Green Living A Comprehensive Guide to a Happy and Sustainable Life by Green Matters

This book offers many ideas & solutions to try to live a greener life but it doesn't always show the complete picture. To be fair, it does show a more balanced view than some other books I have read, but the older I get, the more I have learned & the "solutions" are never as simple as they may first seem.

For example, the argument against gasoline powered anything was that we import our oil which is not sustainable. Okay, but as of our previous administration (Trump) we were the largest exporters of oil thanks to fracking the bejesus out of America. Now, with our current & supposedly green administration (Biden), we are back to importing our oil practically overnight. So which is it? Oil is bad because we import, yet oil is bad because we export.

Battery power anything is promoted as fabtabulous. I myself happened to adore my battery powered weed wackers & lawn mowers around my Eco farm. But what about the damage to the environment & slave labor to get the resources needed to make the batteries? What about disposing of the batteries? There is no discussion of this downside.

Wind power is also mentioned. As is the potential bird loss. According to the book the oil & gas industry made up the story about birds dying. I have no idea if this is true, but I could have swore that the blades were slowed down to reduce bird deaths. So if it was lie perpetuated by big oil & gas, why were the blades slowed?

Hydro (water) power. This is presented pretty clearly. Obviously creating a monster dam is going to have some environmental repercussions & should the dam ever fail...

Coal power is mentioned, but no mention of the tremendous amount of environmental upgrades that coal plants have gone through, including scrubbers which makes coal a lot cleaner than it once was. Yes, it's still "dirty" but it has been improved greatly. Most of these changes were under the Obama administration.

Nuclear is one of those interesting power supplies. It does provide clean energy kind of how batteries provide clean energy. As in, the energy doesn't pollute during use, but the harvesting/byproducts are awful for the environment.

Geothermal is awesome, but expensive & only works in certain areas.

So what are we to do? I have pondered this many times over. Sadly, my conclusion is that there is no answer. Everything we do to create energy causes pollution in one form or another. Even if we went back to when we first settled America, we had wood to burn. Can you imagine if we all went back to burning wood? Even if we never cut down a healthy tree, utilizing only sickly & fallen trees, the smog & pollution would be unbearable in the cities. Us country folks would be just fine (I exclusively heat my late 1700's log cabin with a wood stove).

I realize this may not be a popular opinion, but bear with me. As a full time Eco farmer, I am exposed & in tune with nature as my job. What nature never does is have a mono-crop. Nature likes variety. This way should something fail, the land isn't barren. So why not trust in Mother Natures wisdom & utilize all of our energy resources? This way we can reduce the amount of damaged caused by monopolizing one or two types of energy producers. We already know that every one of them pollutes. But if we diversify, we create more balance. Also, every single one of us has different needs. It is not right to say energy A is the way, do energy A or else. Energy B (or C or D or E or a combination) might be better suited for someone else.

These United States are far from perfect & change is needed, but to continuously tear at our own country saying we are ginormous polluters really isn't fair. China & India are by far the worst polluters & they have no plans on cutting back. They have no interest in the environment or decent worker conditions. How many items have you purchased this week from either of these countries? We buy what's cheap & in turn, we support environmental & human abuse.

We need choices in all aspects. Not more government regulation as this book suggests. When the government steps in, they have a nasty habit of making a bad situation worse. Look at the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency). They are worthless. They do nothing to protect our environment. It's a branch of government that we could disband & nothing would change except our taxes wouldn't be funding them.

What about vehicles? This burns my bottom a bit because I heard a couple of snarky self righteous comments from some folks who already drive electric vehicles. The comments were over the painfully high gas prices. Comments like, "Maybe it will teach you to stop driving a big truck". Or, "I have an electric car, so it doesn't bother me." This attitude is naive & foolish. First, electric vehicles are expensive. If you can afford one, that's really great! You are also better off living less rural with more charging station options. But what about folks like me who must have a 4WD big truck to run their Eco farm? I deserve to be punished at the pump? What about my insanely green lifestyle? Does this count for nothing?

