Posted on 12/24/2011 7:14:40 AM PST by ibytoohi
All land uses are different. Ours are unique. We are restoring it to native vegetation alone in order to address specific scientific and policy questions. As it turns out, with all the money being spent or deferred to 'protect the environment,' virtually NONE of it is "pristine." Worse, the landscapes we took over from its prior owners was anthropogenic in nature, depending heavily upon regular human disturbance for its character and productivity. In effect, "Nature" is an urban myth. I am out to prove that the agencies are an inherently sub-optimal management architecture for something as complex an varied as land management.
How did we ever survive the 1800's when there were no regulations to hinder us?
It is instructive to read about the damage done by about 1880, particularly to topsoil. Its significance was one of the original justifications for Federal land management agencies such as the Forest Service, Soils Conservation Service, or the BLM. Until that time, fewer total people depended upon the land and there was still more soil to waste. Things changed when the frontiers were closed.
Few recognize that much of 'the rape of the land' used as said justification was ALSO due to Federal land management. The only real difference was the goals of policy. The first was to take it from the Indians and Mexicans and settle it whilst the second was to protect those who had made the big bucks doing so by shackling their smaller competition. The latter still holds today with the same big players investing overseas while killing their domestic competition.
It's all still Federal land use control, unconstitutional since before its inception.
I'm sure the fields somehow were able to survive the infestations.
To some degree, government efforts to mitigate or repair the damage were successful. Yet the soil has never recovered completely and in some cases is getting worse. Chemical amendment has masked the impact to a significant degree. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not Mr. Organic; it's just that I recognize what good soil is and so does everybody else in the business. Believe me, any farmer, even those who are totally into amended agriculture, would prefer to have a biologically active and vital soil.
Now, as to how did things survive, much of it did not. Of the some 600 extinctions we have on record so far, two thirds were exclusively due to exotic introduced species.
Plants are like the foundation of a house. The bugs and animals depend upon the plants, birds on bugs, etc. Mess up that system and you'd best know what you plan to do. Frankly, we don't really know very much about how endemic or thoroughly habituated systems worked by which to optimize our interaction and now that our twenty years of work has produced an almost purely native landscape we can now dedicate ourselves toward learning more about how to work with it. Who knows? We may find out that it's not worth "saving," but perhaps there are critical elements that do warrant careful management. We are that ignorant. In any case, and without question, "protection" (as in precluding human intrusion) on a continent that was virtually 100% managed in some way for thousands of years, is, for the most part, a horribly destructive thing to do.
If you wish to learn more about the politics and economics of environmental management, please allow me to direct you to some of my other writings. For an encapsulated history, please see these articles. For a proposal on what to do about it, please take a look at this book.
Allow me to add that fixing any of these problems takes money. I’m all for making money. A mine is a disturbance. This was once a system that thrived on anthropogenic disturbance. Hence, a mine could be a good thing, depending upon how it is done. Were the goals directed toward long term optimization of the land for all of its attributes and uses, purely taking what we can get from a mine alone is obviously not smart.
Sorry, it was the one above your comment and it was by kactus that you quoted. However, since it was a comment of little consequence I guess it doesn’t matter.
“With a farm background, I don’t know any animal which is fed wild onion as part of their diet.”
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Grazing animals will pick up wild onions along with the grass if there are wild onions in the pasture. We used to have to throw out milk from our cow sometimes when she had eaten wild onions or a yellow blooming weed that we called bitterweed. Either one would make the milk have an awful, disgusting taste. If manure from animals that have grazed in an area where there is a problem with wild onions is transported to another area it could carry the wild onion seed.
Deliver a truck load to the White House.
“I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet each new situation with reorganization, and a wondrous way it is to produce the illusion of progress while creating inefficiency and demoralization - Petronius.
Petronius died in ad 66. Bureaucracy didn't.
To hope that mere ‘crats can manage anything not specifically authorized in the Constitution is to shamble down the road that Russia, Cuba, and Europe took. Only individuals/owners take the best care of land.
The “Great UnNatural” Acts (Wilderness, Endangered Species, Clean Water & Clean Air Acts) were used by what can be described as GangGreen” to justify government ownership/management of land to a degree that the Founders would have considered to be a hanging offense.
One may be certain that ever since man arrived on the North American land mass, his travels and the later travels of his livestock, carried seeds. As any gardener of farmer can attest, weed seeds sprout more often desired seeds, grow faster under worse conditions, etc. Look on weeds as the Murphy's Law of agriculture.
It is safe to say the these hay regulations are merely ‘crats ‘making hay’ with their regulatory powers.
PS Carrie-Okie is probably the most informed investigator in this area.
PPS Without question, he is the most intelligent investigator in this field (pun intended).
They don’t want the weed seed passing through the mules and ending up being “planted with fertilizer” by the mules passing through pristine wilderness land.
Any excuse to stop progress is a good exceus.
It’s a wonder how they can look themselves in the mirror and still say that they are “progressives”.
Integrity is not one of their strong suits.
I didn’t read the entire thread so sorry about the mule remark. However, the second sentence about what the government should be doing for the country.
Don't know about this. Free range mules eat weeds. Wonder if Michelle approves of this.
