Bottom line: This is the time to tighten belts. If you have some open ground, plant a seed. The functionality of a regenerative vegetable garden makes sense for building a kitchen garden.
If you can buy a quarter cow and get it into the freezer, now is the time to pull the trigger, so to speak
Also not considered here is that our supplie lines and sources were badly bolloxed by the wuflu fraud and are not back to normal and may never be if the profiteers,can continue,to gouge us as they are still.
As a former Phosphoric acid -Fertilizer process engineer, I am well-aware of the significance of nitrogen and ammonia in the scenario you suggest. Di ammonium phosphate (DAP) has long been the mainstay of international fertilizer market. It depend on phosphate rock (largely Russian or Moroccan), sulfuric acid (sulfur, byproduct of sour NG purification) and Ammonia. The current Haber-Bosch process for ammonia, utilizing natural gas in a steam-methane reforming operation, is expensive and wasteful.
The available of low-cost, high temperature heat from the current spate of advanced nuclear reactors will change all this. But it will take time and money. The end result will be ammonia-from-hydrogen, but the cost per ton faces a wide range of cost estimates. I, for one, am VERY optimistic, if resources are directed in the needed directions.
Engineer, I’m 73. I’ve been following the world for over 50 years . Years ago it was reported in agriculture publications that Israel had a great natural store of ingredients that make fertilizer. Was//is that true??
Great article/background, Jill (I am assuming that is who JGM is). Part & particle of the problem today is trying to weed thru all the narratives & agendas to get to some real information on what/how. At least, I am confident that Trump understands all the irons in the fire, even if he can’t control it. Unfortunately, it seems to me, most people/leaders see thru the Greta Thunberg lens. While no one knows how all this is going to play out, Iran had to happen. The world has spent 47 years dancing around the same issue. Yes, it is like just ripping the bandaid off, but is a cancer that will not go away or get better. But this article gives insight into how I cannot believe the real end game here is China.
We (the US) are responsible for allowing China to replace our production facilities for fertilizers, useful pharmaceuticals, many other essentials. The belief was if we helped them modernize their nation of billions of people they would become our best friends. Well, how did that work out?
Time to plant the garden. We have had an unusually warm dry Winter and Spring. The buds on my peach tree are beginning to pop open which worries me as there is a frost coming on Thursday night and I’m sure more to come. Our elevation is 4500 ft. We will get more frost.
I agree with Drs Malone, plant food where you can. Whether it is pots on a deck or balcony or a garden in your back yard. We can grow a lot of food in our little garden. Last year we planted 16 tomato plants , 3 rows of peas , 3 rows of carrots, 9 pepper plants, 2 hills of squash, 2 rows of beans a patch of Strawberries and a patch of raspberries. We get potatoes from a local farmer friend. My family no longer grows potatoes. They grow wheat and hay. We have a couple of fruit trees.
Get out there and grow some food. That will help when the rising food prices start to climb.
Buy a few extra cans of food when you go to the grocery store. Plant a couple of fruit trees.
Like your attitude. Our parents and grandparents went thru WWII and thrived! Potatoes from costco in a 50 pound bag, buy 1/2 Cow from all the wonderful ranchers that are available. Become a little prepper. We will be fine.
Dr Malone, this may be a complete over simplification, but every large scale feedlot, milking facility, pig farm, poultry operation,and rendering facilities etc have so much natural fertilizer produced by those animals that mostly gets splashed on fields twice a year in some cases to excesss. Could this be a future source of both fertilizer and revenue for those facilities to process and sell to other farms? I know it woulld take time to ramp up but any domestic source located close to where it is neede d might be a long term answer to part of the fertilizer equation.
You are right. I lived in dairy country for the past 35 years. The dairies would clean their lots of manure and load it on manure trucks with spreaders on the back end and head out to the local farmers fields. The roads were busy with these trucks. (Oh, the delightful smell of fresh manure! Lol!)
In the past 15 years, one of the local dairyman's sons started a processing plant for the manure since it was in such good supply. They ground it up and sold it in bulk and then began bagging it. Since our area also has a lot of fish hatcheries, they were able to add ground fish to the mix to make excellent fertilizer.
And decades ago, our own Idaho millionaire, Jack Simplot, started mining phosphate. Simplot only finished the 8th grade, but he was a brilliant businessman. Worth a read of you can find his book. Here's a link to his mining ventures.