Folks, we have to stop being so quick to judge others. We all have different lives & different needs. I believe that most of use care about the environment. Some more than others to be sure. I am one of the people who cares a lot. It drives me crazy because I cannot  come up with the utopia answer to have a truly green life. I do my best to tread lightly, but horrible person that I am, I drive a big 20 year old truck 'cause I'm a poor, dirt worshiping tree huger who happens to also be a full time Eco farmer.

The book also beats up eating meat. That diatribe is beyond tired. Yes, factory farmed meat is horrible. No one should eat it. Mother Nature didn't create cattle for no reason. They are a very important part of our ecosystem when they are allowed to graze naturally. The farm that neighbors mine raises beef cattle. It is one of the most beautiful things your eyes can behold. They rotate from lush pasture to lush pasture. Hay is cut twice a year to feed them all winter long. They are never confined or crowded. That is the type of meat you should enjoy if you don't wish to go Vegan.

Finally, the book discusses detoxing. I used to fall for this, that I needed to detox my body. Our liver & kidneys detox us 24/7. If they didn't we'd be dead. Get plenty of rest, drink plenty of water, & eat clean so your body can repair.

This book, by the way, is printed in CHINA. How's that for a taste of hypocrisy?

Weed-Free Gardening: A Comprehensive and Organic Approach to Weed Management by Tasha Greer

We all know there really is no such thing as weed free gardening. Still, as a full time Eco farmer who's been doing this job for nearly two decades, I was curious as to what the author would have to say.

After reading through this entire book, the summary really is learning to accept weeds in the garden. The photos she provides clearly show an abundance of weeds growing all over. Plants gone to seed. Frankly, it's a mess. But the author is happy & it works for her. It's not for me.

The author provides very good information regarding the importance of soil health. She provides many details on various methods one can employ to build soil health to help keep weeds down. Her main objective is to return carbon to the soil. For some reason, this is something I never gave much thought to. In my mind, I am/was already doing plenty to keep my soils healthy & figured that was good enough. As for weeds, I battle it out with them non stop & after reading this book, I can clearly see that this will continue to be the norm for me.

I overwinter my soils by adding compost from my Eco farm & then covering the soils until I am ready to plant in the spring. Apparently my method doesn't allow carbon to build in the soil. It does keep my soils weed free until planting time however.

One of the main takeaways I retained from this book is that the author strongly encourages putting weeds without seed heads right back into the soil. There are various methods for this. I tend to avoid this, because when I've tried it in the past (simply because I was overly hot, boiling in the full sun & wanted to save both time & labor) it usually backfired. I left pulled/weed hoed weeds on the planted soils. The problem for me at least, is that they will often re-root or regrow making my weeding efforts pointless. You may have more success. I have decided to reconsider this method by doing a very early morning weeding mainly with my weed hoe & my fingers, then leaving the weeds sit, knowing rain is not in the forecast & the weather is going to be hot enough to kill the disturbed weeds. If it is going to rain, this will never work. Nor if the weather is mild.

The author also discusses composting. Both hot & cold as well as some other methods that I've heard of. One being the use of a metal trashcan that is buried. There are other methods as well. I use a "lazy" cold compost method. I am too exhausted to put energy into messing with my huge compost piles when it's in the 90's or in the winter when it's in the 20's. When the weather is good, I'm extremely busy working my land.

The author even mentions one of my favorite books, A Woman's Garden. If you are interested in doing more than growing edibles, but would also like to explore dye plants, medicinal plants & more, you may find 'A Woman's Garden' enjoyable as well.

There is a lot of very good information in this book. Normally I get frustrated with many of the books that come out on Eco gardening because they paint such a rainbow rosy picture of it all giving me the impression that the authors have very little growing experience. This book is not at all like that. This book is a keeper.

Just remember, it's not at all about achieving a weed free garden. Not even close.