This is a hot topic with a lot of opinions and sides accusing others of being wrong. I suggest we step back and look at the science, the biology. From there, I invite your critical thinking to make your own decision.

If we look at a food chain, when something eats something else, on average 10% of the energy of the food source is absorbed and becomes part of the predator. The other 90% is lost through metabolism, heat generation, activity, and other forms of energy use.

To look at this concept an easier way, say hypothetically we need an acre of food to survive, whether it be vegetable, meat or fish. If we had 10 acres of vegetables, you could feed 10 people. If you fed that same 10 acres of vegetables to cows, you could support one acre of cows as only 10% of the energy is conserved and only one person from that acre of cows. Because you have two links in the food chain with cows, 90% of the energy has been lost compared to a person directly eating the vegetable. That is generally why the more meat eaters we support, the less people we can feed on earth.

Now let’s apply this to the farmed salmon phenomenon. I was in Peru a few years back working on some dolphin research. Peru happens to exhibit a natural upwelling system, one of three places in the world where deep nutrient cold water is continually brought to the surface making the waters incredibly productive. The Peruvian Anchovy is a small fish close to the bottom of the food chain that is the great benefactor of these waters, proliferating in huge numbers. Going along the coast, I saw countless fish factories processing these Anchovies. Processing the Anchovy into fish meal, it is then exported mostly to China, Germany and Canada among others where it is fed to farm Salmon.

Paracas, Peru. Part of the vast fleet in port before going out to fish for Anchovy, a stock that is on the decline in recent years

So what we ultimately have is a public resource the Anchovy, that is used to privatize a resource of Salmon and in the process we lose 90% of the energy.

To me, even if we correct the problems of using invasive Atlantic salmon on the west coast of Canada, decreasing wild salmon susceptibility to getting farmed salmon sea lice, and cleaning up the dead zones around these farms, the fundamental process of feeding one fish to another to privatize the resource is fundamentally flawed.

So what can we do as consumers? There is a natural flow of energy up the food chain and wild salmon will do their best to survive and often in great numbers. This allows us to take a certain amount of wild salmon out of the system each year. So eat wild salmon, but maybe eat it less often and when you do, enjoy it for the very special treat it is. We can focus on eating closer to the bottom of the food chain. Discover the Anchovy and other smaller fish like Herring. They actually have less heavy metals and are better for you! Finally, eat vegetables! They are good for you, tasty, and about as close to the bottom of a food chain as one can get. The more vegetables we eat, the more other people will have a chance to eat.

An ecological engineer is defined by an introduced organism into a new environment willingly or unwillingly, that then changes the environment in some fundamental way. A good example is a beaver. When beavers are introduced into new environments, they radically change their surroundings by cutting down trees and building dams.

Spending this past summer on the west coast of Vancouver Island, I started to notice massive amounts of logs distributed along Long Beach and many other beaches. I mentioned to a friend I was walking the beach with one day how these log ridden beaches looked to be a byproduct of the timber industry and the wonder of how these logs were changing the beach environment. At first he disagreed stating these beaches had always had logs, but the more logs we saw with clear cuts and no roots, the clearer it became. Most of these logs have been lost during their shipping sometimes as log booms break up and then are washed ashore.  What would these beaches look like before the timber industry?

A beach changed by the logging industry

It is also certain that of all the creatures on earth, humans are changing the environment far more radically than any other creature. There is a series of new shows out called Python hunters and Hog hunters. These shows are based on hunting down invasive species that are now overwhelming sensitive environments. It looks as if our mistakes and attempts to correct them by the eradication of these animals have suddenly created a source of entertainment.

Beyond stating the obvious, what is the point of understanding ecological engineering? I think it is important that we be aware of our shifting environment and the fundamental causes as the world continues to change. Perhaps as we walk into new environments, we should ask ourselves more often than not, has this area changed and if so, how? Is the environment healthier for the change or not? And how will my intensions and actions further influence the system. By becoming more aware of our surroundings, we will together be more prone to see the change happen, weigh the outcome, and act accordingly. For now, I’m waiting for the day when there is a show about the Lion Fish hunters of the Caribbean.

