I'm reading a really fascinating book called "The Omnivore's Dilemma". It traces 3 different sorts of meals. One through the regular agro-industry, another organic meal and the third is a forager's meal.

In the first part of the book they talk about corn and how most of us have more corn carbon isotopes than any other plant. How's that? You don't eat much corn? Oh, but you do! By proxy of eating meat.

I'm just in the first part of the book and he explains how corn is grown today and what happened to make corn prices so incredibly low, yet farmers respond by growing more corn than ever. Has to do with how we guarantee farmers a certain price per bushel, which was a scheme that replaced one where farmers were paid to idle their fields, by the Nixon administration (Earl Butz... LOL!).

But it explains why when people talk about ethanol they usually talk about corn. Why? Because the US has an obscene overproduction of corn. Although corn is one of the most petroleum hungry crops out there. Kind of ironic.

Corn? Petroleum hungry? Huh?

Well, you see... we manufacture fertiizer out of petroleum. Used to be agriculture was fueled by the sun. Not really anymore.

Anyway, good book. I've heard it exclaimed in a lot of circles and now I know why!

Corn? Petroleum hungry? Huh?

Well, you see... we manufacture fertiizer out of petroleum.
Do you know if it's only byproducts of the the refinement process that are used or does it's use in fertilizer compete with its use as fuel? If it's the former, is that a bad thing?

Do you know if it's only byproducts of the the refinement process that are used or does it's use in fertilizer compete with its use as fuel? If it's the former, is that a bad thing?
I don't know! I suppose we should look that up.

They did mention the guy that invented the process of extracting nitrogen from oil... he was a very very bad man. :(

Oh, I forgot to mention why I called us "corn chips". The book says that Mexicans call themselves "Walking Corn" because they eat so much of it, but we actually have more corn isotopes in us than they do. So we should be called "Walking Corn Chips".

And he also makes the silly assertion that Corn domesticated man. But I think he was doing it to prove a point, corn is the MOST succesful plant on earth and it can't even propagate itself very well without human intervention. :p

Ok, when I looked it gave a technical description of mixing this thing with that thing, but didn't mention where those things came from. Then I saw something that said it was made from natural gas, lots of other things saying it was made from petroleum. Having a hard time with this one. Too much to do. You look!

Oh yeah, it also says they make herbicides from petroleum too. I think it was slightly more of a gallon of oil to grow a bushel (or was it an acre?) of corn.

Having a hard time with this one. Too much to do. You look!
I did some googling before I asked and I didn't come up with anything. I was kinda hoping that Thicket might chime in -- if anyone here would know it would be him.

So we should be called "Walking Corn Chips".
I always liked "long pig" (the term, that is). It's appropriate in so many ways. :)

Yeah, I like that one too. Except we feed the pigs corn, so we're really walking pig flavored corn chips. :p

I thought about buying that book but some of the reviews said it was flawed. I wasn't sure if it was worth it.

I hope it's not just about Americans and their corn obsession, I'm already quite familiar with that. I think I'm one of the only Americans who only eats corn in the form of whole, organic, non-GMO corn.

Do you know where that review is? I'd like to read it and compare.

Some of the customer reviews on Amazon, I think.

I read those. Mostly they were glowing reviews. I went through all the reviews less than 4 stars. The only ones that weren't thought he was a too squishy on the last chapter, could have been much more concise, vegetarians who disagreed with his decision to remain a meat-eater, one low-carber who thought he regurgitated a lot of the usual USDA programming about grains, or else were farmers who thought that he should have used a different style of farm for his research, and one review was that they found a lot of typos (I haven't noticed any so far, not that I'm good at spotting them).

But I didn't see anything about accuracy, other than the typos.

One disappointment is that Cargil and ADM, who process 30% of all grain, wouldn't be interviewed or allow him to follow his representation bushel of corn into their processing plants. They must be throwing in dead babies or something. :p It is interesting to note that Cargil and ADM are the chief recipients of having everyone prop up the price on corn.

And now for something completely different. .

/minor derail

Friend Corn Chips.. the title of this thread reminded me of Friend Bat, a nearly semi-famous comedy bit on a favourite British online comic of mine.

http://www.scarygoround.com/?date=20061128

ight not be for some people, as it is definitely British in humour.

And I put in the u's where appropriate in this post :)

Anyways.. just a random late night (early morning? ) thought.

Well, I agree with one criticism of this book, it is pretty freaking redundant at times! Geez, spit it out man.

One thing I read last night... you know the box of cereal you paid about $4.00 for? Well, it contains about 4 cents of grain. :p

The title reminds me of Simon and Garfunkel.

Hello Corn Chips, my old friend...
I've come to dip you in salsa once again...

Ok, last night I read that in a typical McDonalds meal, under mass spectrometry by carbon how much of it comes from corn?

Soda: 100% (HFCS)
ilk Shake: 78% (Milk produced from cows fed corn and HFCS)
Salad Dressing: 65% (More HFCS)
Chicken Nuggets: 56% (corn fed chicken)
Cheeseburger: 52% (corn fed beef)
French Fries: 23% (cron oil?)

