
it grows topsoil instead of depleting it. Buffalo herds were a part of
the North American grasslands and soil building in grasslands was
discussed. Current herding methods deplete soil - How to change that so
they build soil?

Salatins method employes the synergistic effects of steers and chickens
caring for a pasture, and he is reputed to generate an inch of
topsoil/year.

I recall the soil being pretty good in the small farm oriented dairyland
where most of my relatives lived when I was a kid. Small herds of dairy
cattle, crop rotation including legumes, some farms growing feed for the
farms with the bigger herds. I wonder how such a model can be mapped to
beef herding. What comes to my mind is - grass fed beef rather than lot
fed beef, mixed with a smaller heard strategy where the feed is closer
to local than it is with modern large beef cattle herds.
That is the ideal. Healthier for the animals and human beings. 70% of
antibiotics are used in agriculture, so I'm sure you can guess where
antibiotic bacteria come from. Plus, using the steers and chickens in
combo, no fossil fuel is used in fertilizing the pastures. The chickens
eat the bug, thus there is less fossil fuel based pesticides used, if
any.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html

"Doug Freyburger" wrote in message
Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates

I think you might mean 'ungulates'. At least I assume you are but then
there might be some sort of wavy beast about that I can't bring to mind?????

FarmI wrote:
"Doug Freyburger" wrote in message
Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of
topsoil today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates

I think you might mean 'ungulates'. At least I assume you are but
then there might be some sort of wavy beast about that I can't bring
to mind?????

Dancing with the stars?

D

In article ,
"FarmI" ask@itshall be given wrote:

"Doug Freyburger" wrote in message
Billy wrote:

Natural ecosystems and organic farmers are the only creators of topsoil
today.

While true in general I wonder if there are exceptions here and there
that are of interest.

There's a wildlife preserve in the Netherlands that forms a natural
European grassland with herds of wild undulates

I think you might mean 'ungulates'. At least I assume you are but then
there might be some sort of wavy beast about that I can't bring to mind?????

You're obviously not drinking what I'm drinking. Wild undulates, I said
that? I like it;o) I like it a lot. I like it too much!? I like it.
Think I'll go slip into something drier. Feelin' a little humid.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html