Re: Personal Security / Insecurity
*** I have reviewed my contributions to this list over the last year. Counting my last post but not this one, I have made 76 posts to BDNOW!, most of which have been of a technical nature. Nonetheless I am considered a 'lurker' by the list owner. Interesting, isn't it? Frank, Frank, Frank... For heaven's sake, we both know you are not a lurker. You are one of the most profound posters to this list but, let's face it, your appearances here have been infrequent as of late. It's a shame, of course, that someone will read in the archive that you are a lurker but will probably never see that the accusation was a jest that was commuted right here. Probably at least part of the problem is that my introduction to biodynamics came first through Rodale and Pfeiffer, and only second through Secrets of the Soil and beyond; I am probably canalized to be sure, looking at ascertainable and independently verifiable data as a proper jumping off place, rather than believing entirely in what seems to me to be a rather loose, 'quasi-magical' version of the story I like getting the arithmetic right and knowing what scientists outside the 'biodynamic' circle are sayingit seems to me these were the sorts of things Steiner set Pfeiffer on his path to do, which resonates with what Greg Willis has said in his recent post... I think if we want 'BDNOW!' we'd best have either the mentor system Allan talks about, or else a program where people can get irrefutable physical evidence of the kind Willis discusses, so that we can put 'Steiner remedies' on a scientific basis that even skeptics must accept. Frank - For me, this list is not about world-domination via BD. To me, BD Now! refers to a forum where someone wants to get some help or assistance in their thoughts about biodynamics or in their practical projects can turn to more experienced practitioners for answers and support. I know there is a lot of zealot talk on this list. A lot of conversion talk and what not. For me, the circumstances are strictly one of 'pearls before swine.' Myself, I do not have enough energy or time to put pearls before swine any longer. As you know, we are postulating a spiritual science here that operates beyond the perceptions of orthodox science. It is very very difficult to create a proof of our system within a lesser system. Having experienced the power of biodynamics in food and in soil, I have no need to 'prove it' to anyone. Having seen 'organic trials' conducted at the local ag research center, I have not hope for a proof of biodynamics under those circumstances. Doc Ingham has done some work of this type, but much more should be done. It should be thought of as crucial to the whole task, to find a way to initiate people in the validity of the remedies so that it can be repeated and demonstrated in classrooms, workshops and field trials globally. If that can't be done, then perhaps the rest of the world is right to dismiss Steiner along with Thun as mere perpetrators of myth. Just as they are dismissing Elaine right now. Those of us who have our noses in the soil foodweb are, as usual, gaining a rather distorted view. From those outside of Elaine's world I continually hear that she has provided 'no science.' Now, from others who are working successfully within her world but have become disassociated from her personally, there is considerable criticism that she is more of an evangelist than a teacher, etc etc. My point is not to criticize Elaine, whom I think is a wonder of the modern world, but to point out how even 'science' cannot not be readily established in the face of 'industry.' As far as losing a job because of one's expressed views, here's a tale to impress anyone: http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/id118.htm I'd appreciate it if you'd clarify why your chose that particular link. I'm sorry, Frank. I don't see anything in that article as controversial on a neighborhood level as, for example, people admitting that they think that if cow shit is stirred for from 1 to 24 hours it has become a tonic beverage for humans. Remarks such as these appear on this list some times. I like people to be able to share what they actually do with their preps and teas. Such remarks, accessible to Google can impair an individuals opportunity to do good deeds in their community, though. Who wan't a 'kook' on their school board, for example? Last night on the local news they were advocating checking anyone you meet through google and, if serious about them, through a private detective who, can you believe this?, can get cell phone records... I am sorry Allan had a bad experience in the job market. But, to cave in to fear is not really the answer. You make this sound selfish. The situation I was describing was,again, a public education opportunity (It was a farming position, also) at an established non-profit. In this location I could have exposed 1000s of young people a
Hauschka reprint
