Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Joined: Feb 01, 2006 Posts: 510 Location: Northern US
Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:42 am Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Here is something I read this morning about raising cattle, something I know nothing about.
The Return of the Dust Bowl
By Chris Mayer
"Meat is incredibly expensive to produce, because raising the necessary livestock requires large amounts of grain. According to The Silk Road to Riches, the average cow consumes 2.5-3% of its body weight in grains every day. "A typical 1,200-pound beef steer could consume about 35 pounds of feed per day," the authors write, "or more than 13,000 pounds annually. That's enough grain to feed more than 10 average-sized adults for an entire year." It's also very water intensive. It takes about 6,600 gallons of water to produce just 8 ounces of beef. As you can imagine, this puts meat beyond the pale of many poor countries."
Joined: Mar 19, 2005 Posts: 858 Location: Bridge City
Posted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:00 am Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
FilmShack wrote:
Thanks for the good words Chuck. It is so cold today it feels like the ice age began sometime last night. Any idea's on how much oil and gas would be saved if everybody made 5% of their own food. Reading some of the Hubbarts I think it might be a giant ammount. I read in National Geographic that one cow requires 5 barrells of oil to raise.
I'd like to make a reasonable estimate so that I can add it to my marketing materials.
Any thoughts?
Patti
You know what, I was actually ECSTATIC that winter finally arrived...and I'm not a fan at all of winter! As for stats that you ask for, I have no idea off the top of my head but you've come to the right place to find out! However, I'm slowly starting to get people to change in small ways, such as lowering their thermostat during the winter and raising it during the summer and changing of traditional lightbulbs to more energy efficient and longer lasting bulbs...I find that it's the small simple things that people are willing to change that can add up in the long run w/o coming off as intrusive or pushy...because those simple things make sense to the average Joe, y'know? _________________ "if god doesn't exist, it is necessary that we invent him" - Voltaire
Posted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:38 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
I agree with Chuckmack, I have done those things at home and it was painless! I saw the benefit on my gas and electric bill. I also installed a small solar pv array w/ batteries to help out. Simple steps first!
Posted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 3:59 am Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
I think that this thread hold some kind of a record. I have never seen so many new members with just 1 posting in any thread before. Patti has apparently recruited quite some new members. Congratulations!
Posted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 2:57 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
SpringCreek: Any idea how much it does take to produce your beef? In Japan they pay over twenty bucks a pound for beef.
TopCat: I know tools. I got it. Incredible info. I read somewhere, that there is a breed of cow that eats half the feed but still produces two thirds the meat. I think it is a mini cow.
Chuck: Winter. I admit it is nice to see, but I still want to be on a island in the sun. I've been making my family wear rabbit head hats in doors. That has helped a lot with bill. But I think that KEYSPAN is trying to destroy us. I had this ephiphany, I was on the west coast (Bay Area) last winter and I was struck by how vibrant the place was, and then I thought it's because they have more money, they don't have to pay the costs for energy that we do. Energy cost in New England are huge burdens on small businesses that other parts of the world just don't have. Interesting, no? I'm planning a small book or webisode called "Ten Things we can all do to live better!" and I agree the little things really do add up.
Thanks people, and I'm so glad people have joined up to talk, it is very cool. Thanks MacG. means a lot.
Posted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 4:08 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Spring Creek: What do you think viability of a farm whose machinery is built around Vegetable Oil powered implements. Do you think that enough, corn for example, could be grown to power the tractor etc. needed to make the farm sustainable without backbreaking labor or gasoline?
Pretend money is no option when you think about this, and then we can think about how to make it cheap.
Joined: Dec 27, 2004 Posts: 13181 Location: naive idiot fantasy world
Posted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 7:04 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Personally, I don't think machinery is necessary for farming. See Masanobu Fukuoka for methods of farming completely by hand, what he calls "do nothing farming." See also Biointensive farming. _________________ "...powerdown so soft and fluffy you'll think you're living in a pillow." - jboogy
Posted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 11:46 am Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Man, I thought I would never find this forum. I found Peakoil about a month ago while reading the Garden Girl website. I couldnt remember the name (believe it or not). lol. Anyway, Patti why did you remove the links to Peak Oil from your website and Google Video page?
Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 8:47 am Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
I pulled it because lots of people were getting too wrapped up in thinking I was just about peak oil. I'm about all sorts of stuff, and just being a peak oil person(which I am) is a bit too much for the Martha Stewart types who I'm pitching to.
