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Welcome to episode three of Behind the Shield. My name is James Geering and I will be a host for

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this podcast. My guest on this episode is American farmer Joel Salatin. Now Joel, other than a farmer,

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is also a lecturer and an author. His books include Folks This Ain't Normal, You Can Farm,

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and The Marvelous Pigness of Pigs. Joel is an English major from Bob Jones University.

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He is featured in food documentaries Food Inc and Fresh, which I recommend both of those.

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He has done TED Talks and spoken at Google. Joel is known for his holistic method of animal husbandry.

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He has a very unique look at not only the way the animals are raised, but even the way the food that

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they eat is grown. So he will move his animals geographically through his farm

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to make sure that the acorns, the grass, whatever they're actually eating normally,

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has grown to the point where it has the maximum nutrition and the minimum amount of stress.

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So the product is the healthiest, leanest meat that you can get. And therefore this low stress,

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high nutrition environment creates the healthiest meat for the people that he sells to.

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He doesn't use any chemicals, any drugs, or GMO feed. Now this whole topic is so important to me.

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When you look outside the window, you look at our fellow citizens here in the US, in the UK,

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and other Western developed countries, you are seeing a growing trend of ill health.

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This can absolutely be improved through exercise and movement, but let's say you exercise for

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four days a week, about an hour at a time. Well that's only four hours total in the 150 odd hours

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a week that you have available to you. So the rest of the time is obviously in that balance of

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energy in, energy out. The quality of that food is even more important. The gastrointestinal tract

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is 80% of your immune system. So what you put in is either going to hurt or nourish your body.

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The food that we've been eating, even the salads and the vegetables and people think they're eating

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well, if they're covered in pesticides, if people are wearing hazmat suits to apply this to the food

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that then goes into your children's body, clearly every cell in that food is not going to be

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beneficial. It's going to have some good properties, but obviously some bad properties as well.

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When you go locally to organic farms and you get vegetables and fruit that have not been sprayed

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with these chemicals, that have been grown naturally, that's 100% nourishment, 100% nutrition.

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The same with the meat. If the meat has not been treated with hormones and antibiotics and the meat

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hasn't been shoulder to shoulder in some god-awful warehouse with these stress hormones just surging

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through these poor animals, if its growth hasn't been rapidly accelerated through chemicals,

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then the meat that you ingest is going to nourish your body. If it's the sick, overdeveloped

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meat that's kept alive through pharmaceuticals, then again, this meat is not going to nourish.

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It's going to hurt. We've seen a rapid increase in the amount of disease in this country,

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heart disease, cancer, and I am 100% sure that a large part of it is to do with the food that we

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have served. The other benefit of buying locally from these sustainable farms is you remove the

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transportation costs, you remove the packaging, the impact on the environment. Your local farmer,

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if you select one that prescribes to the same philosophy, doesn't have to ship that food

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3,000 miles, doesn't have to cling wrap it and irradiate it and all the other processes that

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happen to the food that are in the supermarket. The misunderstanding that this food is more

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expensive is another lie. You take away the middleman, the publics, the supermarket that's

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obviously trying to make a profit and understandably so, the cost of processing, the cost of packaging,

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the cost of transportation, and you go from the home directly to the source, i.e. your local

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farmer, they can afford to give you this product at a cheaper rate than the grocery stores do

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because all those middlemen that are taking a cut have been eliminated. So you can't just

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take a cut, you can't just take a cut, you can't just take a cut. That is a fallacy that good food

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is more expensive. It really isn't if you know where to look. The other element is we consume

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way too much meat in this country. So to think of it more like quality instead of quantity,

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you take out a third of your meat consumption, replace it with more vegetables, beans, that kind

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of thing. When you do buy your meat, you buy the high quality meat and that way you're nourishing

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it more efficiently instead of hurting it. So in this interview, we talk about the food industry

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and how it became industrialized in the first place. We touch on the effects of this process

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on our food and why chemicals are usually used in factory farming, how sustainable farming creates

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the best quality food, how to find the local farmer. Joel's up in the northeast so everyone

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needs to find a farmer that subscribes to this same philosophy in their local area. So he'll talk

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about it and we'll provide links to where he suggests on the show notes as well. And then

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how to start a garden, how to take even that farmer out of the equation and grow some of

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this stuff yourself. So it doesn't have to be an entire smorgasbord of vegetables and fruit,

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but there's a few things that are very easy to grow in your local area. You can have chickens

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and a chicken coop. There's all kinds of ideas that he comes up with and making yourself more

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sustainable and that's going to affect how much you spend on food. If you're growing it yourself

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and you can remove that cost from buying those certain vegetables or eggs or poultry. I am very

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excited to introduce Joel. I think he's a voice that we don't normally hear. When we talk about

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nutrition, you hear the doctor telling you about lower your cholesterol, remove fats from your

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diet and you talk about calorie counting and all these areas of nutrition, but no one ever talks

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about where the food comes from fundamentally and how if you eat this type of food and have

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an abundance of vegetables on your plate, you can really forget about calorie counting.

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This will totally nourish your body and if you remove a lot of the processed foods,

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you really eliminate the need to quote unquote count calories. So without further ado,

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I am extremely excited to introduce to you Joel Selatin. So thank you so much for

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agreeing to be on Behind the Shield. One of the main problems that we have in first responders,

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firemen, policemen, EMS is miseducation, I guess you could say from the dietary point of view.

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There's a big push on the exercise side of losing weight and that kind of thing, but I think there's

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a huge lack of knowledge of the kinds of food people should be eating and also fundamentally

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where that food is coming from in the first place. So I'd love to take you down that road and have

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you educate everyone that's listening. I wonder if we could start with the actual farm itself.

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I understand your parents bought the farm, is that correct?

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Yes, my mom and dad bought this when I was just four in 1961. So we've been here not quite 60 years

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and I grew up here. My mother is still alive and day-to-day operations are now done by our son,

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Daniel, and we have our grandchildren here. So we have four generations here on the farm.

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Fantastic. And when you got there, was the soil in incredible condition?

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It was in incredible condition, incredibly bad. We had very large gullies like corrugated roofing

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down the hillside, large rock areas that had no vegetation on them whatsoever. These were shale

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areas, a quarter acre or so in size that literally it was bare, bare rock. And today all those areas

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are covered up with 12 inches of soil. It's not three feet like it was 500 years ago, but at least

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it's covered up and growing something. And the gullies are healing slowly. And it was arguably

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the armpit of the community today. It's, I would say, arguably the most productive farm in the

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community. Yeah, certainly the most well-known, that's for sure. I grew up on a farm myself.

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My father was a veterinary surgeon in England. So I've had a unique perspective of 2016 and

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the years prior and how we are fed and the choices that we make. I know that we weren't completely

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organic. I remember using fertilizer and pesticide on some of the foods. And the chickens were fed

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meal as well as pecking around in the grass. And I know we're going to talk about the way that you

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farm some of those, but it gave me a different perspective when I came over here and see so many

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people choosing their food from the fridge, the frozen aisle or everything being in a packet.

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Now, did you always want to be a farmer? Were you destined to be a farmer since you were young?

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Yes, from my earliest memories, I definitely wanted to be a farmer. I think, looking back

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as you start thinking about your childhood memories sometimes, I realize now the impact

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that my grandfather's farm and my great uncle's farm had on me. My grandfather, actually I

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shouldn't say farm, his garden and my uncle's farm. I said, we came to this place, it was just

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rocks and weeds and gullies and it was in rough shape. But their places, my grandfather was a

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charter subscriber to Rodale's Organic Gardening and Farming magazine in 1949. Had just this lush

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garden that was bounded with a tea trellis grape arbor. And I was a kid, you know, and you could

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reach up and just pick these ripe succulent grapes. And it just seemed boundless to me.

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And I think I never got away from that almost subconscious desire to nest in abundance, be able

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to walk out the back door every day and feel like you're immersed and nestled in abundance,

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very, very powerful metaphor.

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Yeah, absolutely. Now, your parents then, when you were growing up, clearly they had a different

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philosophy than a lot of people in that generation. So how was their philosophy formed to kick so hard

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against what a lot of the other farms were doing around them?

