Sheriffs of Nothingham

Taking liberties with the law (for instance growing your own weed or raising unpermitted chickens) could get you in a heap of trouble. Police forces throughout the country are increasingly resorting to an obscure fundraising mechanism known, mainly within the war on drugs, as civil asset forfeiture.

It is a sign of the trust that we place in our police and judicial system that we allow them to take lives and property in the performance of their mission. We trust that law enforcement will not kill or injure without being able to defend their actions. We trust that they will not steal from law-abiding citizens with wealth transfer as a secondary motive. In civil asset forfeiture laws (civil asset seizure would sound too much like a violation of the 4th Amendment), the standard of defense for the police is much lower than for killing a suspected criminal, as it should be.

Still being sorted out is the matter of how much evidence of criminal behavior is required to seize assets. Maryland's laws are among the most liberal on this score and becoming more so, with the recent override of Governor Hogan's 2015 veto that would have continued to allow petty (under $300) seizures and proposed legislation that would require criminal conviction prior to forfeiture.

I, personally, think Maryland's implementation of civil asset forfeiture has been relatively just and don't think that we need to convict people before seizing assets reasonably deemed to be connected with major crimes. However, other laws should be scrutinized in view of the possibility that a violation could lead to brutal deprivation of essential goods. For example, a greenhouse that one uses for sustenance could be seized if it contains a few marijuana plants. Chicken coops could be seized if their occupants aren't allowed by zoning regulations. No trial required, just a judicial hearing. This is the kind of thing that could happen when Judge Judy or one of her wannabes reigns on the bench. You're either right or wrong, and if you're wrong, God help you.

I anticipate that the breakdown of the rule of law following the collapse of national commerce will cause law enforcement to do whatever is necessary to sustain their power, including civil asset forfeiture as their main funding mechanism. When we begin to see acronyms widely tossed around like CAF (civil asset forfeiture) and EJK (extra-judicial killings) as euphemisms for theft and murder by the ones entrusted with our protection, it will be too late to ask if we've lost control of the police (not to mention private security goons).

Aquaponyx

Listen to the arguments for vegetarianism and it won't take you long to be convinced that it is a morally superior choice over the typical American diet. I would like to at least stop eating animals raised in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Chickens may be future residents of our homestead, but it may be easier to avoid the complications of homeowner's association rules by setting up an aquaponics operation for obtaining our animal protein. I guess you could call aquaponics a form of CAFO, but I'm not ready yet to concede that fish deserve the same privileges as mammals or birds, especially as Jesus himself was at least an accessory to the consumption of net loads of fish.

+Jonathan Bates, of Paradise Lot fame, gave a presentation at a U.S. Biochar Initiative symposium that I attended explaining how he substituted biochar as the growing medium in his aquaponics system. There, as in a chicken pen, biochar could help grow edible plants and serve as grit for the crops (gizzards) that both fishes' and chickens' digestive systems rely upon.

The first step for us will be a greenhouse, which will require HOA approval, but the aquaponics system inside is not burdened with any regulations, to my knowledge. Bates touts the book, Aquaponic Gardening, in his USBI talk, hoping that the next edition includes information about biochar. In any case, I have biochar in abundance to apply to aquaponics. Bates' talk shows that the bigger chunks are preferred. I will want to charge it first, with fish fertilizer or some other nitrate-dense inoculant, in order to support plant growth.

My guess is that the aquaponics system, i.e. the tank(s), pumps, and connections, will cost less than the chicken farming infrastructure and it will probably yield more food. Sometimes, playing by the rules opens your eyes to better solutions, while keeping you in good stead with the community.

Accelerating Eden

Biochar will accelerate formation of topsoil, but ten years is a long time to wait. In my ignorance, five years ago I set up two garden beds using the native loamy sand that remained after our property addition was leveled. The results were so meager that forest vermin weren't even stopping by for lunch. The next few years were progressively more productive after successive additions of compost and biochar enriched the channery soil. Last year, I decided to expand with a new bed by using a method known as lasagna gardening. Also known as sheet mulching, lasagna gardening entails putting down layer after layer of organic matter on top of a poor growing surface, then waiting six months for it to break down enough to plant.  The up front work was considerable, but I was well rewarded with a bed that was more bountiful than the two that had been enriched year-by-year with biochar and compost.  (Biochar and compost were also ingredients in the lasagna garden.)  The takeaway is that, with poor soil, you don't have to wait ten years for a productive garden. You still have to add layers to a lasagna garden every year and dig it all in, but if biochar is included, even that can cease after ten years.

