Le Potager du Sloth: Gardening without fatigue more than Bio

[phil53]

following a chicken litter error (put fresh instead of old)

Litter or droppings ????

Chicken droppings are anything but "manure". The hens are "all in one" and their droppings are very concentrated and very nitrogenous. So yes, by swinging without measure, it quickly becomes toxic. The droppings are used like granules (like Ferramol) !!!

If it's mixed (sawdust, straw, etc.), just "calculate in your head" how many "granules" you put ...

Last year I made the same mistake with Bokashi.
At the height of the season my container was full, I empty it a little about 1 m of melons in good shape. 2 days later the melons were completely roasted.
With the hay technique the roots mainly grow at the rotting hay / soil border so they spread quite a bit suddenly the melons died of overdose.

[Adrien (ex-nico239)]

following a chicken litter error (put fresh instead of old)

Litter or droppings ????

Chicken droppings are anything but "manure". The hens are "all in one" and their droppings are very concentrated and very nitrogenous. So yes, by swinging without measure, it quickly becomes toxic. The droppings are used like granules (like Ferramol) !!!

If it's mixed (sawdust, straw, etc.), just "calculate in your head" how many "granules" you put ...

Fresh soggy litter ... sacred decoction

[Did67]

This reinforces me in the conviction that "it is not because we garden" naturally "in our mind that we do not make ecological catastrophes".

Because before grilling your vegetables - there is "death by overdose", the ultimate Jim Morrison stage - many simply "shoot" them, with excess and therefore leaching - when the plant cannot absorb nitrates , the winter rains wash them away. And weakened plants, more sensitive to certain parasites (aphids, mildew, etc.).

We criticize conventional farmers, but they are dosing! And they have machines that respect the doses. On the sprayers, they manage to apply doses of the kind 100 g of copper / ha, while being effective (I remind you that a "package", bought in garden centers, is often 750 g of copper sulphate, for good reason. of 40% copper, that's about 300 g) ... Of course, pump pressure, forward speed, flow, etc. everything is managed by a computer in the cabin (today, the best tractors are variable speed continuously and spot the skating - you put 7 km / h in the programming, and it's 7 km / h no more and no less, without touching a pedal ... I don't idolize. But you still have to the knowledge.

We forget these technical "feats" and we work like elephants. But, it is "natural"! Why bother?

I myself have a lot of "trial and error" and misfires (this year, plants - weeds and mixed vegetables - late, not developed enough to pump my leftovers with sufficient efficiency!

[Moindreffor]

following a chicken litter error (put fresh instead of old)

Litter or droppings ????

Chicken droppings are anything but "manure". The hens are "all in one" and their droppings are very concentrated and very nitrogenous. So yes, by swinging without measure, it quickly becomes toxic. The droppings are used like granules (like Ferramol) !!!

If it's mixed (sawdust, straw, etc.), just "calculate in your head" how many "granules" you put ...

my father used pigeon droppings as a weedkiller in year one and therefore fertilizer in year two

[thursday]

Hello lazy gardener
I read your last book with friends two months ago. I appreciated the tone, the words, as well as the quantified approaches (on the quantities of nutrients, on water management). A serious scientific approach. But I have a few criticisms to make on this point.
I admit not having read the 2040 pages on this forum, there may be answers to these questions, I didn't see that in the book anyway.

Questions that are in a more global context: how agriculture can feed the world tomorrow, how much it can feed, sustainable, and do other things (of course, we know that by eating less meat, we have a lot of margin), see [url] this [/url=https://medium.com/@jmj.fanpage/lagriculture-peut-elle-%C3%A9quilibrer-sa-consommation-d-%C3%A9nergie-et-continuer -% C3% A0-produit-des-aliments-15dd8bea91fb] by notament (that's what brings me back to your reflection). And minimal surface to eat, for example [url] this video [/url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMfQpklT-dI], several sources are cited (500m² for vegan in biointensive, 5000m² in average otherwise)


IN SHORT. To complete the costings you give, the essential parameters for evaluating an agricultural system are, it seems to me:
-the surface productivity (plant energy, for example the potato is 3MJ / kg produced at a rate of 1kg / m² per year)
-productivity per hour of work

With industrial agriculture there is also the question of productivity by fossil (or mechanical) energy used, but the question does not arise for a gardener who mainly uses his arms. The purpose of this fossil fuel is to reduce working time and increase hourly productivity. If your ideas are applicable on a larger scale, this should be addressed.

