TRUTH MATTERS

Some of the key reasons I joined the Permaculture movement are found in Psalm 127:2, Matthew 11:28-29, John 10:10 and II Chronicles 7:14. Stick with me for a moment and I will explain what I’m talking about. Before I give you the Scripture verses, I want to share with you a nugget of wisdom from an influential Permaculture leader, Masanobu Fukuoka, author of One Straw Revolution …

“I do not particularly like the word ‘work.’ Human beings are the only animals who have to work, and I think that is the most ridiculous thing in the world. Other animals make their livings by living, but people work like crazy, thinking that they have to in order to stay alive. The bigger the job, the greater the challenge, the more wonderful they think it is. It would be good to give up that way of thinking and live an easy, comfortable life with plenty of free time. I think that the way animals live in the tropics, stepping outside in the morning and evening to see if there is something to eat, and taking a long nap in the afternoon, must be a wonderful life. For human beings, a life of such simplicity would be possible if one worked to produce directly his daily necessities. In such a life, work is not work as people generally think of it, but simply doing what needs to be done.”

Now for the Scripture verses which have new meaning for me thanks to Permaculture leaders like Mr. Fukuoka …

First, Psalm 127:2 (NIV) – “In vain you rise early and stay up late toiling for food to eat, for He grants sleep to those He loves.” All my life it has struck me how hard we “civilized” folks work. Work, work, work. Very little time to think. Always working. Always tired. Always stressed out. Never much time to Read more »

Wow. You gotta see the news story about this lady. She is amazing.

Her mother and grandmother both died of breast cancer at 47, and 36 years old, respectively. Her grandmother’s sisters died of cancer at early ages. Diabetes runs in her family.

Annette Larkins is in perfect health and doesn’t take aspirin. In fact, she doesn’t take any medication at all, at least by the conventional modern definition. She is a fanatic of REAL medicine and lives by the quote, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” ― Hippocrates

Mrs. Larkins grows a plethora of fruit, vegetables, and herbs around and inside of her house. She collects rainwater and makes gallons of juice from what she grows. Wheatgrass is one of her specialties. She grows her own and drinks the juice regularly. Yet another anecdotal case of raw food and juicing providing overall health and endless youth. http://themindunleashed.org/2014/03/70-year-old-looks-30-reveals-fountain-youth.html

I’m fascinated with this particularly because I am more of a Weston Price guy – real meat, milk, eggs, etc – when it comes to food. But I cannot ignore the fact that Adam and Eve probably ate more like this woman eats and look how long they lived! (There were other factors with them too, yes, I realize that)

NOTE (3/24/14): Someone suggested that this lady might have used Botox to look so young.  So I emailed her and asked.  She said that she has not used Botox.

“In truth, the ‘chemical imbalance’ notion was always a kind of urban legend – never a theory seriously propounded by well-informed psychiatrists.” –Ronald Pies, editor-in-chief emeritus of the Psychiatric Times (2011) LINK TO ARTICLE HERE.

I’ve always felt that “something is seriously wrong with this picture” when observing various friends and relatives suffering from depression, bipolar disorder, etc and being administered mounds of drugs which had such obvious adverse effects on them. Then one day *I* was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and was administered meds myself. Funny how you get really motivated to understand something when it happens to you! Anyway, against advice from most people close to me, I stopped taking the meds prescribed to me and determined that I was going to pull myself out of “whatever-it-was” without meds. I’m so thankful that I did because frankly, the meds were killing me, making me stupid – it was as if I was walking around in a fog. It was horrible! Turns out that I was later rediagnosed by one of the leading court approved psychiatrists in my city as having experienced “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder” instead of bipolar disorder. Oops. Now, instead of walking around in a fog all day, (“stuck in molasses” as my biz partner described it) my thinking is clear, I feel great, I’m never depressed, I love life, I love my job and the people I work with, and I love my new long term career in Permaculture and I am back to being my normal, high functioning self. What was the stress? Not telling in this post so as to protect those who don’t want the public spotlight. But it’s an interesting story in itself and someday I may be able to tell it so that others can benefit. But for now, suffice to say that maybe you too are suffering from depression, mood swing, what-have-you. Well, I’m here to tell you that, based on my first hand experience, I firmly believe that there is hope for you outside of drugs-for-life. For two other important articles I have written on this topic, please click HERE and HERE or type “depression” into the search box on my blog, just over there on the right of your screen. A wonderful, Godly “elder statesman” counselor once told several of us in a church meeting …. “Sure, I believe in bipolar disorder. Everyone has it. Read Romans 7.” He was serious. Haha. Good one!

