Scales of Ecology

This video is a good example of how living communities can actually change their local environment.

• farming water

• mimicking nature

• capture as much water as possible using as many methods as you can

• leveraging what you can grow (build an ecosystem) so that you can eventually grow what you want to grow - guide nature to grow what you need

  • • • grow plants that can retain moisture (prickly pear as water tank) or build soil organic matter to buffer against drought...saguaros kill their nurse trees

      • grow something that develops a canopy for shade and temperature control

      • grow quick nutrient accumulators if you need more micronutrients

• multiple plants working in harmony

A good look at farmers who are working along the margins of the Amazon rainforest.  This video deals with how to employ agroecological intensification to grow more food on the same amount of land.

• Ag land conversion is a major threat to the amazon

• Many farmers are worried about this environmental issue

• Using silvopasture to have trees, cattle, and grass work together to be more productive

• Trees and grasslands provide carbon offsets for cattle production

A really solid look at why diversity in a garden matters...and how plant interactions are happening.

• biodiversity = resilience

• annuals are great pioneering plants and filling the soil "battery"

• each plant attracts their own sets of microbes through their unique set of root exudates

• these exudates also contain signaling chemicals that "call" their microbes

• Root complementarity (part of niche complementarity)

• Carbon storage increases with diversity

• Quorum Sensing

• Allelopathy - annual ryegrass, 

• Interplanting - beets & tomatoes, green onions & lettuce, etc.

• Relay Cropping

• Cover Crops

• Living Pathways

• Vermicompost teas & extracts (microbial inoculant)

• Animals can be great...but it depends on context