At the end of a season, one is able to look back at it all and gain perspective, perhaps some insight, an objective position. It was not the ideal summer for me to start a garden. I moved to three different houses over the course of the growing season trying to start a garden at each one. Then again, is there ever a perfect time? Is there such thing as a perfect spot? I don’t think so. You have to put aside time to make it happen and try to do it wherever life finds you. The garden project is one of the many key components to the larger question of sustainability and finding a way to live a sustainable life style. This transition to a less dependent and more resilient lifestyle is so crucial for humanities very survival; the argument is there to start a garden somewhere, anywhere.

I came across this bathtub with nothing in it, so i planted Peas, cilantro, and chives

Over the course of the summer, there are three fundamental points that I have observed. The first thing I learned was to plant early and plant often. It distributes your yield over a larger period and spreads risk of any intense weather or unforeseen happenings. Next, sprouting seeds indoors that are destined for the great outdoors never really worked for me. The vegetables were always shocked by the change so unless you have a hardy root like carrots and radish, or it is going into a green house, don’t waste your time. One would be better off using that time to till and prepare the soil for the upcoming season so that when the time does come to plant, your crop will grow rapidly. Finally, a garden does not need a lot of attention but it does need small amounts of attention often. If you can spend just five minutes every day in your garden, the success will be far greater than spending a whole day once every two weeks.

These peas plants produced around 200 pea pods. Tasty right off the vine.

All in all, it was a great success through my eyes. There are two homes that I no longer consider my own that are benefiting from seeds I sowed early on. Their need for commercial products has been reduced. Only small steps, but steps none the less. I found out that radish is incredibly easy to grow and that carrots can indeed grow to just the size of a thumbnail.  Peas are a new favorite food and there can be such as a thing as having too much cilantro. It is a learning process and a fun and rewarding one at that. Vegetables have never tasted fresher than when you sow them, watch them grow, and pick them fresh. Although it was a small beginning, a beginning none the less and perhaps one of the greatest side products of my efforts was seen in others around me taking to the soil and joining in. I will write more about that later. That is enough said regarding the growing project for this summer, until next spring.

When you start to really look for food, it can be found all around, especially when it comes to the coastal temperate rainforest. I was out walking beneath an old growth canopy the other day when I stumbled onto some mushrooms that I thought looked like Chanterelles or Cantharellus cibarius. I picked one, along with the substrate it was growing out of to take it home and try to identify it. Many people are often scared by mushrooms thinking they will be poisonous. But with a little research online and some know how, these can become some delicate treats to add to the list of the foraging forest wanderer. To identify fungi, the substrate is often important so make a note of what you found the mushroom growing on. The color, odor, and way the gills are formed are also important. If you have a piece of white paper, you can take a spore print as well.

Walking along a path I saw these mushrooms growing... food all around

On this occasion, I found out that these mushrooms were in fact chanterelles although the jack-o’-lantern mushroom Omphalotus olearius which is considered poisonous is sometimes confused. This poisonous mushroom has unique characteristics though and can be distinguished if one takes the proper time. I found this site helpful for mushrooms growing on the west coast of North America http://www.mykoweb.com.  

By cutting mushrooms, ones leaves the mycelium to regenerate in following years

I also learned that when you harvest a mushroom, you should cut them at the base of the stalk rather than pick them, helping to promote regenerative growth in following seasons. It is also a good idea to shake the cap, or lightly tap them to help release the spores aiding in promoting the mushrooms return. Happy foraging!

Cut and ready to add to the garden greens, the berries, the food that grows all around

 

 

 

I initially came to the west coast of Vancouver Island in the spring of 2008 to finish my degree at the Bamfield Marine Science Centre. I spent the summer studying the natural world around me and when I wasn’t working or studying, I spent a lot of my time in the forest exploring, watching, and listening.

Looking under leaves, these tasty berries can be hidden from view.

The Coastal Temperate Rainforest exhibits a unique ecosystem that has matured over thousands of years. Some of the most complicated old growth forests can be found here on the west coast. Besides the mosses, birds, and insects, it was the berries that grabbed my attention the most. Colorful, delicate, sweet and sour, they were ripe for the picking. At first it was the salmon berry ranging in color from yellow to red and tasting of a very bitter-sweet experience. Then the blue berries and red huckleberries were suddenly in bloom. They were my favorite, the perfect sweet and the perfect sour respectively in my mind. As the summer grew on, salal berries ripened, followed by thimble berries and finally the season ended with the notoriously famous black berry. Beyond enjoying the multitude of flavors, I noticed that the species themselves seemed to have the entire summer partitioned into different times for fruiting bodies to ripen allowing each berry a moment to shine. It seems logical to spread out a blooming season over the whole summer and not hammer scavengers or (seed spreaders) with a single month or two to consume all berry types.

