(JOHN) Alright!
This is John Kohler with GrowingYourGreens.com today I have a very exciting episode for you.
I’ve got my good friend here, Don Weaver, and I consider Don the expert; I mean, he
did write the book on what we’re going to talk about today and you know that I talk
about it a lot, it’s rock dust!
So here’s one variety right here called Azomite and Azomite is OMRI certified so you
can use it in organic growing and you should be using it in organic growing.
In any case, we’re going to have Don answer some questions about rock dust.
One of the biggest questions I get is “Hey John, where do I get rock dust?
I can’t find the Azomite or the Gaia Greens, so what should I do?
Should I put granite dust on my crops?
Should I put dolomite on my crops?
What should I do?”
So we have the expert here that’s going to answer some questions, so Don tell us about
how long you’ve been into using rock dust and what it can do for a person’s plants?
(DON) Ok!
John thanks for inviting me.
First of all, I’d like to mention that I consider Mother Nature the grand expert of
all this and I’ve been a student of her and the soil and ecology and growing healthy
food for 30-33 years, as long as I’ve been a raw fooder, actually 34 this month; so about
34 years and I’ve studied all the different perspectives on organic agriculture and permaculture
and realized that the foundation of healthy soil is the mineral base which comes from
the rocks of the Earth’s crust and in many soils, many parts of the world, the minerals
have been depleted and leached out of the soil and exploited in many cases by agribusiness,
mining practices.
So, we need to replenish the minerals as a basis for healthy soil and healthy crops and
healthy human body, mind, spirits.
(JOHN) So, Don why don’t you tell us about your background and how you got into growing
organically and using rock dust minerals.
(DON) Alright, well I became an organic gardener in the late 70s and I began reading a brilliant
author named John Hamaker who was a pioneer in the use of rock powder for replenishing
the mineral base in the soil which is the foundation of soil health and human health,
quality and quantity of food and other crops and vegetation on the Earth.
So, I just saw his inspiring articles and learned about his results and the results
other people were getting with remineralizing with rock powder which is largely overlooked
in organic agriculture which emphasizes adding back compost and mulch and organic materials,
but all those organic materials are grown out of the soil foundation which is made up
of mineral particles primarily.
The Earth was once a molten rock cooled down somehow became, that rock became a paradise
and that’s through the action of microbial life on the rocks, turning rock minerals…
fine, dusty, rock minerals into living, organic protoplasm of the microorganisms and they
provide the food for the whole chain of life, all the vegetation, the huge trees everything
is dependent on the microbes, they’re dependent on the minerals.
So that’s why we add rock dust minerals back to the soil.
(JOHN) So, do you think that in organic gardening, in organic growing practices, minerals should
be the base of that whole practice?
I mean, right now it’s not, it’s like…
(DON) Yeah, I do.
I think all most organic farmers are dependent on large imports of organic matter from, primarily,
from animal based agriculture industries; the chicken houses, the beef feedlots and
other animal byproducts industries.
They’re dependent on compost and animal manure to a large extent; of course all animal
and human manure ideally should go back to the soil to replenish it but if we’re dependent
for our fertilizer on the often toxic animal based industry and the destructive industry
that it tends to be in the modern world.
Then we’re just supporting, through buying the manure, supporting a destructive practice
on the whole.
So, we can... if we emphasize minerals as the basis, the minerals will allow the soil
to produce a lot more organic matter right in place and we can compost our garden and
farm crops, and have a lot of organic matter from fertile soil and if we need much less
imported, if any, from organic matter from outside, that should be going on some other
land where it was grown ideally so we try to close the cycle, close the loop of organic
matter.
And again, the minerals are the basis of that, once we get the minerals to a high level on
the soil then it can be pretty self-sustaining as long as we’re returning the organic matter
that’s growing out of it.