This year, I made two beds using sheet mulching and a very deep compost bed, following the same approach, in which I plan to grow mushrooms. My future forest garden patches will be grown out of sheet mulch, also. Perhaps the hardest part about lasagna gardening is getting enough of the right ingredients, green material, in particular. I've had to reach out to acquire enough of this high nitrogen material for my beds. I collect buckets full of used coffee grounds from a local doughnut shop and tons of horse manure from a local stables. It is best to pre-compost manure with straw or other brown material, before adding to the lasagna garden, in order to kill pathogens by the heat of composting. I'm looking at integrating my acquisition of green material onsite through raising chickens. Geoff Lawton explains how.

Chicken Shit

Turning our gaze across the Chesapeake Bay where chicken factories are one of the salient features of the landscape, a group of activists called Food & Water Watch has raised protests against the incineration of chicken manure.  You might think, with my advocacy of using chicken litter to make biochar, I would take exception to that position.  The truth is, incineration is not how you make biochar.

F&WW seems to mainly want to make CAFO's go away, but their agitation against the Renewable Fuel Standard inclusion of manure as a Tier 1 renewable fuel is ostensibly based on increased air pollution from incineration.  A long and twisted tale leads to the current state of dissatisfaction over the way we deal with this resource.

We can begin with Martin O'Malley who, back in his days as Maryland Governor, made a deal with Exelon Corporation to fund $50 million of a project to convert chicken litter to energy in exchange for allowing them to merge with Constellation Energy.  The company that got the award to head up the manure power project, Green Planet Power Solutions, failed miserably.  Now, other players are hoping the money is still there for a more competent outfit to give it a try.

In the meantime, the Maryland Department of Agriculture has begun to assist poultry farmers with a much smaller pot of money under the Animal Waste Technology Fund.  A company called Renewable Oil International MD, LLC has been granted $1.2 million in support of developing a manure-fed energy system that makes biochar as a by-product.

The major action, however, is where a company called AgEnergy USA is talking with Perdue about making a $200 million manure-fired energy plant.

Biochar has been little but an afterthought to some of these projects, which leads me back to the F&WW argument.  Biochar is not made by incineration, but by pyrolysis, of which a particular method is gasification.  Pyrolysis involves heating material in a oxygen-deficient environment.  That means less NOx is produced and particulate matter is also kept low, depending on the speed of the process.   F&WW should like that.  I hope they do, because I think I like Food & Water Watch and would like to link arms with them to work for more local agricultural systems.

Dregs

An encouraging trend in Maryland and much of the country toward more local self-sufficiency is the explosive growth of local beer brewing.  Even more encouraging is the 2012 passage of a law here that allows farmers special dispensation in order to brew and sell beer and other accompaniments. This reduces the logistics of delivering agricultural inputs to the brewers.  I noticed one such farm brewery close by that I would like to visit someday.  Calvert Brewing Company makes several types of beer, with their webpage telling you which types of hops go into each one.

Therein lies my interest; not so much in the drinking, but in the ingredients.  A few weeks ago, I introduced myself to the brewmaster at The Ruddy Duck Brewing Company in order to inquire as to the chances of relieving him of some of the spent grains used in making his beer.  He was happy to oblige.  I now bring him a 30 gallon container every week, which he fills with wet hops and grains out of one of his tanks.  He also gives the stuff away to a couple of local farmers.  They use it as a feed supplement.  I use it in compost (my dog won't eat it).  I do the same thing with 5 gallon buckets of coffee grounds that I get from the local doughnut shop.  Starbucks will give away big plastic trash bags full of spent grounds, so you don't even need to leave a bucket - just ask whenever you visit.  All this collecting activity is incidental to other errands nearby - same with the horse manure and the bags of raked leaves I grab from friendly neighbors who would otherwise pay for their disposal.