As a further comment I would like to add that as people continue to move to Idaho and fill in the farms with subdivisions and strip malls and bring "progress" to our wonderful state, the farms and the dairies (which smell and have flies!) are threatened and disappearing rapidly.
I'm 83. I grew up on a 4000-acre high country farm where every year was a gamble and everyone learned how to work hard. I'm sorry to say that I really dislike the current form of "progress" in all of its manifestations.
Technically that is correct,, But if the farmer did not return the Poop to the ground the ground would suffer ( lack nutrients) and the farmer would have to buy more fertilizer.
While I appreciate the heads up, I have no space for a garden, no freezer for large quantities of meat. We currently spend 50% more at the grocery than we did 5 years ago thanks to Bidenflation. Prices went up but they didn’t come down. Current inflation is much lower, but it’s still going up, not down. Our electric bill was over the top the past 2 months and thanks to many new taxes that will be coming for Virginia residents July 1st I’m holding my breath to see how our budget is affected.
We will need to cut out vacations! That’s ok, I’ve done a lot, seen a lot and we hate all airports!
We have cut back on our eating out at "normal" restaurants - they all seem to rack up a huge bill, just eating out at any ole joint. Even without a single glass of house wine!
We don’t eat fast food. Yuk! When it became obvious after Covid shut down so many restaurants when reopening service and food quality wouldn’t improve so we stopped going out to restaurants. However, we do enjoy live music and splurge on tickets occasionally. Music is good for the soul. Need to feed the soul sometimes.
Thank you so much for this post! It is a good place to tell you about my "Electric Mason Jar Vacuum Sealer VP05" made in China of course. So far so good. easy to use, fits regular and wide mouth mason jars. I'm using mainly to store leftovers. I am also testing it on things like black berries to see if they will last longer in the fridge. I am sure there are lots of ways to use it if it indeed extends the shelf/refrigerator life of food stuff, and not using plastic containers feels good. It can be found on Amazon.
comment. It seems like I had trouble getting even small bags of fertilizer with cow manure, during covid maybe that was the problem - or maybe its just Austin, and/or I didn't look hard enough. I horded and "prepped" so much during the covid era and pre-Biden inflation, after Mac died over a year and a half ago, I started trying to downsize and have been eating my canned food and giving away too. I have lots of dried beans too i was just thinking this morning I needed to start eating more of this too. I try to fit it in to my meals. It has saved me money since I haven't had to buy as much as I would have. I still haven't had to buy much soap, cleaning products. I think I will always be a prepper though and maintain a good supply that my libs could also benefit from.
A thought, if you have a dog or chickens. Dried beans in the Instant Pot (takes about 30 minutes), mixed with leftover veggies/fruit or cheap kale- make an excellent topper or base for homemade dog food. I also fed this to our chickens when I needed to use up excess stored supplies.
Dried beans are super cheap, even cheaper than chicken feed sometimes!
great idea, a good friend has chickens and her son comes over once a week for kitchen scraps and to deliver eggs, this sounds like a less messy way to do that. Wie are looking for a pup, should be soon I hope to focus on a good/the best possible diet for him or her
Thanks again. We are indeed fortunate from a supply standpoint. The refinery production in California aside. Good to have a real man at the helm in any crises. 😊 edited for alliteration
This is a great article Jill, Thank You for all the information. One of my concerns is how far can this government push the people before it blows up in their face. Sure as Joe Biden said the government has f-16’s and could kill every citizen at will but how much can people take. When all trust is lost, the government stops working for the people, and their only concern is lining their own pockets, the people stop believing everything they say, is the republic not then dead? In today’s world if a large portion of this population becomes hungry this government is going to have serious problems.
I don’t know when that critical point will come but if the government keeps pushing their way to that line eventually it will get there. I guess at that point we’ll all get to see what the result of years of robbing the people will bear.
Just got another vertical hydroponic system today, for herbs and strawberries. Got a hydroponic 5-gallon bucket for tomatoes, on my balcony. I am even thinking about planting potatoes in cages on the balcony. Working with local ranchers for meat. Getting to truly know people is becoming important, as well. It might lead to cooperation and even bartering. What a concept!
Look on Amazon for fabric plant bags. We went that way 6 years ago, compact and can get potatoes without dumping it all. But we have always had very good luck with them. Same for other vegs and the best part is dump at end of year to store. Look for potatoes bags.
