Day One on the Farm
After yet another documentary about the shortcomings of the industrial food system, and yet another table-thumping conversation with friends about how things need to change, I was no longer satisfied merely buying the pricier eggs and butter in the grocery store. As a full-time student it isn’t feasible for me to start up a farm anytime soon, but I also realized that despite my years of interest in sustainable agriculture and clean eating as an armchair activist, I don’t know the first practical thing about farming.
A web search pulled up a few farms around the area, and The Eco-Institute (https://eco-institute.org) responded to my cold-contact volunteer request. I showed up on a Saturday morning to a welcoming group of folks (names and photos withheld for privacy).
Before we started working, I noticed something that I recognized from the books I’ve read, but is rare to see on large industrial farms: cover crops. The farmer explained that in nature, you will almost never see bare dirt. It will be covered in grass, bushes, moss, leaves, or pine needles, among other things. He told me that leaving ground open to the bare sun is unhealthy for the microorganisms in the soil that contribute to fertility. On this farm, after they harvest a row of crops, they cover the soil back up to lock in the nutrition.
That very process ended up being my first assignment. I cleared out a patch that held tomato plants and a couple of pumpkin vines to prepare it for fall.
The farmer told me to ignore the smallest weeds, and to do my best with the big aggressive ones but it would be impossible to get rid of all of them because of their huge roots (it was good exposure therapy for my perfectionism). Interestingly, in the case of the crop plants, instead of simply ripping them out for the season, he had us clip off the stalks and leave in the roots — it keeps organic matter in the dirt for next season, and it also helps aerate the soil naturally instead of relying on traditional methods that require additional work and harm soil biodiversity. After sufficient clearing, we put a thick layer of compost over everything, followed by straw. “Never leave dirt uncovered,” the farmer told me.
Composting invasive weeds would perpetuate them, but we were still able to use them sustainably. I didn’t know goats could be finicky about food, but apparently these animals didn’t like eating off the ground.
The next project was weeding some grass, which then went into the compost in preparation for next season. Their main composting process was divided into fourths, depending on how decomposed the organic matter was. They also had something called hügelkultur.
Hügelkultur is a practice of composting in a mound, taking advantage of decomposing wood debris. Just like with the cover crops and straw mulching, the farmer had made sure to cover the mound with hay to avoid the soil dying off to the sun. He told me grass was planted on the mound to help it maintain its shape. Plants do a tremendous job at preventing erosion by holding the dirt in place with their roots and absorbing rainfall. (After a forest near my parents’ house was cleared for construction, they saw rainwater runoff gouging ditches through the neighborhood and carrying tons of clay, which had never once been a problem during the previous decade.)
Gauging how ripe the pumpkins were supposed to be before we picked them was a challenge for me and my fellow volunteer, and we definitely made at least one mistake, but, consistent with the rest of the day, the farmer didn’t seem the slightest bit bothered by our error. Perhaps the gentle, work-with-nature attitude he takes towards growing food has spread to the way he works with people.
My work had been a strict volunteer arrangement, and I was happy to work and learn without any compensation. However, a couple of farm workers insisted I take something home, and I wasn’t going to fight them too hard on it. There’s something different about eating vegetables you know were in the ground just hours before, picked by you or people who worked alongside you. The farm was beautiful, the sustainability inspiring, but at the heart of it all was the community of people driving this movement forward. It was a tangible feeling to step into a welcoming place and work as part of a group of unique individuals who are passionately striving towards a common goal of healthy eating and a healthy earth.
