[Terrapreta] pE in Muck and Mystery

[Gerald Van Koeverden]

Michael,

As you described, zeolite as a soil amendment plays a similar role to  
that of charcoal.  The big question for me is how did the Amazonian  
Valley Indians fertilize/nutrify their charcoal media?

1.  Fish - from the evidence of fish bones found in the soil profile  
- is definitely high on the list.  Amerindians in North America also  
used them liberally in agriculture for corn-growing  - one fish  
buried in a hill of corn.  Fish come up the rivers in great numbers  
every spring for spawning, just in time for the planting of the tri- 
crop system of corn, beans and squash.

2.  Indians must also have had some type of toilet, since they were  
obviously crowded into large villages and small cities in several  
civilizations.  Could they have used charcoal in the pits to absorb  
and sanitize urine and feces?  ...Somewhere I've seen a picture/ 
drawing of plants growing out a man's body...??


Gerrit


On 12-Sep-07, at 1:31 PM, Michael Bailes wrote:

> Muck and mystery has an interesting post on pE
> See http://www.garyjones.org/mt/
>
> I just posted this reply to the article.
> "On the clay pottery you might be on the right track
> This is a comment in a brocure on an Australian "clay" I have been  
> researching called zeolite
> "Zeolite carries a negative ionic charge which naturally attracts  
> positive charged cations like ammonium, potassium, magnesium and  
> calcium.
>  The open crystalline structure of zeolite has many storage sites  
> for these ions which hold naturally through a loose chemical bond.  
> These fertiliser ions are available to plants.
>  Zeolite has a very high cation exchange capacity and thus  
> increases the mixes ability to hold and release nutrients. As  
> cations are water soluble they escape from mixes by leaching.
> Escott Zeolite is also an excellent capillary distributor of water  
> due i. . ."
> http://www.zeolite.com.au/
>
> -- 
> Michael the Archangel
>
> "You can fix all the world's problems in a garden. . . .
> Most people don't know that"
> FROM
> http://www.blog.thesietch.org/wp-content/permaculture.swf
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