Consecration of land

A couple times, we've seen references about 'consecrated' and 'unconsecrated' land on Safehold. With unconsecrated land being pointedly undeveloped, and requiring consecration to use for agriculture and the like. Likely consecration seems to be the Writ's term for the final steps of terraforming a particular plot of land to use for terrestrial and mutant (GMO) Safeholdian plants.

But what would consecration entail precisely?

Given the sparse information we have, it probably involves clear-cutting native wild-type Safeholdian plantlife, possibly even controlled fires to render underbrush to fertile ash.

But is that everything? I can imagine soil composition may need to be altered somehow, maybe through in-situ soil remediation of some kind (e.g. planting crops of tobacco or sunflower to draw out heavy metals, followed by clover to add nitrogen?), and/or the introduction of designed cornerstone species to keep the native Safeholdian flora and fauna from encroaching?

Does anyone else have some theories of what might or might not be involved in Consecration? Or may I have missed something, either in the books or Word of God in regards to what is likely detailed about this in the Book of Sondheim?

There's a reference (I think in TFT) to the former soldiers in the Mighty Host consecrating the land they were being settled on, but it didn't go into any details other than "it takes a lot of work" ... which was a given anyway.

Plowing compost made from Terran plants and manure from Terran animals into the soil sounds like a likely part of the procedure. It's a low-tech way to load the soil with beneficial organisms, and since they're going to have plant/animal waste to deal with anyway why not use it?

Your going to have to inoculate the land with microbes, bacteria.

At the same time you will need to clear the land of it's overburden of Native Safehold plants, probably by burning what you can't otherwise for building materials.

PH is also a consideration and nobody mentioned that in the books. Probably, you need run a couple of rounds of various Terran grasses to start building up Terran organic compounds. You could use clovers, alfalfa or similar crops used by Terran grazing animals so you get the manure to spread as well as start (eventually) using the grazers as a food source.

Nobody knows if local flora and fauna of Safehold will react with Terran crops and animals. Probably the best outcome is that the Safehold plants and animals will not eat the Terran material. Of course there is the problem of if and what Safehold plants and animals are poisonous to Terran animals and people. As has been mentioned in other SF, sometimes you can eat the alien plants but get nothing usable out of them though perhaps just the running of plants through Terran (human and animal) digestion MAY break the material down to a point where it can be used by Terran plants as decomposing matter.

With the descriptions of road being run though Unconcecrated Land but no mention of Terran plants (or animals) taking up residence there, humans and our animals don't get anything usable out of it and the flora doesn't mix wll.

Brigade XO wrote:
Nobody knows if local flora and fauna of Safehold will react with Terran crops and animals. Probably the best outcome is that the Safehold plants and animals will not eat the Terran material. Of course there is the problem of if and what Safehold plants and animals are poisonous to Terran animals and people. As has been mentioned in other SF, sometimes you can eat the alien plants but get nothing usable out of them though perhaps just the running of plants through Terran (human and animal) digestion MAY break the material down to a point where it can be used by Terran plants as decomposing matter.

"This slash lizard's already killed two farmers, Ahrnahld. It's got the taste for man flesh now, and more and more people are going to be out working the fields over the next few five-days. It's only a matter of time before it takes another one ... or a child."

There has to be a certain amount of compatibility between native Safeholdian and Terran lifeforms, or that slash lizard would have poisoned itself by munching on humans before Cayleb had a chance to go on that hunting trip in OAR. There's also references in the novels to humans using dragons as a food source, though it's likely Shan-wei did some genetic adjustments to the land dragons to make them more suitable for human use.