We just watched DER BAUER UND SEIN PRINZ (The Farmer and his Prince) about Prince Charles’ organically run farm. I ordered the DVD from the local bookstore here in Germany. Oddly, it’s unavailable anywhere in the Commonwealth.
The film made me think about growing things and raising chickens. For years after failing with chickens the first time, I didn’t try again because it felt too frivolous and too much of a luxury to keep hens of your own when you knew you could buy eggs, even organic ones, at a fraction of the price.
The film reminded me of what matters to me. The farmer kept going into the middle of various fields and pulling out a plant or a handful of dirt and explaining why it was better or stronger or different than the plant/dirt in the control field. The smell of the good garden soil in spring is so hopeful.
The film gave me a new view of cows. Their cows loll around in a huge barn with deep hay bedding, looking for all the world like bovine matrons in the Roman bath. Comfortable is not a word I connect with cows in a barn. Resigned or placid, but not comfortable.
Prince Charles demonstrated how to make a hedgerow. He leaned thorn trees at a 30 degree angle and then wove all kinds of other things into it. There were lovely photos of established hedgerows covered with blossoms with flocks of birds sailing in and out of them. My resident zoologist has been saying this for years: Hedgerows are good habitat.
Prince Charles’ farm manager said that the average age of farmers in the UK is 59 and young farmers are needed. My youngest is interested in farming so we all perked up our ears. He also said that many young people don’t seem to have had the kind of practical childhood that would help them with farm skills. We’re all brought up to sit in front of computer screens these days.
It’s hard to move toward the future, even when you are convinced it’s worthwhile to do so. We resisted getting a car for three years because we know that petroleum reserves are already so low. But now we have one even though I wanted to go everywhere by train.
I’m wondering how I can contribute to conserving the soil and growing more organic vegetables on my balcony. It’s easy to say: “There’s nothing I can do about it.” But there are always seeds to plant.
In January, I looked up a planting calendar for my area and planted snow peas in a big pot outside. Now they’re coming up. We can’t eat them yet, but they make me welcome the rain.
It’s like writing a book (or reading one). You don’t get guarantees about how it will come out. But we know, inside ourselves, that the attempt is worthy. Even if we fail, this is what life is about.
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