Because, well, I have nothing positive worth sharing at the moment … 

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[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

I haven’t been blogging as much lately. In fact, I haven’t done much of anything online lately. No twitter, no news collation, no personal blogs … worse than that, I haven’t done much of anything other than work. 

If you’ve known me for a long time then you know I am a long term sufferer of depression. It’s not something that (unsurprisingly) I tend to like to advertise. I take my meds and for the most part it’s under control. However, sometimes, it surges forward and takes over for a while. During this period, that has happened again. Stress, illness and lack of sleep are the primary culprits for the resurgence. I’m sure I will get it under control again … 

So there’s a whole bunch of activities that are now waylaid because of this. 

Which has lead me to think that I may want to rethink certain aspects of the property.

This farm project has always been focussed on one end task: to become a teaching farm. To provide case studies. To be a working farm that can be used to bridge the gap between farmers and townies. To highlight different methods of farming and to further those lessons.

So … I’m thinking that I may open the farm up to share farming. 

There is a farm plan in place that incorporates splitting the land up into one to two Hectare lots that are based on keyline features. So, the option of taking on a small area to experiment and/or demonstrate a technique is viable. 

I think it may be an option that allows the land to begin being used for the purpose I had in mind without my illness interfering.

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

One of the many activities I have signed up for includes volunteering as a Green Champion in my workplace. As part of the activities, we tend to put together different events on how staff can “green” their lives and improve their sustainability. This month we’re going to put together a few articles around the topic of “Food and the Environment” and I’ve taken on the task of putting together an article for the above topic.

Now, I know I have a weakness, that is that I tend to get into the technical bits and bobs of the farming process. SO, I’m opening it up to you dear readers of far and wide. What would you like to see covered, answered or otherwise explained in such an article?

As consumers - what would you like to know? 

Farmers - what do you wish was clarified?

Answer via the article response form and I’ll endeavour to ensure it is covered!

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

In this illustration, the blue ball represents the volume of all the water on earth, relative to the size of the earth.

That tiny speck to the right of the blue ball represents Earth’s total fresh water.

If Earth was the size of a basketball, all of its water would fit into a ping pong ball.

How much water is that? It’s roughly 326 million cubic miles (1.332 billion cubic kilometers), according to a recent study from the U.S. Geological Survey. Some 72 percent of Earth is covered in water, but 97 percent of that is salty ocean water and not suitable for drinking.

“There’s not a lot of water on Earth at all,” said David Gallo, an oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts.

CREDIT: David Gallo/WHOI [SOURCE]

Did you know we have reached peak water?

Over the last 40 years, the demand for freshwater use has grown dramatically. What was once the domain of human thirst and food production has become a battlefield for usage rights by mining, manufacturing and industrial plants.

Why do they need fresh water? Simply because salt water will lower the lifespan of their equipment, So, in an effort to extend the equipment life,reduce operational expenditure - in short - increase profits, they will happily consume as much freshwater as they can. In fact, industry is the primary reason for groundwater mining.

Artesian wells have been sucked dry - with effects visible on the surface as lakes and rivers dry up with them - and is directly responsible for raising the sea levels by 13% as the used water is drained off into storm water drains and into the ocean.

So, who cares, we can de-salinate right? 

I mean, any talk of issues of creating super saline patches of water and wet desserts aside, how about the fact that the process of creating power and not changing our ways are still affecting the the planetary boundaries … 

The blackdots are are our current measures and estimates of how the different control variables for seven planetary boundaries have changed from 1950 to present.

The green shaded polygon represents the safe operating space.

For an 18m Synopsis Watch this TED Video: 

The majority of the environmental impacts on the planet have been caused by the rich minority, the 20 percent that jumped onto the industrial bandwagon in the mid-18th century. The majority of the planet, aspiring for development, having the right for development,are in large aspiring for an unsustainable lifestyle, a momentous pressure.

[…]

Now, as a scientist, what’s the evidence for this? Well, the evidence is, unfortunately, ample. It’s not only carbon dioxide that has this hockey stick pattern of accelerated change. You can take virtually any parameter that matters for human well-being — nitrous oxide, methane,deforestation, overfishing land degredation, loss of species — they all show the same patternover the past 200 years. Simultaneously, they branch off in the mid-50s, 10 years after the Second World War, showing very clearly that the great acceleration of the human enterprisestarts in the mid-50s. You see, for the first time, an imprint on the global level. And I can tell you,you enter the disciplinary research in each of these, you find something remarkably important,the conclusion that we may have come to the point where we have to bend the curves, that we may have entered the most challenging and exciting decade in the history humanity on the planet, the decade when we have to bend the curves.

For Source Material read the full paper here

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

The Ethicist column of the The New York Times Magazine started out an article with the following paragraph …

Ethically speaking, vegetables get all the glory. In recent years, vegetarians — and to an even greater degree vegans, their hard-core inner circle — have dominated the discussion about the ethics of eating. From the philosopher Peter Singer, whose 1975 volume “Animal Liberation” galvanized an international movement, to the novelist Jonathan Safran Foer, who wrote the 2009 best seller “Eating Animals,” those who forswear meat have made the case that what we eat is a crucial ethical decision. To be just, they say, we must put down our cheeseburgers and join their ranks.

