Holistic Grazing (split from Cliven Bundy thread)

[Red Baron Farms]

blah blah

You are just repeating yourself mostly and as usual mincing your words. But I'll deal with them one last time. If you don't like the answers, fine. But repeating the questions repeatedly over and over repeatedly again and again like they were never answered is getting as ridiculous as me repeating over and over repeatedly again and again repeatedly over and over that you are doing it.

1) The trademark is a non issue on this forum. Drop it. This has nothing to do with the efficacy of good land management practices versus poor land management practices, HM, MIRG, cover crops used as forage, rest rotation etc... As far as I know it only pertains to certification of instructors, prevention of scam artists co-opting the name like they did in medicine, and similar things like that. If you wish to bring it up in a legal forum go for it. I won't be answering there either though as I am neither a legal expert, nor interested in learning, nor interested in saying something incorrect by accident, since I am not knowledgeable in matters of business law in general nor trademarks in particular.

2) I already explained why I stated the method was already popular down under and why you seem to not quite get it. Because instead of trademarked names, common farmers use common names. It was in the published study I linked to you.

A system of flexible, high-intensity, short period grazing followed by a long period of rest (HI-SG) was first put forward by Savory in 1978 (Savory and Parsons, 1980) and was later introduced to Australia in 1989 by Stan Parsons as “Cell Grazing” (McCosker 2000). The terms of “The Savory Grazing System”, “Short Duration Grazing” and more specifically in this paper “Time-controlled Grazing” are the common names of the new grazing system. Time-controlled grazing (TC grazing) has been increasingly popular amongst graziers in Australia and the rest of the world over the past two decades.

I have seen it elsewhere too. But that's why I said what I said. Also I find is extremely strange you would admit that, "Integration that is decades old here in NZ." and at the same time question your own statement's validity by requiring evidence. Savory developed the original idea (based on Voisin's science). It took off and became a standard practise, modified for each farmers circumstances by each farmer, yet somehow you don't believe it is popular down under because Savory doesn't try to tell a farmer he must use a trademark or that he must stay "pure" to only "Savory's" improvements over time??? It seems to be your issue is that Savory isn't using "holistic" as a scam like they do in medicine, yet you insist it must be due to your associated connotative equivocation of the term. The whole point of it is to adapt to the complexity of each farm which is different soil, climate, terrain, species, available technology, family, social and cultural context, finances etc... You are obviously having cognitive dissonance or some other cognitive issue that I can't address. (alternately you are simply trolling by knowingly asking questions that have no acceptable answer according to your fallacious definitions) So stop repeating yourself. Pointless. You'll not get a better answer from me.

3) Gabe Brown is a HM practitioner. He is a member of the Burleigh County Soil Conservation District. The Burleigh County Soil Conservation District employs certified HM educators. That's why Burleigh County Soil Conservation District uses the trademark. link All the case studies from there are from farmers using HM. However, for the presentation I linked to you, Gabe doesn't have to actually teach the full trademarked HM to teach the specific topics presented in the USDA educational presentation. It wouldn't apply anyway. Part of HM is the holistic context that is different for each and every person on the planet. He can teach a PART of the system though. In this case his experience with forage based grazing multi-species covers integrated with no till crop production. Oh and PS I never said Gabe had published results in a scientific paper. In fact I specifically said it wasn't. His results are published and available from the USDA and the Burleigh County Soil Conservation District, and other associated educational programs funded by the USDA like NCAT-ATTRA, but not in a scientific study published in a science journal. I linked a webinar put forth by the USDA with those results, but you refused to even accept the data because you didn't like the format in which it was presented. Oh well. That's your problem, not mine. But for anyone else who doesn't mind that the USDA used a video format:


ETA PS Yes all the people participating in those Burleigh County Soil Conservation District case studies have superior results and that is why the push to educate more farmers.

 

[Reality Check]

...usual insults and wall of text snipped....

1) The trademark is a issue on this forum. We are discussing Savoy's Holistic Management(TM) not whatever bits of good land management he has borrowed.

