Your Empty Bank Account Is Your Best Tool for Soil Health
A Synopsis of an On-Farm Workshop
Driving to May Farm, I thought I knew what to expect: a farmstead, brick walls, hand-hewn timber, smoke wafting from a chimney in the evening glow, and the cacophony of creaturely sounds I had grown to associate with smallholdings. When I arrived, I pulled into a gravelly drive on thirty acres of leased land. I didn’t see what I had mistakenly envisioned. I saw grassland and a figure, bent at the waist, finishing his evening chores. Stillness and light wind through the trees surrounding much of the acreage–that’s what I heard. Paul, no longer hunched, slowly walked towards me, pointed me around a bit and told me where I could film. He didn’t have to say much. He rents this acreage for his cows, while his home and the rest of his farm are elsewhere. As far as I could see, the content of the video I was there to capture the next day would have to be driven by Paul May’s philosophy of land, grazing and proper scale, rather than visual stimuli.
Paul, one of three graziers in Northwest lower Michigan’s Benzie County, raises cattle on pasture and advocates for a holistic approach to soil health and local economies. On the day of our rotational grazing workshop, some of Paul’s first words to the camera articulated this approach: “I don’t think that anything is separated from anything else.” He returned to this time after time throughout the day. “That is institutional thinking!”, he would exclaim as he pushed those in attendance to reframe their thoughts in terms of systems rather than compartmentalization. Inquiries most often received responses akin to “if you want” or “it depends”. He continuously drove the point home that the seemingly finer points of pasturing are linked together and must be considered together. Myopic focus leads to dislocation.
While we walked and talked, Paul relayed that the connections being observed on his land were not novel. “We’ve had MSU and Cornell for about two hundred years, but these systems have been at work for a long time!” His words, referring to the stewarding of the land by its original inhabitants, referenced something likely closer to our conceptions of “timeless” than “a long time”. To help explore these connections, Paul enlisted the help of Tim Overdier, a retired soil scientist, and Nate Walton, an entomologist from MSU Extension. While these two represented academic and governmental affiliations that didn’t have the same longevity of practices rooted in the indigenous understanding and treatment of the land, they were there to buttress Paul’s long-term take. Tim would plumb the earth with a steel probe for visual references of its organic carbon content, and spoke of the similarities between the management model Paul was employing and the Native American management of the Great Plains- a thriving system involving bison, elk and fire. Nate parceled through cow pies by hand and spade, showcasing dung beetles skittering over his palms and offered diagrams and feedback on the relationships amongst insect life, soil structure and vegetation. These comments provided a basis for back-and-forth dialogue with participants already trialing methods of regenerative agriculture on their own lands and through their own work.
At the beginning of the day, Paul had been asked about the charging system used for his electric fencing. “I’m not going to answer that,” he replied. He did eventually give a detailed answer, but not until he had laid the bedrock for a more complex appreciation of the factors involved. This was a common theme; it harkened back to the Paul I had met the evening before who didn’t say more than he had to until he deemed it the appropriate time. This stance counterintuitively led to interactions of greater value, especially significant in an age of instant gratification, soundbites and screens. His answers weren’t instantaneous, brief or overly polite. Paul encouraged participants to be present in a way that would reshape their questions, rather than simply listening long enough to get singular solutions.
The most valuable tool for his slow, grounded and small-scale work, Paul will tell you, is his empty bank account. He doesn’t have a tractor. His cows are trained to follow a five-gallon bucket. This bucket, which allows him to efficiently rotate the cattle from paddock to paddock, also allows him to propagate desired plant species in his fields. It carries oats as a treat to entice the cows to eat, salt to slow their feeding and seed selected for propagation–in today’s case, Indiangrass. As the cows eat both, the seeds are eventually dropped as well-fertilized deposits throughout the landscape. This landscape is partitioned as he manually winds and moves electric fencing for their paddocks daily. He carries a hose around by hand. He incessantly recalls methods and tools others have recommended to him, or those that might work for those in attendance and follows it up by exclaiming “But I ain’t doing that!”. Paul’s approval has a high bar: where does that tool come from and where does it end up? What kind of inputs does it require? Can I replicate the results it offers using locally available materials or naturally occurring processes? This alternative understanding speaks to a different form of economics and values.
I had expected to videotape a bustling, self-contained small-holding. Instead, I walked through tracts of grass hemmed in by strands of electric fencing. Did a field hold within it the potential to explore complex systems? I had to turn my gaze downwards. Regeneratively pastured fields aren’t monolithic. Bluestem, chicory, goldenrod, dandelions, brassicas and much more abounded. The cow pies dotting the vegetation varied as well–some were tan while others a richer, deeper brown. Some sat like old, dusty deposits there to stay, while others seemed to steam while awaiting quick decomposition. Each of these details signified something and pointed to a story, an application or a practice, and it took attentiveness to view them wholly. The empty chicken tractors and old waterers spoke to recent history, while degraded sandy land referred back to its nature as a stabilized dune, as well as the rigors of previously being orcharded for cherries. The future as well was expressed amongst verdant strips, segments and paddocks and knee-high mulberry. Where I previously felt let down by the sight of fields, fences and some cows, I now had visions spanning much larger timeframes, a core component to Paul’s philosophy–our work with the land should be aeonic.
“Look at this motley crew! Really, I mean…I’ve got some dinky cows,” he says, cracking a smile. His small flock showcases varying shades of brown, tan and black. They’re genetically smaller than most livestock and he has fewer than most other farms and feedlots do. Paul is well aware of this. The deliberate choice of this herd results in less availability for the market, but also results in the regeneration and long-term health of his soils due to the benefits of ruminants with less grazing pressure. The cows don’t rely on imported commercial feed, but instead are active participants in an energetic exchange as they feed from, and subsequently feed, the grasslands. Even in winter they subsist on hay from the region. Their droppings encourage an array of life, from insects and worms, to birds, and lead to soil porousness, oxygenation, and hydration, healthy mycelial networks and other facets of lively, resilient soils. What I viewed as a somewhat monotonous landscape upon arrival began to awaken a sense of possibility. What kinds of systems could I become a part of by making deliberate and countercultural choices?
I needed different eyes to see more clearly what Paul was up to. Accordingly, it wasn’t until viewing video footage from a drone later that I realized we were only a few minutes from Crystal Lake, one of Michigan’s largest inland lakes, and not much further from Lake Michigan itself. There were many sets of eyes in attendance that similarly offered different perspectives on the work being done and the possibilities involved. Potential applications multiplied quickly throughout the day. Before the walk and talk, I had heard Tim speaking about the understandings of land stewardship that the areas indigenous have traditionally held for millennia. What seemed to me like powerful and novel insights have been cherished and transmitted by others for ages. Turns out, a small piece of land has a lot to share.