Annaliese Abbott, Author Malabar Farm & The Rise of Sustainable Agriculture

Common sense tells us that if soil is deficient in essential nutrients, the crops grown in that soil will also be deficient, as will the people and animals that eat those crops.  And so we ask:

Is there a common-sense connection between soil fertility and human health?

Topics include why Albrecht believed there was a connection between soil fertility and human health; how he set about about to prove his theory; and how his experiments encouraged others to track down the truth.

Marc Cooke, President, Wolves of the Rockies

The Billings Gazette reports that the State of Montana will not have enough money to cover all the claims of livestock killed by predators.  And so we ask:

Who should pay for the animals that have been eaten by animals?

Topics include the current state of wolf populations; how wolf populations are managed by the policies and programs of the federal and state governments; and whether taxpayers should or should not be made to pay for wolf depredations.

Nicolette Hahn Niman, Author, Defending Beef: The Ecological and Nutritional Case for Beef

America’s beef industry has many enemies and few friends. 

The enemies-of-beef camp includes the environmentalists who claim that the cow destroys the earth by trampling it beneath its hooves, and forces the climate to change by emitting its greenhouse gases.  

The camp also includes nutritionists who claim that eating the saturated fat of beef makes people fat and sick.  And vegans, vegetarians and animal rights activists who believe all farm animals should either be treated like the family pet, or released to run free in nature. 

The enemies-of-beef camp also now includes the industrialists who offer up meat-like substitutes for beef made with patented chemical compounds that cannot be manufactured without their getting a sufficient royalty.   

The friends-of-beef camp includes those who earn a living raising the animals, and those who process the animals for sale to the public.  There are not many of them!  

That the friends-of-beef camp has been losing so much ground to the enemies-of-beef camp leads us to once again ask: 

Should beef be banned? 

(Nicolette Hahn Niman, Niman Ranch, animal agriculture, beef industry)

Mark Cushing, CEO of Animal Policy Group and author of Pet Nation

On a recent flight from New Orleans, my wife pointed to four companion animals that were visible from where we were seated.  And when one is buckled into a seat on an airplane one’s vision is pretty limited.  There must have been more animals aboard that flight! 

Holy Smokes!!! Our pets are now flying with us!  

In the past two decades the population of pets in the United States has nearly doubled.  During this same period of time the birth rate of the nation’s human population has been in decline, leading to one of the lowest birth rates on record, and heading for lowest birth rate ever.

Given the numbers, it is evident that the United States has given itself over to becoming a “Pet Nation.”

In fact, almost two-thirds of Americans now own a pet.  And we treat those pets as if they were our children.  We turn our homes and yards over to them; feed them the best foods money can buy; take them to pet doctors who cost a fortune; build parks for them; and yes, we even fly with them.  

That so many Americans are now owned by their pets leads us to ask:  

How did the United States become  a Pet Nation? 

Judy Hoy, Author, Changing Faces & Amazing Wildlife

On a previous edition of the Food Chain we talked with Marc Cooke of Wolves of the Rockies in Stevensville, Montana about the attempt to manage the predation of wolves, bears and lions.  

Marc made note of the fact that, to make it possible for farmers and ranchers to tolerate the predation of domestic animals by predators, they are paid up to 300 percent of the market value for each animal lost to the predators.  

Consequent to that conversation, I received a note from Judy Hoy, who was also a Food Chain guest from Stevensville, Montana. Judy’s note read, in part: 

“When domestic animals die from being exposed to pesticides, the predators like wolves or grizzlies or coyotes eat them. Then the livestock owner reports that the wolves or grizzly killed the cow or sheep, so he or she can be paid for it. Livestock owners totally refuse to admit that their animals are being born with birth defects. The Agricultural Department told me that if the livestock have birth defects, it is up to the livestock owner to take care of it. How they are supposed to do that when it is raining and snowing pesticides on all the plants the livestock eat, resulting in the fetuses getting exposed and causing birth defects? I have no idea how they are supposed to take care of that, do you?” 

Judy’s note, and her years of wildlife research, point to a quiet pandemic of pesticide devastation that appears to be gathering volition throughout the world.   This quiet pandemic leads us to ask: 

Is what is deforming wildlife deforming people? 

Jeff Herman, Editor in Chief, Lawn Starter

I once worked as a story producer for NBC Magazine with David Brinkley.  One story we told was about the “survivalists” who believe the economy is going to collapse and so move more than one tank of gas from the nearest big city, where they arm themselves with defensive weapons, store up canned foods, and hunker down to wait.  Our story was titled, “Armed for Armageddon.”     

To get our establishing shot we took the network camera and talent to a hilltop overlooking the Rogue Valley of Southern Oregon.  “Beyond you can see the Rogue Valley,” the talent announced.  “This is where the survivalists hang out.”   

What we saw, looking down from that hilltop, was that the beautiful farmland of the valley had been subdivided into small ranchettes.  But what captured my attention was that nobody seemed to be growing crops!  

On an impulse I turned to Nancy Tappan, who published a newsletter for the survivalist community, and said, “Nancy, we should write a pamphlet on how to make money by farming those small parcels of land down there.” 

A month later Nancy called and said, “Michael, I sold your book!” 

