Learned something about diesel today.

Toyman01 said:

bigdaddylee82 said:

In reply to Toyman01 :

I can't speak for everyone, but take a look into the recent Dicamba drift in Arkansas news articles, over the past couple of years.  We 100% went against Monsanto, and backed our scientists who's actual research showed Monsanto's claims were erroneous.

 

Oh but look! It's still a approved product and the company that make it will happily sell you a Dicamba resistant soybean plant. So what are the farmers going to do, other than buy the resistant plant...from the company that makes the poison. Never you mind all the other plants that are killed off in the process. Anyone like peaches, tomato gardens, or cypress trees? 

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/07/19/742836972/rogue-weedkiller-vapors-are-threatening-soybean-science 

You will also notice that when BASF bought Monsanto, they killed the name. The name that did occasionally get the bad press. 

I don't have a problem with industrial scale farming. It is going to be a bigger and bigger necessity to feed all the people on this planet. I also know how frequently the big dog (Industrial Agriculture) uses their big stick to beat the small farmers into submission. I also understand what their driving force is. It's not feeding people. It's making money. 

Call it a trust but verify relationship, but it's hard to verify when they own many of the voices that we hear from. 

Dr. Chen was at the UofA when I was in school, super smart fella, world renowned soybean geneticist.  I didn't have any of his classes, but had school mates that worked for, and studied under him.  I haven't payed as much attention to what's going on in MO, but in AR our Plant Board listened to our scientists, and have limited the timeframe in which Dicamba can be applied.  It's not a perfect solution, but the herbicide can be applied to benefit the farmers growing Dicamba resistant crops before the more vulnerable other crops are at risk of being drifted on.  They increased the fine from a paultry $1K that most less scrupulous farmers would be willing to gamble, to a much more costly $20K. 

Trust but verify is a wise stance for just about everything in life.  Especially for things you consume, or you give to your kids.  That's why the land grant system exists, every state has one, all of the Southern states have two.  Applied research for public education and consumption.  Sure we're usually grant funded, and some of those funds may come from Evilcorp, but the data is the data.  I can't say it's never shown bias, never been influenced, never been doctored, but if it is, that is in direct opposition of everything the Smith-Lever Act was created for.

infinitenexus said:

I'll just leave this here.

https://www.iarc.fr/featured-news/media-centre-iarc-news-glyphosate/

Don't look at the list of stuff with a Proposition 65 warning in California.  "probably "

If anyone is at risk it's the applicator, the stuff volatilizes so quickly there's no risk to anyone down the food chain.

Robbie said:

Re: agriculture.

Does anyone know of any plants that use up co2 at a higher rate than others? I think I asked this question recently but I'm thinking a lot about it lately. 

I have areas of "land" I don't want to mow, so using only sunlight and rainwater and converting some airborne co2 to o2 sounds like a good use of the space to me.

Never thought I'd find a place to talk about this on GRM.  In short, it's moot.  If you want to sequester carbon, old growth hardwoods are your best bet.

My thesis research was on carbon sequestration in native grassland prairie restorations.  We had a couple base (control) virgin prairies, never tilled, and a series of various ages of restorations thanks to the National Park Service.  We analyzed a lot of stuff, comparing them all.  The key take away, yes those grasses sequester carbon, but after ~5 years, if you've got a healthy prairie, there's so much microbial and invertebrate activity in the soil, respiring during their natural processes, that it's basically a flux, net zero, the ecosystem is putting out as much carbon as it's taking in.

alfadriver said:I will say a REALLY good way to suppress CO2 is to grow your own food.  That takes the transportation of the food out, in addition to CO2 absorption.  Even better, if you compost the remains, that also will get turned into the soil.

"My" tomatoes are lookin' good this year, although had to harvest a few early because of some killer rains.

I don't even like tomatoes in their unprocessed form, but dammit these were grown HERE, that means something.

When I was growing up (like toddler age), we had an above ground swimming pool.  Then one year, it disappeared and tomato plants and I'd like to say cucumbers (maybe, hey I was three what did I know) were growing in the now empty spot of yard.

41 year old me realizes that they probably took the pool out because they had a very young child in the household who was just big enough to open doors on his own.  Anyway, you can grow a decent amount of food in a postage stamp backyard.

bigdaddylee82 said:

Robbie said:

Re: agriculture.

