Farming with Nature

Farming with Nature, originally published in 1954, is a classic introduction to organic agriculture and the importance of soil-building and healthy soil. From the foreword: Few words in any civilized language are used less correctly than is the word nature. We are exalted by the beauties of earth and sky-a crimson sunset, a flower-decked meadow, the majesty of a snow-capped mountain. The emotionally inclined go into ecstasies over the prismatic colors in a rainbow and sigh romantically over a snowy landscape in the moonlight. And we call these pictures Nature, whereas they are but the manifestations of Nature. Nature is the law back of the manifestations; the principle that maintains rhythm throughout the universe.

A fertile soil is Nature in superb manifestation. It is here that the universal rhythm is at its best. Productive land is a living workshop where many agents are on the job preparing ingredients, though inadvertently, to be used by growing plants in building complete foods, not only for themselves but for the animal kingdom as well. As goes this workshop of the soil, so goes humankind on the earth. Indeed, all organic life is completely at the mercy of the processes going on in the soil's workshop. The fact that plants secure the greater portion of their nutrients from the air in no wise lessens the value of the nutrients derived from the soil. Without the latter, there would be no life on the earth as we know it.

I like to think of this soil-world as a chain made up of numerous fertility links. Each of these links, operating under the mandates of Nature, performs a series of specific tasks as a part of one harmonious whole. Though some of these fertility links would appear to be more essential than others in supporting organic life on the earth, the fact of the matter is-all are indispensables. From the standpoint of the farmer, though, some of the links that make up this marvelous chain are more vital than others, simply because they are within the farmer's power to control them. That is, through his land operations the farmer can either strengthen his fertility chain or he can wreck it almost completely by means of incorrect tillage practices.

Consequently, good farming, whether that be understood as the growing of one plant in a pot or the cultivation of vast acreage, consists largely of maintaining an unbroken, dynamic fertility chain in the land. The wise farmer or gardener will seek to understand each one of those fertility links individually; then he will strive to get the most out of them-without violating the natural laws which rule both him and the land which gives him his food. And this is Farming with Nature.