Small Farmer Tools ~ Simple Efficient Solutions

This past few weeks I've discovered both Richard Perkins, Making Small Farms Work, and Curtis Stone, the Urban Farmer. I've been trying to understand the combined notions of (1) smallholder farming, (2) using permaculture & "organic" approaches, all while (3) having a profit-making orientation and these two are really good about pinning things down with numbers, planning their steps and documenting their actions, and analyzing and tuning for moneymaking. Anyways, today I just want to spotlight a couple of simple efficient solutions they're both champions of. First, the Japanese paperpot method of seedling-starting and transplanting into beds (which Stone sells via his Paperpot venture)... Second, the quick-cut and cut-again greens harvester... FYI, Perkins is also getting into the business of selling the solutions with this Farmers Tools venture. Note that neither Stone nor Perkins are the direct inventors of these tools, but they've each been really prolific in using them profitably and especially in demonstrating how they can be amazingly effective! Check out their respective YouTube channels, Ridgedale Permaculture and Urban Farmer.

Making Nature Useless ~ Beyond Peak Farmland

Ronald Bailey at Reason asks Can We Save Nature by Making It Economically Useless?

“Decoupling” human economy from ecology could render large areas of pastures, croplands, and managed forests too remote for exploitation. [...] "The way we will save nature is by rendering it economically worthless," declared Ted Nordhaus. Nordhaus, chairman of the Breakthrough Institute, was speaking at "Making Nature Useless," a seminar sponsored by the D.C.-based think tank Resources for the Future. With that one sentence, he summed up the entire session’s theme. [...] "Why are we using just half of the planet's ice-free land surface?" he asked the audience. Cropland only occupies about 12 percent; pasture, 24 percent; managed forests, 9 percent; cities, 3 percent. About 12 percent of the world's ice-free land, he noted, has been formally set aside for conservation and preservation. What makes that 12 percent different? His answer is that, for the most part, it is too high, too dry, too steep, and too remote. We have saved what we have saved, he suggested, largely because it is not worth anything economically. Most of the lands that are not legally protected but remain unexploited share the same economically off-putting characteristics. [...] humanity is on the cusp of "peak farmland." If current land-use trends continue, an enormous amount of crop and pasture land will be abandoned and returned to nature. [...] Urbanization contributes to the process of decoupling economy and ecology, since fewer hungry people engaged in low productivity subsistence farming mean more land for nature. [...] Analysts with old-fashioned Malthusian mindsets are again decrying the imminent approach of "peak everything" followed by a collapse of civilization. The data presented at Wednesday's seminar points toward a much happier version of "peak everything," as humanity increasingly withdraws from the natural world during the rest of this century."

CityFarming ~ Open, Fast, Healthy Urban Foods...

TIME's Michael Lester spots MIT Media Lab colleague Caleb Harper and the CityFARM project...

Farm for the Future ~ Sustainable Growth...

UD spots Rebecca Hosking's docu A Farm for the Future exploring...

"How to transform her family’s farm in Devon into a low energy farm for the future, and discovers that nature holds the key. With her father close to retirement, Rebecca returns to her family’s wildlife-friendly farm in Devon, to become the next generation to farm the land. But last year’s high fuel prices were a wake-up call for Rebecca. Realising that all food production in the UK is completely dependent on abundant cheap fossil fuel, particularly oil, she sets out to discover just how secure this oil supply is. Alarmed by the answers, she explores ways of farming without using fossil fuel. With the help of pioneering farmers and growers, Rebecca learns that it is actually nature that holds the key to farming in a low-energy future."

Urban Farming ~ Imagining Future Boston Food...

The Globe's Leon Neyfakh asks If urban farming took off, what would Boston look like?

"Not every farm looks like a farm any more. A new type of agriculture has been sprouting up in urban centers [...] and Boston’s new ordinance opens the city up to a whole range of ideas about how to integrate food production into city life. [...] On the more inventive side, entrepreneurs are trying to reimagine the traditional mechanics of agriculture so that it might be woven into the built landscape of a dense and busy city. Now that Boston has officially signaled its interest, the possibilities are vast -- maybe Boston can even become home to North America’s first skyscraper farm"

Neyfakh goes on to spotlight several specific ideas...

• A-Frame Conveyors ~ Ferris wheels for plants
• High-Rise Farming ~ Greenhouse skyscrapers
• Rooftop Greenhouses ~ Available empty acres
• Hydroponic Trays ~ Stacked veggie growing
• Shipping Container Mini-Farms ~ LED-litups
• Tilapia Ecosystems ~ Fish-fertilized gardens
• Shopping Cart Gardens ~ Guerrilla agriculture
• Corner Fields ~ Using vacant land parcels
• Undersea Edibles ~ Shellfish and seaweed
• Green Basements ~ LED-lit underused areas
• Bees ~ Urban healthy insect husbandry
• Chickens ~ Non-rooster urban coops

Sky Greens ~ Singapore's Vertical Farm on PBS

Singapore Looks Skyward to Take Farming in New Directions on PBS!