Great news! One of my favorite biodynamic books has now been reprinted, Dr. Hauschka's The Nature of Substance, and also (one I haven't read)Nutrition (same author). Both are available from JPI, or www.anthroporess.com Christy
Roundup Resistant Weeds Popping Up
Title: Widely Used Crop Herbicide Is Losing Weed Resistance January 14, 2003 Widely Used Crop Herbicide Is Losing Weed ResistanceBy ANDREW POLLACK he world's most widely grown genetically engineered crops soybeans, cotton and corn developed to be impervious to a popular herbicide are facing a new challenge to their continued long-term use. The herbicide, known as Roundup, is beginning to lose its effectiveness in controlling weeds. In the last few years, weeds resistant to the herbicide have emerged in Delaware, Maryland, California, western Tennessee and at the edges of the Corn Belt in Ohio and Indiana. The problem, crop scientists say, is the very success of the genetically engineered crops, particularly the soybeans, which now account for more than three-quarters of all soybeans grown in the United States. Farmers like the genetically engineered crops, which are sold under the brand name Roundup Ready, because they can spray Roundup herbicide directly over those fields, killing the weeds while leaving the crops intact. But the popularity of the crops has caused the use of the Roundup herbicide to skyrocket, setting up "survival of the fittest" conditions in which the rare weeds that survive the herbicide can flourish. Eventually, experts say, farmers will need to reduce their applications on the genetically engineered soybeans and other crops to preserve the long-term usefulness. The resistant weeds could also be a problem for the Monsanto Company, which developed both Roundup and the Roundup Ready crops. Roundup is Monsanto's biggest product, accounting for about 40 percent of its estimated 2002 revenue of $4.6 billion, according to Bear, Stearns. The Roundup Ready crops, the linchpin of Monsanto's agricultural biotechnology business, had revenue of roughly $470 million last year, Bear, Stearns said. Referring to Roundup herbicide by its generic name, Mark J. VanGessel, an associate professor of crop science at the University of Delaware, said, "With the advent of Roundup Ready crops, all we're using is glyphosate." "Long term," he said, "what's going to have to happen is getting away from the continuous use of Roundup Ready crops." The resistance is currently found only in a few types of weeds, crop scientists say, and farmers can easily use other herbicides to kill those weeds. But some scientists are concerned that the resistance could spread, rendering Roundup herbicide less useful. That would be a problem for farmers because glyphosate is by far the most popular weed-killing chemical in the world. It is considered relatively benign in environmental terms and safe enough for use in home gardens, and it helps farmers control weeds without the tilling that can contribute to soil erosion. Weed specialists say it might be hard to find good replacements, in part because the very success of Roundup has cut profits from other herbicides, causing farm chemical companies to reduce investments in developing new ones. "There aren't a lot of new herbicides coming down the road that will bail us out," said Christy Sprague, a weed specialist at the University of Illinois. Monsanto executives say that the resistance is not a significant problem. "The reality is, and the facts are that, one, resistance to glyphosate is rare and, two, where it has occurred around the world it is very manageable," said Kerry Preete, vice president for United States markets. Company officials said they expected use of the crops and of glyphosate to continue increasing. Still, at its annual meeting next month, the Weed Science Society of America is to discuss if Roundup is being overused and will perhaps recommend restraint, said Ian Heap, chairman of the society's committee on herbicide-resistant plants. And competitors of Monsanto have seen an opportunity to push their own products as alternatives to Monsanto's. Syngenta is widely advertising its recommendations that farmers limit the use of Roundup and not grow Roundup Ready corn if they are also growing Roundup Ready soy. "If it works on one thing, it might not work on the other," one ad reads, picturing a meal with ketchup slathered on a hot dog and French fries and also on the apple pie. Besides soybeans, about 65 percent of the cotton and 10 percent of the corn grown in the United States contains the Roundup Ready gene, according to Monsanto. Roundup Ready canola, an oilseed crop, is widely grown in Canada.
