patrick.net

@Ratherbecaving

Funny, I was just listening to a lecture by Donald Kagan about ancient Greece in which he brings up the point that most people don't even know any farmers anymore.

Here it is:



I found it here:

https://fourble.co.uk/podcast/lecturesonan

The whole set of lectures is very good. I'm almost through them all. I listen to them while walking to or from a cafe each day.

He's awesome. His kid sucks ass.

We are far and few between these days, our soil is toxic , our seeds are tainted, our crops only have a small percentage of the nutrients they are supposed to contain. America has the lowest quality grains and bread in the world. It's all embarrassing. Farmers who attempt rotational grazing without the help of fertilizers like nitrogen, or organic farming, are ostracized by mainstream farms and shunned in their communities. I grew up shucking corn every summer as a young child, I would watch my neighbor plow his field every year with his horse. Now all of the land that once held families' corn fields and gardens are developed into subdivisions and strip malls. It is saddening how far Americans are drifting from basic knowledge and survival skills, just to depend on our greedy government. My friends and community are no longer as concerned with the value of a dollar, they are more concerned by becoming more self sufficient on what little land they own, investing in small livestock, and compost, learning by trial and error how mother nature can provide what we truly need to survive.

"Fields Without Dreams" sounds like an interesting read. I will have to check it out. Sounds a little to close to home, regarding my comment on the current fate of family farms of the past. It seems farming generations are ending due to the amount of physical labor involved in the running of a farm, along with the lack of wealth involved in being a farmer. Farmer's daughters and sons usually choose a different path than the generations before them. Farms don't get vacations, farms don't get days off, farms don't provide an individual with medical insurance, or other medical benefits, if you have a hard season it is difficult financially and emotionally, and can be literally back breaking and fruitless work some seasons; due to drought, pests, and other natural events. The risk of failure and the stress of the fear of failure prevents generations from wanting to continue the legacy of those who worked the earth before them, knowledge handed down for hundreds of years, gone to waste for the goal of plugging along with the current status quo, to obtain some sort of college degree to sit in front of a computer, or test field samples in a lab, or maybe go to school and find there is no longer a real use for their degree, and start a job waiting tables, ironically at some local farm to table restaurant, making more money than they would using their masters degree, all to achieve the goal of less hard labor and less commitment than farming demands. Not very admirable behavior to give up on the practice of sustainable living a farm provides a family, the support of a community, and the ups and downs taught in life by working the land. I can't imagine many people shedding literal blood, sweat, or tears into their keyboards. I'm not even confident these days that the average American could grow a house plant, much less maintain a garden, nor a farm, or would have any interest in doing so.

Good grief.

Patrick says

Ratherbecaving

Funny, I was just listening to a lecture by Donald Kagan about ancient Greece in which he brings up the point that most people don't even know any farmers anymore.

Here it is:



I found it here:

https://fourble.co.uk/podcast/lecturesonan

The whole set of lectures is very good. I'm almost through them all. I listen to them while walking to or from a cafe each day.

I know farmers, I live countryside. Category is shrinking. If land goes up, farmers can’t farm for living. I see many call it quits, kids inheriting land just sell it, or farmer gets old. Land needs to come way down to make farming profitable.

So, @Ratherbecaving, tell
us about your farm. What crops do you grow, what animals do you have. Let it all hang out!

PS. And what or whom you'd rather be caving to?

My brother and I drove the backroads from Williamsburg to Stuart, VA. I saw something I had thought disappeared long ago - tobacco farms. There were quite a few small tobacco farms on that 5-hour drive.