Nitrogen Fixing Trees - The Multipurpose Pioneers
Animal Forage, Food Forests, Food Plants - Perennial, Fungi, Plant Systems, Rehabilitation, Soil Biology, Trees — by Craig Elevitch
The myths about the wonders of nitrogen fixing trees are many. Craig Elevitch and Kim Wilkinson explain how to use them effectively.
Nitrogen Fixing Trees for Permaculture
 Flowers of the leguminous tree, Kowhai, the national flower of New Zealand |
Nitrogen fixation is a pattern of nutrient cycling which has successfully been used in perennial agriculture for millennia. This article focuses on legumes, which are nitrogen fixers of particular importance in agriculture. Specifically, three legumes (nitrogen fixing trees, hereafter called NFTs) are especially valuable in subtropical and tropical permaculture. They can be integrated in a permaculture system to restore nutrient cycling and fertility self-reliance.
Comments (0)Posted on: September 29, 2008
Humanure Handbook - Free Download
Compost, Conservation, DVDs/Books, Fungi, Potable Water, Rehabilitation, Soil Biology, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Waste Water, Water Contaminaton — by Craig Mackintosh
With chapters like ‘Crap Happens’, ‘Deep Shit’ and ‘A Day in the Life of a Turd’, this is sure to be an interesting book, albeit possibly not one to read over lunch?
With this wonderful substance piling up in all the wrong places (after all, we’re running out of clean water, and yet we’re crapping in it…), this taboo topic deserves a lot more attention than it gets. Enjoy the book - and special thanks to the author Joseph Jenkins for making this freely available (warning: 22mb PDF - if you want to download chapter by chapter, scroll down on this page, or just read online here).
Comments (0)Posted on: September 18, 2008
Greening the Desert
Food Forests, Fungi, Land, Rehabilitation, Salination, Soil Biology, Swales, Trees — by Craig Mackintosh
This is just one example of how permaculture can transform the environment, and, in so doing, dramatically change lives. By evidencing the dramatic transformation possible in the world’s worst agricultural scenarios, we hope to make people stand up and listen.
Big Agribusiness would convince us that continuing with fossil fuel dependent monocrop systems and genetically modified crops is the way of the future, but with fuel, transport and fertiliser costs skyrocketing, and growing evidence that genetic tinkering is causing far more harm than good, we, instead, advocate tried and tested methods of working with nature for the benefit of man.
Below is a behind the scenes look at Greening the Desert.
Comments (3)
Posted on: March 1, 2007
Fungi help some trees weather acid rain, but not all
Fungi — by Administrator
A discovery reported in the latest edition of the journal Nature (June 13, 2002) — that fungi on the roots of some trees in the Northeastern United States help supply much-needed calcium in forest soils battered by acid rain — would seem to ease worries about the worrisome form of pollution.
But don’t stop worrying just yet, warns Timothy J. Fahey, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Natural Resources at Cornell University and a co-author of the report, “Mycorrhizal weathering of apatite as an important calcium source in base-poor forest ecosystems.”
“Not all tree species are fortunate enough to be associated with the types of root fungi that supply calcium,” he says, pointing to sugar maples, which in some areas have suffered serious declines in recent years. Click for more…
Comments (0)