So, the foundation of organic agriculture I think should be remineralization of the
soil with a full spectrum rock dust; not just the dolomite or granite dust like we were
talking about before but a mixture of different types of rocks like you’d typically see
in a river bed or glacial gravel bed where the river or the glaciers have mixed together
many strata and types of rocks so you get a broad spectrum.
Just like we want to eat a varied diet of various types of fruits and vegetables and
nuts and seeds and whatever else we think we need in our diet, we want to give the soil
all the different rock minerals and it takes over from there and nature does its thing
of producing fertility and health and…
Where there’s not health there’s something wrong in the whole soil, plant, human system.
So, when we see human health breaking down we should think about what’s going on in
the earlier chains, the earlier links in the chain of life and health.
(JOHN) So it’s pretty much evident that we should be using the rock dust in the growing
but the problem most of my viewers have, and I’ve gotten this question…
it’s probably the number one question that comes up on rock dust is “Where do you get
the rock dust?
I can’t get the Azomite or the Gaia Green Glacial rock dust from my local nursery, nobody
sells it around here, I’ve called the big box stores…”
Well, don’t even waste your time calling them but local garden centers and other places,
they just don’t sell it.
So, what can somebody do besides ordering online?
I mean, you can order this stuff online.
This are 50 pound - 40 pound bags, they’re expensive to ship so it’s not super good
to be shipping around the country.
So, what could people do that would be available in their local area to use Don?
(DON) Yeah, well I think, local is a good thing to stress because obviously the shipping
cost of rock powder can be expensive.
I don’t discourage people asking their local nurseries and their big box stores about rock
dust so they start to educate them and make them aware of it.
A lot of them just don’t know we’re not educated about things like rock dust for soil
remineralization.
There’s a website called Remineralize.org in Massachusetts, it lists a lot of commercial
sources around the country and around the world, you could start there.
You can also go just to your local, say, phone book in the Yellow Pages under “sand and
gravel” you’ll find the local gravel pits, you can talk to those people and see which
ones have byproducts that they’re not using or they’re selling cheap; sometimes they
give it away, sometimes cheap.
And if you get it fairly finely ground… you can ask them if they have rock dust or
gravel dust or gravel crusher screenings they’re called and you want something that can pass,
at least some of it, through a 200 mesh screen is ideal, that’ll make it a really fine
dust coming through.
It doesn’t all have to be fine dust but if a fair percentage, say 15-20% is a fine
dust, it’s usually great to use for the soil and you can get it for free or as we
said a low cost.
So, again Remineralize.org for the sources list around the world and locally ask around,
go to the nurseries…
There are more and more nurseries carrying it, for example “Down to Earth” I think
it’s called, in the Portland area I just heard they’ve sold about 150 tons recently
since they started carrying the Gaia Green Glacial rock dust which comes out of British
Columbia.
So, once people start using it and their nursery starts selling it people come back for more
because they get such great results normally and so get some…
Get a nursery started carrying it and they’ll see for themselves, they can experiment, they
can get feedback from their customers.
Also, it’s possible each individual out there or a group of people could get together,
and be a distributor of rock dust.
Contact this companies and see if it’s practical to get a pallet load or a truck load sent
to your local area and then distribute from there use it for your garden and then see
which of your neighbors are ready to grow real good food again.
Speaking of real good food, we’re surrounded by it here in John Kohler’s garden.
This stuff tastes so great and it’s so good for you…
I wish I could eat it more often.
(JOHN) Grown in rock dust.
(DON) My garden is doing similarly but he’s got a garden even bigger than mine and it’s
doing fantastic.
So, thanks John.
(JOHN) You’re welcome.
(DON) I wonder if you have any other questions about rock dust.
(JOHN) I sure do.
So, once people get the rock dust, whether it’s the Azomite, the Gaia Green or whether
it’s from their rock quarry and all that stuff how do you apply it?
How many pounds per square foot, do you put in?
Should people mix a scoop in when they plant a new plant or should they just mix it in
their soil or what?
