SilliamWhale
Member
I think skepticism is ingrained in people. Cynicism, negativity... we never want to believe something if we were taught it second. We are far less likely to question something taught us first and by our family. Our grandfathers farmed this way.... that's the right way! Helped along by the fact that majority of people are farming this way and the majority must be right, right?
But what do you think they're lying about? I find some of the claims of higher yield a bit far fetched, but that's because despite what I want to learn and do, I am in monoculture crop world. Claims of one crop yielding higher don't seem feasible to me. Claims of each acre yielding higher in the variety of crops is much more plausible to me. I also find the idea of land turning around so quickly hard to believe, but that could be because many of the books are based in more moderate climates than mine. What can be 3 or 4 growths in some of these areas is lucky if it translates to 1 good growth here.
But what doesn't lie to me and what do I trust equivocally? Nature.
Go walk through even a badly managed pasture, what do you see? Multitude species of grasses, wildflowers, bushes, trees, birds, insects, rodents... even bigger animals. They all live there.
Go walk through the middle of a "well managed" arable mono crop field, what do you see? One plant. The odd weed. A few insects and you hope they aren't the kind that wipe out your crop. Animals don't live in arable fields, they visit them.
Now consider inputs. Many pastures receive very little inputs so you're putting very little money into them. In comparison, an arable field has tremendous inputs to do all sorts of things. Firstly to help the seeds grow, secondly to stop sh!t from eating them, thirdly to prevent other plants from stealing their nutrients.
Why does one support so much life with so little input while the other supports very few organisms but requires so much?
Have you ever, in a natural setting, seen a plant growing in straight lines, separated an equal distance from all other plants with only bare dirt around it in order to grow the best it can? No, because that's not how plants have evolved. Just as sheep and cattle and horses eat different parts of the plants and birds eat different food sources and species differ regionally based on what's available, so do plants. Not all plants require the same nutrients, not all plants require the same water, not all plants require the same sunlight. They aren't all in competition. That's us telling ourselves that all plants are competing for the same food. It'd be like me saying I can't keep my dog in the same field as my cows because one of them would outcompete the other and starve it.
Be skeptical of authors, they're only human and thus as open to their personal interpretations and opinions as we are. But I think if you want to learn, read them, read modern methodology, think on them and then go sit in the middle of an untouched meadow and look at what Mother Earth has done.
I'm not saying their lying but what you don't have the opportunity to do is quiz the old writers so you chances of getting to the nub of the matter may be compromised. I'm not saying you can't be inspired by them. I am too
Put it another way. An old boy was growing vegetables in his garden and the vicar turned up. "Wonderful what you and the Lord have created here Mr Fothergill" said the Vicar. "You should have seen what it looked like when he had it on its own " replied the gardener. My point is we need to be able to extract what we can from the land in a way that suits us economically too.