The path leads on

My fascination is how this trait or communication has developed over time and over species. Plants typically have the ability to communicate with themselves and each other through root systems and hormonal changes in the apical meristem or “growth tip.” To get a better idea of how plants communicate, one might be interested in a TED talk by Stefano Mancuso http://www.ted.com/talks/stefano_mancuso_the_roots_of_plant_intelligence.html.

Perhaps when the fruit is plucked, a hormone is released letting the plant know the berry is no longer there, meaning it was successfully eaten. If this information is feed-back over many generations, it could cause the berries to pinpoint an opportune time to ripen, a time when others do not. This is of course just a theory but it supports the theory of Darwinism and competition. There are always other factors to consider and a theory remains just that until tested and proven. For now, being back on the coast I find myself in the month of the Salal and Thimble berries and it is time to go forage in the Coastal Temperate Rainforest.

The simple act of gardening is an expression by the individual towards self-sufficiency and a sustainable lifestyle. Our understanding of sustainability continually evolves to this day, but maintains fundamental roots in a maintained closed energy loop. A food web in nature describes a sustainable system for the simple fact that there is a closed loop from growth, to predation and decay, and finally back to growth again.

It is in our human actions that we have developed a linear consumptive system which has broken the loop and put us on the path towards an overall non-sustainable system. So how can we keep moving towards a closed loop regarding our food production? Well there’re many answers to this question and when that is the case, I like to begin with the simple ones that I myself have control over.

One beginning step that I have found to be incredibly important, easy, and gratifying is to start one’s own compost. It is affordable, economical, fun, and I’m going to show you how to build one.

all I had to buy was the chicken wire, hinges and handle

What you’ll need:

4 pallets

4 meters of chicken wire

2 hinges

Screws and either staples or short wide flat head nails

Plastic covering or a thin board for a top

I have found pallets to be extremely effective. They allow for air to flow into the compost causing the organic material to break down within a few weeks while preventing odor from building up. If you go to your local grocery or hardware store you can often pick them up for free. You’ll want four and because some pallets have seen better days, try to find four that have the same dimensions, are sturdy, and void of rusty outcropping nails.

Choose where to build your compost. Compost breaks down best when it is moist. Not dry, not wet, but moist. So if you live in a dry climate, shade might be the best bet. If you live in a wet climate like it is here in the Coastal Temperate Rainforest, than sunny spots are great.

Getting it done one step at a time

Dig the four pallets about half a foot into the ground arranged in a box.  Screw them together at the corners. Line the outside with chicken wire and either staple it to the pallets or use the short flat head nails to pin it in place. Fill in the dirt around the base. The chicken wire should line up with the top of the pallets and hopefully extend a few inches into the soil.

All we need now is a lid.

Put your covering over top of the compost and either use screws to attach your lid or string to hold down your plastic covering. This will help maintain the microclimate and prevent animals from getting in.

Finished, one has reduced their trash output significantly by keeping all their organic waste within a closed loop and created fertilizer to be used in the garden within a few weeks. They don’t call it “Black gold” for nothing.

Use these with any lid to allow for easy opening and closing.

The growth in our knowledge regarding sustainability lies in our realization that a sustainable loop does not only allow us the ability to maintain an action in perpetuity, but that sustainable actions results in more efficient practices, which translates into fewer materials with smaller energy inputs. This results in greater economic gains and healthy lifestyles over the LONG TERM.

Hope it helps. Would be great to hear some feedback or see some pictures of your finished compost! Happy gardening all.

The saying is classic, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” When we devote our full attention to a single effort, especially one that is subject to the elements, we stack the chips of risk. Risk is inherent in life and exists at every turn with every decision we make. There is no avoiding it, but why not manage that risk if the opportunity presents itself. Here was my first crop for the spring, finally transplanted into the garden in mid-April on a beautiful sunny day.

