Having recently joined Permies I have been made aware of many new things. Gratifying to hear so many are doing the right for themselves and Mother Earth. My efforts are on a farm scale but soil health is the same everywhere. I have been using the word "resilience" as part of our effort to become less dependent on most everything. We are in the Tallgrass Prairie region of the country so I look to the prairie as a guide for maximizing our natural resources. On the prairie, the small plants grow first, having their days in the sun. Next comes the mid height plants before the tallgrasses take most of the sunlight. The last wave of the prairie is the taller species, mainly grasses but also the sunflowers, blazing star and some shorter species that do not require full sun like bottle gentian. A resilient landscape would do well to mimic the grassland, always something blooming and growing. Maximizing the seasonal availability of growing temperatures and adequate sunlight. On the farm we must get away from the monocrop and do much more with the growing season. This year we will feed the soil and soil life first, fingers crossed for an early spring.
To add to this, we are just learning how water comes and goes on our farm. An in-depth study of our hydrology is in order. We have a fair amount of subirrigation here, gravity taking water from points higher and moving it to points lower. The great thing about improving soil and adding organic matter is it will dry better in times of moisture excess but hold moisture better in dry periods. I like these odds. We can start to plan our crop rotation with topsoil and subsoil moisture availability in mind.
