Socialism and health

[Roger B]

Is this what you mean when you say socialism:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/04/world ... d=all&_r=0

If so, I am ALL for it. I even want to do it myself. But our winters are brutal, our soil is sandy and difficult to work with, and we have very little room. I have been thinking about constructing a small green house.

I bet these "farmers" in Jamaica won't be using pesticides or other poisons on their own food. Who wants to bet?

Roger

[Ellen Madono]

Hi,

Not sure who you are talking to Roger, but yes, I think this Jamaican return to the earth is coming as a great hardship for most of us and a blessing to the planet. Don't know that this is socialism though. I just doubt that any ism is going to provide and answer.

We are trying to grow veggies without fertilizers (except compost) in Japan. I am not familiar with this jungle like climate and I would starve if my production were my source of food. Farming takes lots of knowledge. It is taking me many seasons to slowly remember what my ancestors knew like the back of their hand.

Maybe in your area the focus would not be farming. Maybe the population is too great for what the earth can provide for locally. Maybe there will be a terrible die off in many parts of the world. Maybe your local machine shop needs to remember its homegrown skills and work with what is appropriate for the enviroment. I only metioned machine shops because I have spent a lot of time there and clearly there are idigeous skills at many levels of culture. I don't have an answer.

What I see ahead is scary. I am thinking how can I have my homeopathy knowledge available in the worst of circumstances. What would I bring for the great escape?

I know crazy.

Best,
Ellen

[Angela McGuire]

Have you heard of bio char? It is better at improving the nutrient value of soil than regular fertilizer.

Sent from my iPad

[Tanya Marquette]

I do not know what bio char is.
I use compost from house veggie waste, leaves, chopped tree limbs which I get from the town.
There is also organic fertilizers that are ‘guaranteed’ to be non-GMO.
There is also homoepathy to help the garden along and it has been a real saver in my garden
with several problems.
As for feeding the world, we do know that organic farming can do that. The UN WHO did a report
couple of years ago in which it stated that organic farming in Africa could feed the entire continent.
It also noted that GE production would never be able to do that.
t
From: aim818@yahoo.com
Sent: Monday, August 05, 2013 5:23 PM
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Minutus] Socialism and health

Have you heard of bio char? It is better at improving the nutrient value of soil than regular fertilizer.

Sent from my iPad

[Dr. Joe Rozencwajg, NMD]

Do you happen to have a link or a copy of that report?

I would love to read it!
Dr. J. Rozencwajg, NMD. "The greatest enemy of any science is a closed mind". www.naturamedica.webs.com

[Tanya Marquette]

I wish I did. My computer crashed after receiving that reference and all was lost.
Maybe we can find it online.
t
From: Dr. J. Rozencwajg, NMD.
Sent: Monday, August 05, 2013 8:43 PM
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Minutus] Socialism and health

Do you happen to have a link or a copy of that report?

I would love to read it!
Dr. J. Rozencwajg, NMD. "The greatest enemy of any science is a closed mind". www.naturamedica.webs.com

[Maria Bohle]

I have been farming for the last 40 years. It is the most difficult thing you will ever do. Be sure to purchase standard crops and save your own seed it is getting harder to impossible to get. Don't expect these heirloom varieties to tast like what you buy at the grocers. Flavored are different. Vegies are harder. Tougher that is.
After 40 years in the same place I still cannot guarantee a crop. Good luck with your farming. Find someone local to teach you. Soils, weather, water, and manures are all different and one size does not fit all.

Sent from my iPhone

[Tanya Marquette]

It is true Maria. Every year is a drama in farming and gardening. So many
uncontrollable elements like the weather. My favorite apple grower lost his crop
for 2 years running and maybe this year as well. He was a truly organic farmer.
Wound up using his property for weddings to make a living. He still does a small
vegetable patch but he is not showing up at farmer’s markets.
We are also losing our 2 best CSAs in the area. One due to management and weather
conditions as well as labor problems within the group. The other one is a conflict
with a group that bought the ownership of the land that was being farmed. The
tragedy is that this new group portends to do community education and biodynamic
farming which is exactly what is ongoing their now. The farmers wanted to work
with the new group but their sense of community excluded this community based
farm project.
Seed saving is a growing venture around here. One group does heirloom seeds and
also runs community workshops to teach about gardening, including seed saving. I
am fortunate to live in an area with many local, small organic farms. Many of these
farms will do community outreach to promote better nutrition and use of foods.
t
From: Maria Bohle
Sent: Monday, August 05, 2013 10:19 PM
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Minutus] Socialism and health