I was trying to set up my own message board, but I have been so sick for the past week I haven't gotten around to it. I am also trying to be a regular contributer to the site just like everybody else. So to that end, I have been hanging out in gardening and chickens quite a bit on this site.
Joined: Jan 01, 2007 Posts: 246 Location: Pacific Northwest
Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:43 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Spring Creek,
The tractor may not be dead if you have wood. My family is planning to build one of these small scale wood gasifiers this summer. It will be fun to see if we can do it. I want to use it to power a generator for my well pump.
Posted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 8:00 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
Quote:
FilmShack wrote:
SpringCreek: Any idea how much it does take to produce your beef? In Japan they pay over twenty bucks a pound for beef.
Patti
Given that Canadian net farm incomes are approaching zero, the sale price of beef is pretty close to the cost of production. Market ready animals sell for about $1.00 to $1.10 Cdn per pound.
But I think you were asking about the physical inputs. I'm not a beef producer but I did work on a couple farms years ago and I'll venture a quick response. (Please read "he", the farmer, as "he or she")
Typically calves are produced on a cow/calf operation, which would likely be a ranch. This is may not be arable land so a cattle herd is the best way to harvest the pasture. The ranch would then sell feeder cattle at 4 to 600 pounds to farmer to background them. You want them to grow a good frame before they go to the feedlot. Say this farmer is in an area where he has a good hay crop but not alot of grain. They are growing relatively slowly as they build bone. He would take them up to 8 to 1000 pounds. This guy then sells them to a feedlot where they have corn, now they are finishing more cattle out west on barley. In the feedlot they are full-fed a corn diet supplemented with soy or good quality legume hay. They want the cattle to put on weight as quickly as possible so they finish at 1200 lb. with a good layer of fat. Finishing quickly is most efficient in terms of feed intake and capital.
In the 80's Ag. Canada tried to change the beef grading system so a leaner carcass graded choice. Consumers wanted well marbled beef because it is jucier and tastes better. (marbling is the fat in the muscle) so they changed the system back. To get this fat carcass they full feed grain during the final finishing stage.
Typically the cow herd on the ranch will be a British breed, Hereford or Angus. They do well on pasture and are good mothers. They would be crossed with an "exotic" breed like Charolais or Simmental. The European breeds are larger framed, tend to grow faster and will finish with the right fat cover at 1200 lb. under a full grain diet. The British breeds would be too fat at 1000 lb. The British breeds will finish on grass, as they would be growing more slowly and be more mature when they reached market weight. They don't need the high grain diet to have good meat quality. Grass fed beef is now a premium product.
When it is said that one pound of beef takes 10 pounds of grain to produce I think it's a bit misleading. That last pound put on in the feedlot may take that or more. 8 to 1 conversion efficiency (8 pounds of feed to one pound of grain) with a 57% carcass yield (57% of the live animal is the primary carcass) is 14 to 1. But the younger animal has better efficiency, less body weight to maintain and putting on less fat. Conversion may be as high as 4 to 1. And for most of it's life that cattle beast is eating roughages. Ruminants (cattle, sheep and goats) and pseudo-ruminants (horse and rabbits) can utilize cellulose, people can't.
Harvesting pasture allows us to use the resource from non-crop land. Although huge corn fed feedlots may not be very energy efficient, cattle are part of an efficient integrated system. When I was in Holland, which has a very intensive agriculture, I was surprised by the number of sheep. They are used to clean up the grass from roadsides and hedgerows, so that nothing is wasted. The Dutch diet is based on bread and cheese. Milk is a very efficient source of high quality protein. In India the cow is so revered they don't even kill the bulls. So to prevent us being inundated with homeless bulls we should at least have some beef from the dairy bull calves.
It is difficult to design an organic cash crop system. If you're shipping all the grain off the farm where is the nitrogen (N) going to come from? Most organic farms are mixed farms, so they keep the nutrients on the farm and recycle them through the manure. There is a Biodynamic dairy farm near Listowell which is the nicest, most productive farm I've ever seen. A good alfalfa stand will supply all the N needed for a following corn crop. So you need cattle to market your hay through (cropers look at livestock just as a way to market crops). Ethnically I'm Northern European, they traditionally used alot of dairy products, as do I, so much so that I'm practically a symbiote of dairy cattle.
Beef production on intensively managed rotational pasture is ecologically and economically sound. See the works of Joel Salatin. The system was first proposed by Voisin in France and developed in New Zealand. The Kiwi's invented the electric fence which made intensive rotation viable. Dr. Ann Clark of the University of Guelph has achieved 600 lb. of beef per acre and gains of 400 lb. per animal on good land. And a very nice looking pasture it is too, few things are a beautiful as a herd grazing on a good pasture.
