New social norms for ecological rescue
New social norms for ecological rescue
- weeds are wonderful
- use them for free, delicious, nutritious food
- they are easy to maintain because many are nearly indestructable, frost resistent, requiring no pesticides, herbicides, water, fertilizer, etc., though as usual they grow best if water and soil is sufficient.
- they find and compete for and/or coopporate in the real-estate that apparently suites them, sometimes flurishing as robust tender dark green wonders with no help from us, thank you very much.
- use them for free, effective medicine
- heal-all (Prunella vulgaris, https://pfaf.org/user/plant.aspx?LatinName=Prunella+vulgaris) grows very commonly as a weed in yards here in Oregon.
- leave them be or encourage them in your spaces
- let organic farmers know you want them:
- "Wild spinach [Chenopodium album] and green amaranth (Amaranthus retroflexus) [in a photo is] dominating a planting bed on moist fertile farmland.
As is common, the wild seed is already in the soil. It just needs to be tilled and watered to grow.
None of these wild seeds were introduced by the farmer. They too over a bed planted with some intended crop that never survied the competition from our vidorous wild friends."
John Kallas, "Edible Wild Plants - Wild Foods from Dirt to Plate"
- Kallas' book covers highly nutritious, and prepared properly, delicious wild greens, found in most of the USA and much Europe and other parts of the world.
- Examples of treasures appearing in my small yard as "wild" volunteers:
- crocus (safron, very expensive gourmet spice)
- heal-all (Prunella vulgaris, https://pfaf.org/user/plant.aspx?LatinName=Prunella+vulgaris) grows very commonly as a weed in yards here in Oregon.
- cats ear (salad w/ pickle juice and peanut butter dressing)
- cress (Cardamine hirsuta), wonderfully mustard family green with a flavor similar to but better (IMO) than water cress or kale.
- plantain (seeds in salad, etc.)
- dandelion
- pink clover (flower heads in salads)
- willow herb
- violet
- leaning into plant power is rewading:
- to the uninitiated, wild foods may seem more bitter, pungent, strange.
- over time our bodies adapt and many of the strange or off-putting sensations turn to deep, rich, fullfilling and pleasant sensations because:
- our lower digestive tract adapts to the new naturally highly nutritional and medicinal mix, including:
- including flora replacing human pathogens and other adaptations
- epigenome for better processing of tannins, saponins, phenolic acids which have wonderful medicinal properties [https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/phytochemical table 1].
- It's human heritage, how we coapdated to our ecology over time, to eat plants and use them as medicine.
The origin of human diet and medicine is based on eating wild plants and using wild plants as medicine, with a continuum between the two, as a matter of proportions of each based on medicinal strength.
"[Wild p]lant exploitation has been at the root of our dietary and medicinal practices. It is this heritage that we must retrace as carefully as possible" to determine the origins of human diet & medicine.
- Timothy Johns, "The Origins of Human Diet & Medicine", University of Arizona Press, 1990
- plants are the source of what we need.
- The spectrum of nutrional, medicinal, aesthetic and spiritual goodness in plants covers it.
- Nutritional:
- protein: Plants create (are the source of) all the essential amino acids, all we need as building blocks for us to synthesize protien in our bodies. [http://communityselfsufficiency.org/_PhytochemicalBoundsEstimationViaMetabolomicsPhylogeneticsAndTaxonomy.html]
- fatty acids: Plants create (are the source of) all the essential fatty acids we need. Over-processing as in pure seed oil or refined flour creates inflammatory and otherwise detrimental substances.
- vitamins: Plants create (are the source of) all but B12, though for plant and mushroom sources grown organically, symbiotic microbes that produce sufficient dietary vitamin B12 are often present. The more sterile the environment, the less B12 will be present. Here's an example with white mushrooms: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agaricus_bisporus
- minerals: Plants are the source of bioavailable minerals for animals and humans. Through water intake from the soil, minerals are absorbed, refined and incorporated in plants.
Chlorophyl gives makes plants green, and each chlorophyl molecule has an atom of magnesium in it's center.
Vitamin A precursors (the best and safest source of our dietary vitamin A) and metabolites are yellow, orange and red, causing the same color in leaves and other parts with less chlorophyl, or darker green when chlorophyl is present.