Have you estimated the surface productivity, weighing / estimating the harvest on the vegetable garden in kg of vegetables, by counting the surface of this vegetable garden and obviously adding the surface to be allocated for the growth of hay?


The least pressing question, on labor productivity, if we ask ourselves from a gardener's perspective, would it be greatly affected if instead of harvesting with a tractor, the hay had to be harvested with a scythe, that it would take hundreds? hours per year of harvest? (I'm not saying that the tractor oil is a lot of energy, and time saving, and in the end it would do all the work in a certain way, with this system of the big thickness of haying : I don't think so. But this hypothesis deserves a quick order-of-magnitude estimate to be eliminated.)


-------------------

Let's go a little further in the reflection. In Europe, the middle ages from the 10th to the 13th, a strong demographic growth took place (admittedly much slower than what we have there). A grassland / cropland / forest based system has been put in place. A collapse took place in the 14th century with a division by 3 of the population and this is the image that we retain of the Middle Ages (famine, plague arriving on the weakened population), It may well be that the famine came , in addition to demographic growth (going from 6 to 20 million for France in 3 centuries), the exhaustion of the soil with this agrarian system, and the exhaustion of forests to be "cleared". In short and without dramatizing or going back to digging, because it is far too early and what is said about the collapse of the 14th century with "soil depletion" remains to be substantiated, a system where we take vegetal energy to the meadow to give it to vegetable crops, without mineral fertilizers is good, but is it sustainable over a few centuries?

[Did67]

Immediately two important details.

I got down to the task of envisioning a slightly different path for vegetable gardens (it's in the titles of my two books). A path consisting in not wasting the energy of biomass by composting, in better nourishing the soil organisms, in living more closely with "biodiversity" (not thinking only of your stomach).

Even if I also have (private) thoughts on agricultural models, I absolutely do not broach this subject - I leave it to others ("A2C" = conservation agriculture, Konrad Schreiber, Marc Dufumier, etc.), care to deal with agriculture.

I already have too much to do ... I am old and diminished by the after-effects of my heart attack (and a few other "sores" related to age).

On the other hand, if we have reliable data on the yields of the different agrosystems, it is because there are many people, funding sources, researchers, institutes (INRAE, ITAB, etc.) ... obviously can't do that.

Sometimes I take the time to weigh a harvest (for things that are harvested once such as garlic or potatoes). I obtain, per unit area of ​​vegetable garden, yields "easily" equivalent to those of "classic organic".

But this is obviously misleading, since each m² of vegetable garden is "supplied" with hay by about 3 or 4 or 5 m² of natural meadows.

In the intensity of work, there is simply no picture. Even without making measurements, it is obvious that we are not playing in the same division. I "work" maybe 10 or 20 or 50 (depending on the crops) less!

For the rest, yes, lots of good questions. Not easy to answer. But immediately, beware: it is not a question of going back to the Middle Ages. This is a misleading idea. For at least one simple reason: all the mineral elements put into circulation from the mines are still in circulation! In any case, we can mobilize them through well thought out agro-ecosystems! And that changes everything ! The Middle Ages mobilized what the decomposition of rocks had left on the surface, and not yet legumes. Today, it is mainly nitrates that are leached. Most of the P and K (and other elements) are "in circulation" (and no longer in the mines). From a very serious source, discussions with the engineers in charge of the projects, the recovery of P in the wastewater of Baden-Wurttemberg (the German region opposite), will make this region surplus (at current doses!). Staggering, right ???

[Did67]

I didn't see that in the book anyway.

That was not the subject!

I already had to fight with my editor to treat as I did what was the subject: another way of gardening in his private vegetable garden [the two books are, roughly, in number of words, twice as many longer than what had been signed in the contracts!]

[Adrien (ex-nico239)]

following a chicken litter error (put fresh instead of old)

Litter or droppings ????

Chicken droppings are anything but "manure". The hens are "all in one" and their droppings are very concentrated and very nitrogenous. So yes, by swinging without measure, it quickly becomes toxic. The droppings are used like granules (like Ferramol) !!!

