An excellent and very long essay about the fragilities in the US food system

An excellent and incredibly long essay on the fragilities of the US food system by Madge Waggy. About a 30 minute read, 45 minutes if you stop and think while reading it.

Rather than repeat the whole catalogue (of potential failure points), four things are worth holding in mind, because they are where the pressures actually meet: 

• The system has very little stored reserve, so a delay anywhere turns into a shortage somewhere else.
• The most critical nodes, from packing plants to ports, are few enough that one failure travels nationally.
• The natural base, meaning water and soil, is degrading slowly and unevenly, with the damage concentrated in the regions that produce the most.
• The public has little reserve and adapts quickly, which delays any political pressure to fix the problem.

The point of gathering them is not to list ten separate troubles but to show one system with several places it can give.

***

What would make the biggest difference is probably the least glamorous thing, which is treating resilience as something worth paying for in advance rather than regretting in hindsight. That means valuing the buffer, the spare plant, the local mill, the cover crop, and the extra warehouse, even when they look inefficient in a good year. It means measuring the system not by how cheaply it runs in calm weather but by how gracefully it fails in bad weather.

The hardest part is that resilience has no constituency. It has no ribbon-cutting, no dramatic rescue, no visible hero.

Disclosure: Some of the "stock phrasing" suggests that AI might have assisted in the writing of this essay.

Peppers, apples, lizards and ducks

The dregs in the bottom of the mug

Quicksilver was helping us pick potatoes when she got distracted.

She found some Stocky Red Roaster peppers that I had missed when doing our last picking. If memory serves, she found 13 of them.

I told Mrs ERJ that I was tired. I was done. She could toss them on the compost pile and I would be fine with that.

But she didn't do that. She put on a pretty dress and a straw hat and walked around the neighborhood and tried to give the peppers to our neighbors. She came home with two of the thirteen peppers.

In that simple act, she reinforced our standing in the neighborhood as "certified good-guys" far more than everything I have done this summer.

Girls and their social nature, God bless them all.

Technology

Southern Belle's employment evolution now includes work-from-home requirements.

To make that happen, she needs more computer power and, especially, more monitors. Her 12.7" slap-top screen is not going to cut the mustard.

The monitors are cheap. Computers, and RAM, are expensive.

Fortunately, Pascal, my new son-in-law, is gifted in the cyber-arts and is cheerfully helping Southern Belle out. He recommended two, inexpensive, 27" monitors and a signal splitter.

Jumping from one 12.7" screen to two, 27" screens AND the original 12.7' screen is approximately 9X more viewing area.

MM-106 rootstock

While poking around the property, I stumbled upon a planting of apple-rootstock that had slipped my mind. I counted over 30 useable whips and am strongly considering bumping up the two Dacha orchards by an additional 5 trees each.

The orchards are already at the gross-overkill level, but the ground is available and the trees are almost free. 

MM-106 is the most dwarfing rootstock that is reliably free-standing. That is, it does not require a post or a trellis to keep the trees from falling over even while being established. However, the trees will be more productive, earlier in their lives if they are supported because that tips the carbs:nitrogen ratio which is one of the primary variables that helps a bud decide if it is going to make a woody-shoot or produce fruit.

MM-106 is a very productive rootstock and at one time was the most commonly planted rootstock.

Its failings are that it is larger than most commercial orchards currently desire, it is intolerant of standing water (clay) and is not very cold-hardy. In spite of those failings, there are 40 year-old trees in the Upper Orchard that are Empire grafted on MM-106 and they are still paying their rent. It seems unlikely that I will still be here 40 years from now.

Life is about compromises. The greatest point in its favor is that I have 30 of them in my possession right now.

Boys need purpose

I have been pondering the first video in yesterday's post. The narrator pointed out that modern parenting (feminist-forward) rarely holds boy's accountable.

I think that is a backhanded way of pointing out that the feminist world-view is that boys/men don't have the capacity to exercise self-discipline and thus cannot be held accountable, the same way you cannot hold a mentally retarded person to the same standards as a normal person. It is the implicit sexism of very, very low expectations.

Fathers are gun-shy about challenging mothers. It rarely ends well.

Boys wither under what, in reality, is the contempt of their mothers and the cowardice of their fathers.

Proving once again that children need both parents. They need the ying and they need the yang. Boys need both mothers and fathers. Girls need both fathers and mothers. A father is not a defective parent (i.e. an inferior, third-rate mother). We are our own species and what we bring to the parenting table cannot be replaced by "more mothering".

Play-date

Quicksilver's play-date group introduces them to the letters of the alphabet. This week's letter is "L" and the letter-person is Lizzy Lizard.

Of course, being the helpful person that I am, I reinforced the lessons by sharing the following clip from The Parent Trap with Quicksilver. Sadly, there are no local businesses that will allow generous grandfathers to lease a lizard for a week.

Some pictures of the duck dormitory

The duck dormitory is a work-in-progress. 

