Does permaculture truly involve corn for ethanol?

Question

On another forum, I had a discussion with someone about permaculture and, coming from a biodynamic viewpoint, I believed it was more about sustenance type farming. He said that it should be larger scale and went on to argue that corn for ethanol, with the ddgs being fed to feedlot and confinement dairy would be permaculture. I am especially interested in Garnet's take on this...

Answer 1

Use of vegetation to provide motor fuel is by nature going to remove  the carbon from the soil.

Well, there is a way to use plant life that does not. If we use a pyrolitic process to produce effectively wood gas, and then use the  charcoal as a soil amendment, it stays as active soil carbon for decades. But it does not support much soil life.

In warm climates, tossing vegetation back on the soil does not build up a carbon rich soil. So we can skip that process and go straight to pyrolisis.

It matters whether we are using corn or corn stover for  fuel. But the way it matters has to do with passing the corn through livestock, or eating it ourselves. Corn can extend alfalfa or soy into a lower protein diet, and add the extra calories our calorie deprived people so much need.  Put another way, when we become calorie deprived.

But as the Irish Potato Famine demonstrated, corn is not a good source for our main calorie needs. And corn is unlikely to become a major part of a permaculture, despite the success of corn in  some Aboriginal societies of America.

They  never attempted to make this the sole food source the way Irish did with potatoes. Corn had to be offset with pumpkin, squash, deer, rabbits, fish, nuts, fruits.

Just a point of concern about e-coli and beef eating corn: e-coli was essentially a moot point when I was a kid. What happened is the ecoli organism had its DNA spliced with a nasty virus, so that ecoli(157) contains serious toxins.

It would be worth while infecting some cattle on grass, deliberately, with e-coli(157) variants to confirm that they do not foster its growth. Does anyone know whether that test has ever been done? We know they grow in human gut.

Answer 2

it can, but not exclusively.  The important thing to consider when thinking permaculture is the the synergy of the farm.  Are you using one crop or livestock to support others on the farm?  If you  are using cows to make manure, digesting the manure and pulling off the methane, using the digested manure to improve soil to grow corn, and using the methane and corn to make the ethanol; then feeding the cows the beer mash, yes.  If not, then no.

Answer 3

Garnet says...."No way in heck!"

If everything lines up just perfect, all the stars, moons, sun, wind, rain, and insect predation, you will get 1.3 gallons of corn ethanol for every gallon of fuel used to grow the corn, and turn it into ethanol.  

However VERY often the stars are off kilter, and it uses MORE fuel to grow the corn and turn it into ethanol than it was able to produce.  I believe the more normal return on corn is 8/10ths of a gallon of corn ethanol for every gallon of fuel used to produce and turn it into corn ethanol.

Also as far as I'm concerened, corn should NEVER be fed to cattle, except to help capture cattle that escaped their pasture....that means about a coffee can full, for the whole herd of escapees.

The PH in a cattle's rumen (the cows stomachs) is normally a neutral PH.  Corn makes their rumen extremely acidic.  It shortens the lives of cattle, gives them a bad case of heartburn for life, and causes all sorts of health problems (destroys their liver).  This acidic enviroment is the PERFECT breeding ground for Ecoli...!!!

As we all know Ecoli has become a real problem in our meat supply, most especially hamburger.

If cattle are raised on nothing but grass, and hay, they have no Ecoli to speak of in their systems.  They are MUCH healthier cattle.  There would also be almost zero chance of ever infecting humans with Ecoli, because their wouldn't be any to accidentally contaminate the meat (especially hamburger).

There's a feed lot owner about four miles down the road from me.  He used the mountains of manure to spread and grow corn, for silage for the feedlot cattle, for their winter feed.

Mountains of manure, major stench in the summer, major flies in the summer, and still many, many tons more manure produced than he's able to use on his corn fields.  Feed lots, no matter how you look at it, are NOT a natural, or permaculture.

Farmer's could make an argument for just about any form of farming being permaculture.  A farmer could farm alfalfa for 5 years, which is a nitrogen fixer, then plant corn for a year (which uses a lot of nitrogen), then put it back in alfalfa for another 5 years.  

True permaculture mimics nature.  The animals deposit their manure on the pastures on which they live.  Farmers keep livestock moving (just like constantly moving herds of buffalo) so the grasses are not overgrazed, the soil not compacted, and manure build up is not too much.  It's awsome if something like chickens or turkeys can move into pastures after the hervibores are moved to the next pasture.  They scatter the manure, and eat the fly larva.

The livestock should be brought to the food in permaculture.  Not the food being brought to the livestock (exceptions for rabbits, and winter feeding of livestock).

Plants that help each other, should be grown together, in gardens (lots of good books on that subject).  Animals and plants that do well together (like chickens in orchards) should be together.

Permaculture is all about mimicing nature, and not damaging the land.  Any feedlot, almost all dairys, and the majority of mono crops...not good for the land, and certainly not mimicing nature.

~Garnet

Permaculture homesteading/farming over 20 years

To answer about Ecoli testing, at least one form of testing such as this (that I know about) has been done.  If they take the feed lot cattle off of the high corn diet, and feed them nothing but hay six days prior to slaughter, the Ecoli in their systems drops to nearly zero.  Just six days of hay...imagine that!