Dirty secrets of healthy soil | Peter Rutherford | TEDxPittwater

our next speaker is Peter Rutherford Peter is uh the senior ecologist at Kim bicki and an Engleside local Peter has a thing for dirt uh what is healthy soil and how does it impact human health let's find out please welcome Peter this stage I'm here to talk about something I think is just as exciting um so just put this over here from just get myself organized okay top the Tex is good I'm here to talk to you about soil this amazing stuff called soil which is what that is worms and all those beautiful creatures I'm just going to put that there for a moment so okay as most of you know i' work up at Kim bricky at um run an ecology education center up there and this is the sort of EXC bit of feedback is that sorry um and it's a very exciting place to work because what we do is we work we work with soil and before I start how did I get so interested in soil I just want to tell you a little bit about my story I grew up as a farmer as a chemical farmer actually out near molong or orange in the Central West and it's really lovely my mom's here today as well so I'm very excited to have her here she's 90 this year and um and and that's where I grew up and everything we did had chemicals associated with it you know our whole life was about chemicals that's how I was trained in farming and I studied Agriculture and horiculture and and I learned more about chemicals and how to the chemical industry how to how to run a farm that way how to how to grow food that way and then I ended up on a cotton Farm I got a job on a cotton Farm out near wew war in Northern New South Wales and um this was the epitome this was a wakeup call for me in terms of the destruction going on in terms of chemical use and abuse of the system we used to um obviously masses of spraying going on you know um airplanes were used for all that sort of work and uh we even used to spray birds and things that used to come and eat our other crops we used to get animals you know Birds coming and eating our safflowers and sunflower crops and we'd get the plane out from town filled up with dilden or claan and we used to spray birds with chemicals and and they all died and next time we plowed the fields we just plowed them into the ground I'm giving you a personal story because this is what happened to me why how did I become to know soil you know it was a big big story for me out there and then about 30 years ago from from now my dad died of cancer and when he died of cancer quite young 60 he was my age when he died and um I decided not to be a chemical farmer anymore it was like because I think the chemicals had something to do with with his demise and so I I so what did I do I started to retrain myself in Organics and biodynamics how do we how do we grow food either in our own backyards or on farms without the chemicals and um it was a big learning for me huge learning it's a 25 year learning now and everything I started to learn in permaculture in Organics biodynamics rof Steiner's amazing work took me back to the soil back to the soil everything took me back to the soil this amazing stuff where you start to see incredible things when you look and you know you see the beautiful worms and so my first question is what is a living soil so it's about a living soil not just a soil and these four words really describe a living soil it's it's a it's unbelievably alive you've got incredible life in beautiful soil um You've Got A diversity of variety there of of creatures the bigger the diversity of creatures the healthier the soil and there's a beautiful old saying isn't there my dad taught me this old saying finish the sentence variety is the diversity is the same saying diversity is the exactly so divers it's all about diversity and we know that the plant immune function is related to diversity so the amount of microbes in the soil the amount of the different types of microbes in a soil um give plants their immune function their strength to resist insects and diseases we know this now from solid scientific research so soil is is amazing stuff and we start with the bigger creatures like worms you know the Beautiful Creatures that make soil um and all the other bugs and things that you can see in soil and then we get down to I want to take you into a little journey inside we've been out to space now let's go down into the soil so then we get then we start looking at electron scanning microscope photos of the soil this is we're now looking at soil this is this is um soil fungi and some bacteria and things you can see in there penicillin as most of you know came from the soil that's the penicillium fungi um in the soil we're now looking into the soil into the world of of electron microscope world of the soil this is what it actually looks like um moldes and Fring structures of molds what a beautiful world you know I'd quite like to be a worm next next time I come back um uh and explore this a little bit um on your skin you know there's in a handful of soil in a handful of soil like that and you've all got a cup under you under you can you all just grab the little cup under your seat with soil in please in that little cup of soil which is a beautiful living soil in your hand there are over there are billions of microbes in every handful of soil there are billions of microbes in there right now don't worry they're