Draft Day at Lindig's Farm

Dave Lindig has a farm that he makes money on through agritourism. The farm grows sorghum, gourds, and pumpkins. It also has several species of poultry, a few calves, and a handful of goats (including two baby goats). Entry is $5 for adults, $3 for children. A variety of products are for sale on the farm, including cookies made with sorghum molasses, Jake's maple syrup, and pumpkins.

I visited Lindig's farm on Homestead and Draft Day -- a special event in which people were demonstrating plowing, tilling, and farming techniques using horses instead of tractors. Others were pressing sorghum with a mule-powered press, then boiling the juice to turn it into molasses.

At Draft Day, I talked with a fellow who bred mules. He told me about the relative advantages of mules over horses: mules live longer; mules are more agile on uneven ground; mules are easier to train; mules have sturdier legs than horses.

It was beautiful to watch the horses and mules plow the fields. There was a bond between the farmer and the horses -- an organic, loving, symbiotic relationship. The farmer and team worked close to the earth -- the farmer was literally a couple feet away from the ground, in the open air, not "protected" or isolated by the cabin of a big machine. It was such a contrast from the gigantic tractors, run by agribusiness farmers in air-conditioned cabins, rolling on huge tires over large acres of monocultures.

I left feeling like horses and mules were the clear path to a better future for sustainable agriculture.

Clock of the World

Perhaps one of my favorite songs performed at the Land Institute's 32nd Prairie Festival was "Clock of the World," by Krista Detor. She wrote it as part of the Darwin Song Project, a performance group at the 2009 Shrewsbury Folk Festival tasked with commemorating Charles Darwin's 200th birthday.

The lyrics of the chorus: "somewhere bells are ringing, somewhere someone's marrying, or a casket someone's carrying, a crowd somewhere is gathering; somewhere a bell is marking what is passing as sublime, like a clock of the world keeping perfect, holy time."

As Krista sings in the song, "Grace may find us yet."

Wilderness Plots: Songs and Stories

The 32nd Land Institute's Prairie Festival (Sept. 24-26, 2010) included a musical performance honoring prairie pioneers called the "Perennial Polyculture Suite." The musicians -- Krista Detor, Tim Grimm, Malcolm Dalgish, Tom Roznowski and Scott Russell Sanders -- performed selections from WTIU's PBS film Wilderness Plots: Songs and Stories of the Prairie, based on the book Wilderness Plots by Scott Russell Sanders.

Both the book and the video bring to life short stories about the settling of the American West. The live performance at the Prairie Festival included songs like "Rebecca Versailles," which is about a freed slave who found out, once she reached Indiana, that her children were not allowed to go to school with white kids. She was told that Indiana law forbid black children to be educated with white children, and she was advised to teach her children herself. But Rebecca Versailles, who was raised in slavery, did not know how to read or write.

Determined not to let her children go uneducated, Rebecca Versailles took the initiative to make pens and books that she then sold to the white school. The pens and books were of high quality, and eventually the school let her make them perched in the back of the school room. So the hard-working mother, while making the pens and books, quietly absorbed the lessons taught in school; and when she went home at night, she taught them to her own children. These children never took for granted the value of education, and when they grew up, they became teachers themselves -- teachers who vowed never to turn away someone who wanted to learn, no matter their race or creed.

Other songs from Wildnerness Plots are posted on youtube, such as "Wishing for More than I Dare Say."

Heterogeneous Wes

This past weekend I attended the 32nd annual Prairie Festival at the Land Institute in Salina, Kansas. It was inspirational beyond my expectations.

Key speakers included Wendell Berry, Scott Russell Sanders, Josh Farley, Sandra Steingraber, Kent Whealy, and of course Wes Jackson, founder of the Land Institute. All of the speakers were given standing ovations after their lectures. They are among the central heroes working towards the advancement of sustainable living through research and consciousness raising on land use issues. Their lectures are available on CD from the Land Institute.

There is much to say about the festival, but what impressed me the most was the humor that was ever-present despite the sobering overall picture that the lecturers laid out before us.

During the evenings and on Sunday morning (the last day of the festival), musicians performed and lightened the mood. Some songs were melancholy and contemplative, to be sure -- like a song about how the air will be bought and sold and the poor will be left breathless. But other songs were downright hilarious, like the tribute to Wes Jackson called "Heterogeneous Wes."

The song traces Wes' journey from genetics student to professor to founder of the Land Institute. It went something like this: "he studied biology, chemistry, genetics to boot, then he moved to Kansas to start the Land Institute." But the chorus was what I remember best. "Polyculture...(it's perrenial). Polyculture (it's incrennial)... Crop rotation, variation, a prairie plan; sustainable, perennial heterogeneous man!"

During the middle of the song, the musicians explained that "incrennial" is a new word that combines "incredible" with "perennial."

The key to getting the humor is understanding Wes' life's work: developing perennial grains to take the place of annuals like wheat and corn. One of the perennials that the Land Institute has developed through selective breeding is kernza, which was available for sale (in limited quantities) at the Festival.

As the Land Institute's website explains, the perennial polycultures they are developing will cut down on erosion, pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, fossil fuel use, pollution, and water use, protecting the soil -- arguably our most precious resource.

Because of Wes' work on perennials, Life magazine named him as one of 18 individuals it predicts will be among the most important Americans of the 20th century. Thank you, heterogeneous Wes!

To learn more about Wes Jackson, check out "Prairie Pioneer Seeks to Change the Way We Farm" by Richard Harris on All Things Considered, available at npr.org.

Badly Drawn Cow

Last night in my Forage and Crop Systems class, we were learning about different types of fences. Our professor showed us a cartoon-y picture illustrating how an electric fence works. I tried to copy it in my notebook... but I'm not very talented when it comes to drawing.

When I inspected my finished "copy" of the illustration, I burst out laughing. It was so horrible! A cow with a tiny head, short legs, huge body, and stumpy tail. :P

Here's hoping this badly drawn cow will get you to laugh, too.

Fencing and Wire Insulators

Today I learned that fencing wire is not attached directly to corner or end posts; instead, it is attached to an insulator, which is in turn attached to the fence post via another wire. Why?

An insulator is used as an intermediary between the wire and the fence post to keep electricity away from the post. This way, if the post gets wet, it doesn't drain electricity from the wire.

Here is a video of my classmate learning to attach the insulator to the fence-post wire. It's not as easy at one might think!

Wrapping and Snapping Fence Wires

During our fencing workshop today, we learned how to attach high-tensile wire to corner posts and line posts using insulators, strainers, crimps, and what I call "wire-weaving." We had to learn how to tie a specific kind of "knot" and wrap the wire around itself several times so that the insulators stay in place. It was hard at first, but we were quick to improve our "wire-wrapping" skills once we got the hang of it.

The trickiest part was actually cutting off the extraneous wire. Wire cutters are considered "cheating"; the "real way" to trim the wire is to snap it off manually.

A lot of people had trouble learning to snap off the end of the wire, but I picked it up quickly. My professor said, "somebody get a picture of this!" as I wrapped and snapped wire like a pro (or an advanced beginner). It was easier for me, I think, because the technique is very similar to the techniques in jewelry-making, something with which I've had a bit of practice.

Above is a video of my friend, Gretchen, learning to "wrap and snap" fencing wire.