When looking around for who did make money by farming small parcels of land, I ran into an interesting statistic in the Census of Agriculture, which said the most productive farms in the United States, in terms of dollar value of crops per acre, were located in New York City’s Borough of the Bronx.  The second most productive farmland was located in the City of San Francisco, and that farmland was generating an average of $76,421 per acre per year.  When adjusted for inflation, that would be $263,129 in today’s money from one acre of city farmland! 

How so much money can be earned by farming so little land became the focal point of MetroFarm, The Guide to Growing for Profit in or Near the City for the City.   

Though most cities in the world get their food from farms that are relatively close, American cities have become accustomed to being fed by farms located in distant growing regions.  But what if those survivalists were right?  What if the day comes when the economies of farming food thousands of miles away stops making sense, and the food stops coming?  That thought leads us to ask: 

Do you think the city's vacant spaces can be made to generate a substantial sum of food and money?  

Mike Wade, Executive Director, California Farm Water Coalition

What will happen to our food supply if politicians buy up farmers' rights to water?

The good Lord blessed the Golden State of California with the perfect environment– for growing food! 

The State was given 28 million acres of arable farmland, a benevolent Mediterranean climate, and a spectacular north to south range of mountains to catch and hold the drift of precipitation from the Pacific Ocean.  

The State was also given people with the strong hands and good minds for growing food.  And grow they do.  

The farmers of the Golden State grow over 400 different crops, including two-thirds of America’s fruits and nuts and one-third of all its vegetables.  And by growing this food, farmers earn $50 billion dollars a year for the state.  

But, as those farmers are fond of saying, “Food grows where water flows.”  

California is once again in the midst of a drought.  These droughts are an unfortunate part of the Golden State’s history.  Those who look deep into that history say that some California droughts have lasted over 200 years. How long will this one last?   

When water stops flowing to the extent everyone wants it to flow people must fight for the water that does flow.  Because unlike money, which can be borrowed from the future, tomorrow’s water cannot be used to grow today’s food.  When water does not flow, food does not grow. 

Today, not enough water is flowing in the Golden State of California, and so those who want the water must fight for it.  One place Californians fight for water is in Sacramento, where the government is currently sitting on a budget surplus of $100 billion dollars, give or take!.   

Some in Sacramento want to use this pool of surplus money to buy up the rights of California’s farmers to the state’s water.   

This fight for water leads us to ask…  

What will happen to our food supply if politicians buy up farmers' right to water? 

Attorney Sarah Vogel, Author, The Farmers Lawyer

BOOM!  It was 1914 and the world was at war.  Europe was being torn to shreds by trench warfare, and wherever the trenches went, the land was certain to be in fallow. 

It was hungry times for America’s friends and foes alike.  What America had at that time that the nations of Europe did not have was farmland and farmers.  American farmers were given the opportunity to grow food, and so they borrowed money, plowed up the ground, grew food for the world, and made money.   

BUST!  When World War I ended in 1918, America’s European friends and foes alike turned their swords back into plowshares and returned to the business of feeding themselves.  This left American farmers with a lot of crops to sell, but without enough buyers willing to buy those crops.  

And so, while America’s city-dwellers enjoyed the exuberance of the Roaring Twenties with its soaring stock market, American farmers struggled with their collapsed markets and bank loans.   Then came the dry winds of drought, and many of America’s farmers withered up drifted away.  

This boom and bust farming cycle has throughout history.  Take the first decade of the second millennium, for another example.  During the early years of the decade, times were good and farmers borrowed big.  But the tide had turned by 2005, and by 2008 farms were being foreclosed, farmers were leaving the land, and farmland was being consolidated into ever fewer hands.

Then Attorney Sarah Vogel went back home to North Dakota, hung her shingle, and sued the federal government on behalf of 240,000 farmers.  She won, and many of the farmers were able to keep their farm.  But attorney Vogel’s big win did not stop the cycle of boom and bust farming.  And so we ask:  

Can the booms and busts of farming be eliminated? 

China is buying up America’s farmland…  with the money we send it to manufacture stuff for us in their coal-burning factories.  Some say this a good deal because we don’t have to work in those factories.  Others say it’s a bad deal because we are selling out our future.  And so we ask: 

Should China be allowed to buy up America’s best farmland?

Topics include why China is having trouble feeding its people; how China is buying up America's farmland; and whether Congressman Dan Newhouse and fellow legislators can stop China from buying up America's farmland.

Glenn Simpson, Executive Director. Golden Gate Audubon 

I was raised in the high prairie of Montana, very near the Crow Indian reservation.  While growing up a boy under the Big Sky I became fascinated­– as boys once did– with the plains Indians and their culture.  

When we played cowboys and Indians, I was an Indian.   

But one thing puzzled me about my Crow Indian neighbors.  Why, I wondered, did they name their tribe after a pesky black bird that nobody seemed to like having around.  Why not name the tribe Eagles, Bears or Wolverines? 

It wasn’t until much later that I learned how intelligent, demanding, and even domineering a murder of crows can be.  I now know why my neighbors named their tribe after a bird that is intelligent, demanding and domineering.  In fact, I now believe that “Crow” is the perfect name for one’s tribe!

This awakening is something I am certain the city fathers and mothers of Sunnyvale are learning, because a murder of crows has moved into town and the murder is not about to be moved out.   This leads most everyone in town to ask: 

Once a murder of crows moves in, can it be moved out?