Agriculture on Mars

[darthgently]

14 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

I think it is a given that if life becomes self-sustaining on Mars and doesn’t have much contact with Earth, it will diverge and become completely different from what is found on Earth. Same goes for humans.

As has been noted in a few places through the years, settlements  and Earth will probably have to synchronize microbes periodically to some degree to prevent a lack of immunity to something elsewhere wiping out a population on  Earth or a settlement.  The lesson of what happened when old world germs were introduced to the Americas should never be forgotten; it was painfully and traumatically learned.  Lessons like that need to be cherished to avoid paying the price again

[farmerben]

The problem there is that there are dozens of different genetic immune systems and Native Americans only had one or two of them.  All humans probably share a common ancestor within the last 150,000-200,000 years.  But Native Americans may have all come from a common source within the past 30,000.

 

[magnemoe]

On 1/17/2025 at 12:34 AM, SunlitZelkova said:

I second this. During 6th grade camp I sat at the teacher’s table due to my allergies, and overheard my science teacher (who happened to be sitting next to me) talking to another teacher about how one hypothesis at the time (2014) of why allergies develop revolved around the parents being too clean.

Notably my biological grandmother has numerous allergies but my mother does not, and my mother and father were not clean-obsessed. Not sure how grandma was raised.

I think it is a given that if life becomes self-sustaining on Mars and doesn’t have much contact with Earth, it will diverge and become completely different from what is found on Earth. Same goes for humans.

Think humans in Europe vs. humans in Africa. And for other animals, the difference between African big cats vs. mountain lions in North America.

The sterile environment get you allergies is at least an generation old. It makes some sense think bored soldiers in an war zone or an cat playing with an mouse. 
Now your grandmother having lots of allergies who sounds very weird, but I'm 55 and my mother was old then she got me so my grandmother was born in 1905. 
She would not live in an sterile environment even if an princess before WW 1. 
But your grandmother might grew up in the 60's or later. The Berlin war fell 35 years ago after all, 
 

[farmerben]

There are beneficial organisms for sure.  I think some strong medication I took as a teenager had the effect of making me lactose intolerant.  A decade later a farmer bet me that he could prove I was not lactose intolerant.  He gave me raw colostrum from a grass fed Jersey cow.  It permanently cured my lactose intolerance.  

I think antibiotics, medications, cleaning products, and various chemicals influence our gut biome.  Allergies are not caused by an organism, but the lack thereof, or by the body's own poison responses

[darthgently]

16 minutes ago, farmerben said:

There are beneficial organisms for sure.  I think some strong medication I took as a teenager had the effect of making me lactose intolerant.  A decade later a farmer bet me that he could prove I was not lactose intolerant.  He gave me raw colostrum from a grass fed Jersey cow.  It permanently cured my lactose intolerance.  

I think antibiotics, medications, cleaning products, and various chemicals influence our gut biome.  Allergies are not caused by an organism, but the lack thereof, or by the body's own poison responses

This.  Our guts were “domesticating” other critters long before the first shepherd.  Sometimes people seem to think I’m being over the top when I say it isn’t just humans going to settle other places, that we’ll be taking an entire farm.

Apollo took an entire farm to the Moon.  And it follows that the much larger animals we’ve consciously domesticated outside our bodies are likely woven into that network at this point.  Like via colostrum to tie it back in.

It might seem like an extravagance to have chickens on Mars, but I think it could end up being simpler than not having chickens for reasons we have yet to discover.  Life is a web

Edited 14 hours ago by darthgently

[farmerben]

Each thing we nurture on Mars is an opportunity cost to something else.  I say ticks and poison ivy can stay away.

[darthgently]

54 minutes ago, farmerben said:

Each thing we nurture on Mars is an opportunity cost to something else.  I say ticks and poison ivy can stay away.

And just say no to human biting mosquitos