Soil Health

The Beet: A Podcast For Plant Lovers

Epic Gardening

Home & Garden, Education, Leisure, How To

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 20 September 2023

⏱️ 13 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Soil health is just as important as animal health. That’s because good soil provides the best possible sustenance for cattle. Additionally, animal impact has a positive effect, as manure attracts microbial organisms that give the soil life. Will managed to convert his previously industrial-farmed soil in just 5 years to a highly productive one. Epic Gardening Shop Homepage: https://growepic.co/3sVetV3 Botanical Interests Shop Homepage: https://growepic.co/3ENlRo0 Book Collection Page: https://growepic.co/3sXGhIx EG Homesteading Book: https://growepic.co/3PItuCA Connect With Will Harris: Will Harris is a fourth-generation cattleman, who tends the same land that his great-grandfather settled in 1866. Born and raised at White Oak Pastures, Will left home to attend the University of Georgia's School of Agriculture, where he was trained in the industrial farming methods that had taken hold after World War II. Will graduated in 1976 and returned to Bluffton where he and his father continued to raise cattle using pesticides, herbicides, hormones, and antibiotics. They also fed their herd a high-carbohydrate diet of corn and soy. In the mid-1990s Will became disenchanted with the excesses of these industrialized methods. They had created a monoculture for their cattle, and, as Will says, "nature abhors a monoculture." In 1995, Will made the audacious decision to return to the farming methods his great-grandfather had used 130 years before. Instagram Website Facebook YouTube Twitter Shop the Store As an exclusive for listeners, use code THEBEET for 5% off your entire order on our store, featuring our flagship Birdies Raised Beds. These are the original metal raised beds, lasting up to 5-10x longer than wooden beds, are ethically made in Australia, and have a customizable modular design. Shop now and get 5% off your first order. Get Our Books Looking for a beginner's guide to growing food in small spaces? Kevin’s book, Field Guide to Urban Gardening, explains the core, essential information that you'll need to grow plants, no matter where you live! He also wrote Grow Bag Gardening to provide you with specialized knowledge that can bring you success when growing in fabric pots. Preorder Kevin’s newest book Epic Homesteading if you are looking to turn your home into a thriving homestead! Order signed copies of Kevin’s books, plus more of his favorite titles in our store. More Resources Looking for... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	It is regenerative agriculture week here on the Epic Gardening podcast, and we have Will
0:07.5	Harris back on the show.
0:09.2	Fourth generation cattle man, we've been talking with Will a lot this week about, you know,
0:14.9	how does it work to shift a farm from an industrial cattle ranch to a regenerative one?
0:19.8	You've been doing it for quite some time now, Will.
0:22.3	And so, you know, as a gardener, soil health is the thing, right?
0:26.6	It's the thing we always say, if you're going to spend the time and effort to improve
0:30.0	one thing on your land, it's soil health so that everything gets easier from there on.
0:36.0	And for you, how much does that matter?
0:38.8	Basic question, I guess, maybe a simple question.
0:40.8	How much does that matter for a cattle rancher, soil health?
0:45.2	Just as much as it does to you, absolutely, just as much as it does to you.
0:50.6	I told you previously that the animal welfare to limo was the first thing that started me
1:02.1	rethinking being an industrial cattle producer.
1:06.9	But it was just a very short time that the soil health became just as important to me.
1:15.7	And I can remember doing to a place on my farm where I had been actively farming it,
1:23.6	my father and my grandfather, my great grandfather, and for all of our lives, you've been
1:31.3	farmed for 100 plus years.
1:35.1	And it's what we consider to be good soil, but you get a handful out of it.
1:41.4	It's just a dead mineral meaty.
1:44.5	Yeah.
1:45.5	And just a few feet over there in the edge of the forest, I can reach down to the other
	...

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