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That's a great question. My dad, his degree was in economics, he was in World War II. And then

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after the, went to college after the war and got his degree in economics. And he, I think he came

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to this more from an economic level than an environmental level. And he realized early on

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that the chemical approach, whether it's chemical fertilizer or pesticide or herbicide, whatever,

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but that trying to beat nature with chemicals was essentially a drug addiction. It was like a

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drug addiction. And it was a vicious circle where you couldn't ever get ahead because nature bats

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last. And so you were constantly looking for more potent chemicals, more, just more, more chemicals.

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You know, we used 100 pounds last year, we got to use 200 this year. And he just saw it as a

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treadmill that you could never get off of. I mean, like economically, you know, you can't

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get yourself into wealth, you know, and you can't chemicalize yourself into health either.

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And he saw that, I think, as primarily an economic equation, much more than an environmental

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equation, which is kind of interesting, because most people, as soon as they hear about, you know,

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not using all that stuff, they assume that you don't have an appreciation for economics,

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because economics means that you go to concentrated animal feeding operations and factories and, you

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know, industrial, monospeciated farms and chemicals and all that stuff. So I like to point that out,

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because I think the assumption is that when you do well by the environment, you hurt yourself

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economically. And if you're going to do well economically, you necessarily have to make some

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compromises on the environment. Yeah, absolutely. It kind of reminds me of, I did an economics class

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years and years ago in England. And one of the only things that stuck, I don't even think I

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finished the class, to be honest, but was the term false economy. And I think that's where we're at

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now is that they thought that these farming methods were going to save money initially.

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But obviously, in the long run, now we have a nation of extremely unwell people. And now,

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we're like, like you said, the debt is now having to be paid physically. I remember you had a great

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quote in one of your interviews I heard you in, a gentleman in the 1940s has said something about if

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you put chemicals in your food, it was eventually the people will have to be chemicalized as well.

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Yeah, that was Sir Albert Howard, the British agronomist who brought aerobic, the scientist who

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brought basically the aerobic composting formula of carbon, nitrogen, moisture, oxygen, and microbes

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to the world in 1943, writing his iconic and agricultural testament, which is kind of considered

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one of the pillars of the entire whatever sustainable ag regenerative agriculture movement.

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He said, when we use artificial manure, that's what he called chemical fertilizers, artificial

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manures. We grow artificial plants, which feed artificial animals, which make artificial people

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who can only be kept alive by using artificial. And of course, look at our pharmaceutical industry.

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You know, that was 1943 when he said that. And certainly, you know, being kept alive with

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artificial is certainly where our nation has come at this point. Absolutely. Yeah, I think that

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pretty much anyone that deals with EMS that's listening to this can testify that we have

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these patients with literally a trash bag full of medications and they're not fixing anything at

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all. And the bigger irony is anyone in the medical community has to take the Hippocratic oath. Yeah,

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Hippocrates himself said, let food be thy medicine. So that's to me the biggest irony you can possibly

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have in the medical industry right now. Yes. And I think one of the problems is that nobody knows

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what their tolerances are. You know, I don't want anybody to listening to this to think that I'm

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some sort of a cultish and it's anathema to ever eat a Snickers bar, or even drink a Coke for that

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matter. Okay. But there's a big difference between having one once a month as a little treat and

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having two a day or three a day and, you know, moderation in all things. And so, and, you know,

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EMS personnel routinely spend a lot of time hanging out at the rescue squad or the fire station or

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whatever. And what do we do when we just kind of hang around? Well, we snack, you know, we snack on

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things. And so, you know, the old adage, you know, that the cops all go down to Dunkin' Donuts,

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you know, the reason it's humor is good humor is because there's an element of truth to it.

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And so we need to appreciate that none of us knows where our tolerances are. We don't know

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when that snacking and what we're snacking on is going to result in diabetes or obesity or,

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you know, any of these kinds of things. And the truth is, if you look at the label, you know,

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you can't pronounce half of the stuff that's on the label. And that's brand new in the human

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lexicon and the human gut. The microbiome, you know, was not designed to handle things that you

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needed to be a scientist in a laboratory to make or things that were too hard to pronounce, to say.

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I'm kind of with Michael Pollan who says, you know, we probably shouldn't eat anything that

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wasn't available before 1900. That's kind of when things really went south. And of course,

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we're going to all be very thankful that the hot dogs were introduced at the 1890 World's Fair. So,

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you know, hot dogs just squeaked in under the 1900s benchmark.

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That was the ones without nitrates back then, probably.

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Yes. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. On our farm, we make hot dogs and they don't have anything

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unpronounceable. You know, it's just beef and pork and they're really great. And they actually

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taste like food. They don't taste like, you know, some synthetic material.

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Yeah, absolutely. So that kind of pushed me to the next question. I think this is a huge pivotal one.

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We obviously, our generation, I'm 42 now, so I was raised outside of my farm, I was raised to

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believe that, you know, it's safe to spray all our food in insecticides and, you know,

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the mass production and pasteurizing our milk and all these other areas that we literally were

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taught by our school boards and our health boards of the respective countries. So when did the

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industrialization of food really begin? And then what was the regression from there?

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Well, I think that the real catalyst came post World War II, because you have to remember that

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ammunition, bombs, explosives are made from nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorus. And of

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course, those are the three things that are in chemical fertilizer. And so after World War II,

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we had all these stockpiles of NP and K. We had all these businesses, you know, that,

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you know, big businesses that had developed to mine and bag and create NP and K. And so it was

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extremely cheap. And so the natural thing was, well, let's find a market for these things,

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let's go. And of course, in that day, you know, you could sprinkle some of this on the soil and

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it would really take off. Well, the soil, a lot of the soils responded to the natural

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matter. A lot of the soils responded to it because they still had organic matter left over from

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draft power from all the animal manures and all that stuff. So, you know, they responded to it.

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And so I'm a little bit careful to, you know, to cast great disparagements on, you know, on

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great-grandpa who reached for that bag of chemical fertilizer as opposed to shoveling, shoveling,

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shoveling, shoveling in a day when, you know, there were not front-end loaders. You know,

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there was, so the alternative was, well, do I spread a little bag of stuff? I mean, it's like

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a miracle. Or do I shovel? And people were tired of shoveling. They'd been shoveling all the time.

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And so for the first five or six years, you know, this took off. And of course, it was all cheap

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because they were leftover stockpiles from the war effort. In many cases, it had virtually been paid

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for and was just, you know, a salvage operation. So it was extremely cheap, extremely, you know,

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marketable. It was accessible. And so that took off. Well, in the early 1950s then, you know,

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we had the development of the tractor and, of course, rural electrification, plastic pipe,

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chippers, shredders, you know, and gradually the components, the components to run a true

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carbon-centric system gradually came into being through the 1950s. So that by 1960s,

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there was absolutely no reason whatsoever to be using chemical fertilizers. But by that time,

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that orthodoxy was so entrenched in the cultural psyche that it was very difficult to, as we say,

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unring that bell. You can't unring a bell. And so you couldn't restart that clock.

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By that time, you know, the land-grant universities, the research nonprofits,

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all of the USDA, all of these things were stacked and stocked with a paradigm that was a chemical

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oriented paradigm. The truth is that if we had had a Manhattan project for compost,

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not only would we have fed the world, we would have done it without three-legged salamanders,

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infertile frogs, and a dead zone, the gulf, the size of New Jersey and the gulf of Mexico.

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That's the truth. But we didn't have a Manhattan product project for that. We had a Manhattan

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project for something else. And so that's where we ended up. And then the Monsanto

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pesticide area was another separate arm of that whole movement?

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Well, yeah. Well, you know, it's like every, if you read the diffusion of innovation,

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these business books that talk about, you know, new things and how they market, how they change

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markets and how markets adapt, what you see is this, you know, gentle, slow start. And then

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it comes to this, the trajectory starts to steepen and steepen because you get all the

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components necessary to make it efficient, you know, mining, laboratories, distribution,

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packaging, marketing, advertising, you know, all these things have to come together. And so it

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just got steeper and the curve got faster and faster. And so, you know, what started out as

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started out as pigs coming in off of pasture and going into a small piggery of 20 sows

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gradually became a piggery, you know, a concentrate animal feeding operation of

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5,000 sows, pigs, chickens, the same thing. Antibiotics played a huge role in this because

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prior to antibiotics, you simply couldn't, you know, put this many animals in one spot

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in such filthy conditions and have them survive. So the concentrate animal feeding operation

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was definitely a product of antibiotics that allowed us to keep these animals alive

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in such filthy and unsanitary conditions. And then of course you had petroleum came along,

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which allowed us to efficiently transport stuff. I mean, you couldn't have a CAFO 150 years ago

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because you simply couldn't put, you couldn't bring in that much food stuff and haul out that

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much manure. You simply couldn't do it 150 years ago because you couldn't do it with draft power.