Re: Hauschka reprint
Great news! One of my favorite biodynamic books has now been reprinted, Dr. Hauschka's The Nature of Substance, and also (one I haven't read) Nutrition (same author). Both are available from JPI, or http://www.anthroporess.comwww.anthroporess.com Christy Thanks, Christy! Important stuff!! -Allan
ADMIN: Re: Roundup Resistant Weeds Popping Up
PLEASE! Do not send attachments to newsgroups! They eat bandwidth and they are proven potentially unsanitary!! I appreciate the post of this article. In the future, please copy the text to a text editor and remove the tags from it and then post as plain text -or- write a synopsis in your own words and send the url for the article. I do like to get the content into the archives because, links rot. Thanks for the effort -Allan
Re: ADMIN: Re: Roundup Resistant Weeds Popping Up
An interesting piece of info about this article from the Times this morning is that it is front page business section. From: Allan Balliett [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 10:54:11 -0500 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: ADMIN: Re: Roundup Resistant Weeds Popping Up PLEASE! Do not send attachments to newsgroups! They eat bandwidth and they are proven potentially unsanitary!! I appreciate the post of this article. In the future, please copy the text to a text editor and remove the tags from it and then post as plain text -or- write a synopsis in your own words and send the url for the article. I do like to get the content into the archives because, links rot. Thanks for the effort -Allan
Re: Kirschenmann speech
Gentlemen: What What is Sound Science? is about is not GMOs or even agriculture specifically, but what is the nature of scientific inquiry. It's refuting one person calling another person's basic body of knowledge that he brings with him and integrates new knowledge into--junk science. It's a way of discrediting another person's basic belief system and rationalizing your own refusal to have a dialogue with that person. The scientific community of Ph.Ds and M.Ds is very rigid. Only one person gets credit for a discovery and gets to name it. Then that person has his whole identity bound up into that discovery. If someone, say his graduate student, writes a paper that debunks the whole basis of his discovery, then do you think that student will get a good grade on his paper or will get his own PhD under that professor. No. He probably gets dropped. Think about Velikovsky whose writings refuted the bases of many disciplines. He was not accepted at all by them, yet now...guess what? In the end, Dr. Kirschenmann knocks linear, reductionist observations, proprietary information, technology for profit that ignores ecology and cultures, the focus on killing a pest, not on understanding the complex biological systems within which the pest emerges (focus on the county putting Diquat Dibromide in the lake to kill Eurasian watermilfoil rather than on the grandfathered home sewage systems that spew into the lake and the run-off from fertilizing lawns that run down to the water's edge which feed the milfoil) as bad science and he touts Polanyi's style of indwelling and Aldo Leopold's statement on sustainability which he paraphrases as Our task is not to 'save' the environment, nor to preserve things as they are, (neither of which is possible) but to engage the environment in ways that enhance its capacity for renewal as good science. We all have our schtick. I don't see that Kirschenman would object to peppering. The man has a PhD and was a teacher and he left all that and came to help his ailing Dad with their farm. Markess, he turned a whole huge farm of hundreds of acres into a BD farm. He probably used peppering. Then they asked him to be the head of the Leopold Center. He'd done his indwelling. Now he's trying to communicate on the PhD level about this subject which makes it harder to understand. In a nice way, he attacking the scientific basis of industrial agriculture. Now read The Future of Agrarianism. http://www.leopold.iastate.edu/pubinfo/papersspeeches/WBerry.html My two cents, Merla Lloyd Charles wrote: - Original Message - From: Moen Creek [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 13, 2003 2:21 PM Subject: Re: Kirschenmann speech Loved ones, This IMHO is the most significant and concise writing I have read in ages. If I may suggest that this refutes, in it's opening 6 or so paragraphs, the use of peppering to lay a plague on GM wheat other aspects of the tecno crap injected in our food. It tells us to put faith in the virility of life and not fall for the mechanistic belief that because some jerks put chunks of foreign DNA into a plant's genome that they (the plant) are going to hang on to it long! Hi Markess Could you elaborate please, I've tried to read the first part of the speech posted by Barrly Lia three times and have completely missed it on each occasion - I'm not trying to be picky or smart - just can not make heads or tails of it in relation to your comment here. On a different but similar tack - I am more optimistic than most about the capacity of nature (with a little help) to rid the system of the GMO - these are only super weeds to a conventional farmer trying to control them with chemical herbicides - without the herbicides (organic or BD farming) they are GENETICALLY INFERIOR plants - I grew canola conventionally up until 2000 and as the varieties progressed in search of higher yields and better oil percentage they became sucessively weaker and less robust under anything but ideal conditions - I never yet saw a canola plant with anything like the vigour and tenacity of a wild radish plant so again - take herbicides out of the system and it breaks down. Maybe what this is what you are talking about but I cant see it in the speech I read! - Help - ? Cheers Lloyd Charles
Re: GREG WILLIS: FWD Fixing Steiner Agriculture: a footnote
Steve, Do you spray with snow on the ground? Merla [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a message dated 1/12/03 10:57:17 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: We are now entering the wintertime crystallization period which extends from January 15 to February 15. Steiner discusses this on page 30. Neophytes and experienced Steinerites alike should know that Steiner, when giving a lecture, often referred to only one part of a vaster subject so as not to get sidetracked or confuse his audience. So it is with the concept of crystallization. The crystallization period is that time when the cosmic forces work to keep the earth atoms in existence. bla, bla, bla... Here on the Green Thumb Farm the spray season never ends. The Fall gets heavy applications of 500, bc, and equisetum and 501. This is done as sequential sprays leading up to the Three King's Remedy, [6Jan]. This is done over our 100 acres. It is now mid Winter, and yes the crystallization forces are at their peak. This week, during the mid Winter full moon, [which is waxing] we shall start a series of 500 sprays over the whole farm. By the Spring the soil will be bursting with Mycorrhizal fungi, visible to the unaided eye. The earthworms will be rarin' to go...spray on, SStorch
Re: Greg Willis: Fwd: Fixing Steiner Agriculture #2 The Power Of Myth
All right, Greg and Steve and Hugh L. et al., How do you prepare horn clay? What kind of clay do you use? How to you spray it? Etc, etc, etc,! Merla [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a message dated 1/12/03 10:58:48 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: JPI refuse to recognize it or use it. Astonishing! in reference to clay that is wrong...sstorch
Ronnigers Potato Farm
Hi all, Ronnigers (hard g not j) Farm is located in Boundary County, the northernmost county in the Idaho Panhandle. It's beautiful big place with handmade log buildings. Last year we went up there and found no one around, but the store had a sign on it to come in and help ourselves with a old chocolate tin to put the money in. He had bins and bins of potatoes. His catalog says yellows, reds, red/reds, color-splashed, best keepers, russets, red/gold, heat tolerant, white, blue/blue, rose, blue/white and scab resistant. He is certified organic. Also sells onions, garlic and cover crops in 50 lb bags and Halflinger horses that are just beautiful. His catalog gives growing instructions for southern climates too. The new catalog is free at www.ronnigers.com.
