Feb 8 375v Boje notes
Feb 8 Kötke 3 Soil: The Basis of Life 4 The Forest BA 550: Chap 3 Social Groups or
Illich's Tools for Conviviality (any chapter) Boje lecture where your money goes?
The SPICE business And Why I don't think donating food and clothing is an act of
sustainability From here on out Teams will coordinate to design the two canvas
questions: one on topic, and one personal living story to implement sustainability
NOTE: 375 Team 2 550 Team 2 - Conduct focus groups with entire class and
discuss
Kötke 3 Soil: The Basis of Life
Quantum storytelling flows from the microbes, the worms, to the elephants and
humans in the web of organic energy flows. Everything in the material world is
energy, food, and everything is excrement, manure, dung. The flow of quantum
energy comes from the Sun, is consumed by plant, an in a succession of energy
transformation called food chain. These energy transformations matter and have
nothing to do with eating one another and each other. The wiggly red worms create
soil from garbage that generates nutrient soil for plants and fungi that neither could
absorb directly. Wiggly red worms contribute to the smooth functioning of the
whole. Composting is therefore the basis of life, to create living soil.
The earthworms do not need to be taught what they are, and what they are to do, it
is simply their nature to be. We would all starve without them, without their organic
function and identity and role in the web of life, their location within the web of
living energies. Earthworm excrement helps create humus of the soil. Humus is
defined as the organic component of soil, formed by the decomposition of leaves,
paper, fruits, veggies, and other plant material by soil microorganisms. This makes
our New Mexico desert into a living oasis.
PRINCIPLE: there can be no constructive, without destructive.
To construct soil, the earthworm must be destructive to the waste, or there is no
continuance of the human and many other species. The ignorant human destroys in
a stupid way, puts the waste in landfill, does not compost, does not care for the
lowly earthworm, and this is why Kötke says humans are psychotic in their wanton
destruction.
If humans intend to sustain then they must teach their children the organic energy
rights of the earthworm. They are the true functional being in the complexity of the
web of life.
There are 9,000 species of earthworm, and it has as a nervous system with an
anterior nerve ring, ganglia and a ventral nerve chord. Earthworm has a true closed
circulatory system and no true respiratory organs. It makes soil for planetary life. It
gets in the rock chips, clay, sand, minerals of the desert and takes care of organic
detritus.
Detritus is defined as waste or debris of any kind. Our Las Cruces waste bins and
even our streets are filled with rubble and detritus (rubbish, fuse, scrap, waste, and
so on).
The earthworm works hard to make the soil healthy.
“Soil is the gut of the earth, the principal digestive organ of planetary life” (p. 26).
Soil and earthworms are part of an interdependent living community of microorganisms, insects, small animals, reptiles birds, and so on that contribute to and fee
of the soil. Soil, this gut, feeds the humans, including the vegetative and animal
community that eat the nutrients of the plants in the soil moisture, and this is the
result of many energy transformations in the creation of soil, taking infertile subsoil
of our Las Cruces clay, sand, and rock and turning it into living soil, and these
earthworms are the decomposers taking raw organic material and even paper
scraps and turning it into micro-organisms, making micro tunnels these earthworm
passageways let water and oxygen enter to soil community.
“Earthworms have been called ‘ecosystem engineers’”.
When you use earthworms to decompose the New Mexico vegetable and fruit
garbage, you are engaged in energy transformations to create living soil, a way to
uncompact earth, to allow moisture and minerals to mix, for microbes to live in the
soil, for them to reach stems on the surface.
Combine earthworm decomposition with Permaculture and you have a way to bring
life back to New Mexico soil. Earth passageways are important to infiltration of
water and oxygen, and when you do earthworm compost work, then the diversity
and richness of the desert habitat increases.
“Once land was cleared for production agriculture, native earthworms quickly
disappeared. Unless non-native species of the lumbricid family were introduced to
the area, earthworms were absent for periods of time. Scientists have been able to
investigate the effects of introducing earthworms to pastoral lands and quantify the
benefits they provide.”1
http://sciencelearn.org.nz/Science-Stories/Earthworms/Earthworms-role-in-theecosystem
1
“ Different types of earthworms can make both horizontal and vertical burrows,
some of which can be very deep in soils. These burrows create pores through which
oxygen and water can enter and carbon dioxide can leave the soil.Earthworm casts
(their feces) are also very important in soils and are responsible for some of the fine
crumb structure of soils... Earthworms play an important role in breaking down
dead organic matter in a process known as decomposition… Earthworms are also
responsible for mixing soil layers and incorporating organic matter into the soil.
Charles Darwin referred to earthworms as ‘nature’s ploughs’ because of this mixing
of soil and organic matter. This mixing improves the fertility of the soil by allowing
the organic matter to be dispersed through the soil and the nutrients held in it to
become available to bacteria, fungi and plants.”2
“In 1881, he (Darwin) wrote in The Formation of Vegetable Mould, “It may be
doubted whether there are many other animals which have played so important a
part in the history of the world, as have these lowly organized creatures.” Darwin, of
course, was referring to earthworms… earthworms provide these ecosystem
services to humans:
 Increasing pastoral productivity: Once lumbricid earthworms become
established, pastoral productivity increases by 25–30%. This is equivalent to
2.5 stock units per hectare. Earthworms remove the surface thatch material
that can block water from entering the soil, as the thatch can cause it (and
soluble nutrients) to run off.
 Facilitating and accelerating mine restoration: By increasing soil fertility,
recycling waste products and providing food resources for predators,
earthworms help to restore functioning ecosystems both above and below
the ground.”3
From Penn State -- Soil pH
http://www.earthwormsoc.org.uk/earthworm-information/earthworminformation-page-3
3 http://sciencelearn.org.nz/Science-Stories/Earthworms/Earthworms-role-in-theecosystem
2
“Soil passed through the gut of earthworms has a neutral pH. This is probably due to
the pH buffering action of organic molecules produced in the gut of worms.”4
Until a few years ago, agribusiness believed earthworms were unimportant, so they
just use petrochemicals to treat the land. The land died, and now agribusiness is
paying new attention to the role of earth worm in reengineering the soil, working
the soil, excreting nutrients, letting the fungi grow, tunneling water and air
passages, mixing the organic and inorganic matter.
New Mexico has experienced soil exhaustion, soil compaction, soil erosion, soil
abuse, and soil collapse. The soil is not healthy. Desertification is a reality in Las
Cruces. It is flagrant, and it’s the fault of humans, govern bureaucrats, bankers, and
we can change that by paying attention to the work of earthworms. The earthworm
can help the soil to breathe, to regenerate, to come back to life. New Mexico can once
again support luscious biological plant life, and your composting can help.
http://extension.psu.edu/plants/crops/soil-management/soilquality/earthworms
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Source: Extension PSU.