Editor’s Note: We’re re-running another of Michelle Smith’s timeless farming columns, this one originally published on 24 January 2018.
There is a country proverb that the best fertilizer is the footsteps of the farmer. Anyone who follows me through an average day could be forgiven for taking this literally, as I trot out to the barn a dozen times before noon to check on baby chicks or hop on and off the tractor to examine new growth or a patch of soil. (Though I am known for how little I care for clothes, I do spend money on my feet when I can, since I depend on them to earn my living.)
For a farmer, the devil — and everything else — is in the details; details that can be hard to spot from a tractor seat. Don’t get me wrong, I love my tractor enough to kiss its bar-tread tires as it saves me back-breaking work, but it doesn’t teach me how to read my soil the way handwork does.
Farmer spreading grasshopper bait in his field. Year unknown. (Dorothea Lange, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothea_Lange, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
I took a soil workshop once in which the instructor enthusiastically dug a giant hole, jumped in and told us all to give it a good sniff. From the top level to the bottom she taught us to see, feel and smell the differences as the profile moved from loamy topsoil to grey podzol. Now, when I walk my field and note the areas which may be compacted and poorly drained, I take up a handful of dirt and sniff for dampness. Those are the areas I may wait to till, or perhaps cultivate lightly before planting a cover crop. If I get on them too early in spring, the tractor ruts I leave will last the rest of the season, or even years to come. There are a few low spots I have converted, faute de mieux, to perennial plantings of berry bushes and raspberry canes. It makes for complicated tillage patterns, but this gentler treatment of my field means healthier overall productivity.
Poor soil can also make getting rid of noxious weeds harder. Trying to get rid of reed canary grass, couch grass or Canada thistles in compacted soil that never dries out is a job for martyrs, as the runners resist chopping or tilling and multiply even faster. A bad patch is hard to isolate and can infect the adjoining fields, making your neighbours cross too. Identifying recalcitrant patches of invasive weeds before they get out of hand and go to seed keeps gardens happy, but if you always drive your field instead of walking it, you won’t see this stuff until it’s too late.
There are benefits in apportioning nutrients as well. A quick survey of the weed populations gives a pretty accurate picture of what the soil needs — and doesn’t need. If the pigweed is really happy, you might want to hold off on adding any more compost to that area. Thinly growing sorrel means you need to lime. These days, there are GPS-based nutrient management systems that map soil samples taken at regular spacings and spit out a finely tailored, nutrient-management plan for each field. I do love good tech and would have sprung for this if I could have, but I was told my fields were too small to make this practical — that it would be easier just to walk around. Since doing a visual survey of my five acres takes about an hour and costs way less than $7,000, I decided to spend my money on shoe leather instead.
It makes one wonder, though, what such technology gains us. True, large farms on the prairies and wherever there are larger tracts of flat land (i.e. not Cape Breton) are now sometimes tilled by remotely operated tractors programmed by a computer, but at what cost to soil life and erosion? The more frequently samples are taken, the more finely tuned the nutrient map will be, but at what point does it become more cost effective, especially when working smaller, more fragile or marginal areas, to simply develop your own visceral experience of the interplay of soil and water movement on your land? Tech advocates claim that learning to read a computer-generated model can replace that kind of knowledge, but I remain unconvinced that it is useful except on a scale so large that care can be only a peripheral concern.
Wendell Berry is famous for saying you should only farm as many acres as you can plow with the horses you have and have only as many horses as you can feed with the acres you own. I am not trading in that tractor for horses or oxen anytime soon, but I do think there is some value in not trying to farm more land than you can reasonably walk – even if you don’t get to walk each inch very often. How else can you reasonably gauge the slope and pitch of each part of your field, or decide if that bottom land is better left for summer pasture? My neighbor had one very lush field that he never let the cows on until the end of June, for fear their hooves would tear up the sod. As long as he coddled it, that low-lying field stayed productive and healthy even in flood years.
A ‘cow man’ or dairy worker milks cows by hand at Old Parsonage Farm, Dartington. Although electrical milking apparatus is used on this farm, some cows respond much better to hand-milking. The cows all have their tails tied up to strings hanging from the roof to keep them out of the way of the cow man’s face whilst milking. (Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons)
Biodynamic farming practices may be scientifically suspect, but there is no arguing with the results on some of these beautifully managed farms. When I read about the minute care required just to make a manure pile, I find myself suspecting it is not the arcane ingredients but the devotion that creates the payoff.
It’s like the difference between dairymen who handle their cows as individuals and larger operations that have resorted to tagging cows with computerized activity monitors to let them know when the animals are in heat and when and what they need to be fed.
I know many outwardly tough dairymen who, nevertheless, have favorite animals and despite the exigencies of the bottom line keep them past their prime with little justification. They may not be able to lavish affection on all 200 cows, but their sympathy is engaged for the betterment of the herd. Those are the farmers that care and who spend long hours watching the cows in their barns and fields. Just keeping an eye, because they love it. On a small scale at least, this attention translates into increased health and productivity. One farmer I read about saw a production increase of 10% after he began brushing his cows twice a day. Certainly this kind of de-stressing would make any Bessie or Buttercup relax!
On the other hand, a young farmer I know could not figure out why his milk production had dropped by 50% until he checked his computerized feed system. His high-producing cows were the victim of a computer bug that had halved their grain ration. He fed them by hand until he figured out a way to hack his own computer and fix the problem.
Computers should enhance a farmer’s observations, not replace them.
The Slow Food Movement is often (rightly) characterized by an elitist sensibility around food and fads, but in other ways it celebrates the fine art of taking care. Even if the scale necessary to grow food for a hungry planet does not allow such a precious approach in the mainstream, we can still take a lesson from the measured pace of these artisanal-scale producers. There is simply no technological substitute for that hands-on attention to detail.
Though I do not share their religious conviction, I admire the Quaker principal of intentionality: so far as is possible, every action and observation is performed deliberately and with due thought given to the possible consequences. I feel the same about Buddhists and their mindfulness practice.
Farmer plowing with horse in Netherlands. (Photo by Sally V, own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)
On my ideal day, I would like to move through my farm with that same kind of care and deliberation and attention. A slightly slow chick would be noticed and helped before it became sick. A loose piece of roofing would be screwed down securely. An outbreak of scale on the apple trees would be caught and dealt with before it got out of hand. In my orchard, I can tell when it’s time for a dormant oil spray by checking the blossom development every few days — I don’t need to calculate degree-days. More footwork but what could be more pleasant in early spring? Having to slow down this winter has meant that maybe this year, I will take the time I need to really look at everything I should and possibly even get it right.
Or at least make it better.
Market gardener, farmer, workshop leader, seed-saver, political candidate and mother, Michelle Smith has spent over 30 years coping with the challenges of our bioregion and in the process has built a store of practical and technical knowledge. The Inverness resident has served on the board of Seeds of Diversity Canada and represented Alternative Producers with the Federation of Agriculture but can do nothing about her hair. She is pictured with a head of Club Wheat, a seed that shares her approach to hairdressing.
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