The Russia sanctions are almost funny. The EU's oil embargo means buying Russian oil refined in India and/or marketed through other countries. Last week I suggested we don't need grain, this week I want to explore the many ways we can work around the current system...how we make do with what we have. But what about fertilizer...we'll starve! Think about it... chemical fertilizers didn't exist until 1900 or so, and nitrogen synthesis wasn't even invented until WWII. This absurd senseless war could be an opportunity for US citizens to become self reliant.

Don Grooms life celebration concert, and his song "Use it up wear it out, make it do or do without".

We're just in that place when we've got to make do. I went grocerying yesterday and everything had gone up 20 to 30%. Fortunately the garden is yielding lots of the last of the spring crops. We've several cabbages to make into kraut. I'm trying a new recipe this year adding some of our carrots and a little (store bought) ginger. (20 min)

We have several heads and I've no idea how many jars, but it will be all we need for the year. I really prefer fall/winter cabbage, I find them sweeter. But we tend to eat those as they mature.

We've also been getting lots of broccoli which we steam and freeze (or eat). The snow peas we eat fresh, but they've about played out. We harvested the last of the lettuce before the Florida folk festival and fed everyone a big salad. We've got three beds of sweet potatoes started.

I've been somewhat entertained by the impending fertilizer crisis as most flush human fertilizer into a treatment plant to become a pollutant. Urine collection is an easy way to get instant fertilizer. Dilute urine at least 10x, I use 20x (about a cup per gallon of water, and you can direct apply to your plants. They green right up and grow vigorously. There are several simple systems. (7 min)

Urine can be used to break down compost and as a fertilizer when mixed with wood ash!
Here's a slightly different approach (4.5 min)

There's more to our waste than urine, and simple ways to make use of it.

Laura Allen gives an intimate tour of a home-built composting toilet in her Bay Area urban home. The nutrient-rich composted "humanure" is used to enrich the lush, edible landscape, and doesn't waste precious drinking water like flush toilets.

...and there are even simpler bucket systems.

This is a twenty-minute instructional video providing some compost toilet tips and techniques in northern Uganda at the WeltHungerHilfe.de headquarters in Moroto, Uganda. Filmed by Joseph Jenkins, author of the Humanure Handbook and The Compost Toilet Handbook.

Another walk through the process of looking after the "bucket dump" for the humanure. Included is a description of the humanure system and the basic concepts.

Feeding a garden without buying fertilizer is quite possible - Elizabeth has been working towards that for four years and has now created a garden that no longer requires purchased inputs.

You want a fertile garden? Send out this chain letter and reap the smelly reward...
Dear Friend:

This letter is being sent to you for we know you are critically
interested in your garden, and the Spring season is now upon us.

This is a fertilizer club and it will not cost you a cent to join.
Upon receiving this letter, go to the address on the top of the
list and shit in their garden. You will not be the only one there, so
do not feel embarrassed.
Then make five copies of this letter and send them to five of your
friends who appreciate fertile gardens.
You will not get any money or checks, but within one week if this
chain is not broken, there will be 9,216 people shitting in your garden.
Your reward will come next Spring when you have the most fertile garden in the
neighborhood.

Mrs. Harry Butts Mrs. Smelly B. Hind
236 Bed Pan Court 476 Diarrhea Way

Mrs. C. Howie Farts Mrs. Carrie Potts
682 Fertilizer Way 1422 Enema Drive

Mr. A. Bigger Movements Mrs. Lucy Bowels
89 Rectum Road 897 Corn Cob Lane

Mrs. Charles Syringe Mr. and Mrs. Took A. Fizzik
1420 Suppository Lane 434 Running Loose Lane

P.S. If you are constipated, pass this on to your next door neighbor.
Do not break this chain. (One man didn't give a shit and lost his
entire lawn.)

Another option is to make both biogas (methane) and get fertilizer with anaerobic digestion.

Honest review of the pros and cons for the HomeBioGas 2.0 system.
Here's a quick 1 min descriptor if you don't want to spend 20 min on the previous clip...
So we're wasting our waste.

Another fertility hack is to farm earthworms...
This Super Simple Worm Bin Turns Trash into Fertilizer (And Took Less than an Hour to Build!)

A DIY bathtub worm bin is easy to build and makes homemade fertilizer 24/7. If I need more worm tea, I dump in a bucket of water and collect the worm leachate from the drain. I'm not worried about fertilizer shortages. The compost worms are working all the time. And it only took less than an hour to set up! Make your own fertilizer at home and feed plants without buying anything.

There are also easy to make worm tower systems.

For those who want to grow food in a small space, without spending a lot of time worrying with it, a worm farm bucket provides continuous fertility using minimal time and effort. The idea is to put it right in the garden.

