It may seem like we’re taking the back-seat to farm—because we are—but, there’s still a lot going on behind the scenes here at NTG.

The First No-Till Growers Intensive

In case you missed it, tickets for our first all-day no-till farming intensive in Kentucky, with guest Daniel Mays of Frith Farm, went live on Monday. In short, half of the day will be devoted to Daniel presenting his soil-building methods he developed on his farm in Maine over the course of the last decade, coffee and lunch will be provided by/at Spark Community Cafe, then we’ll visit Rough Draft Farmstead for a farm tour and further discussion. And maybe a drink or two. Check out the event page for more information. Tickets are going fast. The event isn’t until October and already one-sixth of them are sold, so don’t wait. If you want to know more about Frith, check out his episode of the podcast and follow them on Instagram.

Did I mention we’ll be giving away a Meadow Creature Broadfork from Paperpot.co?

A Future of Mulch?

With a massive increase in hemp production on the horizon, and CBD products proliferating, Farmer Jesse may have stumbled upon a new source of mulch. He writes, “I was speaking with some hemp producers at the market this weekend and they asked if I could use their waste material from oil production. So it would be essentially everything but the oil––stalks, seeds, all of it… So the material has alcohol and possibly seeds in it. Both of those things are not great for soil life, but especially with hemp legalized, there is going to be tons of this stuff available here. Thoughts?”

There are some interesting ideas, and a few precautions, shared in the thread. Check it out.

A No-Till further reading list

You can’t learn to farm from a book. I hear that often in my old-school farming neck of the woods. And their right, it’s a vocation you must do to learn, but I don’t agree with the sentiment. I think it’s often used as an excuse to not continually educate oneself about farming. Nothing replaces direct experience, but reading about alternative—better—growing practices exposed me to ideas and methods I may never have discovered on my own. Besides, ecological farming is, as far as I’m concerned, bottomless.

One of my favorite questions is, “what three books have…?” be it informed someone’s growing practices or profoundly changed their perspective on life. Maybe we’ll start a No-Till Growers recommended reading list. We’ve already covered The Organic No-Till Revolution by Andrew Mefferd and Farming for the Long Haul by Micheal Foley, and now we have have another to add to the list.

The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health by Robert Montgomery and Anne Bikle. It’s worthy of a review from the perspective of a farmer, but time is short—it being the growing season and all— and you can read the synopsis on Amazon. Also, I highly recommend Audible, I’ve listened to two books in two weeks.