2) You did not give any evidence that HM(TM) is very popular and widely used in Australia and NZ. Popular means that majority (or at least a large percentage) of farmers know about and use it, not the there are random references to it on Australia and NZ web sites. You stull have given no such evidence:
Red Baron Farms (28th May 2014): Evidence for HM is actually very popular and widely used in NZ and Australia?.

3) Gabe Brown is a HM practitioner.
...snipped yet another wall of text!...

Red Baron Farms. please do not assume that I am so ignorant that I do not know that HM practitioners exist !
I know that Gabe Brown is a HM(TM) practitioner. That does not mean that he talked about HM(TM) at a conference:
* Red Baron Farms (24 June 2014): Where is Gabe Brown's presentation on Savoy's HM at that conference?

The ignorance of citing of YT videos as if they are scientific evidence continues, Red Baron Farms !

Actual answers to these questions are still outstanding, Red Baron Farms:
* Red Baron Farms (9th June 2014): Evidence that "dry" grassland will turn to desert if the herds of herbivores are removed (and the reverse)?

* Red Baron Farms (10th June 2014): Evidence for the "The australian megafauna decreased, in brittle areas that ecological change resulted in desert, but in areas that were not brittle, change still happened, but didn't result in desertification" claim?

* Red Baron Farms (16 June 2014): Please supply evidence for the USDA NRCS or SARE "major" grants to HMI.

* Red Baron Farms (17th June 2014): Please cite the published paper containing Gabe Brown's results (or confirm that you made a mistake stating that there are published results)

* Red Baron Farms (24 June 2014): Were all of the farmers in the conference or that panel invited because they performed better than standard BMP?

* Red Baron Farms (1 July 2014): Where in [URL="http://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/SR07220.htm"]Comparing the effects of continuous and time-controlled grazing systems on soil characteristics in Southeast Queensland is Savoy's trademarked HM cited as used on the property in question?[/URL]

I will remind you again: If a case study does not refer to Savoy's HM (trademarked or not!) then it is not a case study of Savoy's HM !

 

[Red Baron Farms]

1) The trademark is a issue on this forum. We are discussing Savoy's Holistic Management(TM) not whatever bits of good land management he has borrowed.

You mean borrowed from him. And no. The trademark is not an issue at all. Absolutely irrelevant. I can see you love it as a red herring that allows you to equivocate whenever you wish. But it has no meaning to this thread. Zip Zero Nada.

 

[Reality Check]

You mean borrowed from him.

A new unsupported assertion, Red Baron Farms !
Red Baron Farms : Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of then existed before Savoy.

As far as I can see:
* Rotation grazing existed before Savoy.
* No till existed before Savoy.
* The concept of using cover crops as feed was before Savoy.
* The only innovation that I can see is the addition of intensive grazing (some would call that over-grazing ).
But since HM(TM) is such a big dark secret, it is hard to see what was borrowed and what is new !

 

[Red Baron Farms]

A new unsupported assertion, Red Baron Farms !

You are so slow and your memory so bad you forgot the quote just minutes earlier?

A system of flexible, high-intensity, short period grazing followed by a long period of rest (HI-SG) was first put forward by Savory in 1978 (Savory and Parsons, 1980) and was later introduced to Australia in 1989 by Stan Parsons as “Cell Grazing” (McCosker 2000). The terms of “The Savory Grazing System”, “Short Duration Grazing” and more specifically in this paper “Time-controlled Grazing” are the common names of the new grazing system. Time-controlled grazing (TC grazing) has been increasingly popular amongst graziers in Australia and the rest of the world over the past two decades.

some would call that over-grazing

True. And what? People that haven't got the slightest idea of what causes overgrazing call it overgrazing, and you somehow think that is significant?

PS There is no secret. It is free to anyone willing to learn. I have stated this multiple times, so no excuses from you. It is a secret to you but only due to your willful ignorance. You refuse to learn, then call it a big secret. Self fulfilling prophesy.

 

[Reality Check]

..snipped insults...

