WHAT IS NATURAL FARMING? Part 5 NO WASTE, MATERIAL CYCLYING & THE POWER OF NATURE
Natural Farming is an environmentally friendly growing system, with zero emissions, with all wastes recycled. It is a food production system that conserves water and conserves carbon. Since the soil has high levels of healthy, vibrant microbes the organic matter is quickly converted to soil. The bodies of microbes and small soil creature can be about 80% water, and one per gram of soil can hold up to 10 billion microbes. Therefore having high level soil microbes means significant levels of water are conserved in the system. Furthermore the microbes also conserve carbon, both within their bodies and in the organic matter they decompose into the soil.
Top Soil builds up higher each year (while with modern agriculture soil depletion is considered normal, even with many organic systems). The biologically active zone of the soil also moves down each year. Soil microbes can be used to turn solid lava rock into soil. Soil microbes can be used to turn deserts green. Soil Microbes are The Power of Nature.
Using the Power of Nature composting becomes almost instantaneous. All organic waste matter from the kitchen and the property enters this biologically rich decomposition machine. You end up living in a healthy cocoon of local biology that promotes health and vitality and protects against illness, pests, and disease, for people, pets, animals large and small, plants, and all the creatures of the soil. You become part of a local, balanced, healthy ecosystem. This is why we say, “Be Like Nature.”
This seeming miracle happens by inoculating planting areas with Indigenous Micro Organisms IMO, and keeping those areas well mulched. The animals are kept on deep bedding that is inoculated with the same microbes. In the fields anything the animals can eat are collected for feeding time. Other weeds are left in the field as mulch. The food grade plant material goes to the kitchen, either commercially or for personal consumption. Scrapes and leftovers are offered to appropriate animals. What the animals don’t consume are consumed by the microbes. In the field the microbes turns the weeds and mulch into soil rich in organic matter and vitality. In the animal beds the bedding and feeding wastes, including manure, are turned into a rich, biologically vibrant and balanced compost. Because the manure is decomposed so quickly the animals live without stepping in their own waste, the animals do not smell, not even pigs, and flies are not a problem.
This means you will always have a place to put food scrapes and yard waste. This means you always have a source of fully composted compost available, compost you did not have to haul and turn. The animals did that for you. All you did was provide food once a day, and fresh bedding material about once a month. You will never need to muck out a stall or barn again.
By using this animal bedding as mulch, which is fully composted and inoculated with a balanced ecosystem of healthy microbes, you will get bigger fruits and vegetables. They will be colorful and have better texture and taste. They will have higher levels of biochemicals that promote health. Your yields will be higher. As your plants and animals start reaching their genetic potentials, your food becomes medicine. The pressure from pests and disease will be small, perhaps not noticeable. You’re plants are heavily mulched so you don’t have to do much weeding if any.
Over time this system becomes even more productive. The more plant material you grow, the more you can feed your animals, and the better your animal nutrition will be. The animals eating more nutritious food means more and better composted organic mulch. The more composted organic matter added back to the plants means you will grow more plant material. And so it goes. This is how you turn a farm that needs more inputs ($) every year to one that is sustainable, and can maintain itself. And this is how you take a sustainable farm and turn it into a regenerative operation, one that produces excess food and more top soil every year.
“The miracle takes place after two or three years. Using IMOs, your soil will inflate like a balloon, becoming softer and allowing more oxygen into the root zone.” Master Cho CGNF-H Input Manual