The chicken nuggets have some really odd ingredients like: TBHQ, an antioxidant derived from petroleum that is a form of butane. Dimethylpolysiloxene (suspected carcinogen, establish mutagen, tumorigen and reproductive effector... in addition to being flammable).

I pity you if that's your "typical" meal. Corn is the least of your problems. <img src=http://lag9.com/biggrin.gif>

Good grief, I don't eat that. I'm merely retelling the book.

The point of the first "meal" in the book is the industrial food complex and how awful it is on many levels. It is petroleum hungry. It is bankrupting farmers. It is lots of businesses trying to think of ways to get people to eat more calories (because otherwise your growth is flat and wall street doesn't like that) and it is horribly polluting. We've taken the cycle of sunlight -> plants -> herbivores -> fertilizers -> plants and it is now artificial fertilizers -> one type of plant -> herbivores. The excess fertilizer (which farmers feel they must use) and go into the ocean cause huge spots of hypoxia and fish kill-off, then the manure lakes from the feed lots, the run off of antibiotics and the new breeds of much worse e. coli.

Now the 2nd meal is "pastoral". Where a farmer grows native grasses, lets the cows feed in rotation on the grasses, then he rotates in chickens to feed on what the cows leave behind and they distribute the cow poop by feeding on grubs and what not and contribute their own nitrogen rich products. Very sustainable agriculture that doesn't deplete the soil, allows the soil to recuperate. A completely closed system except for some of the chicken feed.

Now the 2nd meal is "pastoral". Where a farmer grows native grasses, lets the cows feed in rotation on the grasses, then he rotates in chickens to feed on what the cows leave behind and they distribute the cow poop by feeding on grubs and what not and contribute their own nitrogen rich products. Very sustainable agriculture that doesn't deplete the soil, allows the soil to recuperate. A completely closed system except for some of the chicken feed.

As to the chicken feed, if the farmer has any extra land, why not grow corn? Don't chickens eat corn? You could get two oxen with a yoke, and pull some muscle powered tillers across the corn field to plow it, to sow the seeds, and harvest it once it's ripe, so you avoid using oil to harvest it.

Heck, just everybody live like this group (http://www.800padutch.com/amish.shtml), and US petroleum dependency instantly over :)


(Incidentally, after reading that site, I learned that Amish population has tripled over the time people thought to start monitoring their reproductive rates. I have no idea how the surveyors measure that.)

Now the 2nd meal is "pastoral". Where a farmer grows native grasses, lets the cows feed in rotation on the grasses, then he rotates in chickens to feed on what the cows leave behind and they distribute the cow poop by feeding on grubs and what not and contribute their own nitrogen rich products. Very sustainable agriculture that doesn't deplete the soil, allows the soil to recuperate. A completely closed system except for some of the chicken feed.Does the book also explain how environmentally costly (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_benefits_of_Vegetarianism) meat production is?

To produce one kilogram of meat (http://www.thevegetariansite.com/env_animalfarming.htm), you need 3000L of water, about 100x the amount it takes to produce one kilo of wheat. In the United States, livestock account for 20% of all emissions of methane, an extremely potent greenhouse gas. Half of all energy used in agriculture goes toward producing meat. It takes 6.9kg of corn and soy to produce 1kg of pork.

Your sustainable models only solves a small number of very large environmental issues. And, it could never exist and prove for the extraordinarily high meat demands of the U.S.; it would be too expensive and require too many resources as opposed to the present (morally and environmentally appalling) system.

Basically, the more meat-oriented the culture, the more environmentally destructive it is. And it shouldn't surprise you that Americans are on top here.

As to the chicken feed, if the farmer has any extra land, why not grow corn? Don't chickens eat corn? You could get two oxen with a yoke, and pull some muscle powered tillers across the corn field to plow it, to sow the seeds, and harvest it once it's ripe, so you avoid using oil to harvest it.
He's trying to farm sustainably and productively. He's pretty much the poster child for farming with those goals.
http://www.polyfacefarms.com/
New York Times - An article about Joel Salatin titled "High Priest of the Pasture" written by Todd S. Purdum and published in the New York Style Magazine on May 1, 2005. (registration required)

Smithsonian Magazine - An article named "Down on This Farm the Times They are A-Changin'" from the July 2000 issue of the Smithsonian Magazine.

National Public Radio - A radio interview for the program "On Point" which aired on NPR on May 4, 2005.

other Earth News - "Making Better Bacon" by Megan Phelps appeared in the April/May 2004 issue of Mother Earth News.

The New Farm - "Pig-Powered Compositing" by Christopher Shirley appeared in the September/Ocober 1994 issue of The New Farm.

National Public Radio - A radio interview for the program "Living on Earth" which aired on NPR on August 21, 1998.

Staunton News Leader - Event held at Polyface Farm for Virginia Gubernatorial candidate.