For some reason, there is a whole generation of young folks who talk “regenerative agriculture” as if they have either discovered the Holy Grail, or they stumbled upon some suppressed knowledge. I don’t think either are really the case.

My grandfather’s brother was lucky enough to stumble onto a wonderful woman, who happened to be the only child, of a very successful farmer in the hamlet of Shy Beaver in the middle of Pennsylvania. I think he worked for the railroad, but I could be wrong, and had happened to meet her during a survey/construction project. Either way – love at first sight – marriage, and viola! he was now a dairy farmer. Holstein cattle, Duroc pigs, and crop rotation – corn, wheat or oats, alfalfa. When you run a large dairy, you don’t need to buy commercial fertilizers, you make your own and you use a manure spreader to do that. There was very little in the way of “artificial” on that farm, and they used crop rotation to build up their soil. Worked.

My grandfather wasn’t that lucky – but he did have a large back yard that became the family supermarket for all of their vegetables, fruit, and poultry/eggs. He also wasn’t going to spend money he didn’t have to buy fertilizers or insecticides/herbicides, and everything they did not eat was either thrown to the chickens or onto the compost pile.

Frankly, both of these men practiced regenerative agriculture to some degree. As did most of our forefathers and -mothers. It was what it was. Orchards were planted, and often the hogs were pastured in there to “plow it up,” to eat whatever dropped after harvest, and spread their manure. Silvopasture.

I bring all this up to sort of point to the fact that not every farmer creates a dustbowl, not every farmer is an agri-corporation, and not every farmer is poisoning the world. Normal family farm operations get rolled into the bad rap of industrialized agriculture. Not the time or place to go into the politics/economics of that – we’ll stick with the topic at hand.

A few weeks back I mentioned to some young people, that I was retired from the rat race, but that I was more busy now than I have been since my kids were little. They were curious what this old Texan was talking about, and I said “I am deep into regenerative agriculture on my piece of property to help the soil, create food forests, and have fun.” Their whole attitude changed – like “he too knows the secret of life…”

There is nothing new about this – I knew people fully organic, planting food plots, cover crops, scything grain, raising fish in rain water collection tanks, over 50 years ago. Back then, they were usually old hippies and devotee’s of “Mother Earth News.” They were certainly more of a fringe, and they didn’t have social media. Today – the world is at your fingertips and you can use social media to raise awareness – and cash – for your endeavors. So, today’s regenerative farmer/rancher is out there being publicized and marketed in a way we never saw before.

This is all good stuff. But it isn’t new stuff. However, if it can pull people back to the soil, back to getting their hands dirty, and encouraging everyone to plant a little something here and there – then it is a great thing, because we need more of that.