Seeds - Tips and Experience, Raising Plants, Any Farmers Around Here?

mayku-T-meelo

Member
Joined
Sep 24, 2016
Messages
188
Hello,

for I guess obvious reasons on this forum, I think most of us has a certain negative attitude toward seeds as a food resource. But I would want to turn to their, I suppose, functional, or more appropriately, meaningful goal in nature. I would want to learn more about conditions and processes in planting any kind of seeds, from fruit trees, other trees, bushes, seeds from vegetables and fruits, whatever.

Ten years ago, when I have been reading some socio-historical accounts of the world-colonization and ecological imperialism, one idea struck me - along with shifts in demography, forceful and violent events, in parallel, the same was happening with plants and animals. This idea somehow always stayed in the back of my mind as an interesting way of turning the logic and another way of approaching the animal-plant relations. As some plants are obviously dependent on spreading with animal help, we also have developed a variety of methods for cross-fertilization. Then there is the obvious problem of big corporations purposely homogenizing seeds, forcefully deranging life processes in general, not taking into the account the cosmological implications (that Ray sometimes mentions) and ecological dependencies in turn for the mere profiting and accumulation of wealth. But I sense that ingerence of humans into the plants is not by itself a bad thing, and that it can be rewarding for both parties, if done in a proper manner.

There are, I suppose, multitudes of disciplines, thoughts, allegories, pronouns and such, that could point out the importance of seeds. If you have any, please share.

I've experimented here and there with plants, more so when I was a kid. Although I have bleak memories of that, I think I had a phase, when I discovered that seeds germinate and I was trying to sprout everything.

In the few recent years my interest came back, I also started to spend quite some time in the nature. I see also that thoughts on those moments are keeping me happy and positive during the winter. But I've also never put myself to really go very deep into those developmental aspects, I was always more or less observing the phenomena on the surface, changing of the seasons, occasionally reading in other fields of biology or philosophy, like biosemiotics. For different reasons, I was finding excuses or was distracted by set of circumstances and obligations of the "here and now" attitudes, that are the mode of operation of contemporaneity, moving from place to place figuratively and literally.

But last year, I've happened to plant three trees, that were growing during the winter in my apartment. One of them sadly died after the plantation, I think growing indoors during the winter season wasn't the best start for them, I definitely caused too much shock, one way or the other. Probably it was also because I haven't payed attention to other seasonal/weather influences, biological rhythms of the nature or haven't chosen the right spot or basically anything else. There must be many reasons behind it. Even more died before in the autumn of 2019, when I was preparing the seedlings (using googled tips) and some seeds didn't even sprout, I guess it's expected to a degree. I've started out with 7, 2 of them survived. All of the above, I was doing more or less intuitively, not really preparing too much, except that it obviously takes a little patience and attention throughout a longer time span to take care of a growing plant. But the whole time during, before and after, I was thinking that there must be some set of tried out principles. It's just that no one I know personally, is very interested in the topic to the degree of vocation, that would bring about the transfer of some skillful knowledge.

I am fortunate enough that I have a family living in the countryside, they are also farmers, but since I know, they tend to buy bulk of their food from the grocery store and the vegetables that they grow are also from seeds brought from the store. They don't really tend to go very deep, when I talked to them they acknowledge the influence on the moon, they also use the almanacs suggesting the best time to plant and that's almost about it. They raise cattle, so they have a lot of manure as a fertilizer and they tend to stick to strictly pragmatical side of things, which is fine.

In the meantime, I have discovered some Youtube channels on the topic, like this one - Self Sufficient Me, it's fine and interesting, and it brings some insights, which are common sense and exploratory, I like it, even though sometimes the information is applicable or immediately useful, due to different factors. I am basically longing for some more organized set of principles, such as a good book or collection of literature on how to germinate and take care of plants. Anything related. Any propositions would be very welcome. Also, if there are any growers out there and know of a reliable access to so called heritage seeds, I would be obliged, if they could share the information.

Once I watched an interesting movie called The Secret Life of Plants, based on the book, that I believe was pretty popular, back in the days. I really enjoyed the movie, haven't took the time to read the book yet. Among amplification of some of the themes from 70s and evidence on plant consciousness and their sentience (that I see haidut is sporadically coming back to), there's also talk on electrophysiological experiments done on plants by J.C. Bose (that Ray mentions, because of his findings in the context of matter-life processes). But there's also some talk about George Washington Carver, that supposedly revolutionized farming. From glancing over, I am not so sure if it's worth to go into it, does anyone else maybe know more about him?

So, starting this thread is more of a first step of preparing for this hobby, hopefully connecting with someone with a similar interest or that is very knowledgeable? I would be very happy. Well anyhow, I plan to update, if I find anything on my own. It's still gonna take some time, it's midst of the winter here in Europe, but I think the spring will come about pretty soon in no time, and honestly I can't wait.

To end this, I was thinking that it's a good, let's say, life-encouraging, life-promoting practice, however woo-woo that may sound. I observed, that when I was handling the seeds, I was treating them personally and I was sad and angry at myself, when I messed up with any of the plants during the process. Well, for what it's worth I've felt more alive during the process, but I would want to avoid the unnecessary mistakes, so this year I hope I will be more prepared and cautious with bringing life into the world.

While I don't necessarily agree with the immediate implication of this meditative exercise, it's kind of interesting to think about. Supposedly it's from Rudolph Steiner, I haven't checked, haven't read yet anything from him really and also haven't went into his legacy. But it's the first thing I will probably start investing my time into in regards to this topic. There are some organizations and agricultural movements, that were inspired by him, but I have only googled it for now, they are called bio-dynamical agriculture.

Hold a seed in one hand and a stone of similar size in the other. Look at them both and try to visualize how they are the same and how they are different. When a breakthrough occurs we suddenly see into a higher dimension - the fourth dimension of growth. All living things live in an additional dimension of growth, expansion and organic change over time.


Selection_032.png

Selection_033.png

Selection_034.png

Selection_035.png


Anyway, I hope to hear on your thoughts and experiences, take care!
 

Similar threads

Back
Top Bottom