If it's mixed (sawdust, straw, etc.), just "calculate in your head" how many "granules" you put ...

my father used pigeon droppings as a weedkiller in year one and therefore fertilizer in year two

I confirm it works, even the dandelions OUTSIDE against the trunk have dirtily passed the weapon on the left: all black

[thursday]

Immediately two important details.

I got down to the task of envisioning a slightly different path for vegetable gardens (it's in the titles of my two books). A way of not wasting biomass energy by composting, [...]

Thank you for your answers.
Thus, there is at least 3m² of meadow per m² of garden, which is far from negligible. This for a yield per m² of vegetable garden of the same order as the cutlure, good.

Is hay in great thickness every necessary necessary over time? It makes it possible to increase the carbon rate each year, in any case, you say. it seems that we do not have to lower the doses each year: there is no reduction in the use of meadow surface to be expected in the long term.
You also speak of spontaneous grass which brings their energy. I had a garden with a thick layer of chickweed. The mourron comes on a well balanced land. It is easy to remove and makes a good salad.
But from what I understand, it won't be thick enough. Plants of several m² must be combined on one m².


I was certainly not talking about going back to the middle ages. I mentioned that, as far as I understood, a depletion of soils ended in lower yields, no need for industrial means to make an ecological shipwreck therefore, and I do not know what it is about a system based on mowing grassland.
Indeed, in the course of European agricultural history, the cultivation of legumes has overcome the problem. (Industrial fertilizers came even later to go even higher by surface rendering)
But therefore, you are not proposing to found a nourishing system, hay would be limited to vegetable gardens, this question of sustainability in the event of generalization arises less.
I have noted from your book that what comes out of the mines alters in the long term, notably the irreversible accumulation of copper in the ground (but also many other metals). to what you indicate there, what has been taken out of the mines and dispersed also conversely has a beneficial effect for the growth of plants when it comes to nutrients.

[Adrien (ex-nico239)]

Immediately two important details.

I got down to the task of envisioning a slightly different path for vegetable gardens (it's in the titles of my two books). A way of not wasting biomass energy by composting, [...]

Thank you for your answers.
Thus, there is at least 3m² of meadow per m² of garden, which is far from negligible. This for a yield per m² of vegetable garden of the same order as the cutlure, good.

Is hay in great thickness every necessary necessary over time? It makes it possible to increase the carbon rate each year, in any case, you say. it seems that we do not have to lower the doses each year: there is no reduction in the use of meadow surface to be expected in the long term.
You also speak of spontaneous grass which brings their energy. I had a garden with a thick layer of chickweed. The mourron comes on a well balanced land. It is easy to remove and makes a good salad.
But from what I understand, it will not be thick enough. You have to accumulate the s plants of several m² on one m².


I was certainly not talking about going back to the middle ages. I mentioned that, as far as I understood, a depletion of soils ended in lower yields, no need for industrial means to make an ecological shipwreck therefore, and I do not know what it is about a system based on mowing grassland.
Indeed, in the course of European agricultural history, the cultivation of legumes has overcome the problem. (Industrial fertilizers came even later to go even higher by surface rendering)
But therefore, you are not proposing to found a nourishing system, hay would be limited to vegetable gardens, this question of sustainability in the event of generalization arises less.
I have noted from your book that what comes out of the mines alters in the long term, notably the irreversible accumulation of copper in the ground (but also many other metals). to what you indicate there, what has been taken out of the mines and dispersed also conversely has a beneficial effect for the growth of plants when it comes to nutrients.

Frankly I did not understand everything

This for a yield per m² of vegetable garden of the same order as the cutlure, good.

What do you mean?

Is hay in great thickness every necessary necessary over time?

What do you mean?

It increases the carbon rate each year

Isn't the interest of hay that it is balanced in C / N?
To increase the carbon rate it would rather be boyat, no? And be patient ...

there is no reduction in the use of pasture surface to be expected in the long term.

What would be the problem with this exploitation?

You also speak of spontaneous grass which brings its energy

What do you mean?

It is necessary to accumulate the s plants of several m² on one m²

Is it always related to the supply of hay or do you want to talk about something else?

I don't know what happens with a system based on mowing grassland.

Same question as before: what would be the problem with this exploitation?

you are not proposing to found a nourishing system, the hay would be limited to vegetable gardens

In what way are the vegetable gardens not nourishing?

this question of sustainability

The durability of what?

I have noted from your book that what comes out of the mines alters in the long term

What do you mean?