As Walt Whitman said:
And the good green grass—that delicate miracle, the ever-recurring grass.
Posted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 4:24 pm Post subject: Re: I made a TV show Sample and I need real feedback
FilmShack wrote:
Spring Creek: What do you think viability of a farm whose machinery is built around Vegetable Oil powered implements. Do you think that enough, corn for example, could be grown to power the tractor etc. needed to make the farm sustainable without backbreaking labor or gasoline?
Spring Creek, hi neighbour, hope you don't mind if I take a shot at this.
I think the question is not so much can a farm be run with renewable energy, as how are we going to do it. There really is not other option. Obviously farming can be be done without fossil fuels as agriculture predates the industrial age. Traditional farm work isn't particularly backbreaking but it is slow. Industrial agriculture may not be resource efficient but it is labour efficient. Only 1.8 % of Canadians farm. But as we power down there is likely to be more labour available. My cousin runs 60 sows farrow to finish, feeds 2000 hogs, crops 500 acres and since he wanted to get out of continuous corn and rotate through alfalfa he bought 20 dairy cows. He has some weekend and summer help but does most of the work himself.
On the way home last week I passed a Mennonite farmer with a wagon load of sawdust pulled by a team. When I need a load I call the trucker and they deliver 50 or 100 yards. It costs me more cash but less time. The "Small Farmer's Journal" makes a case that horse farming is economically viable even today. The rule of thumb is that horses take 20% of the land for their feed.
In the Nov/Dec issue of Small Farm Canada There was an article on Tony MacQuail's mixed power farm. He does most of the work with horses but has a loader tractor for material handling. This is a good compromise. I visited his farm 30 years ago, it's nice to see he's made a go of it. I asked him if it's worth doing and he said yes, that it was a good way to live.
There is a rig called a Mennonite tractor, a hitch cart with a diesel engine mounted on it. This allows you to run PTO (power take off) powered equipment and still use horses as the prime mover. This lets you use swathers and balers on a horse powered farm. They even used to make pull type combines.
Using data from the USDA Alternative estimates of corn energy balances (pfd) I make it an EROEI of 5 to 7:1, and with Pimentel and Patzek's numbers 3.8:1. This is farm gate. Half the energy is in the nitrogen (N) fertilizer. I think you would have to go low input farming, if not Organic. Ammonium nitrate has gone from $50 / ton to $450 last year, who knows this year? The University of Manitoba is researching low input cropping systems, using pesticides and concentrated fertilizers where appropriate, Natural systems agriculture. A legume plowdown will supply most of the N requirement of the following corn crop, so most organic farms are mixed farms, to have a use for the hay crop. Even Fukuoka used poultry manure on his crops, Fukuoka Farming web site. I have only found one reference to straight grain organic farming; Large scale organic farming. So it is possible to produce most of the fertility on farm. A rotation might be wheat, alfalfa, alfalfa, corn, soybean or wheat, clover (for seed), corn soybean.
Using OMAF crop budgeting data, fieldwork fuel consumption is around 4 gal./acre, 6 if herbicides and P & K fertilizer are included. The soybean would produce 50 gal./ac. of biodiesel or SVO which would be enough to supply the fuel requirements of the entire rotation. There is on farm soybean roasting equipment (raw beans can't be fed to hogs) perhaps an on farm crusher could be developed. Perhaps it could be owned co-operatively. Rodale says that they have achieved the Holy Grail of organic farming, no-till, with yields the same as conventional; New Farm. This would reduce fuel requirements by over a gal./ac.
careinke wrote:
The tractor may not be dead if you have wood. My family is planning to build one of these small scale wood gasifiers this summer.
This sounds great, what I want is to use a Sterling engine the same way. A hybrid poplar plantation or switchgrass are low input and probably easier to use as fuel than SVO. REAP - Resource Efficient Agricultural Production has been doing research on this for years. Here's a question; why all the work on cellulolitic ethanol when houses are still heated with oil, gas and electricity, why not heat with wood or straw pellets and use the fossil fuels in the equipment?
I would like to see more reseach dollars going into this. Individuals and farmers can only do so much. Canada gets as much of its' energy from firewood as it does from nuclear, but nuclear gets all the research. When Shumacher was asked about appropriate technology he said "what do you want inappropriate technology?"
Yes, I do think that a farm can be sustainable on an energy basis. I don't know what it looks like, but it will be fun finding out. I hope it looks like the Shire.
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