Many people today are aware that our topsoils are not only being washed away by tillage, but also that they are depleted of minerals compared to what they used to be 100 years ago. Here’a an article that discusses this problem. LINK HERE. What to do about the problem? Well, this article is promoting ocean based fertilizers – which, I am sure, are great. But how much do they cost? Probably a lot. But hold on. Most people don’t realize that there is a solution available to this problem which can often be obtained for free. Yes, it’s possible to turn dirt, water, sunshine, minerals from deep in the ground, air and just a little bit of fun, healthful labor – nothing more – into the most nutrient dense, mineral rich fruits and vegetables on the planet. Purchase my $1 eBook to find out the solution. Yes, that’s right. Just $1. I absolutely guarantee that you will save many times more than the $1 you spend or your money back. If you implement this system, you will also have vegetables that are much better than grocery store vegetables and better than traditional home garden vegetables, full of the proper minerals to give you and your family the best health possible. My eBook tells you everything you need to know and tells my story as well. I’m not asking you to try something that I have not done successfully myself. Try it. You’ll like it! CLICK HERE to purchase “The Lazy Gardener” eBook for only $1.  Something else you should know – “Organic” doesn’t necessarily solve the mineral problem if by “organic” they simply mean “pesticide free.”  If “organic” produce is fertilized with fertilizers which contain the proper mix of minerals – such as (presumably) the ocean fertilizers referenced above – then great.  But not all “organic” produce is grown this way.

This system is SOOOOO easy too. Jesus said “Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.” For years, I labored and labored trying to get healthy produce from my garden. Then I discovered the natural (God’s) system and my gardening has been sooooo easy ever since! One more Scripture I want to share with you is found in Psalm 127 where it says “In vain you rise early and stay up late toiling for food to eat, for He grants sleep to those He loves.” Enjoy!

I hear a lot of my friends say things like “global warming, schlobal warming! … that’s nonsense … look how cold this winter is” and “the global warming myth is just being used to control our lives more” and so on. Well, I have studied this a lot now and I would ask you to consider some points …

(1) Joel Salatin – America’s most influential farmer – recently wrote “History will vindicate Allan Savory as one of the greatest ecologists of all time.” “Folks This Ain’t Normal” (2011), p. 175 … OK, so what does Allan Savory have to say?

(2) Allan Savory wrote the following … “Simplistic and counter intuitive as it may be the fate of civilization today hangs on two slender threads – the correct management of livestock [WHAT??!!] and the rapid development of benign energy to sustain cities and mass transport. Excessive emissions of carbon and other gases from fossil fuels are not the only causes of global climate change, nor are they the greatest cause of climate change, as popularly espoused. … To avert disaster on a scale almost unimaginable a global strategy is required that addresses carbon emissions while effectively dealing with biodiversity loss and biomass burning to reverse desertification that is not caused by atmospheric carbon buildup.”

(3) N. Africa was once lush and fertile. Now it is a desert. What happened? Archaeological evidence indicates that it was improper agriculture – that is, agriculture that degrades soil, such as tillage and improper livestock management. See my article HERE for some science papers on this topic.

