These tomatoes are a product of Fukuoka's #DoNothingFarming method.

They are harvested from volunteer plants that pop up in the weeds growing in our pig pasture plantings. We carefully seed our pig's slops with our favorite rustic local varieties, some of which have been developed here on our farm.

Every week we harvest pots and pots from seed that our pigs worked into the soil. How awesome is that?

#NaturalFarming #RegenerativeAgriculture #Organic #gardening #Agroecology

ニンニク収穫した。garlic 🧄
#自然農 #NaturalFarming

アスパラガス（折った後
#自然農 #NaturalFarming

@Sheril

#naturalFarming

The system is based on the recognition of the complexity of living organisms that shape an ecosystem and deliberately exploiting it. Fukuoka saw farming not just as a means of producing food but as an aesthetic and spiritual approach to life, the ultimate goal of which was "the cultivation and perfection of human beings".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masanobu_Fukuoka

"“You ask me to plow the ground. Shall I take a knife and tear my mother’s bosom? Then when I die, she will not take me to her bosom to rest” (Wilkinson, Blood Struggle, 49). It isn’t the first time that I read or hear about the practice of tilling as something so incredibly destructive. There is so much to tease out there, but just a few thoughts put very briefly that I will ask you to pull apart as reflections…

"The act tilling:

- removes histories from the land
- The layers of strata that hold pottery, bones, the ancestral parts of us are destroyed
- the landforms that were created to honour the spirits of lands are plowed flat
- the very history of the land is disrupted and destroyed
- removes and displaces indigenous seeds and plants, and leaves the land broken and open for invasive plants – destroys potential for trees and regeneration as well as any natural protection provided by the plants that existed there
- exposes the soil to intense solar radiation, baking it, drying it
- increases erosion significantly
- destroys mycorrhizal networks – and on this I will expand.

"I have often though about how violent the process of tilling is. Traditional agriculture, vs that which was brought here by Europeans. .... I have also been told about ceremony that determines which trees to harvest, which to leave to grow. These things we learn over time, over connection. It is generations of knowing to know a single tree, never mind a grove of living, thinking, feeling beings. The result was more of a curatorial relationship of relationality between that which grew on its own and that which we either planted or fostered. The result was a bountiful land that provided everything needed within short, short distances and surprisingly minimal amounts of labour."

portage – "the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water." (https://wikiless.tiekoetter.com/wiki/Portage)

"Soil is not a “dead” or neutral thing. It is teeming with life. From insects and crawlers, to bacteria and fungal networks… and then the roots and life systems of trees and plants, this is a place of high activity and a total life system. we are intimately connected to these places through all our being."

from https://giiwedinanaang.wordpress.com/2023/03/14/ancient-memories-through-our-very-own-skin/ – recommended if you have time and energy
#noTill #naturalFarming #soil #fungi #IndigenousKnowledge

筑摩野五寸人参🥕

#自然農 #NaturalFarming

Got tired of debugging my code so I'm rebugging my soil.

#NaturalFarming

RT @iatetweet
Fundamentally, there needs to be a transformation in the way agricultural science — indeed, all of science — is conducted. Assumptions about what counts as legitimate scientific knowledge must be questioned #NaturalFarming
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00021-4

Good morning from the hills of Kodaikanal. It's sunny with no clouds in sight yet and there's a pleasant chill in the air. I'm looking at more beds that need work for the upcoming growing season. The day ahead is exciting, and packed with things to do!

#gardening #NaturalFarming

Getting the tingling feeling that I'm about to enter that stage in life where if a thing can't be composted, I mark down its value by half.

#gardening #NaturalFarming

"a spiritual person of Japan [Masanobu Fukuoka] ... call[ed] for a serious and intensive return to the traditional agricultural technology."

"there are critical innovations— the use of straw and the conscious seeding of legumes such as clover and alfalfa...."

"Plowing the land and planting it to one crop decreases rapidly the fertility of the soil, requiring that the land be refertilized with animal dung, decomposed plant and animal wastes, or chemical fertilizers. Or replanted to a soil-enriching legume, such as clover. The decreased fertility of the soil can be assumed to lead to weakened plants which are more susceptible to disease and parasite infection, and there is much discussion in modern circles to the effect that the plants contain less nutrients for the people who eat them than do plants raised in naturally fertile soil."

"Natural people have a strong common bond throughout the world."

From _Akwesasne Notes_, 1978, pages 30–32.

#naturalFarming #natural #nature #traditional #fukuoka

Free online reading of "Miracle Apples", the true story of a Japanese Apple farmer who practiced Fukuoka Natural Farming.

Kimura failed to grow a single apple in 10 years. He was harassed and mocked by his neighbors. Then when he tried to commit suicide, he suddenly realized that nature didn't work with modern farming. We need to abandon our modern farming practices in order to solve the problem of pests without using any chemicals.

#naturalfarming #permaculture

https://dokumen.tips/documents/akinori-kimura-miracle-apples.html?page=1

"Miracle Apples" is a movie and a book of the real story of a Japanese apple farmer who inherited an apple farm from his father-in-law. He tried to grow apples without using chemical fertilizers or pesticides or herbicides because his wife had severe asthma.

He failed to grow a single apple in 10 years because of all the pests in his farm. The moment he tried to hang himself in a nearby forest, he became enlightened.

