Guest guest Posted June 16, 2004 Report Share Posted June 16, 2004 hi suze, so now I'm going to ask you the diabolical question I'm sure you see coming. i know miraclegro is 'bad' but i don't know why. why? something about depleting the soil. i used to use it our supposed 'organic' community garden. it made my stuff grow better but i knew we weren't supposed to be using it. i was in charge by then anyway, so what the hell. i know, i was one hell of a person to be in charge of an organic comm. garden. no one else wanted to do it, so there i was, ignorant me, stepping up to the plate. i now have large pots in the back of our townhouse. since they don't contact the soil, except for the drainage hole in the bottom, and because the pots are smaller than they should be and my veggie plants won't get full sun, i decided to put miracle gro potting soil in there. yes, i can see you cringing! I'm curious how my produce will turn out, refractometer wise. is it possible they might get a good reading? thanks. laura On Wed, 16 Jun 2004 09:00:08 -0400 " Suze Fisher " <s.fisher22@...> writes: > Re: re: Vegetables Without Vitamins - How to deal with low >quality foods produced by local farms >my thinking, i guess incorrectly, has always been, that whatever is >growing is growing, therefore it must be getting what it needs from the >soil in order to grow. i guess that thinking is wrong. Right, it's wrong. > >also, referring to suze, i have no idea what a refractometer is and how >it tells you your produce is good or not. It's a tool that measures the total dissolved solids (vits, mins, sugars, etc) in produce. In essence, it measures the amount of nutrition in a food. The measurement is called " brix " and there are brix index charts that list the numerical equivalent of the quality of produce. For example tomatoes are classified as 4=poor, 6=average, 8=good and 12=excellent. I tested one yesterday from a local hydroponic producer and it measured 3.75 brix - below poor. So far almost everything I've measured has come out with a " poor " reading. I'm told this is typical. It probably would've been quite *atypical* for the produce that Price's groups ate (as well as the forage their livestock ate). > >is it possible that so many of our health problems have its roots in poor >soil, Not only possible, this is the crux of the matter. and so there's pretty much nothing we can do except build up our >own soil at home and grow our own stuff and live exclusively on that? That is one option. Or you can get a refractometer and use it to identify producers of high quality produce in your area. If you get meat/dairy from local sources, you might also be able to measure the brix of the pasture the livestock is on, if the farmer lets you. You can also help local farmers improve the quality of their produce if you feel so inclined. > >I've been trying to live on raw kefir and yogurt with little success, >thinking i was getting superior nutrition. but maybe the grass the cows >eat that produces the milk is inferior and so I'm not doing myself any >favors? That is quite possible, and perhaps even likely. Suze Fisher Lapdog Design, Inc. Web Design & Development http://members.bellatlantic.net/~vze3shjg Weston A. Price Foundation Chapter Leader, Mid Coast Maine http://www.westonaprice.org ---------------------------- " The diet-heart idea (the idea that saturated fats and cholesterol cause heart disease) is the greatest scientific deception of our times. " -- Mann, MD, former Professor of Medicine and Biochemistry at Vanderbilt University, Tennessee; heart disease researcher. The International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics <http://www.thincs.org> ---------------------------- > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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