alternatives in land use

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That is good stuff!


Ha, all they did is "work, eat, and sleep." I believe it.
 
Jim, I posted before I realized there was another page of posts, that ever happen to you??

Are you saying that sustainable farming is a fine thing, but since it produces less food per acre compared to a "chemical" operation which uses fert, grain, antibiotics, etc, that it is not possible to feed the world with sustainable ag? And then, by definition of the terms, if non-sustainable techniques are the only way to produce adequate food, but they are non sustainable cuz of the resources they consume and what they do to the soil, that we be doomed, its just a matter of time??
 
I am just saying that we cant stop. If these changes must be made for our survival, then they must. I just cant feature cutting production across the board while we figure it out.

Or is the death of hundreds of millions to make production match supply the only way to achieve sustainability? That is what I cant figure out.

The funny thing to me is that Norman Borlaug was seen as a hero for the green revolution. Using science and technology to feed hundreds of millions of people. Now we shouldn't look at him as such.

We can use science to cut the resources needed. Now we fear science, even if it helps us, because it is funded by a corporation.
 
FireFighterZero said:
Okay, someone should now decide what sustainable means. A hard and fast definition that we can get behind. Just saying "like, sustainable, man, like for the future and stuff" means noting.

Sustainable means that this melon cost double. Tyson can call its chicken pieces sustainable. The USDA has a guideline for its organic label and I like that.

Unsavory as it may be, how are you going to feed the inner city folks? Not talking about the Africans here, Americans that live MILES away from a garden. It no longer becomes a question of feeding the "world" as so many find cliched.

So how is the sustainable industry going to produce the same amount of food? Just calling me and others like me unsavory and "non-sustainable" while not being in farm country or knowing the people who do the work does not lend well to the conversation. I never hear what our options are. I just see bumper stickers.

They must be the only ones because the made a video about them? Nonsense. IT was a great video, and a great method and I appreciate it very much.

You must realize, Kevin, that the people working on the land are not Swift, Con Agra, or Cargil, right?
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your pretty defensive! I don't know your farm, I don't know your operations. What does your grass look like? Do you promote wildlife on your property? It seems like your pretty keyed into keeping your land healthy so I'm not talking about you.

I do know of millions of acres of farmland that is a virtual dead zone with no top soil remaining and on chemical life support. I do know of millions of acres a severely over grazed land throughout the west where I spent the first 20 years of my life from new mexico, arizona, Colorado and montana. I have seen trout streams destroyed by cows. There are good cow calf operations, there are ones that just let their cows run through the national forest and eat everything in sight year after year. I have spent a lot of time hiking and riding horses throughout the west and it's not all pretty!

I have also seem the rivers of filth from hog farms in North Carolina.

There are people finding solutions, like allan savory, like Allan Nation, Joel Salatin. I think we agree on these things more than you think we do. I think that part of the problem is too many people are unconnected with the land. Food is a distant thought and little care is given to where it comes from. More people should be working the land, not less. More kids should go through four H not less.

As for feeding us city folk. If your looking for just feeding us, give us the grain that is fed to the cows and pigs and chickens in the feed lots! That would solve a lot of problems right there. If you want meat, than let it be fed grass fed. That's never gonna happen

my family has a garden that feeds us throughout the year. We have chickens for eggs. I like to hunt and fish for meat, allthough the water in michigan is so polluted that my baby is not supposed to eat the fish I catch Because of mercury.

The deer are less and less because nobody hunts anymore and the department of natural resources sucks. We get a cow share from a farm that raises grass fed beef. We eat meat two to three times a week.

I'm an idealist. but you will jave to explain to me how these million acre farms owned by millionaires in air conditioned offices are giving a shit about the land. Yeah there are a lot of wonderful family owned farms across the country, it sounds like yours is one of them. But that's not the norm, it should be. Look at all the ghost towns across he midwest. Where did all the people go? The land is still covered in soy, corn and wheat, but the towns are empty.

Those five generation family farms are a relic and should be cherished.
 