Finally have the soil turned and sprouts in the ground

Here is the day after…

...and there goes the new seedlings

The lesson is a good one and simple one when it comes to gardening. “Plant often.” Most of the garden has died, not suited for a second day in a full hail storm. By planting all my cucumber together, they all suffered the same fate…along with the chard, arugula, carrots, and pumpkins. If I had spread out the sprouting of all these vegetables over time, my available window of vegetables reaching maturity would have been longer. It also allows for these crops to ripen at different times allowing for a continual flow of produce over the summer rather than a single day’s harvest yielding a bucket full of cucumbers. This method seems to contrast a farmer’s effort to bring large amounts of produce to market. It is a simple observation from a first time over zealous gardener. Luckily, I sprouted many seedlings and did not have space for all of them when I first transplanted so I was able to replace what went under in the hail storm.

On a side note, crops I have directly sowed as seed seem to be doing much better than those that were transplanted after sprouting inside. The act of transplanting itself could hinder the growth as roots have to re-establish and sprouts have to readjust to a harsher outdoor climate.

A pumpkins first days

“Rise up this morning smiled with the rising sun three little birds pitch by my door step singing sweet songs of melodies pure and true saying, this is my message to you:”(Bob Marley and the Whailers)

Sitting on my doorstep reading a book and enjoying a cup of coffee, an American robin (Turdus migratorius) runs up to me. It pauses with its head up as if looking at me, then darts 3 feet to the left into the grass and pulls a worm from the ground. It rises up again tall, head raised high…. Pause, darts once more a foot away and pulls up another worm. I am now intently watching this productive little bird go… I watch it pause. It doesn’t move a muscle. I can’t see the pupils move, but I know this robin’s eyes are scanning the grass with a focused attention for the slightest of movements. Robins can see a greater variety of colors and further distance in comparison to our own vision. The robin tweaks its head slightly as if to confirm another worm’s presence before shooting over to pluck it from the earth. The red breasted bird then scampers a few paces before taking to the sky knowing the hunting grounds have been thoroughly checked. Just like that; three worms in 20 seconds and breakfast has been served.

the Coastal Temperate Rainforest is a world of Fungi

If you’ve been hiking or backpacking before with a time frame of three hours than you know the term.

Swamp Lantern or Skunk Cabbage

Here is a glimpse at a short mission up Lone Cone (2,434 ft) on Meares Island outside Tofino BC.

Tofino can be seen in the foreground on the left

Sprouting seeds is by far my favorite part of the whole garden project so far. The variety of seed shapes and size is fascinating ranging from large pumpkin seeds we all know so well to others like the cucumber seed, being only a few millimeters long.

To start off our vegetable garden, Tony and I went to the local garden store here in Tofino to buy some sprouting trays, a bag of potting soil, and a Ph soil tester. My biggest worry is that our soil Ph will be too low or high which would require us to modify the soil or buy a lot of potting soil. For any garden, determining the Ph should be taken into consideration when choosing the site and is a key place to start so that one may know exactly what they are dealing with when starting a garden.

Our soil looks to have a Ph of 6.5

From what I’ve found, most crops will grow between a Ph of 5.5 and 7.5, so we’re aiming for almost neutral soil with a Ph of 7. There are a number of things one can do to make the soil more acidic or basic, but it takes time. One can add Lime to raise the Ph or sulfur to reduce it if done some months prior to planting. In my opinion, these are both fairly evasive options that require a specific treatment of synthesized compounds. Compost on the other hand acts as a natural buffer, keeping the Ph from fluctuating too far in either direction. We all generate compost naturally, so it only makes sense to focus our efforts on building a compost bin and using it. Compost can break down in as little as three weeks if done correctly.

We’re still trying to have a garden on a budget so I will build the compost out of pallets and I’ll discuss how to do that later. Our cost to date is as follows The Ph test: $10, A bag of sprouting soil: $10, potting trays: $7. I have gotten all my seed from working with The Land Conservancy at my previous job, but most places will sell a pack of seeds for 2.99 or 3.99 depending on what you’re looking to buy. That puts our garden at 27 dollars so far which I find very reasonable.

Always more fun with friends

After transplanting these early spring crops, I hope to start sprouting others suited for late April and early May.

one week on