Nerdsniped: Agricultural statistics and District Nine logistics

[kawuli]

So, remember the post I made, way back when, about Panem geography and such?
(over here)

And remember how I said I was going to write a fic about D9 for the Mary Sue Big Bang (you guys should write OC fic with me it'll be fun)?

Yeah. So today I COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY nerd-sniped myself when I realized the USDA provides free data downloads of crop harvested area on a by-county basis, and that I could therefore not only plan more precisely where I should put District Nine, but also where the wheat-growing crew my protagonist belongs to would be at what times.

So now my "Hunger Games Fic References" folder now includes R code and QGIS files. Don't ask me man, I don't know either.


SO. ANYWAY. We started here:


Then, thanks to the USDA, I could see where exactly the Corn Belt is located (and note that this is soil-characteristics-driven, so unless we screw up the soil too badly before Panem comes into being it'll stay put, approximately), and where, currently, wheat is grown. Some of that will shift in Panem, and I am imagining in a less energy-intensive agricultural system, there would be less irrigated wheat way out West. (Less energy-intensive also means longer rotations, less fertilizer).

Which gives us this:

The blue is maize acreage, orange is wheat acreage, the darker the color the more harvested area in a given county.

If you add soy, which is just about always grown in rotation with maize, it looks like this:

Again, orange is wheat, blue is maize, and now green is soy: you can see that the blue part in the first map just basically turns greenish.

Unfortunately I don't have Canada's ag statistics. D9 might go up a ways into the Prairie Provinces, Snow knows there's enough wheat grown in Manitoba to keep the Mellarks in business until the 20th Quarter Quell.

So, combining the Kid Pix sketch with the super fancy georeferenced data and assuming Panem's crop breeders are working overtime to keep up with climate change (plausible), you end up with the middle of Panem looking something like this:


D10 is drawn based on partly handwaving and partly cattle distributions, as the rest of the animals I assume are more intensely raised. Cattle, though, would make more sense to have on range as much as possible so you don't have to feed them grain (or silage, or hay, or whatever).

Now, if you're willing to take those rough borders as plausible, and assume the crop distributions are similar, I can tell you more about D9 logistics.

Major crop rotations in D9 are corn-soy-fallow, corn-soy-wheat-fallow and wheat-red clover-fallow, where you might get more than one rotation in before fallowing and fallows might last more than one year, depending on your soil fertility and fertilizer availability. This works because Panem is maximizing return to people and fertilizer, not economic return on a piece of land. Sorghum and alfalfa for animal feed could be grown in pockets, cotton likewise (probably in the southeast near the Mississippi), some oilseed crops like canola in the north and rice in the southeast. You can grow either sugarbeets in 9 or sugarcane in 11 for sugar--maybe both. I don't know about potatoes--maybe 9, maybe 11. And now I'm going to stop thinking about all the minor crops before I disappear down another internet rabbit hole.

For the main crops, corn, soy, and wheat, I'm imagining crews that run up and down the districts planting and harvesting. You would have teams of two per machine, working as combine/planter/tractor and truck drivers (for carrying grain and machinery), and about four machines per crew, moving out to plant/cut from a central point and then heading for a new area together. This also means D9 is one of the only districts to have an extensive road network for moving machinery around--it'd be too hard to do all of it by train.

I'm putting my girl on a wheat crew: so, from late September to late November they're planting winter wheat from south to north, in April and May planting spring wheat in the northern part of the district, Then they spend June - August harvesting winter and spring wheat, again moving from south to north with the harvest dates.

That leaves late November through March for working in town in mills, loading docks, etc. A few mechanics from Six do major overhauls to equipment in winter, but basic repairs can be done by crews, with one trained D9 mechanic per crew, who would be a driver, just with extra training in an apprenticeship style with the D6ers.

You would need more corn and soy crews per area because corn/soy land is less spread North-South and harvest dates are closer together. Compared to the modern US, Panem probably produces much less maize and soy both on an absolute basis and compared to other crops, because less is fed to animals--although more might be used for ethanol and soy diesel, depending how you feel about Panem's oil supplies (I think oil is scarce enough to be expensive but not nonexistent, for the record).

Anyway, this is quite a lot more geeking out than is truly necessary for fic-writing purposes, but I had fun with it so I thought I'd share, so you all can amuse yourselves or ask questions or tell me what bits make no sense before I start writing the real thing.

Comments

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

That's pretty interesting! (thanks USDA XD;) Whatever reading you do that gives you ideas/gets you excited about this stuff is good, I'd say!

(I felt a bit tempted to write OC stuff with you?! You're good at making me feel excited, Kawuli! But I am reluctant to commit to schedules with long fic and I don't think I have any ideas of that size at the moment)

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Yes, it is fun! I am a fan of data so poking around with it was good times.