Lurker
Dear Allan , for start I enjoy very much - most of the time- the BDNow list . The reason I don't participate more is very simple - I can't find enough time in the day ( my time management must be very bad) I have access to the computer only during working hours and believe it or not most of these hours are spent in the field, I am busy with two jobs plus running a few cattle and growing a few dryland wintercereals at home, I have a great young family which wants to see me every now and then and I have a great interest in other aspects of life which do occupy my mind from time to time . Apart from that - if all members of the list would sit together in a conference room and talk about the issues we are talking about - you would have exactly the same - some would talk all the time others every now and then and others would just listen - you wouldn't call the latter ones lurkers would you? Warm Regards Tobias This message is intended for the addressee named and may contain confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient or received it in error, please delete the message and notify sender. Views expressed are those of the individual sender and are not necessarily the views of their organisation.
Re: Kirschenmann speech
[snip] and integrates new knowledge into--junk science. It's a way of discrediting another person's basic belief system and rationalizing your own refusal to have a dialogue with that person. TO SAY NOTHING OF HAVING A DIALOGUE WITH NATURE, AS ENCOURAGED IN THE ESSAY BY STEVEN TALBOTT CITED NEAR THE END OF THE SPEECH (p.13). [snip] that professor. No. He probably gets dropped. Think about Velikovsky whose writings refuted the bases of many disciplines. He was not accepted at all by them, yet now...guess what? SCIENCE IS NONETHELESS THE SOCIAL VENTURE OF A SOCIETY OF EXPLORERS, A COMMUNITY OF SCIENTISTS (p.11). NOTICE THE CASE OF VALID EVIDENCE AGAINST RELATIVITY JUSTIFIABLY BEING IGNORED IN THE FACE OF EINSTEIN'S COMPELLING WORLD VIEW, AS POLANYI POINTED OUT IN HIS BOOK PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE, (SEE p.25 OF THE HAROLD L. DAVIS PAPER CITED ON p.11 BY KIRSCHENMANN). [snip] understand. In a nice way, he attacking the scientific basis of industrial agriculture. THE DAVIS PAPER CITED ON p.11 HAS A GREAT PASSAGE IN THIS REGARD: THIS BELIEF IS LIKE ANNOUNCING TO WALL STREET THAT THE PURSUIT OF FINANCIAL GAIN IS A MISTAKE AND IS WRECKING THE ECONOMY. ___ Barry Lia \ [EMAIL PROTECTED] \ Seattle WA
Re: Lurker
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Dear Allan , for start I enjoy very much - most of the time- the BDNow list ... Apart from that - if all members of the list would sit together in a conference room and talk about the issues we are talking about - you would have exactly the same - some would talk all the time others every now and then and others would just listen - you wouldn't call the latter ones lurkers would you? There is nothing wrong with 'lurkers', Tobias, and every mailing list has' them. I don't think Allan was being critical of lurkers for being that. roger
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Re: Greg Willis: Fwd: Fixing Steiner Agriculture #2 The Power Of Myth
All right, Greg and Steve and Hugh L. et al., How do you prepare horn clay? What kind of clay do you use? How to you spray it? Etc, etc, etc,! Merla Hi Merla There are excellent in depth horn clay articles in the BDNOW archive - Greg Willis, Hugh Lovel, Glen Atkinson, If you start 2nd June 1999 and go through to mid 2000 you should have all the info you are looking for. Cheers Lloyd Charles
