1st Anniversary
The beginning of the new school year reminds me that I have reached a milestone: one year since I started farming full-time. It’s been a bumpy year, with big successes and catastrophic failures along...
View ArticleWhy do you have grass?
One of the arguments I hear often about why we have to continue modern industrial farming practices is because there just isn’t enough arable land to grow enough food for everyone. I almost always...
View ArticleMy 10-10-10 challenge
I often hear a lot of people claiming that the world cannot feed itself. They say there are too many people. They say there isn’t enough land to grow all that food. Some, even recognize that there...
View ArticleFood as a fungible commodity
All around the internet, you can find vigorous discussions about how, with the impending risk of international economic meltdown brought about by massive overspending, the smart bet is to invest in...
View ArticleThe flow of the seasons
We moderns get very put out by the changes of the seasons, even most farmers. We see the seasons as interruptions of the process we think we should be able to pursue all of the time, and because of...
View ArticleBecause it’s a farm
I heard today that our tenant farmer–he plants our 100 or so acres of tillage–thinks my wife and I are ripping off my mother-in-law because, well, there are goats eating grass in the front yard and...
View ArticleA question of contrariness
Quite a few people have asked me over the past few years why it is that I decided to start farming. While there are a lot of reasons why I’ve decided to do this, I’ve discovered that many of them boil...
View ArticleStanding in the ramparts of a distant frontier wall
“I think of us as the Ramparts People. In all ages we have camped on the edges of the earth, the buffer between our more conventional and timid brethren and those nether regions where, as the medieval...
View ArticleNot for the faint of heart
There are days that I understand why people don’t want to be farmers. It’s not a job for the faint of heart. Certainly, I’m making a judgment call here, but the fact is when your livelihood relies on...
View ArticleA state of mind
For me, the biggest downside of farming is that my health doesn’t always agree with it, mostly in the form of sometimes debilitating allergies. People often ask me why I keep doing it knowing that I...
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