(haha yes it's convenient that I had this kicking around already, otherwise I might not have done it...)

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

I like seeing you clearly have so much fun. :D

(the power of lucky timing!!)

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

and I pictured an inane D4 conversation of general confusion-

Finnick: They move around in Nine. Some of them at least? With the planting.
Theo: How do you know that? (wow, Finnick, so informed! :D)
Finnick: Rokia told me.
Tyde: The weather probably varies throughout the district, since it's so north-south. They do things...staggered? Maybe that makes sense.
Song: Did she tell you why?
Finnick: No, she was only telling me about mechanics from Nine apprenticing in Six. There's big farming equipment that they drive and stuff.
Odysseus: ...what are things like in Nine these days? .....Do any of you have friends in Nine??

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Awwww I love your 4 crew.

After the war it wouldn't be far from 4 to 9 and 10, they could go on an epic adventure! (and I think Sara goes to 9 during the war so they'd have friends-of-friends-of-friends or something they could visit :D)

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

<3

Roadtrip!! ...can any of these people drive??? XD; (Finnick says: Rokia can teach me?! Annie says: You ask her too much stuff... ^^;) (also, no, Theo, before you ask, it is not just like with a boat)

(I think friends-of-friends-of-friends are definitely considered legitimate to drop in on by District Four standards! It's probably a size and population of district thing- who's all that far away and unconnected to you after all? They may have some trouble explaining this, but at least Mags taught them all that it's proper manners to bring a gift for those occasions)

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

hahahaha excellent!

Rokia doesn't mind answering questions and teaching people stuff :D She could probably be convinced to tag along on the grand adventure too. Especially if the alternative is Theo pretending that because he can drive a boat he can drive a car XD

And yes! friends of friends of friends....totally fair game. They'll overwhelm the poor D9s but it'll be fun

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

Good, good~! Yes, Rokia should come along. She'll be their driver/go-between regarding some of the people she knows there. It'll be a chance to get to know the remaining Fours better.

(Song says: He'd better not so much as consider it....)

That's probably what's "wrong" with D4 by some standards- too much spunk down there. ^^;

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Yes okay, and at this point we may as well bring Sara along too, since she's the one who actually knows some Nines. And she's trouble so she'll probably get along fine with Theo.

(Song probably says: oh dear don't encourage him!)

And hey, it'll be a party! They can bring treats from Four to trade around. And maybe a kid or two'll come back to Four with them and hitch a ride back on the train! (Rokia puts on her serious face and explains the importance of inter-district communication for the new Panem if anyone questions it)

[xanify.livejournal.com]

HAHA YOU ACTUALLY DID IT THIS IS AWESOME

/also a nerd

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

I DID

It took me a while because silly work expected me to do actual WORK wtf? BUT YUP

(I also have a bunch more crop areas and dairy cows and yields and and and.....but I am restraining myself. For now.)

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Putting this here for future reference...and for anyone else's amusement.

Youtube videos about combines (we'll get to planters and such later):
John Deere S-series cab: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXDkSPO1AEc
Claas combine at work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XStbpS1HNDA
Case combines at work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wd78mdiwrpA

Truck transporting a giant combine http://www.stewartinternational.co.uk/assets/images/combine-harvester.jpg
(Conveniently in Panem there is no other traffic on the road so who cares about "wide loads" and seriously long truck beds?)

[sonja flaagan (from livejournal.com)]

Potatoes are grown in large quantities near me in the Red River Valley (border of Minnesota and North Dakota). One of our processing facilities in Grand Forks makes the french fries for McDonalds. One of the largest farms here in the area Black Gold also has farms in the south. It would probaly depend on your rotation. Potatoes, soybeans, corn Sugar beets are definitely grown near here also. Rotation typically being sugar beets, barley, soybean or sugar beets, corn, soybeans. To go on a side rant I wonder if a great amount of beer is drank, if it is having barley in the rotation would make sense if not corn for biofuel production or animal feed. We also have canola further north which is rotated canola, wheat, soybeans. Or you can have winter canola further south by Oklahoma and have winter canola, wheat, wheat.

When your thinking fallow are you saying that a cover crop is grown such as turnips or clover and then composted in along with manure from district 10?

I would definitely be willing to beta!!

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Oh man this comment made me :DDDD because I don't know much about the northern plains. My grandparents used to farm out in western KS and OK and I grew up in Indiana so I know a little bit about those places but it's great to hear about your area!

Good to know about the potatoes and sugar beets-- I know Michigan grows a lot of beets but I already assigned them to D6 so they're not going to be crop producers...(slightly related tangent, I know there's sugarcane ethanol in Brazil, I wonder if that would be feasible with sugar beets?)

And I didn't realize there was winter canola! That makes sense, I'm totally adding it to the southern D9 rotation.