The article continues on and invite their readers to make the strongest possible case for this most basic of daily practices. Put simply, why is it ethical to eat meat?  

I believe that this is the wrong question.

Why is it ethical to take any life to eat?

If we are going to argue based on a value judgement, then that must be the question that is asked. 

If one is to take a moral stance on the food they eat based on the taking of life, then one cannot create an arbitrary differentiation based on whether or not that life has a face. 

Plants have life. Plants have forms of behaviour which includes items that can be described as play, strategy and reaction to outside influence. The fact that they do not react with ‘puppy eyes’ have the ability to run away or communicate in a way we recognise does not negate that fact.

So, if one was to take a “no life taking” moral stand for the food they consume, what is left for them to consume? The Fruits and nuts that fall to the ground? Eggs? Milk? Honey that dripped from a hanging beehive?

The choices that remain would be highly limited, let alone the possibility of remaining healthy.

Within nature, life eats life. It is the cycle. There is no guilt over it. The question should not about a moral stand. The real question is “how is it ethically ok to eat?”

The failure to use all of the food you have is a greater ethical “sin”. Waste, quite simply, is the greatest ethical no-no. 

Every food we have available to us is one we are wasteful with. Of the 15000 identified edible plants, humans cultivate only 250 for food. Of these, we often waste a great majority of the plant. I’m not even talking about the industrialisation of certain foods. As one such example - people buy radishes with the leaves attached, then remove and throw them away. Radish leaves are a delightful salad leaf - why throw it away? At the very least, compost it! Nose to Tail eating was long a tradition of almost all our ancestors and yet we now snub the crunchiness of a crispy sow ear salad or the delights of an oven baked Roman tripe stew.

When it comes to food, the triangle of expectations is an effective measure of the ethical value. Good - Fast - Cheap : choose two. If you’re food is fast and cheap, chances are it’s not “good”.  I don’t just mean McDonalds either. The more processed a food is - the closer to “Ready To Eat” it is, the less likely it is to be meeting the “good” criteria of foods when exploring it from the view of “ethical” food.

So, is it ethical to eat meat? Yes, with an if. If you are respectful of the food you eat, then you are more likely to be ethical. If you take a life (whether with your own hands or via that of a farmer) then you should respect that life by making use of every part of it to the fullest.

Everything else is just moralistic guilt and propaganda.

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]

So, the farm and the many projects that are involved there have taken a second place to the home building components and engineering specifications worksheets. 

Well, specifically, the choice of items that we need to finalise so that the Architect and engineering firm can finalise the Building and Engineering specification sheets that can be used to then go to tender to find a builder.

This is not an easy task.

As per my previous post about the triangle of expectations this home brings, there are the many concepts that one must consider that involves trying to not only see yourself in the home, but in a lifestyle that may have altered in five years time. 

That said, one is not forced to do this all alone. 

[Continued at The Goodrock Park Blog]

For those unaware of what this is …

R2B2 stands for a new generation of multifunctional, sustainable kitchen devices. Containing a food processor, a coffee grinder and a hand blender the machine is built from easy to maintain, hard-wearing materials. It is highly functional yet due to its simple construction it can easily be dismantled, cleaned and serviced. The machine’s aesthetic is simple, natural and timeless. Most importantly it couldn’t be easier to use; chopping herbs, grating cheese or mixing cocktails can all be accomplished with a just a few pedal kicks.

In short, it is a foot pedal-powered flywheel that not only drives the appliances but also acts as an energy storage device. With a few kicks the wheel can be set spinning up to 400 revolutions per minute! That’s enough stored energy to blend, grind or chop. 

The machine is built from made-to-last materials like stainless steel, oiled wood, glass and ceramics, and is designed to run for 10,000 hours without a service – but if you do need to disassemble it, it can be done with just two Allen keys.

No more bamix, no more electric kitchen aids!

They are accepting “non-binding pre-orders” to help boost some business angel funding, so if you are interested and would like to put your name down for a potential bulk order, let me know and I’ll start collating names and send through a letter.

By that date, I will have had the 4000 delivered in early September and the saplings will have had a chance to have been aclimatised for a few weeks and ready to begin their plantings.

I am in the process of trying to organise a day on the property to surround the planting.

I will be sending out eMails to local landcare, DPI, CMA, DSE and Volunteer groups to invite them to think about joining us on the property to offer talks on the day around not just tree planting, but also land management issues. These, I hope, will include topics such as salinity and erosion management, taking care of creek sides, the value of paddock trees and wildlife corridors and natural pest management amongst so many other potential topics.

I’d also like to open up the invitation to anyone who thinks they can offer a hand in planting, provide additional information sessions or help with logistics such as food and bathroom facilities.

There’s a lot to do and not much time to organise it in — and to be honest, I’m probably biting off more than I can chew, so any and all help will be welcome.

More on this soon.

[Reposted from The Goodrock Park Blog]