Colleen Peltomaa

John Lewis Morgan wrote:Hello,
I am have been living on this beautiful 25 acre property for a year by myself and it is slowly becoming an amazing model for Appalachian-style permaculture and restoration agriculture.

The house is very large and spacious. There is a couple moving in soon and room for more. There are many opportunities for work and recreation in the nearby outdoor adventure town of Fayetteville, WV. Rafting, rock climbing and more in the beautiful new river gorge are just minutes away.  

I currently have three large hugelculture-swales finished or in construction. tremendous potential for forest farming in the 20 acre new-old-growth forest with water shed and quintessential babbling brook. I have constructed a water tower rain catchment system with gravity feeds into the house. I also plan on developing ponds and springs for redundant water systems and resiliency.  I study Ben Falk, Mark Shepard, Sepp, and many others extensively. Artists and musicians will find inspiration here as well. This is the real deal, brown permaculture. Ask any questions of me and I will try to get some pictures up as soon as I get a functioning camera. Come co-create with amazing people in one of the most beautiful parts of the world. I want to start hosting a few wwoofers as well. I have mulefoot pigs, nigerian dwarf goats and chickens. I had 12 ducks but the fox got all of them. I embrace a 90% failure rate, but my first season has been more successful that that .

I see this post is originally one year old and I trust you are making good progress. We purchased a .22 acre lot in Raleigh County as a launching pad for going around the area and to find more acreage for a homestead and permaculture (I'm mostly into fruits, berries and melons). We recently saw a 17 acre farmette with a nice home priced at $59k, but we have not yet sold our home here in Connecticut so are restricted to drooling over photos of fertile acreage.

Would you please tell me if you have had any personal experience concerning mining rights and how that could play out if one does not own the mining rights and what you think is the likelihood of negative impact?

60% is an unbelievably huge number and I guess that's why I stick with well moderated forums and closed groups on Facebook where everyone shares the purpose of that group.  Personally I've experienced what I call, "THE MUST NOT KNOW" PEOPLE. and they need to make themselves known so that they can loudly and soundly reject in very general wording (not real details - seems all about emotion) whatever I posted or commented on. I do tend to think outside the box at times so I understand their upset - they really didn't want to know THAT.     I treat them differently than I would a paid troll, but those people are why I like to stay within groups with a shared viewpoint and a toe-the-line moderator.  Thanks, Paul.  Regarding moderators though I've sometimes had to leave a group because the moderator could not stretch his viewpoint to encompass mine - then I realized I was not on the right forum or group and gracefully left, not pushing my reality upon another.

paul wheaton wrote:I think a lot of corporate troll stuff is blamed on "internet trolls" and I need to point out that there is a huge difference:

internet trolls:  Will say anything to get a rise out of people.   Will knowingly state blatantly false stuff just to see people get upset.  Will typically post hundreds of posts from the same account in a short period of time.  More likely to write really long posts.

corporate trolls:  They have a job to do.  They need to get a rise out of people to draw attention to their message.   Will usually be managing a dozen accounts (sock puppets) simultaneously.  The sock puppets will agree with each other and work really hard to discredit anybody with a contrary message.   Posts will usually be pretty short.  Each account will usually have just a few posts.  Sometimes the account will have posting history, but any one account will almost never write a lot of posts within one hour.

Internet trolls, or just "trolls" have been around for decades.  Bored people that just want to find some way to get noticed and don't care about the consequences of their actions.

Corporate trolls are fairly new.  Just the last five years or so.  But they have become really huge in the last two or three years.  I would guess that 60% of the comments posted on the internet come from corporate trolls now.

Kitty Hudson wrote:'Old' but worth maintaining in this economic climate...and one never knows when one's own livelihood/finances will be devestated (I'm a nurse--all it takes is one bad accident sometimes and a person can no longer work in their chosen field). No one green will give you everything you need, but knowing your local edible weeds will provide you with variety. Here in SW KY, wild greens (some sort of escaped turnip like Seven Top I think) are not uncommon, nor is wild asparagus rown form bird-scattered seeds...usually I see it along fencelines. Lamb's quarters have already been mentioned.

Perennial greens: sorrel and leaves of horseradish are tasty, though I prefer them in small doses added to other things. Garlic chives are a seasoning, but I do add them liberally to soups and salads.

Think about dual purpose crops as well. Leaves of yardlong beans, beets, turnips, grain amaranth, radish and many others are edible...just pick a leaf at a time from each plant in a row and you'll have plenty for a salad or 'mess' of greens without affecting the production of the plants.

Winter hardy greens that can be harvested all winter long are great too--kale, collards, mustards, etc.

(Not to mention that there are other uses for some of these as well--Hopi Red Dye Amaranth and Bulls Blood Beets are used for red dye as well as food, Radishes--which bolt fast--have seeds well suited to sprouting)

Between dual purpose plants, wildlings, a few perennials here and there, and combining plantings (winter greens started when the beans are fading, quick growing radishes harvested from the same bed just as the amaranth is getting big), a person need not have a large garden to provide them with a lot of greens (But a big freezer would be mighty handy).

[/quote


So, the consensus is there is more than one "most nutritious" green, so I personally narrowed it down to "...and grows like a weed...". Hubby has been working double shifts (on call) and he is not tired at all and I see him eating bags of raw kale. Myself, I would juice it mostly and add some stevia. We also have a stock of blue green algae powder. I hope everyone here gets closer to being self-producing regards nutritious greens.

Matthew Fallon wrote:

john muckleroy jr wrote:Garlic mustard?I've never heard of it.Where can I get some seed?

garlic mustard grows wild and is an early spring green around me, i can try collecting seeds next spring if anyone wants some...they grow all over! i end up pulling a lot out, same as with wood sorrel and purslane (though i try to use them up if i can) it tastes exactly as the name implies, definitely an addition to a salad,not the main green! it'd be like eating a whole bowl of nothing but dandelion leaves (yuck!)

i've heard several herbalists claim purslane as the 'most nutrient rich".
green dean's one of my personal faves, i totally agree with him on NOT buying purslane seeds, i had some and they were weaklings!

amaranth leaves are great too as someone else mentioned, i have red amaranth and man does it Spread! but very easy to just yank the whole plant if its crowding other things. in india it's known as 'red spinach' which is a really apt name for it. you can make lots of things fromt he seed head too, gluten free baked goods, pop it like corn, make pudding etc. its very high in iron for one thing..

I know this post is old, but last year I pulled a bunch of wild greens and instead of making a salad I rinsed and juiced them in a masticating juicer. Dark green juice, and I added stevia to taste and down the hatch it went The pulp goes into the compost pile.

paul wheaton wrote:I got this idea from Salatin.  Once a month he makes sure all of his animals have access only to water with a little basic H in it. 

I checked around and found lots of stories of people with animals that were near death from parasites and after this basic H thing, the animals snapped back to awesome health. 

I would think that basic-H would violate any organic stuff because it isn't designed for this use.  I also have no idea what is in it.

In the past, I used it strictly because joel did.  And I was always uncomfortable with the idea.

Now, I wonder if there are much better techniques.  Namely, holzer's approach of lots of poisonous plants.  Plus lots of paddock shift and the like. 

Anybody else used basic H?  Anybody know what is in it?

Has anyone used Borax brand as an effective de-wormer? Okay, I'll do some homework and see if that question already got answered

Came across a video that astounded me and would like to get a discussion going.

First, please watch the video (also on YouTube) if you are interested, thank you.

Here is the link:  http://republicofmissouri.org/

Looking for some clear-headed, not knee-jerk, analysis based on the incoming data, thank you.