I have been farming for the last 40 years. It is the most difficult thing you will ever do. Be sure to purchase standard crops and save your own seed it is getting harder to impossible to get. Don't expect these heirloom varieties to tast like what you buy at the grocers. Flavored are different. Vegies are harder. Tougher that is.
After 40 years in the same place I still cannot guarantee a crop. Good luck with your farming. Find someone local to teach you. Soils, weather, water, and manures are all different and one size does not fit all.

Sent from my iPhone

[Maria Bohle]

Yes Tamarque you are lucky to have organic farmers in your area. I live in what used to be farm country. Had 6 neighbors and now have 90. Organic farming is iffy, every year some critter comes out inshore numbers and decayed a crop. It is easier for people to stop at the grocers rather than the farm. I love it, but homeopathy pays the bills.

Sent from my iPhone

[Irene de Villiers]

Homeopathy should also help with your crops?

I have two purple thumbs so it would be a very bad idea if I tried to farm. I can hardly grow radishes.

But I come from a large family of farmers, each with their own small farm. By large I mean my dad's dad had 11 siblings and his mom had 13 siblings (I had great aunts and great uncles coming out of the woodwork, never quite understood/believed it as a child - nobody could have that many surely and ALL on farms?), and they all lived off their farm produce and lived to an average age of 105 years. They worked extremely hard, were extremely fit, healthy and happy, and I suspect that an enormous volume of farming knowledge, including homeopathy, as there were homeopaths in the family dating way back, died with them.
The library of inherited homeopathy books went to my cousin (the eldest of the cousins) and it was she who first taught me homeopathy.

I wish I remembered all the wisdoms of this amazing generation. I know one key was to ensure they had the right fruit, animals, veg, fruit or whatever for the climate and soil and especially the *slope* of the land visa vis the sun. So they lived all over the place and no two farmed the same things. Always it has to do with what was best suited to where they were. My gran was in what is now Harare, and her farm was Cape gooseberrieis, pineapples and pawpaws. Uncle Tin had pheasants, and kudu. Another great uncle had dairy cows and teff, and made a good living from cream, butter, milk, cheese, yogurt etc - plus teff products. (Teff was great to use in poor years to supplement feed). His brother had nectarines, peaches, quinces and apricots, and grew veg between the orchard rows. Some years one did better, other years the opposite. Another had pork with a factory for sausage and we'd joked that the pigs went in one end and came out the other squished into tubes. Another had merino sheep, very hardy and usable for meat or wool or sheep milk products. And so it went; But they'd all scoff at anyone who told them *what* to farm - they said the situation and soil told them what to farm. That it could not be forced or there'd be problems. They alternated one set of things with another or had more than one "string to the bow" to get results in dry or wet times. I wish I remembered more but it was all back in the 50s and 60s I went to their farms, and they were all in their 90s and 100s then.

They just must have had an enormous knowledge passed down over generations, for small organic farming - not that it was called organic farming back then!
I wonder if there is a record anywhere of their and other accumulated generations of knowledge and wisdom somewhere - or was it all word of mouth. know there were homeopathy books (with fascinating case notes in the margins) but I remember no farming books. I suspect too many extremely valuable pearls of wisdom go with the older generations, with them to the grave, that we are finally coming to realize are truly valuable after all.

Being "modern" s not always the best way..........

Namaste,
Irene

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--
Irene de Villiers, B.Sc AASCA MCSSA D.I.Hom/D.Vet.Hom.
P.O. Box 4703 Spokane WA 99220.
www.angelfire.com/fl/furryboots/clickhere.html (Veterinary Homeopath.)
"Man who say it cannot be done should not interrupt one doing it."