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It was too, transportation was too expensive and too difficult, too arduous and laborious.

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But when petroleum came along and transportation was extremely cheap, then all of these historic

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kind of boundaries could be broken and you could just, and you could do pretty much anything you

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wanted to. So you have a pocket full of antibiotics and the truck is idling on the porch and suddenly

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all these historic parameters, these historic norms, you know, could be punched through.

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We didn't have to do only what we could move with draft power. We didn't have to do only what we

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could shovel or move. And then as we did that, the capacity to take that paradigm on down the road

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did indeed occur. And Joel Arthur Barker, who wrote the book Paradigms, said that every paradigm

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eventually exceeds its point of efficiency. And that's of course exactly where we are now

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as this paradigm of concentrated animals, segregated food systems, monospeciation,

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chemical fertilization, and now of course, you know, genetically modified organisms and whatever.

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These have now, you know, continued to accelerate. And so now suddenly in the last 30 years,

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we have this burgeoning problem with, for example, food allergies. You know, when I was growing up,

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the phrase food allergies didn't even exist. I mean, nobody said anything. You could have a potluck

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or a get-together. Nobody had to worry about gluten or peanuts or whatever. And now, you know,

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you can't have a get-together without accommodating half a dozen special food allergy requests.

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Then you have, you know, E. coli, salmonella, campylobacter, listeria, bovine, spongiform,

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encephalopathy. You know, all of these things have come in the last 30 years as that supposedly

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progressive and scientific paradigm has exceeded its point of efficiency. And nature is now batting

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last. And we're seeing it, of course, in consequences, as you mentioned, you know, in

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bags full of medications and social, emotional problems from rage to depression to

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all sorts of things that, of course, first responders deal with on a daily basis. For sure,

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first responders are on the cutting edge of society's fringes. And it's society's fringes

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where you see the fabric, the matrix of a civilization, you see them beginning to crumble.

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And so first responders have a very unique and special look into the mortar that's cracking

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on the bastions of civilization. It's quite profound.

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Yeah, that's a very good way of looking at it. I never even thought about that. But we certainly,

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I think to me, it's just so blatant that the philosophy we have in our health care at the

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moment just does not work. It's not like someone has blood pressure medicine for six months, and

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then they come up to you one day like, God, that medicine works so well. My blood pressure is

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perfect now. I don't have to take any more medicine. I don't have to take any more medicine.

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My blood pressure is perfect now. I don't have to take it anymore. That never happens. They're on

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that medication the rest of their life. They're on the diabetes medication, the cholesterol

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medication. And I see my blood work from the way I eat. And you see some of these great

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documentaries, Food Inc. and Forks Over Knives and Fat Sick and Nearly Dead. And you see these

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people healed just by returning and eating the way they were supposed to eat 100 years ago.

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And it's that simple. And yet, this lie is so ingrained in people's psyche that when you

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talk to them like that, you get looked at like you just pooped in their cornflakes. And it's

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incredible that they've managed to pull that off in such a short time.

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Well, it certainly is. And then you have the fire station, the rescue squad. Again, everybody's

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hanging around there. So they've got vending machines with nabs and soda and all this in.

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I mean, it's just a disaster waiting to happen. And so, yes, the whole food, the body food

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connection is profoundly inarguable today. And everywhere I go, I run into people that have

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healed their children from autism, healed themselves from cancers, all sorts of things,

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simply by fundamentally changing diet. The human experience was not designed to be

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propped up to have crutches of pharmaceuticals. The person that needs this stuff should be an

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anomaly, not the norm. And the fact that it is becoming such a norm is indicative that something

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is greatly out of whack. Absolutely. I know one of the statistics that blew me away was,

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and I didn't realize this until somewhat recently, that the GI tract is actually 80% of our immune

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system. So obviously, whatever you put in your mouth that travels through that tube and comes

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out your other end is going to affect you positively or negatively. And as you mentioned with

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the bacteria in there, it's going to kill them and destroy everything, or it's going to get them to

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bloom and thrive in the right way, not in an imbalanced way like C. diff or something like that.

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Yes. Well, we are studying now a lot of the whole microbiome thing. And each of us has three trillion,

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and each of us has three trillion beings, critters, in our digestive tract. Three trillion.

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That's a pretty big community. And when you think about it, there's a lot of intricacy there too.

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And they have to build highways and have fire stations and rescue squads and hospitals and

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schools and go to the Lions Club and whatever. They're doing all sorts of stuff down there.

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And that's a very complex community to maintain. And if we put toxins into it, if we put foreign

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material into that community, it's going to upset that community just like polluted water in a

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community or corrupt politicians or whatever. You throw corruption in a community, and you're

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going to be in disarray. And that's the same thing in this bacterial microbial community of

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three trillion members in our gut. We don't see it, but it's nonetheless there and completely

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dependent on what we're giving it every day. Right. And is that, am I correct in understanding

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that down the line of GMOs, by messing with the genetic structure of these basically foreign

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objects, that the body is now not able to recognize them? These ancient, ancient bacteria are not

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able to recognize these particles that are coming in and that's what's causing the problems? Or am

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I off there? No, you're in the ballpark. And I'm not a scientist in that regard, so I can't give you

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all the Latin ins and outs of this thing, but yes, you're exactly right. The GMO studies that have

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been done where they actually feed them the way you and I would eat and not in some special contrived

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prejudicial study that Monsanto sets up, the truth, I mean, I'll give you an example. When

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Monsanto was looking at GMO potatoes, for example, they specifically chose geriatric rats. This is

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all in Jeffrey Smith's book, Seeds of Deception. It's a great book. Anybody that wants to, you know,

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get a kind of layman's look at GMOs. And so they got geriatric rats and fed them. Well, they didn't

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see any difference in the GMOs versus the non-GMOs. But when the same experiment was repeated in

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Scotland, but instead of being completely repeated, they repeated everything except,

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except they used juvenile rats instead of geriatric rats. Well, then suddenly they had all

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sorts of problems. They had organ, you know, organ malfunction. They had sociopathy, had mental,

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you know, mental breakdown, just, you know, all sorts of problems. Just by changing the experiment

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from geriatric rats who already, you know, had their routines and their personalities and their

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organs and whatever, you know, there's no, you know, geriatrics, they don't change much. They've

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already lived their life and it's done. You don't see the big differences. But in the young ones,

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where the metabolism is faster and they're still developing, they saw, you know, huge, huge

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differences. And so, you know, these kinds of studies have been now done all over the world.

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And the only people who can't see them, of course, are the people who are, you know,

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who are in agreement with the basic idea that life is fundamentally mechanical. And, you know,

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that's where it comes down. You know, the industrial mindset suggests that life is

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fundamentally mechanical and we can tweak and move and adjust this DNA and that DNA and throw

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chemicals on the soil and whatever. Whereas many of us believe that life is fundamentally

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not mechanical but biological. And there's a huge difference between biology and mechanics.

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One of the big differences is that living things are spontaneous. They kind of think. They don't

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just follow a routine. They often, you know, kind of have a mind of their own. But the main thing is

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that biological things can heal. Mechanical things can't. If a bearing goes out in your

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front wheel of your truck, you know, it's not going to get better by rest or by,

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you know, praying over or whatever. It's only going to get better if you take it out and replace it.

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But, you know, biological things can heal. They can be in rough shape and you can change the diet.

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You can change the support. You can have a relationship that's gone south and you can

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ask for forgiveness and apologize and the relationship can be healed. I mean, this

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fundamental idea that biological systems can heal is the great hope, is the great hope that we have.