Yes, Dee. I have quite a few of those. Growing at my daughter's place, who has a large outdoor garden. I saw something about growing them in straw in cages. That would work on my balcony.
Jill, I always appreciate your words of wisdom. Folks need to realize the long term ramifications of these moves. I agree that the Iran issue is important and a President finally had the courage to do something about this, but you are right to sound the alarm. Unfortunately, the Liberals will blame Trump and the mid terms will reflect this. I am willing to tighten my belt for the interim but then, we conservatives usually look at issues with common sense. My career was in the medical field and I remember years ago my surgeons were worried about us outsourcing our medicine production to China. There were numerous times we had to scramble for anesthesia drugs to be able to perform surgeries. I’m so glad Trump is trying to bring America’s production industries back to our country.
I had put together dried food 20+ years ago and had to start dispersing it (giving it to food shelves) because of shelf life. Looks like I will start stocking up extra again. Cooked beans and vegetables in glass jars (organic) from Jovial/Bionaturae, as well as jellies, (no sugar) tomato sauce and diced tomatoes. They also have Einkorn pasta. For people like me who don't have a garden plot there are ways to stock up. Thanks for the heads up!
Dr. Malone - your posts are rich in an understanding of economies, agriculture and societal forecasts. Your insights to predictive patterns and trends would be an asset to this Administration. If only there were a position for a Agricultural Economist - you would be that Liason. (Like you need yet another job to do). :)>
I was just about to post his substack article he posted 3_23_26 as well. It is well worth the time to read and he has great graphics at the end of the article. One point is with ever increasing fertilizer inputs the yields are still decreasing.
Bottom line: This is the time to tighten belts. If you have some open ground, plant a seed. The functionality of a regenerative vegetable garden makes sense for building a kitchen garden.
If you can buy a quarter cow and get it into the freezer, now is the time to pull the trigger, so to speak
Also not considered here is that our supplie lines and sources were badly bolloxed by the wuflu fraud and are not back to normal and may never be if the profiteers,can continue,to gouge us as they are still.
As a former Phosphoric acid -Fertilizer process engineer, I am well-aware of the significance of nitrogen and ammonia in the scenario you suggest. Di ammonium phosphate (DAP) has long been the mainstay of international fertilizer market. It depend on phosphate rock (largely Russian or Moroccan), sulfuric acid (sulfur, byproduct of sour NG purification) and Ammonia. The current Haber-Bosch process for ammonia, utilizing natural gas in a steam-methane reforming operation, is expensive and wasteful.
The available of low-cost, high temperature heat from the current spate of advanced nuclear reactors will change all this. But it will take time and money. The end result will be ammonia-from-hydrogen, but the cost per ton faces a wide range of cost estimates. I, for one, am VERY optimistic, if resources are directed in the needed directions.
That is good news! Micro -nuclear reactors are going to change the world!
It will also require honest leadership and public education! Maybe a gag for Greta. 😊
Engineer, I’m 73. I’ve been following the world for over 50 years . Years ago it was reported in agriculture publications that Israel had a great natural store of ingredients that make fertilizer. Was//is that true??
Great article/background, Jill (I am assuming that is who JGM is). Part & particle of the problem today is trying to weed thru all the narratives & agendas to get to some real information on what/how. At least, I am confident that Trump understands all the irons in the fire, even if he can’t control it. Unfortunately, it seems to me, most people/leaders see thru the Greta Thunberg lens. While no one knows how all this is going to play out, Iran had to happen. The world has spent 47 years dancing around the same issue. Yes, it is like just ripping the bandaid off, but is a cancer that will not go away or get better. But this article gives insight into how I cannot believe the real end game here is China.
Yes, Jill - and I completely agree.
We (the US) are responsible for allowing China to replace our production facilities for fertilizers, useful pharmaceuticals, many other essentials. The belief was if we helped them modernize their nation of billions of people they would become our best friends. Well, how did that work out?
"The Greta Thunberg Lens" 🤣 True!
I do remember that Greta has not been able to personally live as though she believes her own words.
She strikes me as meme-worthy, crazy, cannon fodder that the extreme left trots out at regular intervals.
Time to plant the garden. We have had an unusually warm dry Winter and Spring. The buds on my peach tree are beginning to pop open which worries me as there is a frost coming on Thursday night and I’m sure more to come. Our elevation is 4500 ft. We will get more frost.