You wouldn't go to the beer store and expect to buy a craft beer/ microbrewery produced and expect to pay the same or cheaper price, would you? My friends beef probably takes longer to produce without grain. They take it to a small butcher shop where I am sure they are paying more. They dry age the beef so the weight goes down. They do their own marketing, so more time invested. And he has a market that is willing to pay more for the product he produces. I see no problem with that.

That is not to say sustainable ag products have to cost more.
 
DMc said:
I couldn't agree more, Jim.
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This is a tricky one. Because north carolina hogs are cheap! But who pays for the dead rivers when the waste tanks overflow. The hog farmers don't pay and the city folks in the grocery store don't pay. Who pays for the dead zone in the Gulf caused by runoff. I presume it's the gulf fisherman? How do we appropriate and calculate the true cost?
 
Also as far as cheap you have to look at subsidies given to the mega farms. There is the story of NAFTA and Mexico where cheap subsidized corn from the states flooded into Mexico after NAFTA. All the family farms that had been working the land sustainibly for a thousand years could not compete. Hundreds of varieties of heirloom corn became extinct and the farmers were forced to crowd the cities and live on handouts. That story has repeated itself over and over. People complain about entitlements. What about all the entitlements to organizations like cargill, Con ag, and monsanto. They make it pretty difficult for a family farm to compete. On top of that, there was a family farm here in michigan that was sell I ng raw milk through a "cow share" the feds came in and tore the place up. Made the owners personally dump out hundreds of gallons of milk and cheese and break all their eggs. running a small family farm these days seems quite difficult unless you are incredibly creative. We are quite a far ways off from Thomas Jeffersons vision for america
 
This is a good debate. The problem is that it is a handful of theoretical farmers debating with an actual farmer.
 
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kevin bingham said:
....Because north carolina hogs are cheap! But who pays for the dead rivers when the waste tanks overflow...
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What I was referring to was farming done right does not need to cost the consumer so much more. There are lots of people that are knowledgeable enough to want to eat nothing but properly grown food but simply can't afford to. The term " organic " is being used as an excuse to charge more even in situations that don't warrant it.
I think it is very sad that naturally produced, good for the land, wholesome food has become a speciality niche.
 
kevin bingham said:
One of the reasons this post interested me so much is that my dad has been working with Allan Savory for 30+ years. It is pretty cool to see Savory's name start popping up everywhere and even in arboriculture forums!
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He should know Bill then.

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CjWaP0iQmWw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
Absolutely. One of my biggest takeaways from growing up in the Allan Savory "cult" as we used to tease my Dad. Is that you should always operate under the assumption that whatever your doing your doing it wrong and there is a better way. That take away I have applied to my arboriculture and has resulted in my experimenting with a different approach to my job each and every day.
 
DMc said:
What I was referring to was farming done right does not need to cost the consumer so much more. There are lots of people that are knowledgeable enough to want to eat nothing but properly grown food but simply can't afford to. The term " organic " is being used as an excuse to charge more even in situations that don't warrant it.
I think it is very sad that naturally produced, good for the land, wholesome food has become a speciality niche.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's sad. Americans are spoiled in that. We spend hardly nothing of our income on food. We don't care for it. But the cheap price of food is artificial. It is also a misconception that eating whole foods is necessarily more expensive. Organic food is way cheaper than a TV dinner and pop and McDonald's which most people are brought up eating. Organic rice and bean, vegetables and a few courses of meat a week is pretty darn economical. It just doesn't fit very well with the high paced lifestyle most people live. Nobody wants to soak beans over night
 
Tucker943 said:
This is a good debate. The problem is that it is a handful of theoretical farmers debating with an actual farmer.
Click to expand...

I am a part time farmer that grew up on a farm. Market gardened, dairy, now hay and occasionally market garden.

If you grow organically you are going to get some losses or lower production probably. Crop failure maybe sometimes. I agree they do charge more than they should in the store. What the farmer gets is another story.

Back in the 80's organic didn't really get you many sales. It seems to have really caught on now. Some things are pretty difficult to raise organically. Farming is not easy any way you do it.
 
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Tucker943 said:
This is a good debate. The problem is that it is a handful of theoretical farmers debating with an actual farmer.
Click to expand...