Hey now, don’t go disparaging my squirrel friends that way. They are pretty durn smart cookies... Not as smart as my raccoon buddies mind you you, but, still smart none the less :)
Merry Christmas ya’ll,,
Tatt
Marxism was only the popular pitch. It was corporate mercantilism all along, known today as fascism. Its fingerprints are in the Constitution itself, it was instituted with the 14th Amendment, and its tax-exempt financing was set up in parallel with the 16th Amendment.
Folks who work in the field are generally not to whom I was referring.
So, how's the hippie market for "organic" wild onions?
***So, how’s the hippie market for “organic” wild onions? ***
LOL! You ever ate grass fed beef of of onion infested fields?
Nasty stuff! The ONLY way to eat it is to take a bite of raw onion first, then eat the meat.
I was just noticing today that the field west of his infested field has no onions in it at all, same as the field to the north of his also has no onions.
Well never mind the beef, I was hoping he could sell the onions directly to the communists.
I mean, when you get lemons...make lemonade.
!
-
The Running of the Mules... Pompano, Fla
The running of the bulls...Pamplona Spain is a yearly event that involves bulls, and people. In Pamplona the bulls run down narrow city streets behind men and boys who try to keep out of their way to keep from being gored, or trampled and they do this for fun.
Pompano had the running of the mules for another reason: to transfer mules from one place to another.
At the corner of N.E. 6th St. and Flagler Ave, the Florida East Coast Railroad had a “Mule Lot”. It was built many years ago to handle the rather large business of livestock being shipped into this area, mainly for the farming industry. “Mule Daniels” was the primary shipper of mules to this area. They were shipped mostly from Tennessee and arrived in Pompano in groups of three or four “Cattle Cars” or livestock cars. Each car carried about twenty or so mules depending on their size.
I had an advantage others didn’t have. My Dad worked for the railroad and he knew exactly when the mules would be arriving. I got the job of pumping water for them after they were unloaded. They usually arrived on a Saturday so they could be fed and watered and calmed down and then led through town on Sunday when the traffic would be lightest to the lot located on S. Dixie Highway where the east and west Dixie Highway meet.
Back then the east road was just a rock road. The mules were penned there, sold and then carried to various places. All my friends wanted to pump water for the Mules. They could drink more water than a thirsty elephant. It was an “Achy Breaky Arm” job, but being the “Head Pumper” I quickly discovered that my friends were willing to pay for the privilege of pumping water for the mules. I allowed them to pump to their hearts content for a mere ten cents. This not only gave me movie money, but gave me a break from a very tiring job. My friend “Stumpy” Maddox even paid for his turn with two five cent deposit milk bottles, which were as good as cash in the local stores.
“Mule Daniels” brought several men along with a couple of horses to move the mules. Mules, being a cross between a Jack Ass and a horse were a hy-bred that could not reproduce. They were very docile, and it was said that every mule thought every horse was his or her mother and would follow them. Each mule was fitted with a woven hemp bridle or halter, but did not have a bit for the mouth. These halters had a five foot lead and as each mule was caught-up, four of them were tied together. One man would lead two groups of four mules. When all the mules were haltered and tied together, which was almost as good as a rodeo, for some of these mules had never been fully broken, the horses were moved out and were standing by waiting for the gates to be opened. The procession of mules and men could then begin. They would cross the tracks at 6th St. and proceed south along the tracks to the lot on S. Dixie. The trickiest part was the bridge across the Pompano Canal. This was where the horses would be most valuable, as the mules should just follow them across.
When all was ready and the gates were opened, I was just leaving the pump . Suddenly “DO-DO” Smith let out a whoop and hollered loud as he could “HOT DOG! THE MULES ARE LOOSE!” Sure enough when the mules were led out of the pen there were a couple of unbroken mules that spooked, jerked their heads up and got away from their handler and headed south on Flagler towards town. The rest of the mules followed suit and they began running. The handlers were shouting and this added to the confusion. We boys began to run after the mules. Some of them ran across the tracks, some down the tracks and some just finally stopped running and began to graze.
“Stumpy” Maddox lived just south of 6TH St. on Dixie highway. Two of the groups of mules were running down the sidewalk, and they turned into his yard. There they proceeded to trample down his mother’s flower garden. But the worst thing was that one of the group of mules, still being tied together, ran through his side yard and straddled a young Mango tree growing there. Their halters caught in the branches of the tree and pulled it up by the roots. Then they really went wild with those branches in their faces and the trunk and roots flailing away. If those halters had not broken and let those mules free there is no telling what they would have done.
When Mrs. Maddox got home from church, she just could not figure out what had wrecked her yard. “Stumpy” said later he wasn’t sure she really believed what happened, even after he showed her the mule tracks up and down the street. There were mules being chased by the handlers and by us boys, and we weren’t helping the situation. The mules eventually began to tire and to slow down. The horse riders then could approach them and get them tied back together and hold them until a handler could get to them. They didn’t trust us boys to hold them, and I suppose they were justified in not doing so. It had taken a couple or three hours to get the mules all back together and started on their way to the lot. The last brace of mules was found eating grass on the banks of the Pompano canal over by THE MEN AND BOYS ARE BEHIND THE MULES.
And this was the way we had the RUNNING OF THE MULES IN POMPANO.
-
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.