Man, the manure thing bothers me, seriously. On the one hand, manure: super useful. On the other hand, do you really want to be hauling literal shit all over from D10? I'm thinking there's some of that, especially of higher value stuff like pelletized chicken manure that's easy to transport, but for soil building it'd be better to have fallows with yeah, clover or turnip or winter rye or probably mixtures thereof. That'd work well in a mostly no-till system, you could plow after your fallow year(s) to mix stuff in and break perennial or resistant weed cycles, then do no-till the rest of the time. (Makes planting faster too...) Then you can use some additional manure especially for phosphorous, in both 9 and 11. Poor Sara, as a beginner on a cargo crew she gets assigned to the Ag district trains hauling grain and manure and such among districts.

And it'd be great if you could beta! Message me your email? I don't have much yet but getting started....it's really different from what I've written so far.

[sonja flaagan (from livejournal.com)]

I messaged you :)

There are energy beets in development at NDSU... Slow to catch on so far.

I have some ideas for manure.... :DDD But will refrain (for now...)

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Oh huh. Biofuels out of everything seems to be a popular trend these days :D

TELL ME MORE ABOUT MANURE. No, really.

(I got your message. I'll send you some stuff once it exists properly XD)

[sonja flaagan (from livejournal.com)]

http://www.nps.gov/miss/learn/photosmultimedia/upload/watershedBG.jpg I think this would also go into establishing district boundaries. North and South Dakota typically have more intensive cattle production west of the Missouri River. The bulk of district 9 would be between the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers.

The manure issue has been bothering me. Near me in the Red River Valley we have a large feedlot about 30 miles southeast of Grand Forks which takes the byproduct from processing potatoes and sugar beets. The beet pulp is high in energy along with the potatoes for finishing cattle. Cattle typically take 3-6 months in the feedlot to finish gaining a pound for every 6 pounds of feed they consume. Grain fed cattle typically have better flavor, appearance and texture than grass fed. (Would the Capital prefer grain fed or grass fed? Or could it just being able to have access to red meat?) That's a lot of potential manure coming out to fertilize fields nearby. The same idea would be that in Iowa and Southern Minnesota you find a large amount of dairies and hog production because the corn is nearby for consumption.

Or you could take the processing waste, compost it and then spread on the fields instead. Then the cattle would not be grain fed but grass fed to finishing. This typically takes longer but requires less resources and less environmental impact. Dairy cattle can be mostly pasture raised also it helps with keeping sound feet and legs and less need for grain production. Milk production would decrease but it would allow for reduced resources. Dairy cattle at the end of their milk production life are typically butchered for lean hamburger. You could go with a more dual purpose breed such as Milking Shorthorn which would allow the ability to have good meat production also with dairy. Goats could be pastured after cattle in a rotational grazing situation to do cleanup on the plants that won't be eaten by cattle. This would reduce the need to transport manure. It would also keep district 9 and 10 away from each other.

When cattle are slaughtered the processed bone and meat meal from the byproducts could be used as a protein source for poultry production. Since the average chicken produces a 1/4 lb of manure a day (1 cubic foot every six months) you could definitely pellet it. I see it going to D11 for the more specialized crops like vegetables and orchards.

Wild rice is grown extensively in Minnesota so you could add that as a grain.

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Ha yes ok now I want to go get GIS layers for rivers and add those to my map (and sort out the cattle distributions I have which currently don't make sense oh dear).

I tend to think that beef cattle would be largely grass-fed since you've got plenty of space and not that many people, and since energy for growing and transporting grain is scarcer and more expensive. You could have old-west style really free range setups for beef cattle, cowboys and all. Or like they do here in West Africa, where herds go from north to south and back again with the rains, except there it'd be winter/summer. But you'd probably have a couple of feedlots for "gourmet" fattier grain-fed (or crop-byproduct-fed) beef for the Capitol. And those do indeed produce a hell of a lot of manure (my grandparents lived near one in western KS and oh boy could you smell it if the wind is wrong). For dairy you'd obviously need something more intensive, with better managed pastures and some degree of supplementation, so that could be where you'd have the cattle and goats in an rotational system. And that'd also be where you could get manure efficiently, other than wherever you scatter the slaughterhouses and poultry production. All this is probably on the eastern side of the district, so you don't have to move either animal feed or manure farther than necessary.

Well damn now I want a new map with d10 details....and more crop information...and and and oh dear.

[kawuli.livejournal.com]

Also I just realized in the movie they're growing cotton in D11 (I checked and when the Victory Tour is in 11 they drive through a cotton field), which makes some sense geographically and historically but I'd have put it in D9 since a) it can be mechanized, and b) 11 is even farther from 8 than 9 is.

HMMMMMMM okay then