Living and working the land in north central Montana does not lend itself well to experimenting. I can't imagine how tuff it must be. But there he sits, making it work. By his location, his options are limited.

Change can be hard even when it is not but sometimes the impetus for change comes out of left field. Look at all the great questions asked of us from newbies or non tree workers. This forum is filled with been there done that tree guys that have made a living by problem solving. Even though we are not ranchers and farmers we are also not starry eyed young dreamers, but a group that understands the need to get things done. In my opinion a good group to ask for questions and answers on subjects that they may know little about.

We are discussing things that affect us all.
 
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Certain crops can be altered to take production into the amazing category, but at a cost in nutrition. Even if good for the soil growing methods can't produce on a par with big ag., they can produce enough and do so for as long as needed. The life within the soil is as important as water and air for our survival. People need to understand this or current soil destructive practices will continue.

I have not verified the numbers of this pdf but it is one of many that prove that even going organic, we can produce more than enough to feed the world.

http://www.gardensofeden.org/04 Crop Yield Verification.htm
 
i would like to know where these places are. Wind blow moonscapes devoid of all wildlife and vegetation, just fat farmers using peasants to check the fields. Fields that make more money and production for the farmer when all the top soil is gone. The places that have all the kid stay home because there is so much money in farming. I guess the EPA and NRCS only operate in Montana. Good thing they do!

We built hog barn catch lagoons for years. The runoff from cattle confinement areas must not enter waterways, the fines will bankrupt you. Riparian areas must be fenced out. You cant dump your oil down a badger hole, the EPA checks. You must have an applicators licence to apply certain herbicides, keep records and account for every acre and gallon when audited. Your fuel tanks must have containment.

This idea that the kids should have stayed home and worked the land has not been the way of life for fifty years. Look at labor costs for most industries. Used to be that most people lived and worked on a farm. Acreages were small and so were implements. Economics changed and you had to produce more but you could not afford the labor. Implements got bigger and so did farms. Neighbors went broke and the lucky ones stayed afloat and expanded. The only way to do that was bigger implements. Are tree companies awash in good affordable labor?
The kids went to school and got good paying jobs that did not require you to work all week or borrow against the entire value of your operation every year.

Except for a few inherited places around here, everyone I know is drowning in debt. Cost of doing business, and not having a "real" job.

The noble sheep is what built the area I live in. German immigrants built huge operations. Was it the evil grain fed cow that changed that? Nope, labor pool dried up. Cows take less work than sheep, by a long ways. Costs less to produce.

As far as rampant over grazing, I would call that mild overgrazing! It seems that the sight of a domesticated animal within 100 miles of public ground is rampant overgrazing. Not saying that ranchers dont abuse pubic land, they do in some cases. I have seen leases taken away from ranchers. BTW, responsible grazing can lead to improved forest health.

I realize that we are probably not going to reach common ground on the issue. Out here in farm country we tend to look at things differently, and rarely think of our selves as doing it wrong.

So, I guess the truth is probably in between "money loving land rapist", and "noble steward who never makes mistakes".


Politics and regulation dictate a lot more of your food choices than just the whim of the farmer.
 
I have read when you raise wheat you lose more topsoil than the yield of the wheat you take off. Don't know how true that is.

I also read it is really bad to have cattle in your woodlands. You say it can be beneficial, Jim?
 
Hey I'm not saying a debate isn't healthy. I'm saying most of the participants would struggle to grow a half acre garden successfully.

It would be awesome to see farmers switch over to the most ideal practices that eventually make the sky bluer, the grass greener, and the planet happier. New farmers have the luxury of trying to start out that way. A man working the land his whole life with 3 mortgages on the place and overhead that makes our tree business overhead look like a lemonade stand is going to have a real hard time getting the bank on board to be patient and understanding while he revolutionizes the operation. The loan officer at the bank might eat organic, but most likely won't sit back and be patient while the farmer switches over farming practices and can't pay the bank for a few years while he works through the learning curve and adjustment period. Plus he will likely go upside down financially in the mean time and never make it through the transition.
 
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