So now you think that there were no systems of land management before 1978, Red Baron Farms !
You asserted that "You mean borrowed from him", i.e. everything in Savoy's HM(TM) was borrowed by all other systems (including the ones that existed before 1978). So I asked the sensible question
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.

And now you are stating that you do not know the concepts in HM(TM) or where they came from?
That only people who pay Savoy get to know the secrets of HM(TM)?
That your assertion is thus unsupported by any knowledge of the concepts behind HM(TM)?

And yes - having to pay for it makes it a secret since it is only shared by a select few.
You have only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.
I have only have only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.
Everyone who has not paid has only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.

P.S. You should also read the smillies: This means sarcasm and this means joking or humor .

 

[Reality Check]

Red Baron Farms: An example of Savoy borrowing an existing concept from an HM(TM) practitioner called Gabe Brown (you may know of him )

Improving soil health is a priority and no-till farming has been practiced since 1993.

No-till farming

The idea of modern no-till started in the 1940s with Edward Faulkner, author of Plowman's Folly,[2] but it wasn't until the development of several chemicals after WWII that various researchers and farmers started to try out the idea. The first adopters of no-till include Klingman (North Carolina), Edward Faulkner, L.A. Porter (New Zealand), Harry and Lawrence Young (Herndon, Kentucky), the Instituto de Pesquisas Agropecuarias Meridional (1971 in Brazil) with Herbert Bartz.[3]

 

[Red Baron Farms]

So now you think that there were no systems of land management before 1978, Red Baron Farms !
You asserted that "You mean borrowed from him", i.e. everything in Savoy's HM(TM) was borrowed by all other systems (including the ones that existed before 1978). So I asked the sensible question
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.

And now you are stating that you do not know the concepts in HM(TM) or where they came from?
That only people who pay Savoy get to know the secrets of HM(TM)?
That your assertion is thus unsupported by any knowledge of the concepts behind HM(TM)?

And yes - having to pay for it makes it a secret since it is only shared by a select few.
You have only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.
I have only have only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.
Everyone who has not paid has only a vague, broad idea of what HM(TM) is.

P.S. You should also read the smillies: This means sarcasm and this means joking or humor .

No. I understand what HM is. I actually asked for and received the training guides. FOR FREE. Told you time and time again. FOR FREE. HMI is a non profit organization set up for educating people about HM. Yes if you WANT you may take a course with a teacher for a fee. But it is not REQUIRED. All of the materials required to understand HM are FREE. Assuming you have the willingness and ability to actually educate yourself. Which obviously you don't. I do, and did. There is no big secret. It is incredibly easy once you train yourself to think in a holistic context.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Red Baron Farms: An example of Savoy borrowing an existing concept from an HM(TM) practitioner called Gabe Brown (you may know of him )


No-till farming

The first part of holistic management is to identify all the tools available to you to reach your goals both long term and short term. All the science, technology, traditional knowledge and other sources of knowledge etc... Why is it such a surprise to you that Gabe would develop his forage based multi species cover cropping system integrated with no till crop production? The principles of soil health are the same. It's one of the first things that will happen once you understand holistic management and holistic planned grazing. In fact I was astonished to find that completely independent of Gabe, several of the things I had worked out for integrating it with vegetable production, Gabe had worked out too for his garden. He doesn't commercially sell vegetables, but after we talked several times, he might just start. The profit per acre of vegetables is far greater than the profit of his cash crops, (mostly corn) We of course also exchanged nuances we had learned to mutually help each other. Once again your flaw is in fallaciously trying to define HM as a single one size fits all system as opposed to an adaptive system that works for anyone consistently. The species, climate, goals of the farmer, finances etc.. may change, but the principles of soil health, biodiversity and biomimicry don't.

 

[Reality Check]

I understand what HM is..

Then answering:
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.
should be very easy for you, Red Baron Farms.

Or not , since you have not been able to provide (even with "I do not have evidence or was wrong") actual answers to questions for several weeks now.

 

[Reality Check]

...snipped irrelevant wall of text....

