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Lessons from the #Incas: How llamas, terraces and trees could help the #Andes survive #ClimateChange

by Alex Chepstow-Lusty, August 26, 2025

Excerpt: "The evidence shows that from around the year 1100, during a period of global warming known as the Medieval Climatic Anomaly, Andean communities moved higher up into the mountains. They built terraces, irrigated slopes, and planted trees such as alder to make the soil more fertile and provide wood.

"Llamas and their cousins, alpacas, were vital as they were hardy, light-footed, and supplied wool, fuel and fertilizer. Their communal dung heaps even show up in the lake sediments, revealed by spikes in fossils of certain dung-eating mites that thrived when llama caravans were pastured nearby.

"Together, these practices stabilized soils, reduced erosion, and allowed large populations to thrive in the Andes."

[...]

"When the Spanish arrived in the 1530s, this balance was upended. New livestock—cattle, sheep and goats—trampled vegetation and eroded soils. Their free-ranging herds left waste across the landscape, unlike llamas and their easily-collectible dung.

"At the same time, the Spaniards cut down forests for timber and charcoal, in contrast to the Inca who had imposed harsh penalties to protect their woodland resources. The 17th century Spanish pastor and chronicler, Bernabé Cobo, remarked that a Spanish household used as much fuel in one day as a native household would in an entire month.

"The lake sediments record the ecological damage of the era: excess nutrients from dung, more erosion, and a collapse of the Inca's sustainable land management."

#SolarPunkSunday #TerraceGardening #TraditionalKnowledge #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledge #ClimateAdaptive #LessonsFromThePast #SustainableLandManagement #MedievalClimaticAnomaly #MoreTrees #Colonialism #IndigenousHistory

#Minnesota farmer grows #ClimateAdaptive seedlings as co-op member

Brian Ingmire’s mission to help #reforest northern Minnesota became a lot more important after the June 21 storm that leveled millions of trees in the #Bemidji area.

By Dennis Doeden
September 07, 2025 at 9:00 AM

Excerpt: "Brian is a member of the Farm & Forest Growers Cooperative, a network of small farms and nurseries that grow climate-adaptive tree seeds into seedlings, and then sell the seedlings to reforestation agencies and individuals.

" 'Minnesota has a massive need for tree seedlings,' Ingmire said. 'Something like 10 million trees are needed every year at a minimum. And we have a lot of forest disturbance, whether it’s fires or wind events.'

"Ingmire figures he has about 30,000 tree seedlings on his farm, and about two-thirds of them will be available for purchase this fall. Online orders can be placed at climatesmarttrees.com. He's also been selling seedlings at his Bemidji Natural Choice Farmers Market booth, and says having them there gives him an opportunity to talk about the project.

"New North Farm is one of 24 members of the cooperative. Ingmire is growing several varieties, including #RedOak, #BurrOak, #YellowBirch and #SilverMaple. All are collected from about 200 miles south and then started up north.

" 'I can tell you where their parent tree came from,' Ingmire said. “They should be able to handle the changes in temperature extremes. We’ve got different insect pests and #fungal pests that are putting stressors on trees just because of the temperature extremes. These trees should have the genetic ability to deal with that kind of extreme.'

"The need for #reforestation was certainly exacerbated in the Bemidji area after the June storm. It is estimated that Beltrami County lost nine million trees, and many were also downed in parts of Hubbard and Cass counties.

" 'That number exceeds a lot of the nursery capacity that we have,' Ingmire said."

#SolarPunkSunday #ClimateChangeAgriculture
#ClimateChange #ClimateChangeAdaptation #MoreTrees

#ClimateAdaptive

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