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And it's a wonderful thing compared to mechanics. But the entire industrial food system that, you

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know, that you can live on, on Twinkies and Cocoa Puffs and Mountain Dew is predicated on a, on the

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idea that your body and my body and life is fundamentally mechanical and it doesn't really

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matter. It doesn't really matter what biology goes in. Yeah, it's very scary. I think one of

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the other fundamental things that we're seeing in the last few generations now is it seems like

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if you remove the desire to have all the money, all the power and just disseminate it back to the

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whole country, we would eliminate a lot of those problems as well. And you see that with the mega

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farms now, you know, one or two farm companies that want to provide all the food to the entire

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country or the world for that matter. I mean, of course, it's going to just fundamentally fall

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apart instead of having all these small farms being supported by their local communities and

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the food traveling, you know, as I know your policy is less than four hours. And then that way it's

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not being packaged, it's not being frozen or irradiated or any of those things. You go to

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your local farmer, you pick up your food and then you bring it home. Yeah, well, there are a lot of

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aspects to the global food matrix. As you mentioned, the first one being opaqueness. I mean,

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you just can't follow that chain of custody. And so you don't know what is going on in that shrimp

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farm in Thailand that's showing up at your Applebee's restaurant. And so when you start eating

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more local, you actually have a shorter chain of custody from farm to farm to plate. And the

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shorter chain of custody allows you to have more accountability because there's more transparency

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in that shorter chain of custody. And I think I think another thing that's really powerful

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is that when you have a local centric food system, you actually increase a capacity for resilience

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and security in the food system. When you're dependent on a Costco warehouse a thousand miles

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away, that ultimately is a fairly fragile system. I mean, you have to assume that trucks can run on

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time, that computers work, that the merchant marine gets their stuff hauled to the dock on time.

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A lot of things have to work smoothly in that situation. But when you have a local centric

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system where you know your farmer or you're very, very close, you can actually see what's on

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inventory. You know where it is. You can walk there if you had to. The point is that there's a

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tremendous amount of resiliency and forgiveness built into the system when you have a local

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centric system, when you have a proximity between producer and consumer as opposed to long distance.

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Yeah, absolutely. And I think that another huge lie really or misunderstanding, I guess,

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would be a more gentle way of saying it, is that the pesticide covered foreign fruit and vegetables,

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for example, that we find in our shelves in the local supermarket are cheaper than organic. And

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obviously they are if you buy the organic in the same shop or in Whole Foods. But if you just go

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to your local farmers market, it's cheaper. I mean, I have bags and bags full of produce that I buy

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once a week from my local farm. And I mean, literally, probably four or five of those cloth

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grocery bags is for about $50. There's no way in hell you'd be able to buy that much food.

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But again, that simple, simple message doesn't get out there. And if you remove the middleman

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and the price of the gas and the taxes and all the other skimming that goes on between them and you,

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then all of a sudden it's cheaper and they still make their money and you still get your food.

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Yes. Well, that's exactly right. And you're mentioning this makes me

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think about just the cost of processing and packaging and all that. The way to get

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affordable food is to get Whole Foods, just raw foods, and then use your own kitchen to prepare,

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package, preserve the food. I was in New York City a couple of years ago and we went down to

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the green market there on Union Square, arguably the most expensive farmers market in the most

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expensive city of the world. And I asked my hostess, could you show me the most expensive

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potato in this market? She said, oh, I know just the guy. So we shoulder our way through the crowd,

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come up to this farmer with his stand and he's got like a credenza, a bunch of little cubbies

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with all these potatoes. And he has about 20 different varieties, orange ones, red ones,

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blue ones, long ones, skinny ones, round ones, whatever. And so I looked and I found the most

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expensive one. It was a blue Peruvian heirloom fingerling potato for a dollar 99 a pound,

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which is a little bit pricey for potatoes. But all around that green market are supermarkets

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with 120 feet of fluorescent lighted tile floor with shelves full of potato chips for 2.99 a pound,

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way, way more expensive than those little potatoes. So when I say, get in your kitchen,

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I don't mean go back to washboards, hoop skirts, and hearth cooking as romantic as that may sound

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to somebody that's never done it. We've never techno gadgetized our kitchen as comfortably as

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we have today with hot and cold running water, refrigerators, freezers, flickable button stoves,

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slow cookers, Tom's bake, Cuisinart, fry babies, bread makers, ice cream makers, Tupperware.

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Grandma would have given her IT for all this stuff. And so we've never been able to more

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efficiently or sanitarily or simply actually prepare food. And yet the average American is

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far more interested and knowledgeable about the latest dysfunction in the Kardashian household

383
00:45:02,400 --> 00:45:06,000
than they are what's going to become flesh of their flesh and bone of their bones at six o'clock.

384
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:16,880
And when that's the case, those shortcuts that we take for our own food and nutrition,

385
00:45:16,880 --> 00:45:22,160
our own body's well-being, those shortcuts are going to come back to haunt us. And of course,

386
00:45:22,720 --> 00:45:24,800
that's exactly what we see.

387
00:45:24,800 --> 00:45:33,520
Yeah. And again, you touched with the packaging. I mean, if you look at a grocery cart full of food,

388
00:45:33,520 --> 00:45:38,160
by the time you empty all of those food items out of whatever surrounding them, you end up with

389
00:45:38,880 --> 00:45:43,120
two garbage bags full of crap that you've got to get rid of now somewhere. Whereas if you are

390
00:45:43,120 --> 00:45:48,640
taking home cloth bags full of vegetables, you have zero packaging.

391
00:45:48,640 --> 00:45:58,880
Yeah. Yeah. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Yeah. Well, I mean, just for canning,

392
00:45:58,880 --> 00:46:04,720
I mean, if you bought a bushel basket full of green beans and just canned them, we get an

393
00:46:04,720 --> 00:46:09,040
argument about canning or not, but let's just assume that. I mean, put them in glass jars.

394
00:46:11,360 --> 00:46:16,800
There's virtually no waste except you're probably going to throw away the little lid.

395
00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:23,920
But the comparison in the amount of packaging material for landfills and for petroleum use and

396
00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:31,120
just the sheer volume of that is amazing.

397
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:38,400
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it would make such a huge difference on the, I think everyone's community,

398
00:46:38,400 --> 00:46:45,120
I mean, because some people might not have that giant bird-filled mountain in their

399
00:46:45,120 --> 00:46:49,760
local area yet, but if you go to any larger urban area, I mean, they have those things

400
00:46:49,760 --> 00:46:54,080
at the side of the freeways and it's just getting bigger and bigger and bigger. So something has to

401
00:46:54,080 --> 00:47:00,320
stop there too. Yeah. Uh-huh. That's right. So I'm going to transition now a little bit to

402
00:47:00,320 --> 00:47:04,160
Polyface. Well, first I had a question about Polyface. Where did you come up with the name?

403
00:47:04,160 --> 00:47:13,440
Well, poly of course is the Greek, the Latin prefix for many and so we knew that we wanted to do a lot

404
00:47:13,440 --> 00:47:20,640
of different things. So we decided that we would be Polyface, the farm of many faces.

405
00:47:21,440 --> 00:47:26,640
Right. And I know you have several different species of livestock on there.

406
00:47:26,640 --> 00:47:33,040
The transient pastures that you use in pretty much all your animals, can you describe that?

407
00:47:33,040 --> 00:47:38,800
Because I think that's fascinating to me. I watched your TEDx talk and I'm sure you'll talk

408
00:47:38,800 --> 00:47:43,280
about it now, but the difference in the maturity of the grasses and how that ultimately affects

409
00:47:43,280 --> 00:47:51,520
the animals themselves. Okay. So grass grows in an S-curve, a similar way to the grass.

410
00:47:51,520 --> 00:47:57,680
It starts slow, then grows real fast, and then goes into senescence and slows down. And so

411
00:47:58,720 --> 00:48:04,640
the idea, the reason that there are so many herbivores around the planet is to prune that

412
00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:11,840
grass as it moves towards senescence, to prune it back to pre-adolescent stage so it can go through

413
00:48:11,840 --> 00:48:19,840
another vibrant, vigorous, you know, plant-based, you know, plant-based, you know,

414
00:48:19,840 --> 00:48:24,800
green-growth stage, which of course also means that it's going to inhale

415
00:48:26,800 --> 00:48:30,720
carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, break off the carbon, leave it in the soil,

416
00:48:30,720 --> 00:48:38,960
and exhale the oxygen so you and I can breathe. So we don't, so when we look at, you know,

417
00:48:38,960 --> 00:48:45,120
at nature, at the template of nature, what we see are animals moving. In fact, we see large

418
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:51,680
herds of animals moving. But we don't have those large herds anymore. We don't have the wolves.

