• Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    20
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    hace 2 horas

    You should always feel free to grow a garden, but you shouldn’t necessarily expect it to be cheaper than buying food. Especially the first year, if you don’t live in a place where you can just dig up some dirt and chunk seeds in it. Even if you do you should make sure the soil isn’t literally toxic first, especially since it’s common to have a buildup of things like lead or arsenic from now-outlawed fertilizers that can be absorbed by plants.

    My grandparents planted maybe half an acre? Of crops for 10 people, and it was supplemental, not a complete replacement. It also takes a lot of work and can go to shit if the weather is bad. You can account for some of this by planting a variety of crops, trying to head off drainage and shade issues before they start, and with supplemental watering. But don’t expect everything to be super productive every year, especially in the age of climate change. My sister had some plants not put out at all last year (peppers).

    • stabby_cicada@lemmy.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      hace 1 hora

      That’s the thing. Gardening is more expensive than buying food, in the United States and Western Europe, now, because the real cost of food production is heavily subsidized by our governments and we guarantee yields by throwing tons of fossil fuels and their derivatives at the soil of corporate megafarms. There’s a nonzero chance that’s going to change shortly - probably within a generation - for a ton of reasons including but not limited to little Donnie assassinating the supreme leader of Iran for shits and giggles.

      Grow a garden even if it’s not economically efficient. Do it now, when you aren’t relying on it for food, and get the issues with soil and drainage and so on worked out now. Learn to save seeds and select the best growing plants each year so that, as your climate changes, the varieties you grow change with it. That way you’ll have the skills to do it later, when you really need it.

  • BastingChemina@slrpnk.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    14
    ·
    hace 2 horas

    It’s not just fertilizer:

    it takes about 7.3 units of (primarily) fossil energy to produce one unit of food energy

    Assessing the sustainability of the US food system: a life cycle perspective

    With all the fertilizer, heavy equipment and agricultural practices the food production today is very inefficient from an energy perspective.

    Without cheap, abundant energy available the whole food production system is not sustainable

    • kungen@feddit.nu
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      hace 40 minutos

      Exactly. The Swedish government or something did some study recently to determine if we’d be able to be self-sufficient under a longer time if we needed to be, as we currently have a lot of food imports. The conclusion was “yes, but there won’t be as much food diversity”.

      However, they completely ignored the fact that we only have a ~90 days strategic reserve of oil, and that basically all the machining used for farming runs on diesel. And there’s currently no goals to change that.

      If we can’t import or refine diesel anymore, we will starve.

    • Naz@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      hace 1 hora

      I’m surprised to see this truth known on the Internet, I guess Lemmy actually is smarter than most other social media out there :o

  • chunes@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    5
    ·
    hace 2 horas

    When agricultural processes are invented that allow the population to grow by billions, what’s the first thing people do? Rush to fill the extra capacity. Sure would be nice if we had the prudence to maintain a buffer.

  • FundMECFS@piefed.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    2
    ·
    hace 50 minutos

    One day we’ll learn to structure laws so that fertilised monoculture isn’t the only economically viable form of agriculture.

    But agribusiness lobbies won’t allow that so…

  • cogitase@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    51
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    hace 4 horas

    Natural gas is used to produce hydrogen, which is then used in the Haber-Bosch process to produce ammonia from nitrogen in the atmosphere. Only about 6% of natural gas is used to produce hydrogen, so even if the price were to rise substantially, we could divert natural gas from other uses and have plenty for making ammonia. We also have other ways of producing hydrogen, it’s just that natural gas is more established.

    PEM electrolyzers paired with cheap solar in countries with high insolation can now produce hydrogen for less than the cost of natural gas, but we’re only recently starting to see the construction of the large-scale green ammonia plants needed to accomplish this. Egypt is currently constructing a 100-MW green ammonia plant powered by solar energy. Even if you didn’t have enough PEM eletrolyzers you could still just pass current through some salt water and produce hydrogen, albeit much less efficiently.

    It’s not going to be a catastrophic issue.

    • Rusty@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      13
      ·
      hace 3 horas

      Fun fact: Fritz Haber, the German guy that invented the Haber-Bosch process is the same Fritz Haber that developed a way to use the chlorine gas in chemical warfare. He was personally overseeing its effect in the battle of Ypres.

      • als@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        hace 25 minutos

        Clara Immerwahr, who was married to Fritz Haber and was a successful chemist in her own right, spoke out against his research as a “perversion of the ideals of science” and “a sign of barbarity, corrupting the very discipline which ought to bring new insights into life.” She ended her own life the day before he traveled to the eastern front to oversee the use of chlorine gas against Russian troops.

    • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      hace 2 horas

      Thank you for explaining the process, because the pro-fuel-cell pact doesn’t understand that hydrogen isn’t free and production is still heavily reliant on fossil fuels.

      “Oh it comes from ammonia”. Alright, where does the ammonia come from???

