002 – Biodynamics, Demystified Part 1

002 – Biodynamics, Demystified Part 1

with host Linda Borghi and guest Abby Porter

Farm-A-Yard Podcast logo: orange sun with sunbeams rising over a mound of black dirt with 2 sprouts and a microphone in green coming up out of the soil.
Farm-A-Yard Podcast — It’s a movement… have ya heard?

Abby Porter from the Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Biodynamics shares the history of Biodynamic methods and preparations. Abby’s mother, Josephine Porter, founded the Institute. First in a series about biodynamics with Abby Porter which describes the 7 principles of Biodynamic Agriculture.

Get Part 2: http://farm-a-yard.com/p002-2

This podcast is made possible by funding by our Patreon supporters.  For extra free content or to become a patron please see us at https://www.patreon.com/FarmAYard

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Music credit: “Insomnia” by John Sheehan.  Used with permission.

000 – Welcome to Farm-A-Yard

000 – Welcome to Farm-A-Yard

with co-founders Linda Borghi and Criss Ittermann

Farm-A-Yard Podcast logo: orange sun with sunbeams rising over a mound of black dirt with 2 sprouts and a microphone in green coming up out of the soil.
Farm-A-Yard Podcast — It’s a movement… have ya heard?

We are serious about turning the 48.5 million acres of lawn in America into food production!  Farm-A-Yard: It’s a movement… have ya heard?  Linda Borghi and Criss Ittermann, two of the co-founders of Farm-a-Yard, share about the birth of the Farm-A-yard movement as a response to the challenges of soil degradation and food insecurity issues facing our country and the world.

You’ll notice in this episode that Farm-A-Yard is all about solutions, sprinkled with plenty of laughter and gratitude to pave the way for sustainable, lasting change.

This podcast is made possible by funding by our Patreon supporters.  

For extra free content or to become a patron please see us at https://www.patreon.com/FarmAYard

Links:

Music credit: “Insomnia” by John Sheehan.  Used with permission.

Do you have the courage to walk out your door and rip up your lawn? Make a plan!

Just because you are on this website is evidence enough that you’ve got what it takes to grow you’re own food.

It’s a smart brave move on your part to take control of your food and where it comes from.  To know that it’s safe and truly nutritious.

Join the ranks of the grassroots garden renegades that are popping up everywhere!  When we grow food, we are making an impact on our health, the community, the environment and helping to localize our food system for food security. AND yard farming can be a real income generator.

If you are serious about growing food, this is the place!  It pays to get started learning everything you can so that you can have the success you’re looking for sooner than later.

WARNING….once you get started you’ll be hooked.

Record numbers of people are growing food in pots in the window, on the patio, plots in the backyard, front yard, curb sites, public parks, schools, businesses…food can grow almost anywhere!

Where do you want to grow?

Here’s what you need first:  Make a Plan and Get Organized

  • Evaluate your life and what time you can make available for the project.
  • Plan for the size garden you can realistically manage.
  • Assess your growing space options.  Make sure you consider:
    • Do you have permission to use the space? Short or Long Term?
    • Does the area have at least 6-8 hrs. of sunlight daily? Make a sun map (google “sun mapping”)
    • Does it have a safe, convenient  water source?
    • Will it need fencing to minimized wild life distrubance?
    • Get a calendar to use just for the garden to schedule your plan.
    • Get a folder or large manila envelope so you can attach receipts for all your garden seed, tools, investments. You can record and date each oneon the outside of the envelope.  Data is important and will help you get the most from your garden adventure with less waste and cost.  Attach pages that keep track of garden notes, like: Garden map plan, yields, pest problems, budget…

    Equipped with the right information you can get to your goal much faster than most.  This planning can help you save money too!

    We’re with you every step of the way, so get on the Farm-A-Yard email list so that you don’t miss the announcement of our next FREE course. (check your spam folder too to make sure out emails are not getting lost!)

    Click Here to Subscribe

Artificial Fertilizer is “Fast Food” for Plants

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Artificial fertilizers contribute to soil degeneration.  It is no different than highly processed fast food which causes the degeneration of human health.  It’s like drinking caffeine to artificially get the energy you need temporarily but not address the real reason for your low energy.

Healthy soil can sustain itself because it has the real food and healthy environment it needs to regenerate and propagate.  That’s what nature does naturally, all on its own.

Healthy soil makes healthy plants for healthy people.  Period.

Today, many people are interested in learning how to grow some of their own foods without toxic/artificial inputs.

Many people have tried and failed too.

One reason is that the soil is so depleted and it takes quite a while to make your own compost and build your soil health.

I know this because it happened to me when I first got started. All I had was sand to work with.

A lot of people try to garden and when they fail they think that they just have a “black thumb”, when it’s really about the damaged condition of the soil, which is, then, rightfully called “dead dirt” because of toxic chemicals and the absence of living organisms.

One of the biggest challenges with starting a garden or farming project is having the healthy soil you need to make it successful.

Everything depends on that.

FYI…Healthy soil cannot be found in a bag at the garden stores.

BUT DON’T LET THAT STOP YOU!

Linda Borghi has been a Biodynamic farmer for years and knows intimately that the quality of her harvests hinged on the simple commitment to feeding the microbes in the soil with the Biodynamic stir and spray preparations.  She was personally so profoundly affected by the dynamic results that she was determined to spray the country!!

This was really exciting for me to finally learn about this simple solution and it has saved me so much time, work, money and GUESSING.

I was just surrendered to the fact that I had to take the natural “slow road” to fertility by making my own compost and covercropping etc.

Then I got a prescription for my soil from Evan Folds, and he explained, in a comprehensive soil report, exactly what was going on.   He also made some mineral recommendations that I decided to apply to correct those deficiencies.  Now all I do is stir & spray the food for the microbes and continue to add organic matter.  Simple.