419
00:48:51,680 --> 00:49:00,720
We don't have fire. So, you know, and an 8 million head herd of bison running down through your,

420
00:49:00,720 --> 00:49:06,160
you know, your Starbucks and the elementary school might not be a really good thing.

421
00:49:06,160 --> 00:49:14,080
What we do have now is electric fencing, which acts as a steering mechanism, a steering wheel,

422
00:49:14,080 --> 00:49:21,120
a brake, and an accelerator on that four-legged pruner. So we can now steer the animals,

423
00:49:21,120 --> 00:49:31,440
steer the animals around the pasture so that we perfectly manage the meeting, the timing of that

424
00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:40,560
meeting between plant and animal so that they work in symbiosis rather than competitively.

425
00:49:41,600 --> 00:49:47,920
So the cows move every day at four o'clock to a new paddock that's been allowed to rest for,

426
00:49:47,920 --> 00:49:52,880
you know, two or three months so the grass is long. And we mob them in there real, you know,

427
00:49:52,880 --> 00:50:00,080
at high density so they look like a mob of wild herbivores. And then the animals are

428
00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:04,480
going to rest for a few months. And then tomorrow at four o'clock they'll move on to the next

429
00:50:04,480 --> 00:50:10,000
paddock. And so any one area will only have a cow on it, you know, maybe three or four times in a

430
00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:17,040
year. Then after the herd moves along, following about four days behind are the egg mobiles.

431
00:50:17,040 --> 00:50:22,320
These are portable hen houses, chicken houses with layers who free range out from those hen

432
00:50:22,320 --> 00:50:27,920
houses, scratch through the cow patties, eat out the fly larva, sanitize the paddock, turn the

433
00:50:27,920 --> 00:50:33,920
grasshoppers and crickets into eggs, and work symbiotically with the herbivores just like,

434
00:50:33,920 --> 00:50:40,480
you know, the birds in nature. So, you know, these are systems that we use. You know, pigs are

435
00:50:41,520 --> 00:50:51,200
out in pig pastures with kind of silvo pastures, widely spaced trees and grasses. And again,

436
00:50:51,200 --> 00:50:58,880
they get moved not every day, but every five to 12 days, they get moved to a new paddock. And

437
00:50:59,440 --> 00:51:05,440
those we touch three times a year, acorn glens in the forest for the pigs, those get touched

438
00:51:06,000 --> 00:51:10,960
once or twice a year, they're more extensive and not quite as intensive.

439
00:51:13,200 --> 00:51:17,680
So yeah, everything is out and moving along.

440
00:51:17,680 --> 00:51:24,480
So it's moving free range as it's designed to versus the factory meats that are stressed

441
00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:29,360
and side by side and having to be medicated just to basically a chemical life support to less

442
00:51:29,360 --> 00:51:30,000
slaughtered?

443
00:51:31,040 --> 00:51:36,240
Yes, well, yeah, we don't have to use the antibiotics and the grubicides, the parasiticides

444
00:51:36,240 --> 00:51:42,320
and all those things that the industry uses. Because we're actually using the different

445
00:51:42,320 --> 00:51:50,080
the different animals in in symbiosis in relational symbiosis to each other. And,

446
00:51:51,520 --> 00:51:58,560
you know, there's nothing as exciting as a confused pathogen. And in our industrial system,

447
00:51:58,560 --> 00:52:06,000
everything is about monospeciation, you know, whether it's cherry trees or wheat fields or,

448
00:52:06,000 --> 00:52:12,720
you know, Tyson chicken farm, the whole idea is to just grow one thing and grow it very densely

449
00:52:12,720 --> 00:52:18,080
and grow it over and over and over again. Well, all three of those things, one thing densely and

450
00:52:18,080 --> 00:52:26,000
over and over, nature doesn't do any of that stuff. Nature is always about multiple things.

451
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:33,440
And, and seasonal, you know, seasonal differences, different kinds of vegetation,

452
00:52:33,440 --> 00:52:40,880
different times of the season. And, and actually, disturbance events, you know, whether it's fire

453
00:52:40,880 --> 00:52:50,800
or a big herd moving through big flock of birds, you know, destroying an area for a day. But nature

454
00:52:50,800 --> 00:52:59,040
is all about, you know, change up, change up. And of course, industry is all about same keep it the

455
00:52:59,040 --> 00:53:03,440
same, keep it the same, keep it the same, keep it the same. Nature is all about spontaneity and

456
00:53:03,440 --> 00:53:11,840
dynamics. And so on our farm, we, you know, we build ponds, we have a lot of tree peninsulas,

457
00:53:12,880 --> 00:53:20,560
you know, forestal zones to stimulate wildlife. And of course, the pastor, so you have a lot of

458
00:53:20,560 --> 00:53:26,560
this edge effect, you know, open land, forest land, riparian, the ponds we can use for irrigation in a

459
00:53:26,560 --> 00:53:35,840
drought. Water is gravity fed through a matrix of six miles of, of, of water line water pipes, we have,

460
00:53:35,840 --> 00:53:43,360
you know, fresh gravity, pressure, high pressure, gravity fed water on the whole place. So, you know,

461
00:53:43,360 --> 00:53:51,520
it's not like we sit around here and do nothing. We just try to strategically interact with the

462
00:53:51,520 --> 00:53:58,400
landscape in a way that builds resilience and redemptive capacity into the landscape.

463
00:53:59,840 --> 00:54:06,160
Absolutely. I mean, like I said, I've seen the incredible farm that you have now and to say that

464
00:54:06,160 --> 00:54:13,120
you went originally from a very barren landscape, that model surely would be of great interest to

465
00:54:13,120 --> 00:54:17,840
areas that do have more drought, whether it's domestic or international for, you know, potentially

466
00:54:17,840 --> 00:54:24,000
growing crops and feeding people there too. Yes, that's right. That's right. Yeah, that would be

467
00:54:24,000 --> 00:54:28,560
incredible. So the other question I'm sure that everyone's listening to now is I'm pretty sure

468
00:54:28,560 --> 00:54:35,120
they're sold as I was when I first heard you talk a long time ago. You know, side by side, there's

469
00:54:35,120 --> 00:54:40,160
absolutely no question. You know, one, one animal is inhumanely raised and obviously the meat is

470
00:54:40,160 --> 00:54:44,560
going to be very, very unhealthy. And we're seeing that with the ill health of our nation.

471
00:54:44,560 --> 00:54:49,520
And then you've got the humanely raised that you're part of that group. So what are good

472
00:54:49,520 --> 00:54:53,440
resources for people to find a farm like yours in their local area?

473
00:54:55,920 --> 00:55:02,160
Well, fortunately, there are farms that are doing a good job, virtually in every community.