(4) Gaia Hypothesis. Lovelock and Margulis. No, this is not just New Age crap. It’s real science. One major part of it basically states that the earth’s Hydrologic Cycle is heavily influenced by terrestrial vegetative cover. In the recent book from MIT Press, “Scientists Debate Gaia” (2008), on page 303, we read “The results here are consistent with the results of other studies which demonstrate that the replacement of higher albedo desert with lower albedo vegetation in North Africa increases the regional rainfall by increasing the intensity of the summer monsoon.” Google it for yourself. In other words, overgraze N. Africa and/or till it to death by planting wheat, corn, soybeans, etc., thereby removing vegetative cover and guess what happens? Less rain. This in turns makes even less vegetative cover and before you know it … you’ve got DESERT, precisely what we have now in N. Africa – the Sahara Desert. I first learned about this mechanism from Joel Salatin in his book “Salad Bar Beef” and later confirmed it by Googling science papers like this one.

(5) Have a look at Google Earth and notice how many areas of the world are now desert or are quickly becoming desert. It’s scary. Allan Savory is right.

(6) If you do more reading along these lines, you find out that droughts and floods (and presumably ice storms and snowstorms) will become more severe and more frequent, the more we strip our land surfaces of vegetative cover.

What to do about this?

(1) Google Allan Savory’s TED Talk and watch it.  Allan Savory is one of the keynote speakers at the largest Permaculture event ever, next month.  Go if you can.  You can hear Allan, Joel and many other Permaculture leaders.

(2) Oppose tillage and support proper grazing management with your food choices as best you can.

(3) Realize that Jesus is coming back and will make a New Heavens and a New Earth (thank God!) but until that happens, the Genesis Stewardship Mandate has not been revoked. Let’s be good stewards!

[CORRECTED POST] In the Permaculture Movement, we are interested in Feeding People Sustainably. So we are interested in producing the most calories possible in a given land area. But not just any calories. You would not be very healthy if, for example, you got all your calories from refined sugar! But, interestingly, you COULD get all your calories from potatoes if you had to and you would survive. That is fascinating to me, which is why I started growing potatoes last year. So how may people could you feed from an acre of potatoes? Well, considering that you need about 1 million calories per year per person (using the adult male number of about 3000 calories per day), according to THIS ARTICLE, you could feed 17 people from one acre!! Wow. Has anyone ever tried eating a “potato only” diet? Yes, actually. His name is Chris Voigt and you can read about his experiment HERE. Chris says “My doctor is interested to see the final results, and he suspected I would be just fine at the end of 60 days.” Hmm. You’d have to get really creative with your recipes I guess. Ok so now my wheels are really turning … 17 million calories per acre from potatoes. And here’s the “100 lbs of Potatoes from 4 Square Feet” article I linked on Facebook earlier. But both systems need compost.  Stay tuned for compost calculations.

[PREVIOUS ERRONEOUS VERSION OF POST – DISREGARD – TREE LEAF COMPOST ARTICLE HAD A HUGE CALCULATION ERROR] In the Permaculture Movement, we are interested in Feeding People Sustainably. So we are interested in producing the most calories possible in a given land area. But not just any calories. You would not be very healthy if, for example, you got all your calories from refined sugar! But, interestingly, you COULD get all your calories from potatoes if you had to and you would survive. That is fascinating to me, which is why I Read more »

[CORRECTED POST] For a BackToEdenFilm.com gardening enthusiast geek like me, this post by Bev Walker entitled “The Numbers of Leaves” is truly Geek Heaven. I am now in my second year of successful gardening with the BTE (wood chip) method and I am studying ways to collect leaves and twigs more reliably so this is a great article for me.