Does anyone know of any plants that use up co2 at a higher rate than others? I think I asked this question recently but I'm thinking a lot about it lately. 

I have areas of "land" I don't want to mow, so using only sunlight and rainwater and converting some airborne co2 to o2 sounds like a good use of the space to me.

Never thought I'd find a place to talk about this on GRM.  In short, it's moot.  If you want to sequester carbon, old growth hardwoods are your best bet.

My thesis research was on carbon sequestration in native grassland prairie restorations.  We had a couple base (control) virgin prairies, never tilled, and a series of various ages of restorations thanks to the National Park Service.  We analyzed a lot of stuff, comparing them all.  The key take away, yes those grasses sequester carbon, but after ~5 years, if you've got a healthy prairie, there's so much microbial and invertebrate activity in the soil, respiring during their natural processes, that it's basically a flux, net zero, the ecosystem is putting out as much carbon as it's taking in.

So, in a perverse way, the Japanese habit of building a house then tearing it down and landfilling it after 20 years is actually beneficial in a way.

Hey, in a few million years, there may be a "fresh" coal seam along the Japanese coast where they reclaim ocean by dumping their garbage and building on it...

bigdaddylee82 said:

Robbie said:

Re: agriculture.

Does anyone know of any plants that use up co2 at a higher rate than others? I think I asked this question recently but I'm thinking a lot about it lately. 

I have areas of "land" I don't want to mow, so using only sunlight and rainwater and converting some airborne co2 to o2 sounds like a good use of the space to me.

Never thought I'd find a place to talk about this on GRM.  In short, it's moot.  If you want to sequester carbon, old growth hardwoods are your best bet.

My thesis research was on carbon sequestration in native grassland prairie restorations.  We had a couple base (control) virgin prairies, never tilled, and a series of various ages of restorations thanks to the National Park Service.  We analyzed a lot of stuff, comparing them all.  The key take away, yes those grasses sequester carbon, but after ~5 years, if you've got a healthy prairie, there's so much microbial and invertebrate activity in the soil, respiring during their natural processes, that it's basically a flux, net zero, the ecosystem is putting out as much carbon as it's taking in.

 

Wow! Totally interesting.

So I need to plant some trees is what I'm hearing? 

Robbie said:

Re: agriculture.

Does anyone know of any plants that use up co2 at a higher rate than others? I think I asked this question recently but I'm thinking a lot about it lately. 

I have areas of "land" I don't want to mow, so using only sunlight and rainwater and converting some airborne co2 to o2 sounds like a good use of the space to me.

We might could get Monsanto to splice a gene into a plant to do that.  

spitfirebill said:

Robbie said:

Re: agriculture.

Does anyone know of any plants that use up co2 at a higher rate than others? I think I asked this question recently but I'm thinking a lot about it lately. 

I have areas of "land" I don't want to mow, so using only sunlight and rainwater and converting some airborne co2 to o2 sounds like a good use of the space to me.

We might could get Monsanto to splice a gene into a plant to do that.  

You win.  

Knurled. said:

alfadriver said:I will say a REALLY good way to suppress CO2 is to grow your own food.  That takes the transportation of the food out, in addition to CO2 absorption.  Even better, if you compost the remains, that also will get turned into the soil.

 

"My" tomatoes are lookin' good this year, although had to harvest a few early because of some killer rains.

I don't even like tomatoes in their unprocessed form, but dammit these were grown HERE, that means something.

When I was growing up (like toddler age), we had an above ground swimming pool.  Then one year, it disappeared and tomato plants and I'd like to say cucumbers (maybe, hey I was three what did I know) were growing in the now empty spot of yard.

41 year old me realizes that they probably took the pool out because they had a very young child in the household who was just big enough to open doors on his own.  Anyway, you can grow a decent amount of food in a postage stamp backyard.

Funny, I'm 42, and I remember my parents used to have an above ground pool when i was VERY little.  At some point it, like your parents' got removed, and my dad's been growing a big garden ever since.

I guess he passed the gene down.  And Mrs. VCH got it too.  This is what she picked on Sunday:

Those are all grown without any pesticides, fertilizer, and only minimal watering (we've had a somewhat dry summer here).  