      You’re just moving the problem around, not fixing anything.

    • The_v@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      hace 3 horas

      Farmers almost uniformly over-apply N fertilizer. Having it be more expensive and forcing them to look into more efficient ways of applying fertilizer and managing nutrients is not a bad thing.

        • The_v@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          hace 2 horas

          Farmers are price-takers not price-makers. The prices they receive are driven by speculation on the commodities markets (even for crops not traded on the market).

          Since they can’t control the price they receive for their crop, they are very sensitive to any change in the cost of inputs. Determining how much to spent on inputs is the part of their profitablity they can control. So widespread behavioral change is usually pretty close to immediate.

    • marcos@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      hace 4 horas

      we could divert natural gas from other uses and have plenty for making ammonia. We also have other ways of producing hydrogen

      We can’t do any of those in a scale large enough to replace the destruction and have it online for the next planting season on the North Hemisphere. Or the next one on the South Hemisphere either, btw. Or the following ones for each.

  • Bwaz@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    hace 3 horas

    In case anyone was wodering how much damage a single idiot in the White House can cause.

  • Cattail@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    hace 2 horas

    I’m glad I started growing wolffia globosa. Gonna help supplement a lot of meals. Kinda sucks that I got sick and neglected it and got set back a few weeks, but I have enough to sees other colonies

    • perishthethought@piefed.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      40
      ·
      hace 5 horas

      Ohhh…

      Legumes are plants in the pea family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seeds of such plants. When used as a dry grain for human consumption, the seeds are also called pulses.

    • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      20
      arrow-down
      22
      ·
      hace 5 horas

      Comments like this are so ironic because this level of ignorance makes you sound like a Trump voter. You’d fit in really well here amongst the 70 million people who voted for this.

      “America” is three continents. And even in the USA this regime is deeply unpopular, hence all the protests. I don’t think we’re all that great at resistance yet, but we are trying.

      The wealthy elite in the USA have successfully displaced the blame by convincing the people to fight each other instead of them, and here you are blaming “Americans” instead of the people actually responsible.

      • plantfanatic@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        48
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        hace 5 horas

        When someone says American, they mean a USA resident. I don’t know anyone who would assume they mean a Canadian and/or Mexican, since you use those terms for them.

        And if you are you’re just being obtuse or argumentative.

        • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          21
          ·
          hace 5 horas

          That was only one of the points I made. Since you ignored the rest of my comment, and mentioned my username, it really doesn’t seem like you’re saying this in good faith.

          People assuming “American” means resident of the USA is a problem.

          • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            9
            ·
            hace 5 horas

            Why? You have North Americans and South Americans to cover the others?

            What else would you need to include in the term Americans?

            • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              4
              arrow-down
              14
              ·
              hace 4 horas

              North America is Canada and the USA. And there’s also central America, which isn’t included in those two terms.

              It’s a problem because ignorant USians think of themselves as the center of everything, and referring to them as “Americans” further entrenches this selfish world view.

              • PhoenixDog@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                hace 2 horas

                North America is Canada and the USA. And there’s also central America, which isn’t included in those two terms.

                Just casually ignoring Mexico as part of North America says everything I need to know about how intelligent you are.

                Name checks out, you’re obtuse.

              • ricecake@sh.itjust.works
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                hace 2 horas

                What countries have the word “America” in them? How many countries in the Americas are “united States”?
                What do you call a citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

                For the record, The United States of America is the only country with the word America in it’s name. Our immediate neighbor, The United Mexican States, is another country you could, but no one would, plausibly call the United States.

                The British isles contains two countries, Ireland and the UK. One of these is the home of the British, and the other would be much happier if you didn’t call them that.

                Insisting that you not refer to the people of a country by the most unique name in the countries name, because the geographic region has that word in common is … Odd.

              • drcobaltjedi@programming.dev
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                5
                ·
                hace 4 horas

                In English, the correct demonym for a citizen of the United States of America is “American”. There have been others that somewhat are accepted but are not universal like “Yankee” which half the population would take great offense to.

                It isn’t centering the world on us to call ourselves Americans, it’s the only thing that works in the language and is accepted by everyone it applies to. Call a Canadian an “american” and watch how quickly they correct you.

                I’ve seen people propose “United statesian” but there 2 problems with that, first it does not flow well in English, second that doesn’t actually fix the problem since there’s still be ambiguity with people living in the United Mexican States.

              • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                7
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                hace 4 horas

                The whole world uses that term, since the other countries are covered by other terms, or other encompassing terms like I explained already.

                When someone says American, what country do you think they come from? You just said you know what North Americans are, so you wouldn’t include Canada or single out Canada there.

                American has never meant an all encompassing term for north/central/south America, where the hell did you get this idea from?

                • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  11
                  ·
                  hace 4 horas

                  When someone says American, it’s ambiguous what they actually mean. I assume they mean resident of the USA because it’s the norm, but technically you could be talk about a Canadian or a Brazilian. Language should be precise. I think that’s why I see so many people using the term USian on Lemmy.

                  Just because the whole world uses the term doesn’t mean it isn’t harmful.

          • plantfanatic@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            hace 4 horas

            Your point being you are making up a new definition and calling everyone else wrong? I also didn’t even notice your username, you’re just being bloody obtuse.

            Bold move cotton.

        • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          4
          ·
          hace 5 horas

          I don’t disagree that the culture in the USA is violent and negativity affects the world. These high fuel prices are actually good for the USA in the long run, as we’re far too insulated from all the destruction our evil military causes. USAians are going to suffer from this, hopefully.

      • Scubus@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        hace 4 horas

        America, where there is an actively sitting known pedophile president protecting a group of elite pedophiles

        Well, we’re not trying that hard. Seriously, it takes one person to put an end to all this misery and yet we don’t. Until there’s real progress in the US, it’s safe to say that each and every American supports our presidents actions if nothing else through refusal to stop him.

        • backalleycoyote@lemmy.today
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          hace 4 horas

          Gonna take a lot more than one person to end it. The president is just the cream of the crap. It’ll take dismantling the power of his cronies, their wealth/businesses, and their supporters. From the billionaires to the paycheck-to-paycheckaires that scream bloody murder when you suggest taxing their heroes to fund the welfare they think they’re entitled to but is a theft when someone else receives it, the problem isn’t just in high offices. It’s living next door to you and will vote this hate in again even if the current regime is removed.

          • Scubus@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            hace 4 horas

            Then it would take one more at that point. Solve enough problems and eventually people will realize they need to stop creating them. Or solve your neighbors. As long as someone is ACTUALLY DOING SOMETHING against the biggest problem, the rest of them can wait until someone is ready to solve them. When the biggest issue is dealt with, then we can start solving the smaller ones.

            • backalleycoyote@lemmy.today
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              hace 2 horas

              Define biggest problem. Is it the figurehead that has been empowered or the culture of hate that empowered it? Removing the head might lessen the impact short term, but not addressing the real issue that is the culture of hate will just send it to ground, breed a sense of victimhood and lost cause, and pass it on until it surfaces again. On the flipside, start killing your MAGA neighbors (which are more easily accessible than the office holders) and you’re just an unhinged lone wolf that won’t get very far before you’re killed or arrested, plus you’re just adding to the narrative that “these are dangerous people that must be eliminated”. It risks everything, gains little, and strengthens them. Scale that up to thousands of people the ing on their neighbors and you’ve moved on to genocide, which even if you win isn’t going to impress the global community. Great, America’s no longer a Christo-fascist oligarchy, all it took was half of them liquidating the other half… And what do you do with the kids? Kill them along with the parents? Send them off to be reindoctrinated? I have a hard time believing someone who watched their parents get murdered over political beliefs is going to have an easy time growing up compliant in the system where their parent’s killers won.

              It’s going to be a mix of fighting, lives and livelihoods getting lost, and consequences like being stripped of the rights to hold offices, own businesses, and vote- things that should have happened to those who participated in the Confederacy- to win. A lot more than one person is going to have to get their hands dirty with the knowledge they might not live to see it through, and it even then what they’ve done will be on their conscience for the remainder of their lives. You ever killed anyone? Ever beaten someone so savagely they had to go to the ER? Even if you can live comfortably with having done it because you feel morally justified, still weighs on you when you consider “goddamn, I beat the ever loving fuck out of that person and don’t feel bad”.

              I’ve found most people aren’t as comfortable with committing violence as they are talking about it or empowering others to do it for them, so I’m not at all surprised we don’t have a lot of lone wolves murdering their MAGA neighbors, just packs of state sanctioned thugs called cops doing it on behalf of their handlers.

              Whatever we do, however we fight back, not one of us alive today is going to get to live in a decent world. We’re here to duke it out for the foundation of what kind of society our grandkids and great grandkids get to live in, and even then they’re going to have to work to preserve their version of it because hate, intolerance, greed, and entitlement always reinvent themselves.

      • Valmond@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        hace 5 horas

        Wasn’t the CNN just conducting a poll about the Iran invasion and around 100% of maga was for it, and like 35% of democrats too?

        Like insane numbers (am home w bad cold might write errors).

        • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          hace 5 horas

          The 100% of MAGA approving of the war is expected, as it’s absolutely a cult, but that 35% of Democrats is disturbing if it’s accurate.

          There are still people who vote democrat who are beholden to the military industrial complex, and they are infuriating. The Schumer voters of this country are every bit as awful as MAGA. The establishment Democrats in Congress are the reason this illegal war hasn’t been stopped yet.

          Still, this war has the lowest overall approval rating of any war in US history, which suggests there is a large divide between voters and their representatives.