474
00:55:03,680 --> 00:55:09,840
You know, there's the Weston A. Price Foundation, they do the Smart Shoppers Guide, there are every

475
00:55:09,840 --> 00:55:17,280
state has, you know, some sort of sustainable ag, ecological agriculture, you know, network support

476
00:55:17,280 --> 00:55:27,120
group in it. Find out, you know, who that is and check with that outfit. You know, check with your

477
00:55:27,120 --> 00:55:33,600
CrossFit gym or wellness centers, naturopath, acupuncturists, often, you know, anybody in that

478
00:55:33,600 --> 00:55:41,440
alternative wellness community will be plugged into, you know, the wellness food. The point is

479
00:55:42,160 --> 00:55:51,360
that this is a non front page undercurrent, you know, we are a, we are an alternative of a gorilla,

480
00:55:51,360 --> 00:55:58,240
a gorilla tribe, if you will. And so we're everywhere. But you have to find us, you have

481
00:55:58,240 --> 00:56:08,080
to seek us out. And, and as soon as you start seeking farmers like ours out, you know, you will

482
00:56:08,080 --> 00:56:15,200
you will find us. I mean, there's for pastured livestock, there's eatwild.com, which is the

483
00:56:15,200 --> 00:56:22,960
number one national website for for pasture based livestock. It's not a certification thing. It's

484
00:56:22,960 --> 00:56:30,080
just a, you know, it's just a place where farmers who do this can can register. So you know, there's

485
00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:34,960
no substitute for knowing your farmer know your food, go visit the farm. If the farmer won't let

486
00:56:34,960 --> 00:56:42,640
you visit, then, you know, don't go there. We have a 24 7365 open door policy here. Anyone can come

487
00:56:42,640 --> 00:56:49,280
from anywhere anytime to see anything unannounced. That's our commitment to the transparency. And so

488
00:56:49,280 --> 00:56:55,600
you just have to appreciate, you just have to understand that this is a tribe. So if you're,

489
00:56:55,600 --> 00:57:01,440
if you're seeking that alternative wellness, you know, seek out the alternative wellness community

490
00:57:01,440 --> 00:57:07,840
in your community, and you'll find a vibrant support network for these folks. The Nutritional

491
00:57:07,840 --> 00:57:14,240
Therapy Association, nutritional therapists, they're a national network, there are several

492
00:57:14,240 --> 00:57:22,160
several groups that do nutritional therapy, they're plugged in to this wellness community.

493
00:57:23,840 --> 00:57:29,040
So yeah, it's there. You just have to, you just have to find it.

494
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:34,240
Fantastic. You mentioned the word certification, and just kind of jarred something else that I've

495
00:57:34,240 --> 00:57:40,480
been meaning to ask you. So you are known for preparing your your chickens and I was the one

496
00:57:40,480 --> 00:57:47,120
I've seen outside in the fresh air in the pasture. I know that's frowned upon by the governing

497
00:57:47,120 --> 00:57:54,160
agencies that be so how's that battle coming on? Are they starting the people starting to push now

498
00:57:54,160 --> 00:58:03,440
for deregulation of some of that stuff? Oh, not really. It's, it's, it's generally speaking,

499
00:58:03,440 --> 00:58:09,280
it's getting worse and worse. What what we are seeing, I think, is a little more ability for

500
00:58:09,280 --> 00:58:16,880
small producers to, you know, to comply with licensing, there does seem to be some,

501
00:58:18,560 --> 00:58:28,720
you know, some give in the regulatory world to allow smaller outfits to comply cheaper, easier.

502
00:58:29,280 --> 00:58:34,320
And, you know, and this is as it should be there. Their scale scale does make a difference. It does

503
00:58:34,320 --> 00:58:41,120
make a difference whether you're, you know, making 10 pounds of cheese or 10,000 pounds of cheese.

504
00:58:41,600 --> 00:58:47,600
And, and so this this whole compliance thing is a big deal.

505
00:58:50,800 --> 00:58:56,720
There are definitely efforts underway to circumvent the compliance, which we think is great.

506
00:58:56,720 --> 00:59:03,280
You know, we are big believers in the right of private contract is guaranteed by the Bill of

507
00:59:03,280 --> 00:59:10,000
Rights. But we haven't been following the Bill of Rights for a very, very long time. And the right

508
00:59:10,000 --> 00:59:14,640
of private contract says essentially, if you and I want to do business together, it's none of the

509
00:59:14,640 --> 00:59:19,280
government's business if we want to do a private contract between each other, I want to buy from

510
00:59:19,280 --> 00:59:25,520
you or you want to sell to me or whatever. But we have this, this big brother, you know,

511
00:59:25,520 --> 00:59:32,720
this big brother bureaucracy that points its nose and gets in the way of innovative embryonic

512
00:59:32,720 --> 00:59:39,280
solutions to our food system. And that then arbitrarily makes the price of alternative food

513
00:59:39,280 --> 00:59:44,480
more expensive than it should be. And these are all, you know, these are all big issues that are

514
00:59:44,480 --> 00:59:52,800
all part of the equation and part of our context. And the way to make progress fastest on this front

515
00:59:52,800 --> 01:00:01,200
is for more and more and more people to take it upon themselves to find integrity food,

516
01:00:02,240 --> 01:00:10,640
patronize it, and realize that we are changing our landscape one bite at a time. Whatever we have

517
01:00:10,640 --> 01:00:16,720
on the landscape, the health of our nation, the health of our farms, health of our soil,

518
01:00:16,720 --> 01:00:25,040
all of that today is a physical manifestation of the compounded decisions that everybody's been

519
01:00:25,040 --> 01:00:32,960
making for the last X number of years. Where we will be in the future, in 20 years, 30 years, 40

520
01:00:32,960 --> 01:00:40,160
years, will also be a physical manifestation of the decisions we make between now and then. So at

521
01:00:40,160 --> 01:00:50,000
the end of the day, my question is, as a result of my decisions this week, have I helped, have I,

522
01:00:50,000 --> 01:00:55,440
you know, the old parable of the dog, which dog will survive, which dog will thrive, will the one

523
01:00:55,440 --> 01:01:01,200
you feed? So I'm asking, which dog are you feeding? Are you feeding the Monsanto dog, the dog of

524
01:01:01,200 --> 01:01:11,520
obesity, health, and of ill health, erosion, abuse, and violence toward the ecology, toward the

525
01:01:11,520 --> 01:01:18,720
biological world, or are you feeding the dog toward wellness, resilience, forgiveness, and healing?

526
01:01:18,720 --> 01:01:23,840
And 20 years down the road, we'll know which dog we fed.

527
01:01:23,840 --> 01:01:29,840
Yes, yes we will. It's interesting, I just found a quote the other day, Winston Churchill,

528
01:01:29,840 --> 01:01:36,240
actually said, healthy citizens are the greatest asset any country can have. Now following this

529
01:01:36,240 --> 01:01:42,560
most recent election process that we've had, I think it's clearer now than ever, and I'm not

530
01:01:42,560 --> 01:01:46,560
saying versus left or right, I'm just saying the entire process from beginning to end,

531
01:01:47,680 --> 01:01:51,200
that we do need to vote with our dollar, we do need to vote with our individual voice,

532
01:01:51,200 --> 01:01:56,080
because if we put all our faith into whoever they place at the top of the pyramid, which should

533
01:01:56,080 --> 01:02:03,040
really be upside down anyway, then we're at their mercy, but if we actually start making decisions

534
01:02:03,040 --> 01:02:06,640
and voting, like you said, with our feet, then we are going to change this world.

535
01:02:07,520 --> 01:02:08,720
Yeah, yeah.

536
01:02:08,720 --> 01:02:15,600
Okay, now the other thing I wanted to just touch on is, obviously a lot of people listening to this

537
01:02:15,600 --> 01:02:21,840
are going to be in some sort of urban or suburban area. Now I looked into my homeowners association

538
01:02:21,840 --> 01:02:26,880
rules and I'm not allowed to have chickens or anything. I'm hoping that that's going to change,

539
01:02:26,880 --> 01:02:34,160
but do you have any tips on someone that just wants to take a corner of their garden and start

540
01:02:34,160 --> 01:02:40,400
a very, very small scale vegetable patch and or chicken coop type deal?

541
01:02:41,840 --> 01:02:49,760
Well, yeah, again, I think the more people do this, you know, the old victory gardens of World War II,

542
01:02:49,760 --> 01:02:54,960
the more people that do this, the more awareness there is, the more interest there is.

543
01:02:54,960 --> 01:03:00,640
It just, you know, it just moves the conversation forward and I would say the freedom forward

544
01:03:00,640 --> 01:03:08,880
as more and more people come on board. So, yes, I'm a huge believer in doing something for yourself.

545
01:03:09,760 --> 01:03:16,160
And if for no other reason than to just dabble your toe into the awesomeness and the mystery

546
01:03:16,160 --> 01:03:26,320
and the magic of life. And I think for children, gardens are amazingly therapeutic, self-affirming.

547
01:03:26,320 --> 01:03:34,640
I mean, the self-affirmation that comes from being able to plant a tomato seed and then,

548
01:03:34,640 --> 01:03:40,000
you know, eat, pull a tomato off and watch the juice run down your elbows as you eat that tomato,

549
01:03:40,000 --> 01:03:46,400
that is such a more powerful and profound human affirmation than being the top point skitter

550
01:03:46,400 --> 01:03:49,920
on Angry Birds. I think so too.