not going to jump out and get you because people we need to because what we're looking at here is bacteria on human skin that's SL in front of you I want you to understand you're covered in microbes every Square centimeter of your skin right now is covered with it has over a million microbes on it we are microbial I heard David Suzuki in one of his more recent um talks I love David Suzuki amazing ecologist he said when you stand on the scales several kilos of what shows up is microbes understand we are microbes but we're training our kids and people to be scared of microbes you know bacteria viruses protozoa fungi no we need to love the microbes and love our relationship with soil so just taking there's another beautiful slide of soil the blue the blue is the bacteria and the um the fungi rather and the pink the um bacteria amazing world in their yeast fungi so on and on it goes but I just want to give you a fact because you ask most kids what do they think about bacteria and they'll tell you straight away what germs ter they're bad they're terrible look at the ads on TV we're being Hoodwinked programmed so deprogram our population is really important part of what I try and do at Kim bricky because look at the figures about 95% of all the microbes in the world are good for us you're covered you're protected by microbes the ones in the soil you're protected by them every leaf of every plant on the planet covered in microbes it is a microbial world my friends understand and love the microbes not this fear thing and the good ones protect us from the harmful ones so um stop using the anti antibacterials and things which we're encouraged to use don't use them you're giving yourself an opening to a deeper infection using those substances outside of hospitals so how do we make a living soil that's what a living soil is it's unbelievable life in the soil so how do we make it and I think part of our project of every single person not just Farmers every single person should be learning how to make beautiful soil because our soils are devoid at the moment our farming soils so you need to understand it's a living thing how do you make living soil you bring back the life so you start to understand that you got to stop using poisons any poison you spray even herbicides and things like Roundup and whatever we've been told how benign they are they're not benign to the to this life in the soil any chemical you use will be affecting this amazing life in the soil in some way so become an organic grower understand that we need to grow without the chemicals understand diversity that the more different things you put in so all your food scraps all your garden materials go into that beautiful compost or the worm farm or whatever way you're doing it so increase the variety of what's going into that system is how you end up with a very high variety or diversity of microbes in the finished compost and that then makes your plant stronger understand that it's about adding these things there's my beautiful wife Ally um give me a little demo so you know Tang us from that to that that's still a miracle for me that this stuff that we call scraps and yucky and horrible CH turns into this beautiful stuff called soil um ation we need to mix we either do it on a big scale we mix air is really important soil breathe soil is a living creature it breathes and the healthier soils are the Arabic soils we can have anerobic soils as well but the Arabic soils what we're really working with and you you know there's good tools and Technology now to make it on a small scale so you mix and aate aate your your compost or your soil and then you need to keep it moist obviously we need a drink every now and then so does your soil so your compost so keep it nice and moist learn how to make it and actually we're not doing anything really the worms and the microbes are doing this work for us worms what comes out of worms backside black stuff people call you know say worm poo or worm casting this black stuff is worm poo pure humus can we all say humus humus can we all say human human notice the relationship they're they're linked humus human the word Adam I'm using Adam the Hebrew ad that the word Adam comes from the boy's name Adam means Earth or red clay We Are We Are soil my friends so learn how to make it this beautiful stuff called soil and take some of your friends out and their Farms we know that about 80% of our farming soils in New South Wales have less than 1% organic matter left in them the chemical Farms which means they're biologically dead that's a frightening fact even to non-farmers so so uh human health now how do we relate the the soil that we grow in to the health of us you and me and everybody else obviously everything we eat comes from soil I say that to kids I say that to I work with thousands of school kids and I say to them everything you eat comes from soil and they go nah what about ice cream and milk and chocolate and I say everything everything no exception milk for example I give you one example does milk come from soil or ice cream of course where does it come from cows what do cows eat grass where does grass grow soil everything the soil feeds everything everything we get comes from the soil chocolate the whole lot I show them you know beans from the cacao from cocoa trees and things everything we eat comes from soil there's some beautiful