Comments

Episode-1261- Listener Calls for 12-06-13 — 27 Comments

  1. I can’t find the part about pill bugs. I’ve listened repeatedly to the sections where it should be and am not finding it. Does anyone have the time stamp for that part?

  2. Jack, Everything I’ve read about apples indicate that plantings from seeds never produce true to the fruit type. You will get apple trees but the fruit will be useless or non existent on 95 of 100 trees and maybe 1 or 2 will produce a useable fruit (that does not match the parent). Grafting is the only way to retain the characteristics of the original. It seems that planting cuttings as mentioned today may do the same but the root stock may not be as durable or disease resistant. I’ve never seen apple seeds for sale, only trees, but that may not be a determining factor. Can (you) anyone correct or confirm this information?

    • Written by the ignorant and by those that want to sell grafted trees.

      Now will it be “true to type”, no not exactly but that is because apples require cross pollination, meaning all apples are hybrids in their natural state. So your fuji will be likely crossed with a queen anne or say a gala, so you don’t know what you are going to get true. Yet these trees often grow very large and aggressively. The apples they produce are often quite good, not grocery store perfectly shaped good but tasty and quite useful. If you don’t believe me believe Bill Mollison. Here is an except from a PDC transcript he taught in Florida in the 80s.

      “With many plants, I just take the seed heads and shake them all over the garden in autumn. They fall through the mulch. I get celery, parsley, lettuces, and all that, coming up at random. It is very wasteful of seed. The same amount of seed would sell for $20.

      I am trying to shortcut this whole business of buying seed, growing and purchasing seedlings, transplanting them out, cutting off the whole plant at harvest, and buying more seed every year. We are trying to get plants suited to the site, and reduce the seed packet buying as much as we can.

      In Tasmania, we have found that we get many apple seedlings from apple pips that have been tossed out along roadsides. Every seedling apple we grow is a good apple, so we never bother to graft. They are already heavily selected apples, and we grow them from seed. All the deciduous trees that we have were imported. There are no wild apple species.

      We got a frost resistant orange from pips. Nectarines are always good from pips. Lemon will take frost. So will mandarin oranges. I’ve been running around New South Wales when all the mandarins were frosted to the ground. Break them off the ground, and their skins would be stuck on the ground. These trees don’t mind frosting up of a night, a few degrees below.

      A seed bed should be incorporated into the annual garden–a little five square meter place for putting out seedlings. You want them coming all the time. We save almost all the seeds of the fruit we eat, the pips. We let them dry, just along the windowsills.

      At the end of summer, when we have accumulated many of them, we pack them in sawdust and put them outside in a box. The rains fall on them and the frosts attack them. From then on, we start lifting the sawdust up and looking at it, and as soon as shoots start to peep out, we start putting them out all over the place. They are on their way.

      The more fruit you eat, the more fruit you grow. You catch up with yourself in about seven years.”

      The entire PDF is free and it is fricken golden material from some of Bills sharpest days! 155 page of brilliant insight all for free.

      http://www.barkingfrogspermaculture.org/PDC_ALL.pdf

      • I guess the definition of ‘good’ is subjective.

        Since a seed is basically a whole new variety of apple, that is why they talk about thousands and thousands of different types to pick from years ago. It isn’t healthy that we spray these trees and have mono-cropped them; but at the same time propagating them has a very long history before what we refer to as modern agriculture.

        Yet, the one part that gets left out of the conversation most of the time is just how awful many of the apples are if you are eating them raw. Even people trading on the silk road centuries ago realized how crummy wild apples can taste. Mollison’s quote above only proves one thing: his palate when it comes to apples sucks.

        Some apples are good for cooking, others for eating; most, are only good for cider. Years ago most apples that were from seed were only used to make hard cider, so if that is your goal, go for it. If you want good eating apples it really is a gamble.

    • Compromise and plant both. A lot of these trees take 5-10 years to start yielding . . . so why take the chance that it won’t be what you want? Plant a few wild seeds/seedlings and plant a few grafted varieties you know that you’ll like. That’s what I’ve done with my paw paws, persimmons, mulberries and pecans. But, fwiw, I haven’t done it with apples because they are so disease prone around here that I’ll only plant the most disease resistant varieties.