To make one, cut the bottom out of a five-gallon bucket, drill holes half way up it, and bury it to that depth. Fill the installed bucket halfway up with manure, adding food scraps and weeds to top it off. Finally, put in some compost worms (not earthworms) and fill the bucket all the way with water. The nutrients will drain into the garden.

It’s important to put the lid on the bucket to protect the worms from sunlight and birds. Though the lid isn’t airtight, it will also prevent the contents from drying out. Plus, the top can be used as a birdbath or a sprinkler stand.

The same setup can be helpful between two fruit trees or in the middle of a circle of them.

Key Takeaways:

• A worm farm bucket in the garden is a simple, low-maintenance way to fertilize a small space.
Buckets are easy to make, and they send nutrients directly to the garden.
• The bucket lids are important for protecting the worms from sunlight and birds, as well as preventing the contents from drying out.
A short one min descriptor.

Greg Judy uses his ruminant animals to fertilize his farms. (10 min)

Greg is in heaven walking thru lush diverse pasture with 3 weeks rest. With fast growing conditions in the spring with adequate rain fall, our first spring rotation is around 28 days. When rotating your animals, record rainfall events and monitor your regrowth progress. This gives you a good roadmap on how fast to rotate your animals. You can severely damage your whole growing season potential of your farm by returning to a paddock before it is fully regrown.

Jim is a master gardener. He's putting his Florida farm to sleep for the summer with a cover of sweet potatoes and peas. That's sure an easy way to grow healthy food if you have an interest.

Jim Kovaleski is preparing his gardens for the Summer before his Maine trip. He calls it “putting it to sleep”, which means resetting the ground with new heat loving crops that can thrive on neglect!

So yes row crop producers are in a world of hurt if they're dependent on chemical fertilizers, but small scale producers have so many options. We're lucky to have a horse farm/camp here on the mountain. They will fill the pick up with composted manure for $40, and that lays out 3-4 inches over the entire garden. Some cities (like Jim's Florida residence) give free compost. In Maine he cuts grass and mulches/fertilizes with it... a grass fed garden. Bottom line there a many options to build fertility without chemical fertilizers.

I find it humorous the EU's contortions to avoid directly purchasing fuel from Russia. The Duran had a good conversation about it this week. (19 min)

EU's oil embargo mess. Hungary wins, India wins, Russia wins

Chris Martenson does a deep dive on energy and the EU

Is Europe Committing Economic Suicide?

Talk about making do, the EU is outright pretending to sanction Russia as they hurt themselves.

All the issues above pale in comparison to parolees coping with the outside world. Chris Hedges talks with some of his students from prison.

Although it represents less than 5% of the global population, the United States has 25% of the world’s prison population, some 2.3 million people, most of whom are poor. Its prisons are notorious for their violence, overcrowding, and human rights abuses, including the widespread use of solitary confinement. But what is often not examined is what happens to those released from prisons into a society where they face legalized discrimination imposed by numerous laws, rules, and policies that result in permanent marginalization. Thrust into a criminal caste system, these former prisoners are often denied the right to vote, can lose their passports, are barred from receiving public assistance, including housing, and are blocked from a variety of jobs. They must often repay exorbitant fines, abide by arbitrary rules imposed by probation officers, and avoid committing even minor criminal offenses or they go back to prison. The hurdles placed before them are momentous—and these hurdles help explain why, within five years, a staggering 76% return to prison.

In the first of a two-part series called The Long Road Home, we look at what happens to those in the United States who leave prison and struggle to reenter society through the eyes of five former prisoners—all of whom Chris Hedges taught in the college degree program offered by Rutgers University in the New Jersey prison system—who collectively spent 119 years in prison.

Chris Martenson also touches on the US prison system as well as the ways we are harming our children in a clip he calls Your Children Are Under Attack

Perhaps it is an indicator of the end of the US empire that we seem too incompetent to fend for ourselves like the Russians have quickly adapted to do. All we seem to know is how the maximize profit. We have no interest in refitting our infrastructure, providing local grown foods, providing children an enriching education, or even providing sound basic health care. We're on our own folks. We went to a neighborhood gathering last night. Having local friends as a support network is a good idea. I can't remember a more unstable time in my life. There's no telling what the future holds for us, but right now it doesn't look promising. Though TPTB have lost the ability to "make do", it is a skill we all need to exercise. Today I focused on one primary aspect of building soil fertility, but the same holds true for housing, transportation, and so on. We must be adaptable and learn to make do as our political leadership joins in the circular firing squad. Take care and have a good Sunday. I look forward to your ideas in this open thread below!