fruit from that were're growing at kimrick uh Native raspberries on the right they're beautiful Australian native raspberries yakini and and um Cherry guavas on the left hand side amazing all everything comes from soil and so we need to get our kids into the soil we need to understand that um kids eating from organic food food connected to the mother to The Living Earth has a different effect than food growing in soil without the life in it and I'm going to give you a little bit of research stuff on that right now now so food GR in a living organic soil seems to create a more alkaline response in the human body and there's a lot of research in this field happening right now so when you eat something growing that's been grown in a living soil compared to a dead soil it has a different effect on your blood and we know that healthy people tend to be more alkaline for example even cancer there was a Nobel Prize given over 30 years ago for a scientist who Pro that cancer cells cannot live in an alkaline environment so we need to alkalize our bodies and this is one way of doing it so kids who eat a bit of good clean dirt um are healthier when they grow up they are and so I often get asked by teachers you know can I let kids touch soil is it okay for the kids to touch soil say if it's beautiful organic living soil yes absolutely because we know that when when children and you know you've all got your little cups there which I'm about to talk about if children get their hands into soil and their fingernails in soil and they eat a bit of soil it's a good thing I just got millions of microbes extra microbes into my body right then we build up our relationship with the soil by getting some soil into our body when we're kids it just happens naturally you put a baby on down in the dirt what do they do they put stuff in their mouth and that's a good thing there's good research on that I can give you lots of references to that so we need to get our kids and one amazing thing that I I discovered from an article I saw was that microbes in the soil can make us happy there's a actually a microb which they've identified called microbacterium vasay and it's a it's a it's it's a bacteria that when you when you breathe it it's sort of the smell you know the smell of good soil smells beautiful can you just smell your cup you'll get a bit of that smell you're actually getting bacteria into your nostrils right now and we know from the research that this particular bacteria I'm sure there's a lot more we just this is like a whole new field we're learning about um will boost the level of serotonin in your body most of you know serotonin makes you feel good it's a health related um substance in our body and that's article's referen there um so what can you do to finish up my talk with you what can you actually do you and everybody else on this planet you can learn how to make soil for a start we shouldn't be putting any food scraps in our waist bins and you know if you're already doing that I hope there's a little cringe going on with you um don't do it it's polluting you send it to tips and landfills it creates groundwater pollution and creates methane when you bury food scraps in an Anor robic environment so don't do it learn how to do something with your own you know start a compost do a worm farm um and get your kidss out into the soil get your kids out into the soil touch soil you know get them touching soil do you have to wear gloves when you touch beautiful soil no crazy touch the soil feel the soil smell the soil it's very important part of what we need to do I think as as as our communities start to want to be healthier you know we've got sick communities cancer now the number one biggest killer of um people in Australia used to be heart disease cancer is now the number one there's something something not right and I think a lot of it's related to this beautiful stuff here so you know be with your kids get them into your Gardens have a worm farm touch soil eat a bit of soil I've got a little granddaughter I've got two little granddaughters now actually and uh we had one living with us for quite a while and when she was born and for the first year or two and I used to take her into the garden and I used to put it you know before she could even speak I'd put a bit of soil on my hand I'd go like this I put a bit of soil on my hand like this and and she'd put a bit on her hand and I'd go and she'd go and I was doing her a favor I know that I was doing her a favor in terms of building up her immune system so I would encourage you all to not rush out and eat this but um you know what I'm saying work with soil please and um you know get them in whatever you can do uh get them into the soil get them into the soil and the dirt so I just want to say perhaps if we could just contemplate for a moment just take a nice breath of the soil in your cup just contemplate our lives for 30 seconds just contemplate your connection to soil who are you you're a walking bag of soil thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 63,524

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Health, tedx, Sustainability, tedx talk, tedx talks, Agriculture, ted x, ted talks, Lifestyle, Australia, Biology, Plants, ted talk, Global Issues, ted, Food

Id: 6FuEkUiCtWQ

Length: 15min 23sec (923 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 18 2014