  3. Jack, I would love to hear you and Joe Rogan have a conversation about Permaculture… Any chance of that?

    • Wish I had connections like that. You and Rogan seem to have similar ideas on what our government is doing and what we as a people need to do to move forward from this mess. I will have my people call his people – HA

  4. Concerning planting cuttings; normally I prune anywhere from now to March, can I plant these or do you have to wait until spring to do it when their is life in the limb like when you would graft? Thanks.

  5. Hey Jack,

    I wanted to actually leave this comment on the listener feedback show Ep. 1142 from June, but the comments section there is apparently closed. That show dealt in part with Goldman Sachs assisting Smithfield Foods get purchased by a shell corporation set up by the ruling Chinese families and your contention it was the groundwork stage of the financial elite setting themselves up for abandoning the country when the economic SHTF.

    While I’ll admit to thinking along the lines of some of the shows commentary that it strained credulity and seemed to walk along the fringe of conspiracy theory, I just saw this article today on the NY Times DealBook section discussing how JPMorgan Chase had a “friends and family” hiring policy with the Chinese ruling elite to gain more business deals.

    http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/12/07/bank-tabulated-business-linked-to-china-hiring/

    Although I think Goldman and Morgan are arranging these efforts more to generate cash for their businesses then provide a safe haven for flight later, it does show that the financial elite here in the U.S. are indeed willing to kowtow to the Chinese than many might otherwise believe. Perhaps more surprising to me is that U.S. federal officials are actually pursuing bribery investigations of Morgan for the program.

    You’d think they’d be tied in tightly with the government that it wouldn’t go anywhere, but it’s not like you’re going to see Jamie Dimon hauled off in handcuffs anytime soon anyway. More likely than not it will be some low level flunky considering Jon Corzine is still at large raising money for Obama after he orchestrated the collapse of MF Global while some poor broker (Evan Brent Dooley) is sitting in jail for 5 years for his role in the rogue trading.

    Cheers,
    Rich

    • @FoolishCop

      Realize safe haven may not be them physically going anywhere, just their personal wealth. No foreign government will deal with a US citizen or let their money into their banks. Not a ONE. Our government has made it so damn complicated they just all said, F-it, no Americans.

      Now if you have a Chinese or Cuban or Costa Rican or ANY OTHER NATION’S passport, all is well.

      So even if the big wigs at Chase, Sachs, etc. don’t plan to physically leave they money is going to.

  6. Yooo. Back to listening after a few weeks not being at home.

    I enjoyed your last segment explaining permaculture as much more than “organic gardening” and “food forests”. It’s quite clearly the path forward “if times get tough or even if they don’t”. I don’t think there is a single bat shit crazy survivalist who wouldn’t think that self-sufficiency wouldn’t be something to strive for. A smarter one might realize that without creating an integrated design with reusable and multi-use components its an EXTREMELY long road to hoe. Also they’re always so keen on going back to barter. What the hell are you going to barter after so long? Eventually you’ll hit a point where you don’t want to give away any more bullets for things you need. Might need things that grow and provide value, such as quality milled trees, baskets, etc etc.

    One thing you never hear about is producing clothes from scratch. It’s only one of the most important things for a human, yet it’s probably the most taken for granted thing, even by permaculturists/survivalists alike. I read a seed catalog that said people should grow and pick cotton just to experience how much it sucks ass to pick and process cotton. “Long Term Grid Down” scenario, somebody’s gotta grow it, pick it, process it, and turn it into clothes… I don’t know 1 person who knows any of those steps, let alone has any seeds. Hell even in non-grid down scenarios, just look at other collapsing places where clothes go through the roof in expense (they’re imported).

    • The last 10 minutes are fantastic. Jack you really nailed it, I think this is your best quotable sound bite yet.

