Designing Regenerative Vegetable Production
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include: Brassicas (eg. broccoli, kale), peas, fava beans, turnips, swedes, and parsnips. For winter growing grassland possible summer growing vegetables (while winter growing grasses are dormant or growing slowly) to plant are: Potatoes, tomatoes, pumpkins, melons, capsicum, cucumbers, and zucchini.
Graeme Hand is a Holistic Management Certified Educator and CEO of Stipa in New South Wales, Australia. He can be reached at: graeme.hand@bigpond.com. This article was first published in the Stipa Newsletter #59, Feb 2018. To learn more about Stipa go to: http://www.stipa.com.au/index.html.
References:
1. Soil Erosion Threatens Food Production David Pimentel * and Michael Burgess College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA; Agriculture 2013, 3, 443–463; 2. From Shallow to Deep Organics: Redesigning our Agroecosystems for Sustainability and Wellbeing, Professor Stuart B. Hill, University of Western Sydney – October, 2009 3. Managing soil erosion in vegetables, fact sheet 2, Department of Primary Industries and fisheries, Queensland government 4. Landscape Function Analysis, Tongway & Hindley, 2004 5. Dwayne Beck / Buzz Kloot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAE8C3Vr8Zo&t=1s 6. Browns Ranch http://brownsranch.us/ 7. Winona – http://www.pasturecropping.com/pasture-cropping
East Brook Farm—
Photo Credit Gabe Brown
Winter growing broadleaves in a dormant summer growing grassland.
farming. Why? I believe that if I take care of the soil in the best way possible then I am also growing nutritious healthy food year after year. It is healthier for our bodies and healthier for the earth. Very few organic farmers are practicing no-till. Isn’t it difficult and BY ELIZABETH MARKS time consuming? I’ve never farmed any other way so I have no comparison. I have a lot of people who come to work on the farm who had been doing tillage. From ’ve been told by many organic farmers that no-till organic just them I’ve learned that initially it takes more human power and resources isn’t possible. Most farmers who do no-till rely on herbicides and compared to tilling, but after I create the beds using sheet mulch, the sometimes insecticides to do the practice. More and more information maintenance required is much less then conventional farming. is being discovered about the immense benefits of not disturbing the Can you describe the methods you use to soil, but what do you do if using these farm no-till? pesticides are counter to your holistic First, I find the contour of the land (if goal? I sat down with Sarah Williford, a there is a slope) and mark off where the beds Holistic Management International board should be perpendicular to the slope. Then I member and owner of East Brook Farm mow the ground cover. I add lime or other soil in Walton, New York to discuss how she amendments based on a soil test. Next I roll utilizes the four ecosystem processes with out multi layers of brown craft or food paper. no-till organic farming. East Brook Farm is On top of the paper I layer compost and then a 92-acre diversified farm with two acres mulch hay. I wait a few weeks to let water soak of vegetables and flowers, 70 chickens, through either from rain or watering. Finally I 10 ducks, and 9 cows. They run a small create “planting pockets.” Using a hand hoe, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), I dig through the paper and add compost and sell at farmers markets, wholesale to then add the plant. This method of farming is local restaurants and health food stores, East Brook Farm has its garden beds set up on sometimes referred to as “lasagna gardening.” and Sarah has an herbal business called contour to increase water infiltration. Even during Doesn’t the plant find it difficult to establish “Collected Creations” of wild harvested heavy rains caused by hurricanes, East Brook in the mass of roots already there? and home grown herbs. Farm didn’t flood or lose valuable nutrients and You wait at least a couple of weeks to Sarah, you practice no-till organic top soil.
No-Till Vegetable Farming to Improve Ecosystem Processes
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Land & Livestock
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July / August 2018