Overview. There is an 8' by 5' fenced-in run on the right side of frame. Normally, they get the run of the garden to provide slug and snail control.

A 300 lumen, outside, spike-light on a timer that shines into the enclosure to provide additional hours of light. Ducks spatter everything with mud. Having it outside keeps it cleaner and it is much easier to clean.

The most recent addition is the solar path-light. The ducks seem more willing to go into the enclosure when it is well lit after sun-down. I dislike chasing animals. I prefer to modify the environment so they WANT to do go where I want them to go, when I want them to go there.

Mesh does not get covered with mud the way that windows do. More of the light goes in.

The main door. I had been propping it open with a chunk of wood but that spooked one of the ducks. Holding it open with a string-and-hook has been working better.

 

Ducks like to poop while swimming. That makes their drinking water filthy. I saw a woman use a slotted watering bucket for her ducks on one of the Dacha videos. I guessed at the dimensions of the slots.

Ducks like to take a drink after every few bites of food. They stick their bills in the water and shake them side-to-side. Much of the food washes out into the water.

Pushing through, black walnut crop report

Quicksilver definitely has a cold. That meant that I spent time cruising Youtube rather than working. I expect that in due time I will have symptoms but for now I don't.

 

Three minute Youtube short. The Comfort Trap. Boys (men) need purpose. Rescuing them from their setbacks burns their "man-card".

 

 

Two minute Youtube short. It is a waste of time to argue with fools or fanatics.

I was able to make a quick trip to the property that has the Upper and Hill orchard. As reported Here and Here, my plan it to plant "Dacha" or pocket-sized orchards near sites that are reasonable places to build a house.

Today's task was to cut the walnut and elm trees in the future orchards' footprints, drill holes in the stumps and fill them with herbicide.

I used a lab "wash bottle" filled with 1/3 glyphosate concentrate, 2/3 water to fill a .325" diameter hole drilled about 1-1/2" deep into each stump. The wash bottle made for a very tidy job and the task was executed with zero drama.

Looking east. T-posts with red tops alternating with T-posts with white tops. One of the T-posts (right of center) is holding up my (pink) post driver.

I also pounded in "T" posts every place I intend to plant a tree. The last time I was out there I had enough posts to outline the footprint of the orchards and to pound one in every-other tree. Yesterday I filled in the gaps.

The north orchard will have three rows of five. The south orchard will have two rows of seven.

There is a seedling mulberry tree growing close to the site of the north Dacha orchard site. I suspect that it will get grafted to improved varieties next spring.

I had several graft failures with mulberry this year. Some of them were Silk Hope. They were all growing fine. They were all knocked off by deer trying to browse the shoots. The other failed grafts never pushed a bud, a sign of dead scion. That might have been due to cutting the scion after the night when the temperatures dropped to -25F.

Black walnut crop report

After returning home, I toured our property. It has been a while since I walked out-back.

It appears that we have a bumper crop of black walnuts. Sparks 147 (selected in Iowa) is over-achieving. Several of my trees of Drake (Missouri) are performing very well. I am looking at my first decent crop from Hays #1 (Kansas). I have no nuts at all on Emma K (Illinois) or Sparrow (Illinois). Both of those varieties tend to alternate bearing.

Of all the nuts, the Sparks 147 has the most potential as seed nuts, primarily because they are likely pollinated by Drake. That is due to a fortunate alignment of anther shedding pollen-and-pistil receptivity timing between the two varieties and the fact that I have two specimens of Drake immediately upwind of three trees grafted to Sparks 147. It is, of course, impossible to guarantee that any single nut of Sparks 147 was pollinated by Drake, but the math favors that possibility. 

Sparks 147 has nut meats that drop out in halves, which is rare for a black walnut. The trunk tends to be as straight as a pencil with small side branches, so it also makes a good saw-log. Unfortunately, it is significantly less productive than Drake and has a high husk-to-nutmeat ratio.

Grab-bag and protecting my investment in infrastructure

 

 

Another oxytocin generating "cuddle" song.

The feminazi will undoubtedly whine about the song being "creepy". 

Men cannot win. We are supposed to talk about our feelings but then some people use them as weapons against us. Men are wired to be protectors and we are anchored by ideals. Men crave having a purpose.

Garlic

Garlic bulbs of Ivan and Korean Red were dropped off as a housewarming gift to the new home owners who we helped move. I didn't think to take a shovel, so I will be contacting them and asking if I can help plant them.

My hope is that their new home will be a vampire-free zone. 

Quicksilver definitely has a cold

She had a three hour nap yesterday. Nose running. Coughing. 

I did the heavy-lifting watching her yesterday and my backside grew roots into the recliner. Mrs ERJ will be doing the heavy-lifting in terms of watching QS today and I hope to get a lot done today.

Dipping steel tools in oil

One way to increase the life of steel tools and fence is to dip them in oil. Tools like shovels are also easier to use when kept oiled between uses because rusty surfaces have high friction and it is more work to use a rusty shovel than one that is shiny and bright.

