Farming With the Wild

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Learn about farming with the wild, working with nature, not against it. Livestock and predators can coexist with a little help from llamas, which effectively guard small livestock, such as sheep, from coyotes, dogs and other predators.
Learn about farming with the wild, working with nature, not against it. Livestock and predators can coexist with a little help from llamas, which effectively guard small livestock, such as sheep, from coyotes, dogs and other predators.
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Bat houses attract bats, which are welcome residents on farms thanks to their pollinating abilities and voracious appetite for pests.
Bat houses attract bats, which are welcome residents on farms thanks to their pollinating abilities and voracious appetite for pests.
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When properly managed, grazing can be both profitable and ecologically beneficial. Erosion is minimized, habitat is created, and fewer pesticides and pharmaceuticals are used.
When properly managed, grazing can be both profitable and ecologically beneficial. Erosion is minimized, habitat is created, and fewer pesticides and pharmaceuticals are used.
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Poultry forage for a natural diet of grasses and insects.
Poultry forage for a natural diet of grasses and insects.
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Farmers can support pollinators and other beneficial insects by introducing plants that sustain them.
Farmers can support pollinators and other beneficial insects by introducing plants that sustain them.

Work with nature farming with the wild, not against it, and create a prosperous outcome for all.

Farming With the Wild

At first glance, the phrase “farming with the wild” may seem contradictory. Agriculture has been and remains the relentless process of selec­tion and minimization, one that now blankets billions of the Earth’s acres with a mere handful of crops. Farming and ranching activities are consistently identified as the primary cause of wildlife habitat loss, the archenemy of the biodiversity crisis.

Throughout the millennia, agricultural domestication has largely been a dance of coevolution, with humankind playing a leading role as artificial selector and stew­ard, among a full cast of essential and cooperative participants (including birds, insects, fellow mammals, grasses, food and fiber plants, and natural systems). As farms that combined row crops and livestock gave way to specialized factory-oriented monocultures at war with pests, diseases and weeds, ever larger machinery necessitated ever larger areas to operate. Habitat destruction and fragmentation, pollution of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, soil erosion, the persecution of predators and the over­exploitation of nonrenewable resources are now among the many ecologically devastating consequences of modern industrial agriculture.

Forced to compete in a globally oriented food and fiber system, farmers have often had to forsake goals, such as wildlife preservation and long-term landscape conservation (as well as health-care and other basic needs), in favor of short-term economic survival. But with the proper incentives, assistance and resources, farmers can and should be encouraged to manage their lands more sustainably, and profitably, while protecting wildland values.

  • Published on Oct 31, 2008
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