- plants are THE source of protein.
- Protein deficiency rarely occurs without caloric deficiency. Eat enough calories from a variety (seed, leaf, root, fruit) of unprocessed or lightly processed plants, and you will get sufficient protein.
- Plants create all the essential amino acids, all we need as building blocks for us to synthesize protien in our bodies. They are the essentially essential amino acid factories.
- While it is true for some raw plants, the protein is less bioavailable than in cooked animals, cooking the plants typically makes the protien sufficiently available,
and per calorie some plant foods are denser in protien:
100g pure protein 100g protein/ 400 cal 0.25 https://www.nal.usda.gov/programs/fnic#:~:text=How%20many%20calories%20are%20in,provides%209%20calories%20per%20gram.
100g seitan 75.2g protein/ 370 cal 0.20324 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/cereal-grains-and-pasta/7738/1
100g lean steak 23.1g protein/ 117 cal 0.2 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/beef-products/10525/2
100g spirulina 57.5g protein/ 290 cal 0.1982758 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2765/2
100g white chicken: 31g protein/ 165 cal 0.1939 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/poultry-products/703/2
100g nutritional yeast 50.0g protein/ 281 cal 0.1779359 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/custom/1323565/2
100g white mushroom 3.1g protein/ 22.0 cal 0.140909 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2482/2
100g beef steak (1/8 f) 31.3g protein/ 225 cal 0.139111 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/beef-products/3767/2
100g dark chicken meat 23.2g protein / 178 cal 0.13033 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/poultry-products/759/2
100g cooked spinach: 4g protein/ 34 cal, 0.1176 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2631/2
100g asparagus 2.2g protein/ 20.0 cal 0.11 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2311/2
100g arugula 2.6g protein/ 25 cal 0.104 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/3025/2
100g tempeh 18.5g protein/ 193 cal 0.09585 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/legumes-and-legume-products/4381/2
100g hamburger patty 23.4g protein / 248 cal 0.09435 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/beef-products/6210/2
100g parsley: 3g protein/ 36 cal 0.08333 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2513/2
100g broccoli 2.8g protein/ 34 cal 0.08235 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2356/2
100g tofu 8.1 protien/116 cal 0.068965 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/legumes-and-legume-products/4398/2
100g kale: 3.3g protein/ 50 cal 0.066 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2461/2
89 g nettles 2.4 protein / 37 cal 0.06486 g/cal https://www.nutritionvalue.org/Stinging_Nettles%2C_blanched_%28Northern_Plains_Indians%29_nutritional_value.html
100g peas 5.4 protein/ 84 cal 0.0642857 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2521/2
100g dandelion 2.7 protein / 45 cal 0.06 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2441/2
100g chickpeas 8.9 protein / 164 cal 0.05426 g/cal https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/legumes-and-legume-products/4326/2
- WHAT YOU ACTUALLY NEED:
- Many studies show protien requirements are approximately 1/2 of the USDA daily recoommended intake (DRI). But even if you accept the relatively high protein intake requirements of the USDA,
the average protein per calorie intake is much lower than any of the above and a nutritarian diet (or a whole plant part based diet that generously mixes seed, leaf, root and fruit)
generally has the recommended calories. Try calculating the USDA DRI for yourself for protein and calories, divide the protien by calories, and compare to the above list:
https://www.nal.usda.gov/human-nutrition-and-food-safety/dri-calculator
- Increasingly, top athletes and world record holders are vegan
- meat, dairy and overprocessed plants are death:
- grow pathogens in your gut and hold you hostage
- sugar and seed oils inflame you:
- added sugars, refined flours and other simple carbs flood your blood with sugar, causing inflammation, insulin resistance and other chaos.
- extracted seed oils typically also cause inflammation and other problems
- you crave because your gut is full of E. coli and other pathogens that rot flesh. Change to plant based food and the flesh rotting pathogens will die off and get replaced by plant digesting flora.
- animal ag responsible for a large portion of global warming, with estimates as high as 51% of greenhouse gases attributable.
- wild is pure sacred power for good
- like learning to use a kitchen knife, there are the right, healing ways and the dangerous, destructive ways to use it.