Nothing in that screed addresses the point in my post, Red Baron Farms.
The question was: Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.
A partial answer is that Savoy borrowed at least one concept that has been around since the 1940s and practiced before 1978:

Red Baron Farms: An example of Savoy borrowing an existing concept from an HM(TM) practitioner called Gabe Brown (you may know of him )

No-till farming (proposed in the 1940s, practiced by 1971 which is before 1978)

(clarification in bold)

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Then answering:
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.
should be very easy for you

Bad premise. Savory's breakthrough wasn't in the concept, but rather the application of such for consistent positive results.

Or to say it a different way. Reductionist science is very good at breaking things down to it parts to understand them better, whereas Savory shows the manager how to use holism to take those understandings of science and build them into new whole systems with both predictable and emergent properties not seen in the individual parts. Then how to adapt to the negative emergent properties in such a way as to obtain consistently positive results.

You presume that Savory must have needed to reinvent the wheel to invent a new car. He didn't. That does not mean that the car isn't a new design though.

Now Savory did come up with sdhd grazing. He also came up with the brittleness factor. With those two new concepts, he got spectacular results, but the occasional set back. It wasn't consistent enough in dealing with nature's complexity. So he added a management tool for dealing with obtaining goals under complex constantly fluctuating conditions. (he borrowed from military planners) That helped, but still wasn't 100% consistent. So he added the holistic context to it and that gave him 100% consistent results. Not one of his projects has even temporarily failed since, even through droughts, social unrest, economic turmoil etc.... But what's really cool is that same holistic context that was originally intended to help preemptively mitigate negative results also automatically incorporates new knowledge and technology as it becomes available. It grows in a positive way as these things are developed by others. So the manager could simply keep things going consistently positive by sticking with what he knows, but he also can learn to do even better. That happens on a case by case basis and will be different for everyone because everyone's holistic context is different. ie they have different goals, different finances, different knowledge base, different learning curves, different creativity levels, different land in different climates that are constantly changing in different ways, different wants, needs, and desires for their different size families, different political beliefs etc... etc.... etc....

 

[Reality Check]

Bad premise....snipped irrelevant wall of text....

Bad reading comprehension, Red Baron Farms: You stated that Savoy's concepts were borrowed from him, implying that Savoy did not borrow anything that existed before !
And thus my question:
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.

The fact is that Savoy borrowed at least one concept - no till dates from the 1940s!

If you want to move the goalposts back to Savoy used existing, working concepts and added some personal twists (e.g. "intensive, short-term" to rotational grazing) then I will accept that is what he did. This is what I have accepted that he did for some time now.

P.S. Rotational grazing in the US began to be taken seriously in 1950:
Origin, Persistence, and Resolution of the Rotational Grazing Debate: Integrating Human Dimensions Into Rangeland Research (PDF)
60 Years Later: A Symposium On Rotation Grazing (2010)

For perspective, this article was written in 1950 and includes references to trials as far back as 1913 in many different countries.

Basic "rotational grazing" has been around for centuries, e.g. the rotation of sheep between different meadows in the UK.

ETA:
You do not have to emphasize Savoy's incompetence by mentioning his subjective and so useless brittleness factor. If you want to emphasize his competence then cite the use of his brittleness factor in the scientific literature.
"spectacular success" is basically a lie. If HM was a spectacular success then there would be no doubts that it works. But holistic management

One limitation of any land management system is that economically and politically powerful users can easily quantify and argue their needs. It is harder to define the economic value of ecosystem services and, therefore, the ecosystems and people most dependent on them for their subsistence become voiceless and often neglected users. In theory Holistic Management framework addresses this issue, but it is not always seen in the field.[29] Another common criticism of holistic planned grazing is that while farmers and ranchers around the world believe that it works for them and they have even received awards,[2][41][42][43][44] the majority of range scientists have not been able to experimentally confirm that intensive grazing systems similar to those at the center of holistic management show a benefit, and claim that managers' reports of success are anecdotal.[45][46]

(my emphasis added)

Advertising and selling HM(TM) has been a success - look at your almost blind belief in it regardless of the mixed experimental verification .

