Permieguy

Land area: I have 10 acres, but I'm restricting the experiment to my 2 acres of woodland. Branches: the only thing they don't eat is the wood itself - they always strip off all the leaves. So I am daily stacking the stripped branches in piles at the edge of the woodlot. Looks very natural, makes nice rabbit habitat and serves as a drying rack for tree hay.

It is hay made from tree leaves instead of from grass. Goats in particular much prefer to eat tree leaves over grass so the idea is to feed them tree prunings during the growing season, then tree hay in the winter. The making of tree hay was widespread all over Europe for thousands of years prior to Industrial Agriculture and has been best studied by Shana Hansen of Maine in this country. She has an excellent intro video here http://www.mainefarmlink.org/archives/2241 and refers to quite a few academic papers on the topic ... There is now a "Tree Hay" Facebook group (225 members so far) that includes some professional arborists and it's very interesting. The branches earmarked for hay are piled up on brush piles in the woods to dry, then either bound up tightly and stored or just left until time to feed them in the winter. I'm new to the practice, but my understanding is that goats can get most of their winter needs met from fallen dry leaves, supplemented with some "tree hay" left in piles in the woods. More on this later if you're interested.

Ok

In my case, 1.0 because I'm a pretty active guy ... But this is just a starting point for me while working out the details of the system. My goal is to create sustainable animal-based food systems that any able-bodied man could work at 2 hours per day with no special equipment and produce 10 to 12,000 food calories per day ... That is, plenty to feed his family. With special equipment, food calorie output could probably increase many fold with few additional man-hours.

I would disagree that we cannot destroy her. It is my opinion, for example, that the Sahara desert is largely man made. One reason I hold this (non-mainstream) view is because of Paul Ehrlich (1970) ... http://www.amazon.com/Population-Resources-Environment-Issues-Ecology/dp/0716706806/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1464189220&sr=8-2&keywords=paul+ehrlich+anne+ehrlich ... He reportedly wrote ... "the vast Sahara desert itself is largely man-made, the result of overgrazing, faulty irrigation, deforestation, perhaps combined with a shift in the course of a jet stream." Quoted here ... https://books.google.com/books?id=r8l-DMj3XTgC&pg=PA76&lpg=PA76&dq=sahara+desert+ehrlich&source=bl&ots=rmhfRlpuWE&sig=fybb7f8_7RMXeX6P45zD7fl5HEM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjpw82hwfXMAhVVSlIKHVO1ALIQ6AEIKDAC#v=onepage&q=sahara%20desert%20ehrlich&f=false ... I'm ordering Ehrlich's book today to examine his arguments. From my studies, it appears that TREES and TREED AREAS (woodland) is the last great refuge for mankind. We have one more chance in my opinion to get agriculture right ... or go extinct, along with many other species. I think our only hope is to "colonize woodland" with sustainable food production, then focusing on healing other land types - degrading cropland and pasture, for example.

Hi everyone ... I used to post at Talk Rational, but their database died and it appears it won't come back ... so ... I need a new home ... I am an Allan Savory disciple when it comes to environmental issues (see his TED Talk here https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_world_s_deserts_and_reverse_climate_change?language=en) I was an Air Force pilot with an Electrical Engineering degree (because I like electronic gadgetry), then was in business until about 2013 ... at that point I took a 6 month internship with Greg Judy, a world famous Holistic (Allan Savory) rancher in my home state of Missouri. Allan Savory disciples operate according to the following principle .... "Work WITH Nature, not against her." Allan is noted for observing how ecosystem health is enhanced by predators because the predators keep the large herbivores on the move and tightly bunched together which enhances the plant life. Many Holistic Ranchers all over the world are simulating the effect of predators with electric fencing and getting good results. I myself have decided to simulate predators with a movable pen containing dairy goats (inspired by Joel Salatin's movable chicken pens) because I hate fencing of any kind for lots of reasons. I have been operating this system for about 5 weeks now and it is working well. The goats are happy and fat and milk production has increased from about 1 gallon per day (both goats) to about 1.5 per day while at the same time gradually eliminating grain from their diet. I've always been told by goat people that if you cut out grain, their milk production will drop - but this appears to be nothing but an old wive's tale. I am feeding them entirely with tree leaves and brush which exists on my 2 acres of woodland. Mainly I am pruning the trees and feeding them the leaves which they love. I am a member of a "Tree Hay" Facebook Group which has 225 member now and is seeking to revive the old art of "Woodland Agriculture" which was widespread all over Europe prior to Industrial Agriculture. Anyway, I'm currently producing about 3000 food calories per day while enhancing my ecosystem in multiple ways. It won't be long before I'm producing perhaps double that number of calories and deriving 90% of my diet from my own food system which does not require any inputs from destructive Industrial Agriculture ... only requires a little bit of labor each day. I have plans for continuing to develop this "Woodland Agricultural System" to a high degree and I want to incorporate this type of agriculture into my first "Sustainable Woodland Subdivision" in my neighboring county (Johnson County, Missouri) as soon as I am able. I'm interested in discussion and feedback from scientists who also are interested in this sort of thing. I did a series of 5 mini Youtube videos to show my system ... here's the first one ...