551
01:03:50,880 --> 01:03:58,560
Yeah. So, I think they have a lot to offer and wonderfully, we now have a lot of infrastructure

552
01:03:59,360 --> 01:04:05,200
that enables us to do this more efficiently and easier. You know, we have these

553
01:04:05,200 --> 01:04:10,960
PVC pipes with, you know, side pockets in them where you pack them full of compost, you pack your

554
01:04:11,440 --> 01:04:16,160
plant in there and you drip on top and the plants grow out the sides of them, barrels

555
01:04:15,680 --> 01:04:31,680
windows, the windows, the windows, the windows, the windows, the windows, the windows, the

556
01:04:17,120 --> 01:04:24,400
like this. We have, you know, the patio gardens, the stackable pots where you can, you know,

557
01:04:31,680 --> 01:04:39,920
beehives on your, on your roof, the house roof. Solariums, all these wonderful solarium kits,

558
01:04:39,920 --> 01:04:46,240
stick them on the south side of your house and you can grow, you know, we're, you know, we eat,

559
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:52,560
we eat mess with mix and lettuce, you know, year round from our solarium on the side of our house.

560
01:04:52,560 --> 01:04:57,280
Our house was built in 1790. So, if we can do it on our house, you can certainly do it on yours.

561
01:04:57,280 --> 01:05:06,800
And I think that those kinds of participa, visceral participatory actions

562
01:05:10,000 --> 01:05:20,640
move our collective psyche and move our collective understanding of this anchoring to our ecological

563
01:05:20,640 --> 01:05:26,880
umbilical. I think it moves it to a place of humility rather than hubris. And I think a place

564
01:05:26,880 --> 01:05:33,040
of humility is a place for all of us to start. Absolutely. Yeah. I think the appreciation when

565
01:05:33,040 --> 01:05:40,320
you open the door, the appreciation of where you are is huge. I live in central Florida and people

566
01:05:40,320 --> 01:05:45,760
get bogged down in their everyday lives. And I'd say to my little boy, just zoom out for a second.

567
01:05:45,760 --> 01:05:51,280
We live in the state where most people will save up to come visit for a week. And this is your home.

568
01:05:51,280 --> 01:05:56,160
This is where you live. Yeah. So, you know, to appreciate what's around you. And I'm right next

569
01:05:56,160 --> 01:06:02,240
to what's called an Ocala National Forest and the Florida Greenway. So, we have amazing nature

570
01:06:02,240 --> 01:06:07,920
running around. In fact, if my homeowners does stay inflexible, I probably will transition because

571
01:06:07,920 --> 01:06:12,960
this is a horse farm community originally. So, there is a lot of land and there are, you know,

572
01:06:12,960 --> 01:06:18,960
some mini farms that you can get for somewhat decent amount. But I think you're... Yeah. Well,

573
01:06:18,960 --> 01:06:26,160
those HOA things are just... Oh, man, don't even get me started on those things. They're just

574
01:06:26,160 --> 01:06:34,880
frustrating. And I'll tell you, what they do, what they show is not only a profound, whatever,

575
01:06:34,880 --> 01:06:42,480
arrogance toward, you know, toward our dependency on nature, but I think they indicate a condescending

576
01:06:42,480 --> 01:06:49,920
attitude toward farming, actually. And, you know, why is it that growing a rose bush is

577
01:06:49,920 --> 01:06:55,360
perfectly acceptable, but a tomato plant is unacceptable? The only difference is, you know,

578
01:06:55,360 --> 01:07:03,120
one's edible and one's just ornamental. But one smacks of garden shows, the other smacks of

579
01:07:03,120 --> 01:07:13,600
farmers. And I think that as a culture, we have denigrated farming to the point where most farmers

580
01:07:13,600 --> 01:07:18,240
are kind of apologetic about being farmers. Well, you know, I guess I didn't have enough brains to

581
01:07:18,240 --> 01:07:23,520
be an engineer or a doctor, so, you know, I just became a farmer. And we've got this kind of universal

582
01:07:23,520 --> 01:07:31,440
mindset that dumb people farm and smart people don't. And I think that that's a very, very dangerous

583
01:07:31,440 --> 01:07:44,400
place to be when the most precious assets of any culture are air, soil, and water, and farmers are

584
01:07:44,400 --> 01:07:52,480
our first responders to air, soil, and water, and we've condescended to them as if they don't really

585
01:07:52,480 --> 01:07:57,440
matter. And that is a very dangerous place for civilization to be.

586
01:07:57,440 --> 01:08:03,040
Yeah, well, especially as you said, I mean, they're not doctors, but they are. We've come full circle

587
01:08:03,040 --> 01:08:07,920
and yeah, they provide the very medicine that we need. And I think that there's a phrase I love is

588
01:08:07,920 --> 01:08:14,720
in America and England and other Western countries, we're malnourished and overfed, which sounds like

589
01:08:14,720 --> 01:08:19,360
a ridiculous statement, but it's true that the calories that we consume are ungodly, yet the

590
01:08:19,360 --> 01:08:25,200
nutrition on the plate is almost non-existent. That's right. That's right. It's empty. It's empty

591
01:08:25,200 --> 01:08:30,240
calories with no nutrition to go with them. That's correct. Yeah. Well, I would love I mean, I

592
01:08:30,240 --> 01:08:36,240
honestly think there is a movement that's happening in the United States, and I think that's

593
01:08:36,240 --> 01:08:41,760
a movement. There's a couple of phrases I keep hearing now. There's definitely a paradigm shift

594
01:08:41,760 --> 01:08:45,600
going on. I think people are finally getting sick and tired of being sick and tired,

595
01:08:45,600 --> 01:08:51,360
being worked into the ground, not sleeping properly, overmedicated. And then the word that

596
01:08:51,360 --> 01:08:56,720
comes up a lot is when you use it yourself is that tribe. And I'm going to have Sebastian Junger on

597
01:08:56,720 --> 01:09:03,040
the podcast next month. And his book, Tribe is phenomenal. And as a fireman, I've touched on this

598
01:09:03,040 --> 01:09:08,880
and a couple of other interviews. That's what's missing in society. And I think he absolutely hit

599
01:09:08,880 --> 01:09:14,160
the nail on the head. And I think when you're connected to your community again, and obviously

600
01:09:14,160 --> 01:09:21,200
through your farms, you're recreating that tribe that people pride in. That's the fundamental soul

601
01:09:21,200 --> 01:09:28,960
of the human species. Yes. Yes. That will be an exciting program. That'll be great. Good for you.

602
01:09:28,960 --> 01:09:32,320
Yeah, I can't wait for that. Well, this is an exciting program, too, though. I mean, I was

603
01:09:32,320 --> 01:09:36,800
scrambling because it came together so quickly. But everyone listening to you, we don't... I mean,

604
01:09:36,800 --> 01:09:42,080
you said it yourself, this umpteen scientists that you could interview. But how many farmers do you

605
01:09:42,080 --> 01:09:48,000
get to, you know, actual conscious farmers that truly grow the way it's supposed to be grown and

606
01:09:48,000 --> 01:09:53,520
raise livestock the way it's supposed to be raised and educate our generation? I mean, you know,

607
01:09:53,520 --> 01:09:59,440
pretty much yours and mine and everyone younger than us of what it's supposed to be like, because

608
01:09:59,440 --> 01:10:06,160
we were all told something different. And I even growing up on my farm, it was a hybrid of the old

609
01:10:06,160 --> 01:10:12,560
style and the industrial style. And my father was a vet. So he was, you know, healing animals the

610
01:10:12,560 --> 01:10:18,240
whole time. But even he believed a lot of the things that we were told. So I think this shift

611
01:10:18,240 --> 01:10:23,360
really is going to happen. But I think people need to take a look in the mirror and be brave,

612
01:10:23,360 --> 01:10:28,160
make a courageous decision and say, I'm going to, you know, it's OK to change your mind. It's OK

613
01:10:28,160 --> 01:10:33,760
to say, you know what, you got me. Congratulations, you juke me. And, you know, I have these ailments

614
01:10:33,760 --> 01:10:38,480
now. But today is the day I turn around and say enough is enough. I'm investing in my health.