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Basic "rotational grazing" has been around for centuries, e.g. the rotation of sheep between different meadows in the UK.

Of course it has. And holistic management differs from all the rotational grazing methods in that it explicitly recognizes and provides a framework for adapting the four basic ecosystem processes (the water cycle, the nutrient and mineral cycle including the carbon cycle, energy flow, and community dynamics) with livestock production and social welfare.

 

[Reality Check]

Of course it has. ...

Once again you miss the point, Red Baron Farms, and repeat the obvious.

If you want to move the goalposts back to Savoy used existing, working concepts and added some personal twists (e.g. "intensive, short-term" to rotational grazing) then I will accept that is what he did. This is what I have accepted that he did for some time now.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Once again you miss the point, Red Baron Farms, and repeat the obvious.

If it is obvious then why is it so difficult for you to deal with the difference between HDSD grazing and HPG (both developed by Savory)? And if you think that difference is obvious, why even ask the question to begin with?

 

[Reality Check]

And if you think that difference is obvious, why even ask the question to begin with?

The obvious is that holistic management exists !
The obvious is that holistic management is not other land management practices - it is holistic management !

I asked the question in response to your assertion about HM, Red Baron Farms:

You stated that Savoy's concepts were borrowed from him, implying that Savoy did not borrow anything that existed before !
And thus my question:
Red Baron Farms (14 July 2014): Please list all of the concepts in HM(TM) and show that none of them existed before Savoy.

If you make an assertion then it is up to you to provide evidence to support it.
Or not, since you have not been able to provide (even with "I do not have evidence or was wrong") actual answers to questions for several weeks now.

If you make an assertion then you cannot demand that I do the research to support your assertion!

 

[Red Baron Farms]

The obvious is that holistic management exists !
The obvious is that holistic management is not other land management practices - it is holistic management !

I asked the question in response to your assertion about HM, Red Baron Farms:


If you make an assertion then it is up to you to provide evidence to support it.
Or not, since you have not been able to provide (even with "I do not have evidence or was wrong") actual answers to questions for several weeks now.

If you make an assertion then you cannot demand that I do the research to support your assertion!

No need. When I said borrowed from Savory, I meant borrowed from HPSD. Many modern rotational grazing systems borrowed from HPSD. MIRG, Cell grazing in permaculture, mob grazing, etc.... They all use the short duration high impact and long rest concepts first proposed by Savory in 1978. They all do a pretty good job too, depending on the circumstances. But they all have circumstances in which they fail as well. HPG on the other hand has so far never failed, it is consistent and repeatable. It is as big an improvement over HDSD as HDSD was over traditional rotational grazing.

 

[Reality Check]

When I said borrowed from Savory, I meant borrowed from HPSD.

But you wrote borrowed from him, i.e. Savoy. It is that assertion you had to either give evidence for or retract. So you have retracted it and replaced it with another unsupported (but reasonable) assertion !

Savoy seems to be the first person to think of high density, short duration (HDSD) grazing (or at least the first to publish about it). This happened in 1978 so it is not surprising that it pops up in other management practices.

I assume that you have seen Short-Duration Grazing: The Facts in 1999 which does start with Savoy's 1978 paper. It is a review of 13 studies in the US and includes looking at 2 reviews of over 50 experiments in Africa. Not good for that SD part of HDSD - marginal benefits at best. The conclusion has a nice historical perspective in how intensive grazing became accepted without scientific evidence.

 

[Reality Check]

Red Baron Farms:
You keep on going an about the USDA educating people about Savoy's HM because they have a few web pages mentioning him.
But it is as valid to say that the USDA educates people about the deficits in Savoy's HM because there is at least one web page criticizing it, e.g.
Conservation Benefits of Rangeland Practices: Assessment, Recommendations, and Knowledge Gaps (2011)

These results refute prior claims that animal trampling associated with high stocking rates or grazing pressures in rotational grazing systems enhance soil properties and promote hydrological function (Savory and Parsons 1980; Savory 1988).

(in Chapter 2. Assessment of Prescribed Fire as a Conservation Practice (PDF; 2.5 MB)