At a Land Stewardship Project Policy and Organizing Program staff meeting in January 2016, I had a deeply moving experience that will stay with me for a long time. My fellow organizers and I read aloud an early draft of a document entitled, “A Transformational Narrative for LSP Policy & Organizing: A Work in Progress.”… Read More →
PLAINVIEW, Minn. — Rotational grazing, soil health, pasture diversity, and soil building crop rotations will be the focus of a grazing field day on Saturday, July 13, near Plainview. Adam and Amanda Bedtke will host this Land Stewardship Project (LSP) field day from 1 p.m.-3 p.m. at their farm between Plainview and Weaver (11418 County… Read More →
Good news! State legislation that reinstates the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) Citizens’ Board is moving forward, but legislators are going to need to hear from constituents for it to pass (HF 973—Persell, SF 627—Marty). You may recall that during the last hours of the 2015 Minnesota legislative session, language was inserted into a massive… Read More →
In 2012, I had the great fortune to get a tip about a group of farmers, scientists and government soil conservationists who had teamed up in south-central North Dakota to take a holistic approach to making the land more resilient. By focusing intensively on building soil health utilizing a combination of practices—no-till, managed rotational grazing,… Read More →
Tyler Carlson farms near “Gopher Prairie,” the fictional setting for Sinclair Lewis’s 1920 novel, Main Street. In the book, Lewis, who grew up in the real Gopher Prairie, otherwise known as Sauk Centre, used biting satire to poke fun at small town life. On this summer day, Carlson is finding the havoc burrowing rodents are… Read More →
An Innovative Farming System Requires Innovative Training One sign that you’re a solid employee is that the boss hates the idea of you walking out the door, never to return. So let’s consider the case of Ryan Heinen, who has worked on the west-central Minnesota dairy farm of Nate and Angie Walter for the past… Read More →
It’s been said that soil without biology is just geology—an accumulation of lifeless minerals unable to spawn healthy plant growth. And as intense monocropping production practices increasingly remove more life from the ground than they return, it sends that soil closer to fossilization via what conservationist Barry Fisher calls, “the spiral of degradation”: eroded, compacted… Read More →
As spring gathers momentum, so does planning for the 2015 Simon Lake BioBlitz, which is being held July 10-11 at Sheepberry Fen in west-central Minnesota. And along with the planning come the questions: What is it? Why have it? Why should I come? The answers to those questions crash down in a tidal wave of… Read More →
With knowledge comes power—as well as responsibility. On an overcast Saturday in July 2014 several dozen people were gaining more of the former with each step they took through rolling grassland in west-central Minnesota. And as they referred to field guides and smart phone nature apps while tallying a growing list of plant and animal… Read More →
Governor Mark Dayton announced in January his proposal to require an additional 125,000 acres of perennial vegetation along lakes, rivers and streams. There is a long history of utilizing such living borders to filter out fertilizers and herbicides, while fortifying streambanks and reducing the amount of eroded soil that ends up in the water. While… Read More →