I agree with Drs Malone, plant food where you can. Whether it is pots on a deck or balcony or a garden in your back yard. We can grow a lot of food in our little garden. Last year we planted 16 tomato plants , 3 rows of peas , 3 rows of carrots, 9 pepper plants, 2 hills of squash, 2 rows of beans a patch of Strawberries and a patch of raspberries. We get potatoes from a local farmer friend. My family no longer grows potatoes. They grow wheat and hay. We have a couple of fruit trees.
Get out there and grow some food. That will help when the rising food prices start to climb.
Buy a few extra cans of food when you go to the grocery store. Plant a couple of fruit trees.
Have a great day!
Have a great day!
Like your attitude. Our parents and grandparents went thru WWII and thrived! Potatoes from costco in a 50 pound bag, buy 1/2 Cow from all the wonderful ranchers that are available. Become a little prepper. We will be fine.
Dr Malone, this may be a complete over simplification, but every large scale feedlot, milking facility, pig farm, poultry operation,and rendering facilities etc have so much natural fertilizer produced by those animals that mostly gets splashed on fields twice a year in some cases to excesss. Could this be a future source of both fertilizer and revenue for those facilities to process and sell to other farms? I know it woulld take time to ramp up but any domestic source located close to where it is neede d might be a long term answer to part of the fertilizer equation.
You are right. I lived in dairy country for the past 35 years. The dairies would clean their lots of manure and load it on manure trucks with spreaders on the back end and head out to the local farmers fields. The roads were busy with these trucks. (Oh, the delightful smell of fresh manure! Lol!)
In the past 15 years, one of the local dairyman's sons started a processing plant for the manure since it was in such good supply. They ground it up and sold it in bulk and then began bagging it. Since our area also has a lot of fish hatcheries, they were able to add ground fish to the mix to make excellent fertilizer.
And decades ago, our own Idaho millionaire, Jack Simplot, started mining phosphate. Simplot only finished the 8th grade, but he was a brilliant businessman. Worth a read of you can find his book. Here's a link to his mining ventures.
https://www.simplot.com/mining-and-manufacturing
As a further comment I would like to add that as people continue to move to Idaho and fill in the farms with subdivisions and strip malls and bring "progress" to our wonderful state, the farms and the dairies (which smell and have flies!) are threatened and disappearing rapidly.
I'm 83. I grew up on a 4000-acre high country farm where every year was a gamble and everyone learned how to work hard. I'm sorry to say that I really dislike the current form of "progress" in all of its manifestations.
Thanks so much for this astute article.
Technically that is correct,, But if the farmer did not return the Poop to the ground the ground would suffer ( lack nutrients) and the farmer would have to buy more fertilizer.
While I appreciate the heads up, I have no space for a garden, no freezer for large quantities of meat. We currently spend 50% more at the grocery than we did 5 years ago thanks to Bidenflation. Prices went up but they didn’t come down. Current inflation is much lower, but it’s still going up, not down. Our electric bill was over the top the past 2 months and thanks to many new taxes that will be coming for Virginia residents July 1st I’m holding my breath to see how our budget is affected.
We will need to cut out vacations! That’s ok, I’ve done a lot, seen a lot and we hate all airports!
Vacations, fast food, and eating out!
We have cut back on our eating out at "normal" restaurants - they all seem to rack up a huge bill, just eating out at any ole joint. Even without a single glass of house wine!
JGM
We don’t eat fast food. Yuk! When it became obvious after Covid shut down so many restaurants when reopening service and food quality wouldn’t improve so we stopped going out to restaurants. However, we do enjoy live music and splurge on tickets occasionally. Music is good for the soul. Need to feed the soul sometimes.
Reached the point every time we ate out I got the trots. We no linger eat out, have not for yrs.
I find that time has continued to prove exceedingly kind to Michael Yon's predictions re: natural gas, routes, resources, fertilizer, and food.