#naturalfarming #permaculture

https://asianwiki.com/Miracle_Apples

"Miracle Apples" is a movie and a book of the real story of a Japanese apple farmer who inherited an apple farm from his father-in-law. He tried to grow apples without using chemical fertilizers or pesticides or herbicides because his wife had severe asthma.

He failed to grow a single apple in 10 years because of all the pests in his farm. The moment he tried to hang himself in a nearby forest, he became enlightened.

#naturalfarming #permaculture

https://asianwiki.com/Miracle_Apples

Radishes are flowering in winter and feeding the few insect friends that are still active.

// If you want a standing army of ally insects to manage pests, you've got to feed that army whether it's wartime or not 🤷🏽‍♂️

#NaturalFarming

Seeing the long tree shadows in the early morning sunshine made me wonder if they could indicate how far the trees would easily block the wind and prevent the crops from drying out.

#naturalFarming #shelterbelt #windbreaker

(with the markdown for italics)

"there are certain steps we can take to align ourselves with the natural order, both inside and out. It is mainly a process of removing obstacles, letting go of misconceptions, and living a simple life that is close to the heart of nature." (180)

"Natural farming works best when conditions are as natural as possible because it relies on nature’s unique ability to produce abundance by itself." (180)

"examine our own thoughts and determine those that have been placed there by our culture." (180)

"In examining our thoughts we need to ask ourselves ...: “Is this a universal truth or is it a concept unique to our modern culture?” If it is unique to modern culture it should be discarded. Some of these ideas might include, “Society needs to keep growing so we can accomplish great things and make continual progress. We need to understand how nature works so we can extract what we need from it in order to meet the needs and demands of our growing population. We need industrial agriculture to feed that ever-growing population. The primitive people who came before us lived a pitiful and impoverished existence.”" (181)

"Some thoughts may be more personal, for example, “I need to have a career and accumulate material possessions to consider myself a success. The more I know, the better off I’ll be. I need to have a plan for my life or things will turn out poorly. I need to discover the true meaning of life.” Mr. Fukuoka denied that any of these statements was true because they are all the product of a culture that did not use nature as its touchstone for truth." (181)

"ultimately it is much easier to unburden yourself from all that misinformation than it is to carry it around with you. In the end, it will be replaced by other things that are infinitely more fulfilling." (181)

#natural #naturalFarming

from One Straw Revolutionary

1 of 3

(with markdown added for italics. from the One-Straw Revolutionary)

"Today thousands of working permaculture farms and backyard gardens exist throughout the region [the PNW], demonstrating that a perennial agriculture *can* be highly productive. Permaculture has also been shown to be an effective tool for restoring damaged landscapes and human communities." (174)

"Permaculture and Natural Farming"

"In many ways it *does* represent an improvement on basic organic techniques. But when carefully analyzed it becomes clear that permaculture, too, is a product of our modern way of thinking and therefore does not represent a clean break from other forms of modern farming." (174)

"The practice of “observing nature,” however, presupposes an observer and something that is being observed. The separation from nature is built into the process from the beginning, and what is produced is the designer’s *impression* of nature." (174)

"The next step in the design process is an analysis of the elements and functions. Each element—say, a pear tree, chicken, or building—is examined
and cataloged according to what its needs are and what it will provide to the other elements. This is essentially what science does. Nature, which is an indivisible whole, is split into individual parts, is analyzed, and then an attempt is made to put it back together. The reconstructed “whole” becomes a human invention, a simulation." (174–175)

"Ultimately, after all the information is collected and evaluated, the final design is produced. The designer is the creator and eventually the manager. Although the inspiration originally came from observing nature, the design is the work of the human intellect. The designer is firmly in *control*. I emphasized that word because it is perhaps the single most defining characteristic of modern culture." (175)

"So permaculture is based on the commonly shared beliefs and values of modern culture. It accepts people’s alienation from nature without objection, or perhaps without noticing; analyzes the whole as bits and pieces; then tries to fit them together again. It relies on the human intellect every step of the way. There are many wonderful things about human consciousness, but it can never understand a reality that is inherently unknowable. The permaculture saying I quoted earlier, that “the possibilities in a permaculture design are limited only by the imagination of the designer,” is meant to imply that the possibilities are limitless, but it also reveals a prideful overconfidence in human abilities. Why would anyone want to limit the possibilities to something as narrow and imperfect as the human mind?" :blobcatcheer:

"Relying on the intellect moves permaculture outside the realm of natural farming. Most permaculturists, for example, would not object to spraying compost tea on their plants or using exotic soil amendments if they made the crop grow faster and created a higher yield. Using ultraviolet grow lamps is fine as long as they are powered by solar panels or a pedal-powered generator. They visit a natural pond ecosystem in a forest meadow and decide to re-create something like it in their design. The result is a high-tech aquaponics system using PVC pipes, pumps, bubblers, solar collectors, and a digital timer. It is not at all like what the designers first observed, or anything like what you would ever see on a stroll through the woods." I don't think I would be opposed to this aquaponics permaculture, but I've always ran from it, "always" meaning the last few years I've been studying and practicing farming.

#naturalFarming #permaculture

An interview with Masanobu Fukuoka on #NaturalFarming

I'm grateful to this wise farmer for practicing and showing us a better way to grow food.

https://youtu.be/DKrYuKlsJkI

Working with the real Black Gold.

Only a true farmer can understand the happiness in this heap, and feel the enchanting smell of the moist earth. #organicfarming #organicfarm #naturalfarming