      New Mike, I agree with you on clothes. People don’t realize how quickly modern clothing wears out when you are actively working the land. Walmart clothes rip and seams separate pretty quickly. Unless you buy high end WORK clothes (like Carhartt) most will not hold up to a month of continuous duty. The same thing goes for shoes. Clothing is very time consuming to make by hand and the base textile is even more time consuming. Spinning and weaving is still practiced by a few artisans, mainly from wool or alpaca, but it takes special equipment as well as skills. Making home spun yarn and then knitting or crocheting clothing will take people a very long time to conquer. Weaving cloth will be even harder.

    • Interesting idea, I think a more actionable topic though might be acquiring rugged clothing in the first place. Let’s face it even in a break down weaving, tailoring, etc are niche industries. It was so in the middle ages and prior to that as well. So if all shit hits all fans it is likely the guys making clothes will be on some level specialists. Most homemade clothes in the past were sort of luxury items people could not afford.

      Daily clothes were purchased but lasted and lasted and were easily mended.

      Good thoughts and ideas here.

    • It’s kind of a humbling thought to think about shoes and clothes. After I posted this I was talking with the wife about it. Clothes, particularly good ones, just don’t fall off trees. Like TheRancher is saying clothes rip when you work, even good stuff. Obviously thats where patches come in (something you REALLY don’t see today).

      @Jack
      ” I think a more actionable topic though might be acquiring rugged clothing in the first place.” Exactly my thoughts. It’s a really simple prep item, that in general just does not go bad, especially if stored relatively properly. The wife bitched about me having 10 pairs of jeans. As if those 10 pairs of jeans are brand new, never been worn, and sit in a dark room everyday. I think this really makes a good case for us to use some of our monthly “preps” money towards buying clothes, even if its going to good will and backing the truck up on clothes. Put them in plastic totes, and put them in the attic, or out in the workshop stacked neatly.

      Cody Lundin’s book kind of inspired me about re-looking at that important prep point of being prepared for cold and warmth. If things break down and one has to do a lot more outdoor activity, they’re just a must.

    • I’ve been storing ‘durable’ clothing. Most of the stuff you get cheap at the walmart is.. cheap. Regular jeans are ‘prewashed’ to soften them, which means pre-worn out, and the quality of the cottons used isn’t what it used to be.

      I find things like this:
      http://www.duluthtrading.com/store/mens/duluth-ingenuity/fire-hose-workwear/mens-fire-hose-pants/mens-fire-hose-pants.aspx

      To be a lot more durable. Some military clothing is durable, and can be pretty cheap.. (winter versions are thicker) I’ve gotten some great deals on surplus jackets, gloves, hats etc.

      Boots that can be resoled are a must. A three pairs of good boots with some replacement soles could last a lifetime.

      (I’ve always heard that you want at least two pair that you alternate, so they have a chance to dry out.. keeps them from breaking down as fast).

      So I guess part of this is learning/doing the maintenance.

  7. Hey on the canning of meat.
    one thing that is always over looked is to can your meat in a meal.
    We can meat loaf and sheperd pie.
    no oping up alot of preps to make meal. just pull out meat loaf and warm it up. portao flakes on the side and you have a meal.

    In Wyoming it is 15# for 90 mins.

    Also when your done eating. you can always take your left overs and freeze dry or recan.

  8. Regarding owner financing, there is another form that the caller may have been thinking of – a land contract, or contract for deed – where the buyer makes installment payments but does not have an ownership interest until the contract is paid in full. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_contract. IMHO, this is not a good idea in most cases.

  9. Great show. The part about planting apples from cuttings is very intriguing to me. It would be great to get that guy onto the show to talk about this more in detail.
    I have been trying to grow a hedge around my land from cuttings of mostly willow mixed with Siberian pea shrub an a bunch of other shrubs. So far, the results have been quite weak, even with the willows, which are supposed to take root super easily. Some did, most didn’t. I put a lot more of them in this fall. The last ones I put in the spring. So far I have not seen a pattern in what works and what doesn’t. It seems a bit random.
    It would be very interesting to get more details on what size cuttings he uses, at what time to put them into the ground, whether or not it is worth adding compost ore some richer soil with the cuttings etc. This has huge potential both as a money saver and as a way to grow trees with better root systems than the store-bought ones, using cuttings of the store-bought ones to increase variety.