[PREVIOUS ERRONEOUS VERSION OF POST – DISREGARD – I should have checked this author’s calcs with the scientific literature before posting.  72 tons of leaf fall per year is way, way, way too high.  According to this paper it’s 5400 kg/hectare (4752 lbs/acre)]

For a BackToEdenFilm.com gardening enthusiast geek like me, this post by Bev Walker entitled “The Numbers of Leaves” is truly Geek Heaven. I am now in my second year of successful gardening with the BTE (wood chip) method and I am studying ways to collect leaves and twigs more reliably so this is a great article for me. One big take away I get from this article is that the four neighbors participating in this leaf composting project collecting from their own yards totaling about 1.5 acres of area, end up every Fall with a volume of 7263 cubic yards of leaves every year. They reduce this down with a shredder by a 10:1 ratio giving a pre-compost volume of 726 CY. This calculates out to 109 tons(!) of leaf fall weight every year! This is further reduced during the natural composting process to yield an estimated 98 tons of compost every year. From 1.5 acres. So 72 tons of leaves per acre => 65 tons compost per acre. Wow!

MLK HAD A DREAM.  I HAVE A DREAM TOO …. REAL FOOD. SUPER CHEAP.  HEALING LAND.  HEALING SOULS.  Here’s some thoughts on this topic drawn from Mark Shepard’s 2013 book “Restoration Agriculture” (Mark’s farm pictured at left) The most remarkable things I glean from Mark’s book are …

1) Mob Grazing Plus. Everything I have learned about Mob Grazing – cattle, sheep, chickens following, etc. – applies – that is, no input, much higher grazing densities, no meds, etc. BUT … with Mark’s system, densities can be increased even more because of 3 key factors – (a) partial shade which benefits both the animals and the grasses, and (b) fruit from trees falling on the ground which automatically supply extra feed to pigs and chickens (omnivores), and (c) multiple livestock species

2) Mob Grazing Plus a Gazillion. OK well, not quite. But a whole new universe of production is available – IN ADDITION to the mob grazed livestock on the same acreage – because of the trees and bushes, which are arranged in rows with 23 ft wide alleys. You can harvest 1000 lbs per acre of chestnuts alone plus apples and several other items. So for example, if a Mob Grazed cattle operations produces 50 lbs of beef per acre per year (what Greg Judy does), a Mark Shepard system might produce more like 60 lbs because of the extra fertility / shading of the grass, animal shade, etc, PLUS perhaps 10 lbs of lamb, 40 lbs of pork, 15 lbs of chickens (for meat), 50 dozen eggs, PLUS 1000 lbs of chestnuts, 7000 lbs of currants and more (Mark does not give the yields for hazelnuts, grapes and raspberries which all grow under the chestnut / apple trees). Anyway the production is enormous from the tree / bush crops and this is ON TOP OF the already efficient mob grazing operation!

What are the implications of this?

Well, it tells me that with Mark’s system, we have the economic “engine” to drive conversion of cropland — which is degrading rapidly due to tillage — into farmland which is not only wildly productive and wildly profitable, but actually REVERSES land degradation.

I have not assembled all the numbers yet, but I do have some of them. Let’s calculate some retail values of production with what I know so far from Mark’s book. Let’s use some average numbers for retail for “beyond organic” animal products. LIVESTOCK: 60 lbs beef x $5/lb = $300. 10 lbs lamb x $8/lb. = $80. 40 lbs pork x $5/lb = $200. 15 lbs chicken x $3/lb = $45. 50 dozen eggs x $3/dozen = $150. Livestock total per acre: $775/acre. TREE/BUSH CROPS. Add in 1000 lbs chestnuts x $5/lb = $5000 plus 7000 lbs of currants x ?/lb plus hazelnuts plus apples plus grapes plus plus plus … do you get the picture?

Now one of the greatest obstacles to converting row crop land to Restoration Farm land (Oak Savannah) is the high lease cost, typically a minimum of $100 per acre per year and as high as $300/acre per year – even higher in some places. Another obstacle is that cropland is DEAD. The soil life has been killed by years of tillage and chemicals and pesticides. There is very little organic matter in the soil so the soil must be brought back to life by adding organic material. This costs money and takes time.

