11

Wildly Optimistic

It’s Hard to Be a Pessimist in a Land of New Possibilities

I’ve made it clear that this book is no attempt to provide some sort of how-to guide for wildly successful farming. Rather, this is more of a report from the frontlines of a phenomenon that I hope can serve as an inspiration—for other farmers, as well as policymakers, educators, scientists, conservationists, and anyone else who cares about the relationship between land, people, and food production. While I’ve shared some observations on what makes a wildly successful farm, I avoided providing a checklist of requirements for being ecologically correct.

However, there is one common trait shared by all the farmers featured here: optimism. That may come as a surprising characteristic for these farmers, given the debate over “technological pessimism” and “technological optimism.” Basically, technological optimists believe that no matter what the problem—climate change, water pollution, energy production, or feeding people—there is or will be a technological fix for it. The technological pessimists tend to operate under the assumption that we simply cannot “tech” our way out of an irrefutable fact: the Earth has a finite amount of natural resources.¹

Technological optimists often maintain that if you question even in the slightest the ability of machines, the digital world, chemicals, and genetically modified organisms to solve our problems, then you are outright opposed to all technology and human innovation. As it happens, when it comes to farming, mainstream agriculture tends to consider sustainable, organic, and otherwise “alternative” farmers as technological pessimists to the core. Listen to this kind of talk long enough and unconventional farmers come off as a dour bunch of Luddites scratching at the soil with hoes they fashioned from windfall tree branches. The reality is that such farmers are fully embracing everything from high-tech fencing and computer software to cutting edge soil health tests and sophisticated plant breeding. Yes, many are even using herbicides and other agrichemicals. I recently spent time with a pair of beginning farmers striving to be “wildly successful” who are putting their academic training in calculus, plant pathology, and electronics engineering to use developing a better pasture system.

I see wildly successful farmers as “optimistic realists.” Sure, they question the ability of technology to solve all our problems, but that doesn’t make them cynical and negative about innovation. Far from it. They tend to put their trust in the hands of a different driver of change—in this case a working ecosystem.

“If those sounds weren’t there, we would consider ourselves a failure,” farmer Martin Jaus told me while standing next to a mix of wetland and prairie habitat he and his wife Loretta restored on prime crop ground. Taken at face value, that might appear to be a pessimistic statement. But because the Jauses have put their trust in the presence of noisy wildlife as their gauge of success, they have taken steps to ensure they meet such a standard. That has resulted in spillover benefits all across the farm—for the land as well as the people residing on it.

Optimistic realists are mindful of the place technology should occupy in human endeavors, whether they involve farming, manufacturing, or education. When we become, to paraphrase Henry David Thoreau, tools of our tools, then we are vulnerable to the vicious cycle of regrettable substitution. When tools are put in their proper place, then wildly successful farmers can open themselves up to the multiple benefits of a more holistic, integrated approach. Indiana farmer Dan DeSutter was able to stop relying on a steel ripper to break up compacted soil because he knew the implement was just an isolated tool and didn’t provide the numerous additional ecological/agronomic services that cover crops do.

Some may argue that by placing their trust in the ways of the wild, farmers are abdicating control over their own destiny in a way that’s no better than allowing technology to call the shots. But this book describes farmers who are innovative, ambitious, and constantly on the lookout for a better way to do things—the opposite of being passive recipients of whatever life brings their way.

Consider the current excitement over soil health. From North Dakota to Indiana I’ve been on farms where, for the first time in decades, their owner-operators feel somewhat in control of their future. Why? When a farm is almost completely reliant on petroleum-based inputs, combined with technology developed in Monsanto’s laboratories, events far from the land determine that farmer’s destiny. Just putting in more grueling hours, which many do, isn’t enough. War in the Middle East can disrupt the flow of oil; yet one more consolidation in the biotechnology sector can limit the availability of affordable seed. But building soil health starts and ends with a farm’s local terra firma, literally from beneath the ground up. These farmers are striving for a situation that eventually makes their soil self-sufficient, not increasingly dependent on outside inputs and knowledge. That makes those farmers partners in the process. Granted, they may have a minority ownership in this partnership, but at least they aren’t occupying the bystander role many conventional farmers are relegated to.

The interest in building soil health highlights another myth attached to farmers who question the primacy of technological fixes—that such doubters are inherently anti-science. Wildly successful farmers are natural observers and have an almost unquenchable thirst for knowledge—two characteristics of a good scientist. I find the increasing number of alliances developing between farmers, scientists, and environmental experts to be particularly exciting. The best of these partnerships go beyond the traditional paradigm of the land grant scientist passing knowledge from on high down to the farmer. Like North Dakota’s Burleigh County Soil Health Team, the parties involved are learning from each other and share the realization that there are limits to what we can know. Such linkages forged by humbleness can make for a truly egalitarian relationship, the kind that fosters real, long-term change.

An optimistic outlook doesn’t mean ignoring the realities of trying to make a living on the land. All farmers face daunting obstacles, no matter what management philosophy they are practicing. But the wildly successful farmers I’ve seen in action seem to be better able to roll with the punches with some positive vision for the future still intact. They know, for better or worse, that nature truly does have the final say.

One can’t eat a pretty view, but it feeds us in other ways. After spending even a short time with these farmers, I often notice how their language has become saturated with references to the various workings of the landscape. They have allowed nature to guide their farming decisions, and they communicate their greatest joys by referring to how a healthy ecosystem makes its presence known. Martin Jaus actually doesn’t savor describing in detail his grazing system or how he rotates crops. But as soon as the talk turns to his latest sighting of a hawk on a hayfield, he is ecologically animated. Jan Libbey’s passion for birds popping up literally in the middle of a workshop on farm finances is a delight to behold. Such descriptions of nature don’t always have to be of the charismatic variety that make for great photos like the ones Phil Specht takes. When Brooke Knisley talks excitedly about her soil coming to life in the middle of a monocultural desert, one can picture a world that rivals the Amazonian jungle in terms of biodiversity.

Such reflections are just as fun to listen to as they are for the farmers to relate. And that’s another reason I know these people are optimists. To them, each day brings a fresh opportunity to gather material for a new story inspired by the land.