Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Introduction: A Day on the Farm, a Night on the River

1. Beyond the Pond: How One Farm Measures Success

2. A Place in the Country: Improving the View in the Midst of an Industrial Landscape

3. Blurring the Boundaries: Community Conservation and the Power of a Common Goal

4. Brotherhood of the Bobolink: In Search of the Ultimate Indicator Species

5. Raising Expectations: A Team’s Refusal to Accept a Degraded Resource

6. Feeding Innovation’s Roots: True Believers, Late Adopters, and the Power of the Soil Pit

7. Wrapping Around the Wrinkles: Expanding the Land’s Potential by Recognizing Its Limitations

8. Resiliency vs. Regret: What Domesticated Ag Can Learn from Its Wild Neighbors

9. Which Came First, the Farmer or the Ecologist? The New Agrarians and Their Environmental Roots

10. Hubs of Hope: The Connection between Inebriated Grasshoppers and Your Dinner Plate

11. Wildly Optimistic: It’s Hard to Be a Pessimist in a Land of New Possibilities

Notes

Index