In this episode, D. Firth Griffith of Timshel Wildland and Jeremy Dumphy of Pasture Song Farm discuss the misrepresentation of conventional agriculture and the reductionist and binary perspective of regenerative agriculture. They explore the impact of modern accessibility on agriculture and the lack of nuance in the regenerative movement. They also emphasize the importance of context, community, and balance, calling us homeward and not into globalism. The conversation explores the tension between balance and capitalism in the context of regenerative agriculture. It delves into the practicality of growing grains for sale locally and the importance of limits. The discussion also highlights the heroic narrative often associated with regenerative agriculture and the disconnect between stated reasons and actual motivations. The conversation concludes with a discussion on mandatory agricultural systems and the subversive nature of self-sufficiency in place of community ownership or participation.
Get the book: wildtimshel.com/collections/books/products/stagtine
Jeremy's Website: www.pasturesongfarm.com
Episode Takeaways
The regenerative movement often misrepresents conventional agriculture and fails to acknowledge the importance of grains in the food system.
The binary perspective of regenerative agriculture as good and conventional agriculture as bad oversimplifies the complexities of farming practices.
The modern accessibility of buying grains from anywhere has led to a lack of local accountability and reciprocity in the regenerative movement.
The regenerative movement needs to embrace nuance and consider the regional context and diverse farming practices.
Community and balance are crucial in regenerative agriculture, and the focus should be on building relationships and finding sustainable solutions.
Regenerative agriculture exists in tension with the capitalist drive for growth and profit.
The practicality of growing grains for sale depends on regionalized understandings of regeneration and the balance between production and ecological resilience.
The heroic narrative surrounding regenerative agriculture often overlooks the complexity and limits of natural systems.
The marketing of regenerative agriculture can sometimes prioritize marketability over true ecological regeneration.
Achieving regional balance in agriculture requires considering the interconnectedness of landscapes and the limitations of individual farms.
Nuance is essential in understanding and practicing regenerative agriculture, as it involves balancing multiple factors and recognizing the unique context of each farm.
Who is Timshel Wildland?
The Wildland is a pioneering kincentric rewilding project in Central Virginia that is challenging what it means to be wild and how we, the mammal Homo sapiens, and not we, the industrial capitalist and savior of the world, can help heal Earth, together, as Earthlings.
Rewilding is in vogue today and many rewilding projects begin as moving companies—they work to remove unwanted animals, peoples, and Earth’s actual chaos and then work to import native species to grow and run about within their prison yards of exclusion fences. To heal rivers, they buy beavers. To heal beavers, they buy rivers.
In place of this rewilding and regenerative mythology (that humans can control our way forward), The Wildland is a co-creative crescendo of extended families that, through interspecial and intergenerational genomics and relationship burst, slowly and ever slightly, as a land-race of symbiotic life. It is home to wild cattle, goats, sheep, chickens, and horses, alongside nesting black bear families, river otters and beavers once again in the Piedmont uplands, and mountain lions and their bobcats, coyotes, and other friends running at their heels.
The Wildland is a home of life and not a home made for life.
