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Author Topic: Are there...  (Read 5013 times)

BruceM

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Re: Are there...
« Reply #15 on: September 21, 2018, 03:15:53 AM »
I agree, MikeNash, 4x more Roundup in the crop is hardly a step in the right direction. People are easily propagandized; Rodale proved decades ago that chemical free farming had about the same (slightly better) crop loss to bugs, etc, (20%) as full press Monsanto frankenfood dripping with all sorts of chemicals and pesticides. They had much higher yields in drought, because of the increased organic matter in the soil.  The "big improvement" with a new product introduction (pesticide) only last a couple years, then bug/disease resistance kicks in.

The Brix measurement (plant sugars) is a pretty good objective measurement of vegetable "wow" flavor.  Making plants grow fast don't boost Brix, nor does CO2 addition. Very fast growth is usually associated with tasteless, low Brix veges.  The better hydroponics growers manage Brix, which reduces yield.  It is NOT just a matter of mega- nutrients.





mikenash

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Re: Are there...
« Reply #16 on: September 21, 2018, 09:25:10 AM »
Fascinating.

Rodales "How to grow Vegetables & Fruits by the Organic Method"  (all four-inches thick of it and with a Glort-length word count)  - the 1968 edition printed before chemicals were really in use anyway - was the bible in my household for a couple of decades when we had kids at home, grew our own veges, ran fruit trees and waged war on opossums, had chickens etc etc

We were lucky enough to have an inexhaustible supply of almost-free barley straw so had big, permanently-mulched, no-dig gardens and big batch-load compost heaps that were built inside big boxes made of straw bales, got so hot they would smoulder sometimes, and produced the best, black, crumbly compost . . .

When I'm a REALLY old fart and am retired I hope to do that again as I am lucky enough to own an acre of prime growing dirt . . . just need to live long enough

Our kids grew up really healthy, too - running around in the country & eating home-grown stuff & living without a television

BruceM

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Re: Are there...
« Reply #17 on: September 21, 2018, 05:09:51 PM »
Your kids were very lucky, Mike.  I grew up on hamburger helper, Tang, hanging Shell No Pest Strips (DDT) in the bedroom and our summer drinking/cooking water stored in rinsed out, new 2 gallon Xray film developer concentrate bottles, despite the red skull and crossbones on the bottles.  MD's can be amazingly ignorant. Didn't work out well for family health.

My climate here is a so dry, short season and harsh that there is no commercial farming (which is good for me). I had a nice garden with big cold frames and after a few successful years of the soap and oil spray bug and powdery mildew wars, I got hailed out 3 years in a row and quit.  I'd like to do a greenhouse but my health has been too poor for a such a big project.  Year round greenhouse growing here requires evaporative cooling from June through August and my thoughts were to incorporate tall tower with wind scoop inlet, evaporative chilling just below, and 3 x 6 foot air path.









BruceM

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Re: Are there...
« Reply #18 on: September 22, 2018, 02:23:48 AM »
Not glass, 2 gallon plastic (HDPE) jugs. Apparently, medical schools are a weak on practical toxicology. Solvents (and other compounds) leak into the plastic, then leach out. My Dad apologized a couple years before his death by ALS, after a lifetime of osteoarthritis so bad he only had movement left in three neck vertebra; his entire spine had fused.  He said he thought plastic was inert. He still didn't realize the full extent what he had done to himself and his family.






mike90045

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Re: Are there...
« Reply #19 on: September 22, 2018, 03:06:41 AM »
Not glass, 2 gallon plastic (HDPE) jugs. Apparently, medical schools are a weak on practical toxicology. Solvents (and other compounds) leak into the plastic, then leach out. My Dad apologized a couple years before his death by ALS, after a lifetime of osteoarthritis so bad he only had movement left in three neck vertebra; his entire spine had fused.  He said he thought plastic was inert. He still didn't realize the full extent what he had done to himself and his family.

OMG !! wow, glass is tough enough to rinse, but plastic - impossible