Of course, I collect my own leaves, coffee grounds, and dog manure (see previous post), but the volume is an order of magnitude higher with these other sources.  If I ever start home brewing beer, I will also be using the mash for composting, or perhaps for feeding chickens. As a first step, I will try growing some of the varieties of hops used by The Ruddy Duck or one of our other local breweries, in case they would like to buy them from me.

(Sh)it's All Good

Avian flu is not the only disease that might come from raising chickens.  The common concern is e.coli. Some 60,000 cases of e.coli infections get treated every year in the U.S. and a few deaths do occur, but, though those rates are low, who wants to be sickened by some nasty bug?  Nasty, because the main source is animal excrement.

I could say "shit," but that's not what it is to me.  I treasure it and all other excrement because, in a display of nature's alchemical capabilities, crap can be transformed into black gold through the phenomenon of composting. There are several types of dung I currently collect. We have a backyard chicken owner in our church who lets us take their droppings to our community garden for fertilizer. I regularly visit a riding stables about 3 miles away to fill bags with horse dung and cart them home for composting.

Anyone who has pets can also compost their caca with a little forethought.  I bought a cheap, versatile Geobin composter for the sole purpose of composting the dog mess I clean up weekly. I now look forward to making those weekly rounds, especially with the handy, lightweight poop scooper my wife got for my birthday present. The warnings you hear about keeping pet poo out of your compost bin are valid.  However, once the segregated pet droppings undergo thermogenetic composting at 140 F or higher, and then remain in a pile for a year, they are safe to use in ornamental gardens.  It's this short heat and long cure cycle that keeps the risk of e.coli and numerous other pathogens low. In order to keep the pile from reeking, I simply layer sawdust on top of each week's deposit. I also add meats, fats, and bones from our kitchen scraps to the middle of this bin - another no-no for general composting.

The same approach can even be used for humanure, which requires more planning, preparation, and particularity.  The bins should be built to higher standards, a collection system is needed, and odor control must be thorough.  I'm not there yet, but am headed there.  It's not just about making better soil, it is also about protecting the environment.  Our current sewage systems don't do a good job of this.  Less is more when it comes to giving doo-doo the treatment it deserves.

Maryland's big business-friendly governor doesn't make those Eastern Shore farms compost chicken fecal matter before spreading it on the land.  Yet, another way to deal with pathogens from poultry litter is to make biochar out of it.  There is actually some governmental funding being applied to building up this capability for the sake of the Chesapeake Bay.  Biochar has also recently been ascribed the ability to sequester not only carbon, but e.coli as well.  Simply adding biochar to the soil can protect crops from carrying such pathogens.  It seems that combining thermogenic composting of any form of manure with only 10% biochar by volume would make the resultant product quite safe and result in a double win for the environment.

Chickening Out

If there is one food species other than crab that Maryland is known for, it is chickens.  Purdue, Tyson, and others run vast chicken farms on the Eastern Shore.  If one wants to raise chickens in their backyard, however, that can be problematic.  The state only requires that poultry keepers register in case of an avian flu outbreak.  Counties have their own rules.  Calvert county only limits the number of birds you can have if you are raising them as pets, rather than for production.  The hangup occurs with homeowners associations.  A good number of homes are part of HOA's, including our own.  I have searched the rules for several of Calvert county's HOA's and found that one thing they have in common is prohibition of poultry and livestock.

In a state that prides itself on supplying a good deal of the country's chicken meat, this is singular. The reasons may be that odor could reach neighbors, or noise, or disease.  These rules are not in step with the times, however, since cities these days commonly allow backyard chickens.  The list of concerns can be addressed with rules similar to the one concerning barking dogs - if a neighbor complains, the burden is on the purported offender to make it right.  Disease is only a concern insofar as a neighbor or their pet comes in contact with an infected bird.  This would not be a problem since the chickens would be fenced in. I think the real reason chickens aren't allowed is that HOA's still think they live (as the Monkee's put it so long ago) "in status symbol land."  Get over it!  Suburbia, (much less exurbia) was a huge mistake and a trap if you persist in the notion that you can escape the problems of the world by commuting out of it.

My daughter-in-law's parents in Greece claim to be ready for the difficulties ahead, in part because they raise vegetables and chickens.  I envy them.  They may fare better than us unless our HOA or future municipality wakes up to the very real possibility that these "good times" won't roll forever.