121 comments on BBC Covers Peak Oil: A Farm for the Future
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121 comments on BBC Covers Peak Oil: A Farm for the Future
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Here in Iowa we call that recreational tilling. What in the world are they doing that takes 10 gallons per acre? Raising vegetables and fruit? If they are the UK should be able to feed itself with ease.
Animal agriculture needs less fossil fuel than row crop farming. The energy waste is in the animals themselves since a lot of energy is consumed in just keeping them alive.
Re Farming diesel requirement. In my farming days we ended up using approx. 8-9 Gallon/acre on an annual basis in heavy clay soil. This included 10 passes on each plot. ploughing, compressing, harrow 2 times, sowing, compressing, 1-2 times combined herbicide- fungicide spraying, harvesting, harrowing.
Today with combined machinery you can reduce the diesel expenditure to 4-5 gallon/acre.Maybe a little less in light soils. You can study farm energy expenditures here.
http://www.cde.state.co.us/artemis/ucsu20/ucsu2062250061998internet.pdf
kind regards And1
Yes but nice looking cattle. Limousin. A very good breed. Excellent steaks.
No-till. The way to go but very spray intensive. The planters we use can either do No-till or conventional.
Ifn I was back some years I would go full bore cattle and since my neighbor raises a lot of cattle that is what I would do also. We can trade off bulls that way.
Airdale
Forgive a stupid question, but what does that refer to? Herbicides?
Cheers
No-till came from a gentleman named Faulkner,who wrote a book in the 40's called Ploughman's Folly.
He argued that farmers plowed cause they liked to not because it was necessary.(needless to say, at the time, it caused quite a stir ;-) )
No-till is counting on herbicides for weed control. Then no doubt pesticides when the bugs come. And also speaks to an underlying comfort with mono-culture.
This reliance on 'cides' is a problem because many of the broadleaf weeds are becoming resistant to the herbicides. The organic matter does stay higher and it is a superior way to farm from a chemical perspective.
I have had a project in mind. I bought a 'hoe' drill at an auction. (Since the price of no till drills can cause you to clutch your heart)Hoe drills have a metal boot that has some weight to it that the seed falls into and were originally designed to sow seeds in gravelly soil, since regular drills didn't work well as the seed would routinely wind up on the surface. My plan was to put some cultivators and sweeps behind some disks to make raised beds that I could then use the drill for a no-till idea. I don't use herbicides ever! A one time application of a herbicide can kill off all the algea in the soil. This algea is the food supply for many micro-organisms.
Excessive use of the moldbord plow has created a lot of problems. If you plow your fields routinely you will cause the organic matter to be burnt up by the sun and exposure to the elements. You do need to get oxygen, into the ground however. (Jason's use of the broadfork and feeding the worms, in the other thread is a great idea. As is Airdale's sub-soiler)
My strategy is what's called minimum till. Which means that I plow the ground but very infrequently and then follow with an extensive rotation that includes small grain going into hay (legume mix) for several years then pasturing for several years before repeating the cycle. This option is largely unavailable to corporate monoculture.
No-till I take from Fukuoka, not Faulkner. I have no idea whether Fukuoka knew of Faulkner. Wikipedia has this to say:
I don't see much value to no-till outside the natural farming/permaculture methodology. Exactly as you state, if you do nothing to manage the weeds, but don't till, you are just asking for trouble. It's nothing but spitting into the wind.
It seems to me to be a truism that half-measures typically get you less than half of what you seek.
Thanks for the response.
Cheers
I read 'One Straw Revolution' and very much enjoyed it. His approach supports greater diversity which is definitely a strong plus to the environment and hence organic mindedness.
I'm sorry to see that the same games (corporate/government screw the small farmer is happening in Britain as it is here in North America (I'm in Canada)) So nods Rebecca and Tim for being 'good' stewards of the land, while being financially penalized with the pretext offered that somehow big is more efficient when in fact the opposite is true (somehow people can't understand what subsidies both regulatory and financial mean). Hence 10 people per acre. Hopefully we can get your documentary over here.
Tonight on tvo (tv Ontario) they are playing: 'The End of Suburbia' with James Kunstler followed by another titled:'Life After Suburbia' so I suspect they would love to play your documentary if you could offer it to them or does BBC own it? (www.tvo.org)
Larger diversity in plants used as pasture can support a greater diversity and stocking rate of livestock. You can carry a greater number of different livestock on a piece of land than just one type. Sir Albert Howard in his: 'Agricultural Testement' made reference to imo the great British organic farmer:Friend Sykes. Mr. Sykes wrote a great book: 'titled Humus and the Farmer' that you would enjoy. His understanding of pasture management and vermiculture in the 40's was significant as is Louis Bromfields: Pleasant Valley and Malabar Farm. Though I guess there's nothing new under the sun. As I have an 1840's copy of 'Chronicles of a Clay Farm' wherein the benefits of tile draining and using lime were understood.
A return to the use of grain binders or pull type combines with scour cleaners affords a good weed control strategy. Perhaps we have a bizarre notion of growing just one type of crop at a time.
Other than oats/barley few crops are grown together. Furthermore many 'weed's' are great fodder and provide some natural medicinal and anthelmintic help. Older farms used to grow black walnuts around the barn yards so that the livestock could eat the leaves and get rid of their worms/parasites.
It would seem that we 'the civilized' (hmmm!) world made a very wrong turn in the 40's. And 'we' have chosen to ignore the prescient wisdom of people like those mentioned and others like Wendel Berry in pursuit of the 'new' / 'cutting edge' instead of following what has been tested and true.
Cheers all