Some people put sand in a shallow pan like the kind used to catch oil during an oil-change and add a bit of oil. They stick the blade of their shovel or hoe into the sand several times to coat it with oil before hanging it on the wall.

Poultry netting is an item that sees a lot of use on a small holding. I foresee need a great deal of it as I rely on ducks more heavily for insect and snail control. The problem with poultry netting (locally called "Chicken wire") is that it rusts even though it is galvanized.

I had been stymied on how to efficiently paint or oil it until I was oiling my body-grip traps with vegetable oil.

The hot ticket is to place a five gallon bucket on a level surface and half fill it with water, then add about a half-gallon of the cheapest vegetable oil. The oil will float on top of the water. Slowly insert the 24" wide roll of poultry netting into the oil-water until the end of the roll rests on the bottom of the bucket, then slowly add water (probably from a hose) until the top of the oil is within an inch of the top.

Lift the roll of netting straight up and let it drain/drip back into the bucket for about fifteen seconds. Turn it dry-side down and slowly lower it back into the bucket until the end of the roll touches the bottom of the bucket.

When withdrawn from the bath, the entire width of the roll should be covered with oil. Allow the roll to drip back into the bucket for fifteen seconds. Then move to a place where the oil that drips off the roll will not damage whatever is beneath it. I put mine on the woodpile. 

Vegetable oil is not the greatest at protecting against corrosion but it will seal up the tiny cracks formed in the galvanized coating when the wire is formed into the netting. That is, it compliments the zinc coating. It can also beef up the corrosion protection in welded-wire fencing at the welds where the zinc coating is compromised although you will have to up-size your bucket.

Vegetable oil is subject to UV degradation but will last a relatively long time in shaded areas. One place where vegetable oil shines is that it bonds to zinc and/or iron via a soap bond (short-fatty-acid to metal ion). Oil that has been partially degraded by frying forms those bonds more quickly than virgin oil.

This is messy work, so wear grubby clothing and old gloves. 

Oxytocin fix

Your oxytocin fix for the day 

Not all music triggers dopamine rushes. This is the music I played for Quicksilver this morning. Simple, calming melody. Simple message. A lovely piece of music.

Dental issues

I am losing weight due to my dental issues. I bought a piece of cheesecake for medicinal reasons. 550 Calories. Into every life a little rain must fall but I am making the most of it.

Weather

Excellent weather for camping! Looking ahead at the weather is part of working outside this time of year.

I have lots of small tasks to get done after finishing the potatoes. I need to get smoother at switching tasks.

I worked one season in a commercial orchard and I struggled with not knowing what tasks I was going to be assigned do through the day. 

The owner of the orchard like me as an employee. I always said "Yes Sir!" and did my best. I really learned to like Thursdays. We always pressed cider on Thursday and I had the same job. 

I got the impression that many employees were incapable of or unwilling to switch jobs. That is tough on the boss because everything has to get done and sometimes equipment breaks or big orders materialize out of nowhere and have to be filled.

Programmed to fail

The primary difference between charity from an individual-to-an-individual and charity from an institution is that the individual donor is more likely to be invested in weaning the receiver off of his dependency whereas the institution's existence (and the paid positions within it) relies in the dependency never being cured.

I was watching this video, "Why I will never do charity work ever again" and the woman lays it out in her own words.

She was a single mom on-the-dole. She took classes. She volunteered so she would have "work experiences" to put on her resume (i.e. C.V.). She joined "boards" to develop connections and to learn how act like a professional and to improve her tiny sliver of the universe.

She gained skills and confidence. She wrote a grant to create a paid position in the food coop she worked in. The grant was approved. She interviewed for that position and she didn't get the job. 

The person who was hired by the interviewers was a slob with a defeatist attitude and who had virtually none of the skills the narrator had. The difference is that the narrator who had pulled herself up by her bootstraps told the interviewers that she believed that the food coop could be self-sustaining within three years and could possibly expand without the government aid. The woman who got the job told the interviewers that the food coop would (obviously) shut down the month the funding stopped.

I suspect that Mamdani's government grocery stores are being hatched in the same incubator. They will always require government subsidies to keep their doors open. Employees who point out obvious efficiencies will be shown the door. Most of the NYC votors will applaud. 

Fine Art Tuesday

 

The traditional, Japanese fan used very few resources and transformed an ordinary utensil into an item that was both useful and beautiful. The fans moved air, shooed away biting insects, were useful for flirting and signified social position.

Typically crafted from hinoki, Japanese cypress, and thread, and washi paper, the number of strips of wood on each fan was meant to reflect the rank and status of its owner. These laws transformed Japanese hand fans into tools of aristocrats and the samurai class and became a means to signify social standing.

Most of the fans displayed on this page are hundreds of years old. 

 

Note from ERJ: I am not sure how having an "only fans" page generates revenue but I will soon be finding out. Thanks for visiting!