I was so grateful to hear Linda’s experience and find out about this.

Check out the education and solutions at:

www.microbemakers.com   (Special 10% discount, use code: farm-a-yard)

Evan Folds, the Soil Doc can also give you a detailed prescription to meet the unique needs of your soil if you’re interested.

Or you can just start stirring and spraying to feed the microbes and just let them do the work for you.

This concept parallels the picture of the human gut and its need for prebiotics to feed the microbiome for gut health.  This is critical for a strong immune system.

Biodynamics/BioEnergetics is food to build/heal the earth’s immune system.

https://www.facebook.com/microbemakers/videos/1166775200108466/

Linda would LOVE IT if you joined Farm-A-Yard in spraying your part of the country too!!   Feed the microbes, heal the earth, heal the people!

We can do this.

This wholistic approach builds soil so effectively that it also cuts water consumption by at least 50%!

FYI….Did you know that in 10  years 57% of our farmers will be retiring? So who is going to grow our food?

Just one more reason to be an urban farmer and farm your yard. (“just sayin”)

Changing the way we eat one yard at a time.

It’s a movement, have ya heard?

A Personal Food Revolution

plant-grow-eat-signWe at Farm-A-Yard invite you to take action for a personal food revolution.

So what does a personal food revolution look like?

For some people it means becoming a more conscience mindful eater. Learning to listen to their body and noting how different foods affect their energy, positively or negatively and whether they get bloated or have joint pain, etc. They take note of the kind of relationship they have with food and if that is working for them.

For others it’s about making mindful choices of where their food comes from. Is good food accessible to everyone in their community?  How was it was grown or raised?  Mindfulness like this along with a desire to support a local economy and local farmers who are fair and mindful also of good working conditions for their farm workers.

The ultimate personal revolution for me, is learning to grow my own food, getting back in touch with the vibrant life force of the earth and learn from the quiet, invisible, dynamic wisdom under my feet.

It’s important to me to learn how to best grow my own chemical free food in a way that nurtures and supports the earth that is feeding me.

So why else is this so important?

Our nation’s health crisis is not joke.  We’re the top country in the world for chronic diseases, obesity and diabetes.

So, what is the reason?  It is widely accepted that it has everything to do what we are eating and drinking, the drugs people are taking and generally the soup of environmental toxins surrounding us, not to mention the impact of other life stressors and anxieties.

Our healthcare system today is more accurately described as being focused on the management of “sick care”, not “healthcare”.  We spend billions of dollars to try and find “cures” (and the crisis has only worsened),  but we continue to lack getting to the “root” of the problem and only treat sympthoms.

We have to trace it back to our management of our soil and water, on which our very existence depends.  If we don’t get that right, then all our other efforts, though they are vitally important to the overall solution, all will be in vain because without healthy soil, nothing can be sustainable.

That is why I made the decision, as an urban farmer, to grow BioEnergetically/Biodynamically.  Though I have grown without pesticides and herbicides, and chemical fertilizers, it’s not enough for the poor lifeless dirt that is the norm in America. The soil organisms need to be fed.

Biodynamic farming actually farms the soil, the air and even people.  The Biodynamic preparations are food for the microbes in the soil and the whole eco environment.  The human gut and inner ecosystem is a mirror of the soil web. Our life depends on the health of the invisible microbota of the earth and our connection to it.

So, this is what takes our educational webinars to another level.  Get on our mailing list for more information, you’ll be glad you did.

 

 

Linda Borghi Speaks at Cultivating Profits in Small Scale Farming Conference

Raise your hand if you plan to dig up some of your lawn and

grow yourself some food.

Linda Borghi was challenging all the attendees at the Cultivating Profits in Small Scale Farming Conference at Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, NC,  to do just that!

Linda and I believe that the good food movement needs to be fun and like many things also needs a jingle and so at the end of the presentation Linda and Marsha, with ukulele in hand, shared the Farm-A-Yard song for a sing-along with the attendees!  And a one and a two…..

Farm-A-Yard Song

Tune: Battle Hymn of the Republic

Farm-A-Yard it’s a movement

Have ya heard, have ya heard?

Turning lawns into food

Spread the word, spread the word

Make some cash

Ditch the grass

Feed yourself, feed the world

Farm-A-Yard it’s a movement

Have ya heard, have ya heard?

Yard to table

We are able

It’s the food that needs no label

Be a Farmer in your own backyard

Start today it’s a movement

Have ya heard, have ya heard?

Farm-A-Yard is a movement to equip folks to grow food to feed their families and even show you how to make an income part-time or full time. Our nation has a bad habit of wasting resources on the 48 million acres of lawn in this country which is depleting our precious water resources and adding tons of toxic chemicals that are polluting the environment…and for what?  

We’re out to change that in a big way!

Farm-A-Yard is localizing our food system one yard at a time.

Farm-A-Yard it’s a movement, have ya heard?  Join the movement, spread the word!

In the New Year, Farm-a-Yard will continue to bring its educational webinars that lay out the step by step basic skills necessary to Farm-a-Yard Biodynamically with a proven business model that shows you how to cultivate sustainable profits and so much more!  

You don’t even have to own land.

Linda Borghi and Evan Folds make a truly Biodynamic team to bring all the pieces together for anyone looking to be successful in growing food for their family or to generate a viable, sustainable income.

Do you want to learn how to transform your soil for results that will blow your mind?  All life hinges on the health of our soil.

We’ve got the “dirt cure” that takes the guesswork out

of how to regenerate the soil.  

This information is revolutionary!  

You’ll never look at the soil in the same way again!  

You can check out some amazing info at www.microbemakers.com.

Get on our email list to learn more 

www.farm-a-yard.com