When we started La Clarine Farm, we quickly adopted biodynamic (BD) principles, as laid out by Rudolph Steiner early in the 20th century. We were intrigued by its viewpoint that a farm should be self-sufficient and that the farm, like nature, should be considered in its entirety and not just piecemeal. We practiced what might be called “classical” biodynamics for a number of years while we learned more about how it functioned.
After a time, we realized that many of the ideas and methods of BD were geared toward annual cropping systems, and that many of the much touted aspects of BD, such as planting calendars, seemed to have little effect for our perennial crops, such as grapevines and our goat herd. Perennial plants take in the year in its entirety, and change throughout the seasons. They eventually become a summation of many years and patterns. Slowly, we backed away from classical biodynamics toward what might be called “advanced” ideas in BD; we began applying the preparations via homeopathic dilutions from GW Agriculture (real homeopathy, not what most BD practitioners call homeopathy). The results were startlingly better.
We also began spraying the land using complex sequences of the preparations, and again, the results bettered anything we had before experienced. Finally, we find now that we hardly have to spray at all – the idea being that a single “dose” has the greatest effect, and that repeating a dose can negate positive effects. This realization that there is powerful energy in Steiner’s preparations makes us respect them even more, although we use them less.
About the same time, Hank was reading “One Straw Revolution” by Masanobu Fukuoka. It is a real gem of a book. His ideas had a profound influence on us and changed our way of seeing the positives and negatives of biodynamics. The underlying philosophy of BD is quite sound; its conventional practice, however, is somewhat flawed and much too anthropocentric for our tastes.
Fukuoka’s Natural Farming, or “do-nothing farming”, as he called it, opens up the possibility that we humans have a very egocentric and narrow perspective on Nature and that attempts to "know Nature" are usually clouded by our own prejudices. The very fact that we are involved can skew the results away from a natural course. And while he called it "do-nothing", there is actually a different level of involvement for the farmer.
To quote Fukuoka: "it actually involves a process of bringing your mind as closely in line as possible with the natural functioning of the environment. However, you have to be careful: This method does NOT mean that we should suddenly throw away all the scientific knowledge about horticulture that we already have. That course of action is simply abandonment, because it ignores the cycle of dependence that humans have imposed on an altered ecosystem. If a farmer does abandon his or her "tame" fields completely to nature, mistakes and destruction are inevitable. The real path to natural farming requires that a person know what unadulterated nature is, so that he or she can instinctively understand what needs to be done ― and what must not be done ― to work in harmony with its processes."
Fukuoka proscribes four principles for natural farming, which, when followed, allow Nature to “do its thing” with very little human intervention. They are:
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1.No tilling – plowing breaks up the natural order of the topsoil, kills off important microbiology, and allows nutrients to run off or volatilize. The soil is best “tilled” by the roots of plants, earthworms, voles, mice, etc.
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2.No fertilizers – Nature can provide all the fertility needed. One only has to look at a virgin forest of great, tall trees to see for yourself that there is plenty of fertility available. Fertility doesn’t come in bags. It comes in gradual deposits of organic matter which are worked by worms, fungi and microbes and made available to plants. Returning all prunings, leaves, stems and grape skins to the vineyard is a good way to close the nutrient loop on any vineyard and provide for adequate soil organic matter.
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3.No pesticides – An ecosystem in balance has no need for insect control. Only when the farmer has made a mess of things, such as adding lots of nitrogen fertilizer, do insects and disease appear. They are Nature’s clean-up crew, getting rid of the dead and dying. A farm in harmony has a population of "harmful" insects AND a balancing population of "beneficial" insects.
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4.No weeding – all plants serve a purpose. Some gather up certain minerals not found in the soil and collect them in their tissues. Some rid the soil of excess minerals. All of them gather energy from the sun, and produce sugars which are translocated to the roots and exuded, which provide the carbohydrate energy that microbes need to make mineral elements in the soil available to the plant. It’s a neat circle that has worked for millions of years. Weeds are the farmer’s helper, contrary to conventional wisdom. We have seen a gradual progression of weed species from those which are invasive to those which improve the soil, such as clover.
These ideas are not dogma. They are a set of goals to work toward. Sometimes, such as when a vineyard is planted, it might be necessary to till and add some organic, mineral amendments. But once the vineyard is on the right path, as it were, the farmer needs to step back and let Nature find its course. It may not be the exact course that the farmer had in mind, but one can be assured that this is the proper way for the land to develop. The farmer then becomes a guardian and assistant to Nature, instead of an adversary. The resulting products from such farming, be they wine, goat cheese or fruits and vegetables, will be true to the land and the seasons.
Our experience here at La Clarine Farm seems to indicate that once a balance is restored on a farm, in both the land and inside the farmer’s head, these Natural Farming methods do in fact work very well, whether one is growing grapes, raising goats or just tending a home garden.
(c) 2010 La Clarine Farm