Friday afternoon I made this from a previous batch of tomatoes she'd picked:

After reducing it, there was about a gallon of tomato sauce.  Great for pasta, pizza, or whatever.

My kids see the little tomatoes on the counter and eat them like they're eating candy.  We actually have to tell them to stop eating them, they eat so many.  I guess they've got plenty of vitamin C.

Yesterday Mrs. VCH came in with a load of peppers.  Hot, sweet, big, little...probably most of a bushel.  And a fresh watermelon.  

This is a great time of year for eating.  

Robbie said:

Wow! Totally interesting.

So I need to plant some trees is what I'm hearing? 

Robbie, you can still use the land to lower your personal CO2 usage- like I suggested before, grow as much of your own food as you can.  There are very many levels of CO2 usage in the ag industry- too many to list.  Whereas you can run the equal balance that bigdaddylee points out growing your own.  Better than doing nothing, and the food tastes much better- to the point you may enjoy foods you used to hate, like knurled... (LOL).

edit- VCH- I very much envy your back yard- mine is small and shaded, so I do the best that I can.... But it's better than nothing, and the food is pretty awesome.

I have a small backyard garden wiith tomatoes and basil that are doing very well.  And man, fresh basil is incredible.  I have a strawberry plant that's growing like a weed but doesn't make strawberries.  Same with my zucchini plant.  Oh well, I'm just glad to grow some food.  I planted a peace tree recently, and a blueberry bush as well.  Once I move to Florida I plan on having a rather large garden.  My goal is to grow 100% of the produce that my family eats.

Thanks alfadriver for the response regarding bio diesel. I’ve been intrigued by it for years, but it sounds like the benefits are limited to avoiding big oil, not so much for benefits to emissions.

Re ag, from my limited investigation, it does seem like industrial food practices contribute big time to harmful emissions, and I am in the process of turning my land into a food forest for sustainability. My wife and I hope to grow 100% of our food as well. I’m really getting interested in permaculture. It’s amazing.

In reply to infinitenexus :

You can eat zuchinni flowers too. Batter and deep fry and serve with marinara sauce. Here's some from my zuchinni plant earlier this year:

Re: grow your own food

I do have a small garden this year and it has been successful so we plan on biggering next year. The zuchinni grows like mad. The tomatoes go so tall they broke over (I probably should have been pruning - I know nothing about gardening), but we will still have fruit. Cucumbers also have been producing like mad. One sole green pepper from the green pepper plant, and some hot peppers and eggplants on the way. We put way too many different plants into a small 4x8 planter box.

GRM forums: Where a thread debating the evils of diesel morphs into the joys of home gardening.  Classic. 

Ian F said:

GRM forums: Where a thread debating the evils of diesel morphs into the joys of home gardening.  Classic. 

I had this exact same discussion with Mrs. VCH last night.  She shook her head.  I think I did nothing for convincing her me and my fellow car dorks are not weird.

On permaculture- Mrs. VCH took a class in it and incorporates elements into our own garden.  We have a 60' x 100' area fenced off that about half of is the garden (the other half is flowers, a pergola, and kids play area), and another similarly sized area that's orchard.  Plus berry bushes (wild and intentional) all over the back yard.  We have about 3 acres total.  Oh, and about 15 chickens.  

I'd love to see some of the tips you guys have for home gardening- mine did not do well this year, though part of it was a late-April hailstorm that came through and annihilated everything. Also, ants ate most of the roots for my squash and canteloupes.

In reply to CyberEric :

Hey, it's still a leg up! Though to run old cooking oil/biodiesel like we know it typically requires an older engine and a separate heater system. Even GRM showed that Randy Probst drives a biodiesel car: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/articles/veggie-power/

"GRM forums: Where a thread debating the evils of diesel morphs into the joys of home gardening. Classic. " That's what I love about this place- "Like a box of chocolates"

In reply to GIRTHQUAKE :

I think we need to start a new topic....

In reply to GIRTHQUAKE :

Thanks for the link! 

In the article, it says harmful emissions are reduced. After reading comments here, I’m not so sure. Either way I am still interested.

I too love the odd direction this has all gone!

EPA.  Where I’m working at the moment, Angola, there is a huge 300’ tall natural gas flare that rolls copious amounts of coal 24/7.  I’m kind of glad President Nixon created the EPA.