John Marshall

April 8, 2019

Report 4

Oh give me a home

But first…. what if you over heard a ranch hand singing,

”Oh give me a home where the buffalo roam well managed and the deer and the antelope are chased by top tier predators….where seldom is heard a combustion engine and the skies aren’t going crazy because the planet is ruined.”

 and you say, “Thats a fun song! what is it called?” and they respond, “Home on the Range Reloaded.” 

Today I learned about a farm that harvests mostly perennial crops in Wisconsin. Mark Shepard uses farming technique with a catchy title called Strategic, Total, Utter, Neglect. (S.T.U.N.) By considering the whole farm as a ecosystem, he plans a harvest that repeats year after year and he doesn't have to work so hard. He does plan well though. He chooses his perennials and other plants that are right for the climate, of course, and adds Keyline Design permaculture earthworks.(http://www.keyline.com.au/). This allows him to have the water and the tree and bush crops, and then, at the last, he adds some animal impact to give the plants between the crops a nice healthy bare hoofed massage and a trim. The animals eat the perennial crops along with a set portion of purchased feed and thats how they stay alive. Im sure the goal is to have the farm basically run itself forever. Nice idea I think! 

John Marshall

April 6, 2019

Report 3

Sustainable to Regenerative

But first…what if you stumbled across a youtube video that was titled “Save the World in 2 hours and 24 min” (I translated the title to english) but it was in Swedish. https://youtu.be/T8D1OHYo9Z8

I’m going to start focusing on the word regenerative instead of sustainable because sustainable means companies can collect oil in places that will be ruined in the process while paying someone to grow trees to offset the destruction. Sustainable is better than peak oil but, what if we didn't have to use nearly as much oil to get the bare necessities? Polyface Farms won’t deliver more than 200 miles from their regenerative agriculture farm. Regenerative farming means that farm production and soil health increases over time instead of decreases. Regenerative farming practices require no chemical inputs. These farms build the soil (without chemicals), increase biodiversity(without chemicals), and are an example of nature being natural and providing all kinds of food for everything in the process. Regenerative farms plan for success buy using local support. How about we have a regenerative agriculture farm within 200 miles of every house?  I think if I was traveling in a line from San Francisco to Portland, Main, roughly 8 farms would be needed to get me from point A to Point B with sustenance I need as I travel along the 3147 mile long path. I can imagine 8 regenerative farms spaced 400 miles apart could find some creative ways to include everyone in their sphere of influence. I bet they would be spectacular farms.

John Marshall

April 6, 2019

Report 2

Uncle Reko

But first…. what if we received money for growing healthy soil? I would be tempted to quit my job and rent some land and grow food without chemicals in soil filled with living biology, so I could earn 200SEK per acre per year.

Uncle Rico from the movie Napoleon Dynamite is one of the strangest characters in the movie. New topic. Reko I think stands for Regenerative Ecosystem but actually is Products should be OK and ecologically regenerative. Pretty cool huh? If we could take the idea of Uncle Rico, a man who is living in the past, reminiscing about how great everything was, to Uncle Reko who is living for the future and planning for how great everything could be, wouldn't that be great? “Reko is a concept of a tool for rural development that originally started in Finland and which is now spreading across Sweden. Reko stands for solid consumption and the idea is that it should be both OK and eco. This is a new way of buying and selling locally produced products directly from the producer via Facebook.  Relationship food is the future!”

This idea I stole from the pages of https://www.ridgedalebutik.se/what-is-reko . https://www.ridgedalebutik.se/ is selling locally produced products near my house! a 2.2 hour train trip will get me all the fresh, local(ish), hopefully regenerative agriculture food, I can use. super exciting!

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John Marshall

April 6, 2019

Report 1

What I learned on Friday

But first…. what if we took vacations to make our own lives seem much better than we think they are? We could make everyday a vacation! Maybe scheduling two weeks working assembly line at a Chinese mobile phone factory would do it.

I started to watch a playlist on youtube about Holistic Management and Regenerative Agriculture. I find this subject very interesting. I listened to a person named Greg  Judy who manages livestock to help grow plants using nothing but sunshine and water. Amazing. Greg wants 25 counted earthworms per square foot on his land. He currently has 16. He manages his animals in a way that impact the land to help grow more food and provide for all creatures on the land, big or small, wild or tame.