Thank you so much for this post! It is a good place to tell you about my "Electric Mason Jar Vacuum Sealer VP05" made in China of course. So far so good. easy to use, fits regular and wide mouth mason jars. I'm using mainly to store leftovers. I am also testing it on things like black berries to see if they will last longer in the fridge. I am sure there are lots of ways to use it if it indeed extends the shelf/refrigerator life of food stuff, and not using plastic containers feels good. It can be found on Amazon.
comment. It seems like I had trouble getting even small bags of fertilizer with cow manure, during covid maybe that was the problem - or maybe its just Austin, and/or I didn't look hard enough. I horded and "prepped" so much during the covid era and pre-Biden inflation, after Mac died over a year and a half ago, I started trying to downsize and have been eating my canned food and giving away too. I have lots of dried beans too i was just thinking this morning I needed to start eating more of this too. I try to fit it in to my meals. It has saved me money since I haven't had to buy as much as I would have. I still haven't had to buy much soap, cleaning products. I think I will always be a prepper though and maintain a good supply that my libs could also benefit from.
A thought, if you have a dog or chickens. Dried beans in the Instant Pot (takes about 30 minutes), mixed with leftover veggies/fruit or cheap kale- make an excellent topper or base for homemade dog food. I also fed this to our chickens when I needed to use up excess stored supplies.
Dried beans are super cheap, even cheaper than chicken feed sometimes!
JGM
great idea, a good friend has chickens and her son comes over once a week for kitchen scraps and to deliver eggs, this sounds like a less messy way to do that. Wie are looking for a pup, should be soon I hope to focus on a good/the best possible diet for him or her
Thanks again. We are indeed fortunate from a supply standpoint. The refinery production in California aside. Good to have a real man at the helm in any crises. 😊 edited for alliteration
This is a great article Jill, Thank You for all the information. One of my concerns is how far can this government push the people before it blows up in their face. Sure as Joe Biden said the government has f-16’s and could kill every citizen at will but how much can people take. When all trust is lost, the government stops working for the people, and their only concern is lining their own pockets, the people stop believing everything they say, is the republic not then dead? In today’s world if a large portion of this population becomes hungry this government is going to have serious problems.
I don’t know when that critical point will come but if the government keeps pushing their way to that line eventually it will get there. I guess at that point we’ll all get to see what the result of years of robbing the people will bear.
Just got another vertical hydroponic system today, for herbs and strawberries. Got a hydroponic 5-gallon bucket for tomatoes, on my balcony. I am even thinking about planting potatoes in cages on the balcony. Working with local ranchers for meat. Getting to truly know people is becoming important, as well. It might lead to cooperation and even bartering. What a concept!
Look on Amazon for fabric plant bags. We went that way 6 years ago, compact and can get potatoes without dumping it all. But we have always had very good luck with them. Same for other vegs and the best part is dump at end of year to store. Look for potatoes bags.
Yes, Dee. I have quite a few of those. Growing at my daughter's place, who has a large outdoor garden. I saw something about growing them in straw in cages. That would work on my balcony.
Jill, I always appreciate your words of wisdom. Folks need to realize the long term ramifications of these moves. I agree that the Iran issue is important and a President finally had the courage to do something about this, but you are right to sound the alarm. Unfortunately, the Liberals will blame Trump and the mid terms will reflect this. I am willing to tighten my belt for the interim but then, we conservatives usually look at issues with common sense. My career was in the medical field and I remember years ago my surgeons were worried about us outsourcing our medicine production to China. There were numerous times we had to scramble for anesthesia drugs to be able to perform surgeries. I’m so glad Trump is trying to bring America’s production industries back to our country.
Anyway, thank you for sounding the alarm!
I had put together dried food 20+ years ago and had to start dispersing it (giving it to food shelves) because of shelf life. Looks like I will start stocking up extra again. Cooked beans and vegetables in glass jars (organic) from Jovial/Bionaturae, as well as jellies, (no sugar) tomato sauce and diced tomatoes. They also have Einkorn pasta. For people like me who don't have a garden plot there are ways to stock up. Thanks for the heads up!
Dr. Malone - your posts are rich in an understanding of economies, agriculture and societal forecasts. Your insights to predictive patterns and trends would be an asset to this Administration. If only there were a position for a Agricultural Economist - you would be that Liason. (Like you need yet another job to do). :)>
Very well put!! Calm, clear and coherent!!!
Do we really need to depend so heavily on nitrogen fertilizer?
https://pierrekorymedicalmusings.com/p/an-intensive-spring-resuscitation
I was just about to post his substack article he posted 3_23_26 as well. It is well worth the time to read and he has great graphics at the end of the article. One point is with ever increasing fertilizer inputs the yields are still decreasing.