Our Bio-Integrative &

Regenerative Food System

 

This nourishment goes above and beyond “organic.”

Beyond doing “less harm” to the environment, we can create net positive benefits. Regenerative agriculture replaces the conventional paradigm to work with nature, instead of against it, shifting monoculture into diversity and replacing reductionist approaches with complex systems that build life into topsoil, improve the nutrition of the food we grow, and enhance and support ecosystem services, such as clean water, carbon capture, and diverse habitat for insects and wildlife.

Healthy animals, healthy food crops, and high-functioning landscapes are inseparable; together they stand as irreplaceable pillars supporting human health, too. In bio-integrative agriculture, we use our understanding of ecological systems to design and employ enhanced land stewardship, thriving soil food webs, nutritious food, intensely intentional animal management & welfare, and community well-being. Here’s how we implement these practices on our farm:

  • We strive to keep our soils healthy by minimizing disturbance, minimizing solar degradation, and maximizing root/microbial interactions and photosynthesis. To do this, we use dense and frequent planting routines, cover crops, and no-till practices. By not tilling/plowing, we keep sensitive soil food microbiology alive and functioning, benefitting enhanced plant nutrition and natural pest management. In supporting the soil biology, we encourage mineral uptake and nourishment travel through the food chain.

  • Science tracking carbon transfer in the food chain confirms you are indeed what you eat… and you are what your food eats too. To keep our food system safe, we use absolutely no chemicals or pesticides on our food crops, surrounding landscape, in our animals’ diets, and in our animals’ health care - including those approved by Certified Organic practices. By managing our gardens and livestock in ways that promote health and prevent disease, we reduce the need for intervention and encourage more resilient plants, animals, and landscapes for the future.

    In addition, we are very conscious of our use of plastics. Plastics are a widely-used and effective tool in agriculture, but they come at a cost to our waste stream and also soil and human health. While we do use plastic tarps to occultate garden beds between plantings, we are committed to avoiding plastic-mulches which are known to off-gas phalates and other groups of carginenic compounds, as research has shown that crops uptake these compounds into the food chain.

  • We are a tractor-less farm! To minimize compaction and disturbance, our produce and landscape are managed with hand tools only. This practice supports our living soil, minimizing compaction, erosion, and soil food web disturbance. These practices also intimately connects us with our fields so we can be proactive, effective managers.

  • Variety is the spice of life; increased diversity of plants in human diet has been shown directly correlated to long-term health. Replacing monoculture with diversity also allows us to culture disease and climate-stress resilient plants, which become well-adapted regionally reliable varieties when saving our own seed. Additionally, growing a wide variety of food crops and flowers brings diverse food sources to support beneficial insects, birds, and the soil biome.

  • Production vegetable cropping can be very resource extractive for soil, so farmers must support continued harvests with returned nutrition. However, commonly used N-based fertilizers deplete carbon in soils and disrupt functional food-webs. Instead of using chemistry-based fertilizers, our farm relies on biology. We strive to foster a closed-loop system, and therefore all of our routinely-used garden amendments are produced on our farm through biological cultures, ferments, and compost preparations using plant and animal contributions. Recycling fertility and a focus on biologically-driven vs chemically-driven plant nutrition is keystone in a regenerative system.

    Additionally, creating our own fertility avoids indirect antibiotic transfer to our produce. Research shows that antibiotics in dried manure products continue to transfer in low-dose forms through produce and onto the plate. Unfortunately, even Cerified Organic approved manure-based fertilizers largely rely on CAFO waste where antibiotic use is rampant. We do not use antibiotics in our livestock and actively avoid antibiotic transfer to the food system by creating our own fertility to be used on the produce we grow.

  • We love bugs! We do not use ANY insecticides, including those that are Certified Organic approved. Instead, we mitigate damage by supporting functional, resilient system health. By providing diverse habitat, we aim to encourage pollinators and support insects predatory to pests that commonly feed on garden crops. By encouraging diverse insect populations, we also help provide an important nutrition source to our pastured egg-layers and surrounding wildlife.

  • Our animals are moved quickly across the landscape, reducing soil compaction and parasite pressures while providing diverse diet choices for our livestock, which benefits the well-being of our animals and improves the quality of animal-based nutrition that ends up on the table. Coupled with long resting periods between reintroduction, these practices increase biological activity in the soils, builds topsoil, and provides many other ecosystem services.

  • By employing the natural behavior of different species, we can promote better pasture regrowth, increase soil microbial diversity, and decrease potential for soil erosion. Intentional species pairings can also help lower the risk of animal disease through parasite and insect life cycle disruption. Additionally, multi-species grazing promotes above-ground diversity in the form of plants & insects, benefiting wildlife and improving dietary complexity for grazing animals.

  • We encourage natural animal behaviors to the advantage of a low-input agricultural system. During the season of pasture rest, our chickens provide material for future garden amendments and our sheep contribute by trampling and mulching areas that will be newly planted in the spring. Rabbits are employed as pathway mowers in the garden. Pigs are tasked with readying new planting ground as well, and are especially valuable in digging projects. We consider our animals essential employees to regenerative land management. Previously vegetarian/vegan eaters, we respect our animals wellbeing and happiness to the utmost extent, as well as respect their irreplaceable role in regenerative, holistic land management.

  • Northern Minnesota’s seasons make it easy to observe changes in productivity and habits of plants and animals in our surrounding habitats. We respect natural seasonality by allowing our egg-layers to restore their bodies’ energy reserves and do not participate in the common practice of forced winter egg production through artificial lighting.

  • We strive to be connected to our system, so we can learn from it and work with it to support its beneficial potential. We aim to study, discuss, and learn from our environment daily. Combined with love and intention, observation drives our farm management.

  • We have many projects in the works, including permaculture plantings, native species re-integration, silvopasture design, amphibian habitat creation, and more. Check back for updates!