BUT … it seems to me that an investor with a little patience could realize huge returns by making the up front investment to resurrect dead cropland and put the land into “Restoration Farm” production. We’re talking over $700 per acre in just livestock revenues against very low production costs. Then on top of this, we have THOUSANDS of $ per acre in tree / bush crops, again, against very low inputs / harvesting cost.

As for revenue timeframes, I have heard that chestnuts can begin yielding in as little as 3 years with grafting and proper soil prep. The other tree and bush crops can yield sooner than this and livestock can begin yielding within 2 years. I don’t know yet how much this conversion would cost up front, but I do have a feel for what steps to take and some approximate costs of some of these steps. I hope that I can refine this model soon for presentation to investors.

Stay tuned!

PS How will we get cheap food out of this? Well … it seems to me that if we can invest say $1000 per acre over 3 years to resurrect cropland then begin harvesting all this bounty, would it not be possible to lower the retail prices of food thusly produced? If “beyond organic” beef sells for $5 per lb under the Single Species Mob Grazing model, isn’t it possible that we could see it drop to $1 per lb under the Mark Shepard model? I see no reason it could not. Ditto for chestnuts. And everything else. Abundant supply drops prices. This we know. How much it will drop, I cannot say.

Several years ago, Dr. Andrew Stoll, director of the Psychopharmacology Research Laboratory at Harvard Medical School-McLean Hospital, conducted a landmark study on the role of omega-3 fatty acids in bipolar disorder and came up with some surprising results. The researcher discovered that when patients with bipolar disorder consumed omega-3 from fish oil, they experienced a marked reduction in episodes of mania and depression. Extensive research continues to demonstrate that omega-3 fatty acids form the foundation of a solid, healthy diet, while also reducing the risk of heart disease, stroke, hypertension, and arthritis, among other conditions. Here is a link to Dr. Stoll’s recent (2012) book … LINK

Steve Ilardi earned his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Duke University in 1995, and has since served on the faculties of the University of Colorado and (presently) the University of Kansas. The author of over 40 professional articles on mental illness, Dr. Ilardi is a nationally recognized expert on depression. His work has been honored by the American Psychological Association’s prestigious Blau Award for early career contributions to the field, and his research on the neuroscience of depression has been funded by the National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH).

Dr. Ilardi has also received several major teaching awards in recognition of his dynamic, engaging classroom presence. Recently, he was selected from a pool of over 2,000 instructors as the recipient of the school’s highest instructional honor, the HOPE Award for teaching excellence. He also maintains an active clinical practice, and has treated several hundred depressed patients over the course of his career. Dr. Ilardi lives in Lawrence, Kansas with his wife, Maria and daughter, Abby.

Here’s some excerpts from a recent article in Psychology Today authored by Dr. Ilardi … LINK

Got Chemical imbalance? What Big Pharma Doesn’t Advertise
Published on August 10, 2009 by Stephen Ilardi, Ph.D. in The Depression Cure

A prospective patient recently asked me if her depression might involve some form of chemical imbalance. Like most Americans, she had seen hundreds of drug ads trumpeting the idea, but they filled her with a deep sense of helplessness. “I really don’t want to take antidepressants,” she explained. “And yet if there’s truly something wrong with my brain chemistry, I’d pretty much have to get on meds, wouldn’t I?”

She had aptly framed the conventional wisdom: Got chemical imbalance? Then you need to ingest some chemicals.

But the conventional wisdom is misguided. Yes, depression entails striking neurochemical abnormalities, but this fact – in and of itself – tells us nothing about how best to treat the disorder. That’s because there are numerous ways of altering depressive brain function, and most of them have nothing to do with psychotropic drugs.

And he goes on to cite studies about how exercise, diet, bright light (sunlight) and “changing the mind” all have powerful anti-depressant effects.

Great article!