Organics?

Before the holidays I had the great privilege of attending an Organic Farmer regional collective meeting. It was a great time, filled with great food, coffee, and networking with Organic Farmers from across Central and North Eastern Nebraska.  Let me tell you, there was every farmer under the Sun present. Farmers who have been farming organically since before the USDA even paid attention to what organic agriculture is. Farmers whose dads had transitioned the family farm to organic management 30 years ago. And a handful newbies (like myself) who are just trying to figure out the first step in getting certified. There was an agronomist who went over soil fertility management, and a representative from an organic grain buying company who went over the markets for the past year and projections for the next.  It was a really great opportunity to meet new faces and learn a lot about organic crop management.

A great resource for anyone interested in organic management~ Don’t mind the feed dust! This book has good grain rations in it as well, and I used to keep on hand in my Granary to reference when mixing feed.

                What’s the deal with organic farming?

So, what is organic farming? What does organic mean? You’ll get a tremendous amount of very differing answers to these questions depending on who you ask. Stripped down and to the point, the purpose of Organic management is to build soil health and fertility without the use of petroleum derived fertilizers, and to avoid the use of man-made lab-chemical based herbicides. Sounds pretty simple and straight forward, but for a conventional farmer, whose plan to raise a good crop is all based on purchasing and applying inputs, it raises a lot of complex questions on how to manage the soil in a natural way while still producing a healthy, productive crop. It takes a lot more thinking, planning, flexibility, diversity, patience, and a complete change in mindset. The change in mindset is perhaps the biggest challenge of all for stubborn farmers.

Alfalfa is a great forage crop~ and gives the soil a nice break from intensive row-crop production while replenishing nitrogen in the soil.

                The number one tool in the organic farmer’s arsenal is a well planned crop rotation. We’re not talking about a two year rotation between corn and beans with occasional alfalfa. We’re talking about 5, 6, 7 year rotation plans involving corn, soybeans, winter wheat, clovers, rye, alfalfa, oats, all working in a particular order to not only help provide the soil with what it needs for the following crop, but to also interrupt the weed seed cycle in each field. If a farmer is going to only continually rotate between corn and soybeans year after year, he’s going to experience the exact same weed problems year after year. But, lets say that farmer follows that corn with a fall planting of winter cereal rye, and frost seeds some red clover into that rye in late March, he could have a nice rye hay crop get cut in early June and get a hay cutting off in July of red clover. Those two cuttings would help interrupt the weed cycle, because as the forage is cut so are the growing weeds before they can go to seed. In Late summer or early Fall the Farmer could disk up that clover, plant rye again really thick and then in late May as that rye is starting to form its own seed head, roll the rye over with a roller crimper to terminate it and no till plant soybeans right into the field. The rolled rye of course acts as a mulch for weed control, and helps keep moisture in the soil. It’s possible, and there are farmers out there doing it, but as mentioned before, it takes planning.

                The benefits of this model of farming is that it helps the farmer move his attention away from writing checks to chemical companies and pushes the attention toward management. It takes a little extra work using the old noggin, but the reward for that attention to management is consistent premium pricing for what is produced.  And believe it or not, you can have really phenomenal yields with organic management. One organic farmer that I met averaged about 60 bushels an acre for soybeans, and the price of organic soybeans this year at harvest were $30/bushel. This farmer, by practicing organic management was able to essentially make the income of a conventional farm that would’ve been twice his size. If you can double the value of your work, with lowering the cost of your production why wouldn’t you? I hear a lot of farmers laugh, or look at organic management with skepticism…but I’m pretty sure every organic farmer that I met is totally okay with that as they cash in their checks.

Red Clover is an amazing forage with a tremendous ability to fix nitrogen and amend the soil

I’m currently in the process of getting only a handful of acres certified organic for this next season. It’s nothing huge, but I want to give it a shot. I love the challenge of trying to figure out the right rotation to give everything what it needs. I love the idea of keeping and growing my own nutrient cycle on this farm, and I love the idea of putting in the extra work to farm that way and actually seeing it pay off without much risk. Will this entire farm be certified organic one day? Maybe, maybe not…all depends on how well I can manage it.