ARCHIVE - Visualizing Ecology - Fatal Harvest Reader http://www2.evergreen.edu/visecofall/taxonomy/term/26/0 Please post your essay on environmental problems related to agriculture in this forum. en ARCHIVE - R.J. Jensen http://www2.evergreen.edu/visecofall/r-j-jensen-1 <p>R.J. Jensen    November 12, 2006Lucia Harrison Fatal Harvest Reader    Fatal Harvest Reader had a bunch of interesting essays that Andrew Kimbrell was trying to get the reader to think about the way most farming is destroying biodiversity and killing so many of the species that promote healthy soil and so much more.  Its so sad to me to think that they would try and erraticate an entire species by spraying pesticides that kill everything that you need to have good soil that doesn&#39;t get depleted as quickly.  Those pesticides will be carried through the water shed and will trickle through the boundaries by animals and insects that eat from the crop and as the essay Our Forgotten Pollinators says the predators that eat the pollinating insects will eventually be poisoned and the predators that eat them will eventually become poisoned and so on until it reaches humans.  In my opinion the fact that pesticides make the soil erode and carrie them with it is terrifying because some of them  don’t decompose and are always going to be their and will eventually find their way back to us.    The fact that we were able to see an organic farm was so intriguing to me because I have always seen my life headed that direction.  So for me to see an actual working organic farm and to get a general sense of how it works was amazing.  I have always been kind of interested in the techniques that are used for sustainable farming.  The way Helsing Junction alternated fields as a way to give the land a break and just let it go.  This is a great way to ensure biodiversity because it lets the natural things in the land rebuild, the way they were using clovers to put some of the nitrogen back in to the ground was ingenious to me because it would also promote a healthy equilibrium.  By this I mean that it would help allot of the macrobiotic soil dwelling critters that are harmed so easily by any type of pest control.  In the next essay Can Agriculture and Biodiversity Coexist by Catherine Badgley found “A global assessment of the status of modern species indicates that 11 percent of birds, 18 percent of mammals, 5 percent of fish, and 8 percent of plant species are facing extinction.” is terrifying to me that we as a species are waging war on nature when nature is what defines us as us.  She goes on to an approximation by E.O.</p> <p><a href="http://www2.evergreen.edu/visecofall/r-j-jensen-1">read more</a></p> http://www2.evergreen.edu/visecofall/r-j-jensen-1#comment Fatal Harvest Reader Sun, 12 Nov 2006 20:32:01 -0800 jenrob16 525 at http://www2.evergreen.edu/visecofall