(DON) Yeah, I think normally you prepare a whole bed at once, at least the beginning
of planting to prepare a new planting bed it’s good to add a generous amount initially
at least because you may be trying to make up for 10,000 years of leaching and erosion
since the last glacial periods remineralized most of the world’s soil.
So, I usually recommend about a pound per square foot, one pound, and that is equivalent
to about 20 tons per acre on a farm scale, or acre scale, and that usually produces immediate
great results and you have reserved minerals to last probably years depending on how efficient
you’re returning the minerals back to the soil through your composting and your mulching
systems and how much you may be standing off the property.
So, be generous, that’s the main principle and a pound per square foot I think is a good
guideline.
you could do half a pound per square foot, a 10 tons per acre rate, still should get
real good immediate results.
If you only have less to work with you can still see good results a quarter pound per
square foot or even less.
Depending probably how finely ground the rocks are, so that’s the way to do it, be generous
and then you usually want to dig it in or cultivate it in the top 4 to 6 inches of topsoil
that's the main aerobic microbially active area is so you’ll be sure to feed all those
microbes and that’s the main initial planting…
I mean, rooting area for the plants.
Then, once you start tasting mineralized food you’ll see you’re on the right track,
you’re starting to feel better, you’re doing the right thing, you’re giving back
to nature some of what we’ve all been taking for centuries and starting to replenish the
Earth rather than continue to deplete the Earth.
It feels good and it’s obvious we need to do this on a worldwide collective scale.
(JOHN) Alright Don, so what would you say the difference is between using the Azomite
or the Gaia Green Glacial rock dust, which is what I use here, versus the stuff you said
you can get at a local rock or sand quarry?
(DON) John, can’t you see I’m eating some of your mineralized lettuce?
(JOHN) Sorry, you can have a second there Don.
(DON) Yeah, I think I’m ready.
(JOHN) Chew… make sure you chew your food really well Don, it’s very important.
(DON) That stuff is great.
(JOHN) 200 times a mouthful, 200 chews a mouthful.
(DON) Got it, Ok done!
So, for the Azomite and the Gaia Green and some of the proven commercial products [they]
have a long track record, they’re proven to work consistently, they’re usually very
finely ground which is a major factor for the availability for those tiny soil microorganisms
that need a finely ground product.
But again, if you can find a source in the local gravel pit that has a fair amount of
fine dust in it then you may have something also great, that is overall much cheaper by
the ton; you can get larger quantities for much cheaper.
But, if you have a small garden and you want to be sure something is going to work right
away and you have access to the commercial bagged products, like the 50 pound bags, that
might be easier for some people.
Just personal choice and what makes sense for your local area, wherever you are in the
world.
(JOHN) So what about the quality or quantity of the different minerals and the spectrum
of minerals?
Can it vary between the different brands from Azomite to Gaia Green to a quarry?
(DON) Well, they tend to be similar like… mixed rock deposits all around the world tend
to be similar in composition overall, none of them is going to be identical to the other
because all the rocks are in different percentages and proportions.
And you mainly want to get enough of a mixture which will provide all the minerals and then
nature, the microbes, sort out what they need for their metabolic needs.
So they’ll pick a little bit or boron, a little bit of magnesium, a little bit of zinc
and incorporate it into their protein building they’re building their own tissues and protoplasm
and then taking gases out of the air and building their microbial colonies and communities and
civilizations under the ground and then the plants can just tap into all of that wealth
and fertility and draw their sustenance from that living soil.
The soil that doesn’t have the microbes is basically dead soil and nothing will grow
in it, so it’s a matter of feeding the microbes.
They eat at the first table, as Dr. William Albert used to say, and if we feed them their
complete natural diet then we can start growing our complete natural diet with all the minerals
(30+) proven to be essential to the function of our bodies and brains and to prevent cancer
and all the diseases you’ve got to have all the nutrients active in supporting your
immune or health system so you stay healthy and don’t have to worry about all these,
so called, diseases of civilization.
