Under Cover Farmers

These farmers were already doing no till and were convinced to do cover cropping with multiple species. Not permaculture but they are moving in the right direction. They could see the benefit to diversity but I can't understand why they cut their herbicide/fertilizer use 75% and not 100%

movie notes: if your feeling sad today, watch this.

good 'ol farmers give no till / cover crops a try and they find this:

-increased soil moisture, less power to pumps
-natural weed control, less chems
-decreased soil temp from the highs, other crops were burning out
-more vigor in plants, due to root reach, due to more ambient moisture
-increase soil nutrient level, result less chems bigger yields
-richer soil drains better then the strata sheeting of water they get from till and disturb.

conclusion: one feller at the end said after 6yrs he has not hit a production increase plateau and he doesn't know if there is a plateau!

to hear the words of permaculture come out of the mouths of hardened chem farmers made me VERY happy

Bottom line:
They are making more $$ per acre,
AND, their neighbors are asking them how they did it.

Now this is a bio-intensive operation, I cant call it permaculture until the plants can self propagate without going to purchase seed. Definitely an improvement to the status quo though! If there was a way to replace the tractors with high density grazing cattle that would be nice to see as well.

Excellent stuff. This is right on the spot.