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Post by steev on Feb 25, 2020 0:04:39 GMT -5
Myself, I find some of the discussion about reducing the population a tad 1938-ish Germany: get rid of the undesirables; breed lots of the desirables; I say this being 50% ethnic German (from Ukraine, two or three generations, so not the "good" Germans, as I've been literally told, but Catherine the Great, a Prussian, thought they were good Germans. I could go on, but I won't.
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Post by flowerbug on Feb 25, 2020 6:00:19 GMT -5
i think there is some sense to paying attention to breeding but most people don't consider it appropriate for humans for some strange reason (perhaps religious). when reducing the population is the goal you would think that all groups could be talked into keeping their levels about to the same proportions if that was such a touchy issue. my own preferences would be to cross breed everyone so there were no more visible differences that people could use for stupid things like racism. i'm sick of all the petty crud that happens in the world just because people are different from each other. and yes i know even if that ever happened we'd still likely find some reasons to torment one another. in-group out-group behaviors seem to function in every group i've observed.
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 25, 2020 16:07:30 GMT -5
Well, China got on board with limiting the population some years ago and recently decided to up the number of kids allowed, so bucking the trend of thinking too many people. I suppose some people are now cheering on the coronavirus as a relatively neutral way to diminish the population, although so far the actual death rate seems to be quite low for a pandemic, but then I know nothing about such things so that's an uninformed opinion. I personally have problems when anyone starts talking about breeding people as I prefer to think of humans as slightly more individualistic than other animals, but even other creatures have preferences they act on if possible.Not many other creatures, perhaps, but some.
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Post by steev on Feb 25, 2020 16:43:35 GMT -5
I have problems when people start talking about breeding, period, especially those who can't stop until they get a son; that was partly why China upped the allowance to two; when only one was allowed, couples often would give up girls for adoption, so they could take another chance for a boy; one might suspect they didn't value girls as much as boys; I am reminded of Al and Tipper Gore, who weren't content with one, two, or even three lovely girls, but had to have a boy to name Albert Gore III; what environmentalists!
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Post by flowerbug on Feb 25, 2020 18:38:59 GMT -5
i didn't have any, they can have my share...
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Post by jocelyn on Feb 26, 2020 9:10:59 GMT -5
Here is an interesting population link data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?most_recent_value_desc=trueThe world fertility rate is a little under 2.5 children per woman, over her lifetime. If you scroll down, you get the rates per country. Countries with little old age security, possible disease or war wiping out parts of the popluation, those countiries have more children. I couldn't find population growth per country, over time. It's probably out there though. World population growth is slowing. See the following link. It has some interesting sublinks too. ourworldindata.org/world-population-growthRight now, world population growth is about 1 percent a year, down a lot.
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 26, 2020 15:31:13 GMT -5
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 29, 2020 14:06:19 GMT -5
One of the sad and interesting side effects of climate change that we hear virtually nothing about is the actual plague of locusts sweeping across Africa and now into Pakistan, which has declared a state of emergency. Apparently the swarms are up to a million insects and each can eat up to their own body weight a day..the degree of mayhem they are causing hasn't been seen for decades. What crops there were have been eaten down to dirt...
Years ago I read about some farmer on the Canadian prairies who invented some sort of gadget that mounted on the front of a tractor to sweep up and collect grasshoppers and then he fed them I THINK to his cows, well pulverized and mixed with grain I'd imagine. I have wondered from time to time about why they don't get collected and fed to chickens... But of course nobody appears to be thinking along those lines.
The concentrated effort is focussed on hiring planes and dumping tons of insecticides on the swarms...whether or not they kill the grasshoppers the insecticides will undoubtedly kill most other insects such as pollinators.. and to my understanding, the last time the grasshoppers became an issue on the prairies, insecticides of the day appeared to have little to no effect on them. Oh when will we ever learn, as Pete Seeger used to sing...
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Post by flowerbug on Mar 1, 2020 17:22:49 GMT -5
when you have no birds, frogs, toads, etc to eat the bugs...
pretty much you could try to net them and bury them as fertilizer, but in such an arid climate and few resources they can't even get nets or protect anything with fencing or fabric.
people can eat them.
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Post by prairiegardens on Mar 2, 2020 14:35:08 GMT -5
well not going to cover an acre field but netting is likely far more accessible there..because of mosquito netting...than pesticides and some planes to spray them from, which is what they are trying to raise money to do at the moment. apparently people do eat them, in which case it seems as though a resource may be being wasted..except that perhaps they don't get eaten in the fully adult stage, only in the immature stages. Hard to imagine all that hard skin being actually edible but don't know.
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Post by steev on Mar 2, 2020 19:32:38 GMT -5
Grasshoppers are popular in many cuisines; deep-fried with soy sauce, or salt, chili, and lime are both good and very nutrient-packed; if the hard chitin is beyond you, treat them like in-shell sunflower seeds: chew them until the good is gone, then spit out the husks.
After SHTF, I'd much rather eat grasshoppers than long pig; you don't know WHAT disease those suckers might be carrying.
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Post by prairiegardens on Mar 5, 2020 9:14:04 GMT -5
Apparently so, just read an article in National Geographic detailing the 10 most popular types of insects eaten regularly around the world, with the notable exception of North America. So I wonder why these locusts are not being harvested for food instead of being poisoned so they are of no use for anything?
The 10th on the list btw, were stinkbugs, which apparently taste like apples.
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Post by reed on Mar 5, 2020 17:54:48 GMT -5
I accidentally ate a stink bug one time, the flavor lingered for an extraordinarily long time. I assure you however, it didn't taste like apples.
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Post by blueadzuki on Mar 5, 2020 18:13:40 GMT -5
Different insect. The ones they are referring to are WATER stinkbugs, which you find in places like Asia.
I think the real issue is CATCHING the bugs. That's isn't always easy with locusts and grasshoppers.
The real problem, from what I understand, is people poisoning the bugs, collecting them and THEN selling them for food. It makes people sick and turns then off of eating insects.
I understand India has a similar problem with rice rats.
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Post by steev on Mar 5, 2020 23:09:01 GMT -5
Yes, places where locusts thrive may not be in possession of many butterfly nets; poisoning them knocks them down, but they're only good for fertilizer, although not organic; they could be fed to pigs, but again, not organic. Having worked in the ag chems industry, I'd as soon not have that crap in my diet.
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