615
01:10:38,480 --> 01:10:44,080
And that example you use, I've heard you in other interviews, people say they can't afford to eat

616
01:10:44,080 --> 01:10:48,640
healthy. And then you point out all the material items that we have in our homes that we quote,

617
01:10:48,640 --> 01:10:55,440
unquote, can't live without. It's time to rethink about that. Right, right. That's right. There's

618
01:10:55,440 --> 01:11:02,720
plenty of money in the system. What's not there is the conviction to live by value. And that's

619
01:11:05,680 --> 01:11:11,040
the next hurdle. Live by value and just do it. So, yeah, that's good.

620
01:11:11,040 --> 01:11:11,600
14

621
01:11:11,600 --> 01:11:12,320
14

622
01:11:12,320 --> 01:11:16,160
Absolutely. OK, well, I'm going to wrap up with a couple of short questions and then I will let

623
01:11:16,160 --> 01:11:20,480
you go because I know you had an interview before this and I'm sure you probably got a bunch of

624
01:11:20,480 --> 01:11:25,200
people racked up. So obviously you've written several books yourself. Folks, this ain't normal

625
01:11:25,200 --> 01:11:33,280
is the one that I've got coming to me. As far as you as a reader, is there a book and or a movie

626
01:11:33,280 --> 01:11:37,520
that you recommend? 15

627
01:11:37,520 --> 01:11:45,680
16 Well, the movie, I mean, Food Inc. is as powerful as they get. It's a little bit of a

628
01:11:45,680 --> 01:11:50,400
downer. As long as you come out of there realizing there are farmers like me to go patronize, it's

629
01:11:50,400 --> 01:11:56,800
good. But it's a little bit of a downer. We like Fresh better. There's a documentary out

630
01:11:56,800 --> 01:12:02,880
named Fresh. We're in that one too, but it's a much more upbeat, can-do type of movie.

631
01:12:02,880 --> 01:12:03,520
16

632
01:12:03,520 --> 01:12:11,040
17 Books. Well, you know, I tend to gravitate toward farming books.

633
01:12:11,040 --> 01:12:16,720
18 But, you know, it doesn't get any better than

634
01:12:16,720 --> 01:12:26,160
Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America. You know, Wendell Berry is iconic in the sustainable ag

635
01:12:26,160 --> 01:12:32,480
movement and certainly articulates a lot of the issues very well. He's wonderful to read and

636
01:12:33,360 --> 01:12:40,240
profound. So if somebody wants to just, I mean, besides my book, to look at these issues,

637
01:12:41,280 --> 01:12:45,520
Wendell Berry's The Unsettling of America is probably as good as they get.

638
01:12:45,520 --> 01:12:49,360
19 Okay. Yeah, I have seen Fresh as well. That was a very well-made film too.

639
01:12:50,400 --> 01:12:56,160
And then one more question. When you need to laugh, when you've had a bad day or you just had enough

640
01:12:56,160 --> 01:12:59,760
and you need to laugh, what do you do? Where do you go? Who do you hang out with?

641
01:12:59,760 --> 01:13:07,280
20 Oh, well, I enjoy being at home. I mean, I travel a lot. So

642
01:13:07,280 --> 01:13:16,880
when I want to get away, I get home. So I enjoy being at home. What I do for enjoyment is, you

643
01:13:16,880 --> 01:13:25,840
know, I read and, you know, my wife and I are right now are going through Downton Abbey. That's just

644
01:13:25,840 --> 01:13:33,440
a wonderful series. We don't have a TV. So, you know, we get a DVD of a series if we like it.

645
01:13:33,440 --> 01:13:40,000
But we have a lot of laughter on the farm. We've got a lot of people here. Whenever there's a lot

646
01:13:40,000 --> 01:13:47,360
of people and they enjoy each other, there's a lot of laughter just in the shenanigans of every day's

647
01:13:47,360 --> 01:13:54,400
ordinary activity. Last evening, I'll tell you this, yesterday afternoon, those people who know

648
01:13:54,400 --> 01:14:02,000
me and have read after me know that I do not have great carpenter skill. And but I get along, but

649
01:14:02,000 --> 01:14:09,200
just, you know, it's kind of slap, slap dab together, you know. And so yesterday afternoon,

650
01:14:09,200 --> 01:14:17,600
I was helping my 13 year old grandson put together his duck, duck pin in for the winter for in one of

651
01:14:17,600 --> 01:14:22,480
the hoop houses. And I've done, you know, we've done this every year for like three or four years.

652
01:14:22,480 --> 01:14:30,560
He's had his ducks and we just make like a 12 foot by, you know, by 18 foot, he's only got 40 ducks.

653
01:14:30,560 --> 01:14:39,120
So not like that, that'd be real big. So we kind of make this level, this little plastic bird netting

654
01:14:39,120 --> 01:14:44,960
pin inside the hoop house. So the, the length, the hens, the chickens are outside and this little pin

655
01:14:44,960 --> 01:14:50,480
of ducks is inside. So it's a, you know, it's an enclosure within the enclosure. And we've used the

656
01:14:50,480 --> 01:14:55,920
same, we use the same materials every year. Okay. So we're out there and for some reason, last year,

657
01:14:55,920 --> 01:15:00,640
the boards got misplaced. Somebody put them away. We didn't have, so we had to start a fresh,

658
01:15:00,640 --> 01:15:07,440
I was going to make this thing a little bit simpler. So, so we did. And we are, we got done

659
01:15:08,000 --> 01:15:11,920
and Travis, he's 13, he just turned 13. He's standing there. He's looking at this. He says,

660
01:15:12,480 --> 01:15:16,480
well, grandpa, that's a pretty good job. It just looks like a two year old built

661
01:15:16,480 --> 01:15:25,760
about last till I split. So, so that's a, that's, that's humor.

662
01:15:25,760 --> 01:15:31,600
Yeah. The kids, kids say some funny stuff. I remember it's not quite the same genre,

663
01:15:31,600 --> 01:15:37,680
but I remember when my son was probably only five and he came out of the shower holding his,

664
01:15:38,480 --> 01:15:42,560
holding his manhood and looks at me and goes, daddy, look, it's almost as big as yours now.

665
01:15:42,560 --> 01:15:48,800
I said, thanks. Thanks a lot. I, but yeah, that keeps me laughing every day too. And I think

666
01:15:48,800 --> 01:15:51,760
that's, that's another thing that we're missing. We should be laughing a lot more.

667
01:15:54,560 --> 01:15:59,840
Oh, very good. All right. So just to finish up then, where can people find you just before,

668
01:15:59,840 --> 01:16:05,440
before we hang up so they know where to look? Yeah. Yeah. Poly face farms is our website.

669
01:16:05,440 --> 01:16:13,360
That's all one word P O L Y F A C E farms. If you get poly about P O L Y F in there,

670
01:16:13,360 --> 01:16:18,720
it'll pop right up. And it's a website. We have all sorts of links. We have resources,

671
01:16:20,720 --> 01:16:24,560
you know, lots, lots of, lots of information there, places where I'll be speaking,

672
01:16:25,280 --> 01:16:29,120
all those kinds of things. We have a gift shop, you know, if you want to wear a shirt that says,

673
01:16:29,120 --> 01:16:35,680
you know, grass fed or, or a lunatic farmer or whatever, you know, we have that as well.

674
01:16:36,480 --> 01:16:42,720
So yeah, check that out. Lots of information there. And that's poly face farms.com.

675
01:16:42,720 --> 01:16:47,360
Fantastic. All right. Well, thank you so much for talking to us today. I'm sure that there's

676
01:16:47,360 --> 01:16:51,600
a huge amount of people out there that are going to have their minds blown by, by this talk.

677
01:16:51,600 --> 01:16:56,240
And I would love if, if it's okay with you in the future, down the line sometime to come up to

678
01:16:56,240 --> 01:17:01,120
the farm and actually maybe shoot an interview on video, follow up. Absolutely. We'd love,

679
01:17:01,120 --> 01:17:27,920
we'd love to have you. Love to have you.