(JOHN) So, the next question I have for you Don is some people always ask “If I use
the rock dust… hey I see it has lead in there and it has mercury in there, what about
the heavy metal toxicity?”
Don, what would you say about the heavy metal… because this does contain metals that can
be toxic in high amounts, right?
(DON) In concentration, yeah.
The rocks of the Earth’s crust contain all the nutrient elements and it’s apparently
the microbes’ job to pick and choose the biologically necessary ones and let the other
ones go and leach out; like they’re not going to be building...
If there is a trace amount of something like mercury or cadmium they’re normally not
going to incorporate it into their tissues or if they do it’s probably because they
have a way to use it in their metabolic processes.
But normally they just take the biologically essential and healthy nutrients that we all
need… the zinc… there are trace amounts of lead and some of the heavy metals in our
food that come through the soil and I guess we don’t really know for sure which of them
are utilized somehow and which are just processed and eliminated, but normally in the tiny amounts
there’s trace elements nature has been using in the soil forever so there’s no reason
for concern about it as far as we know.
Again, if you used something that had a concentrated amount of…
I mean, a spill of something like mercury is highly toxic, or uranium if someone is
mining uranium and spilling it out on the soil somewhere then you could obviously poison
your soil and anything you try to grow on it.
But basically rock dust is as natural and safe as anything we know on Earth and it’s
not only safe but it’s… it provides so much in the way of essential elements and
most people are more or less deficient in supposedly over 100 nutrients that we need
and they’re all based on... their creation is all keyed, into the mineral on the soil
so this is basically how to provide all this minerals in a natural balanced way.
(JOHN) Don so, thank you for your time.
I appreciate it a lot and the last question I have for you is how can somebody learn more
about rock dust, rock dust minerals and the books you’ve written?
Wait, didn’t you write a new book?
Why don’t you share with us how somebody could learn more about all your books and
how somebody could just learn about this stuff if they want to do more than just buying and
using it, because you guys should all buy it and start using it in your garden, but
if you want to learn more and learn really the science behind it Don will tell you how
to do that.
(DON) Ok, yeah.
I think it’s always good to learn about something before you decide if it’s right
for you.
I don’t know if anyone has found this to be wrong for them but there’s a primary
website my friends Joanna Campi in Massachusetts started 20 years ago called Remineralize.org,
it’s the website of the non-profit Remineralize the Earth Inc. and I highly recommend supporting
their work and seeing what they’re doing.
You can go to the website and see what's being offered there.
The books that I coauthored with John Hamaker and authored myself are called “The Survival
of Civilization” and “To Love and Regenerate the Earth”; they’re both available for
free online at a website called SoilandHealth.org.
It’s a great website and they’re in the agriculture section in there and there are
also many good free publications on health and nutrition but check the agriculture section
for “The Survival of Civilization” and “To Love and Regenerate the Earth”.
My new book is called “Regenerate the Earth” with a long subtitle, you can find that at
VibrantHealthandWealth.com that’s David Klein’s website, he’s the founder and
publisher of Vibrants Magazine, formerly Living Nutrition.
So you just go to the bookstore section of VibrantHealthandWealth.com if you’d like
to read about and perhaps order my new book “Regenerate the Earth - Nature’s call
to remineralize the soil re-green the land, rescue the climate and restore our health”
they all go together.
(JOHN) Alright Don.
Well, thank you once again I appreciate you sharing the message of rock dust.
And once again, you know I learned about the rock dust from Don, I know he wouldn’t steer
me wrong, I’m using it and it works exactly like he says it does.
All my stuff tastes amazing, your stuff could taste amazing, you could grow better, grow
faster, grow stronger plants that taste more, yield more and grow better food than your
neighbors.
So, hopefully you’ve enjoyed this episode learning more about rock dust with Don Weaver.
Once again this is John Kohler with GrowingYourGreens.com we’ll see you next time and use some rock
dust, it’s good stuff.