SOC 248 Chapter Notes - Chapter 12: Staple Food, Squanto, Busby
28 Nov 2017
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Soc 248- reading notes- sernau ch 12 ecology. If mingled with farmers the animals could produce organic fertilizer: mobile herds had few possessions. Corn and beans can be dried and stored for winter use. It was squanto who saved the pilgrims from starvation, not the other way around: by 3000 bce animals were being put to work pulling blows and producing seeds that were edible to humans. Draft animals allowed large areas to come under cultivation. Sowing the seeds of civilization: agrarian states and empires fed their growing populations through the intensive cultivation of a few strains of grasses whose seed grains could be fed directly to humans. Industry did not replace agriculture but rather transformed it. Made it so you could dig irrigation canals and then pump water. Allowed for machining of the tractor and the harvester. Industrialized agriculture combined with global marketing of food, or agribusiness, feeds an ever-growing portion of the planet"s billions.
