Maybe nutrients do, in a way, appear out of thin air once your soil has recovered. Manufactured out of your regenerated soil microbes, air, and sunlight.
Agree, in that case the ingredients would be time, effort, and knowledge. Maybe another framing would be "no added artificial ingredients" if we're continuing the food label comparison.
This reframing of hay as nutrient input rather than just feed cost is solid. The comparison between synthetic fertilizer as "salt that kills the unseen workforce" versus hay-through-cattle as multi-functional makes the economics way clearer. I've been thinking alot about how bale-grazing placement could basically turn cattle into precision fertilizer spreaders without the fuel and equipment costs. Dunno why more operations don't calculate the NPK value of hay imports when comparing it to syntehtic inputs.
Exactly. Once you see cattle as nutrient movers instead of just consumers, bale grazing starts to look like precision application without equipment. And agreed, very few folks actually account for the nutrient and biological value of imported hay when comparing it to synthetic inputs. Thank you for your comment and continuing our conversation in rethinking the regenerative model!
Why does regenerative exclude the needs of the farmers? Hay can be sold. Soil cannot. Farmers need money now. Its not even an economics question, its a purely needs question.
That's where the community aspect comes in because you raise a very REAL concern. Nothing is free. We've talked about this in piece we did last week. More often than not successful regenerative farms are supported by a vast community support system, there are no lone wolves in regenerative ag.
Yes, and buying in hay is cheaper than buying more land to grow it on. But your gain is another farm's loss. Myself I buy in straw for winter bedding that ends up on the fields as fertiliser. Haven't bought artificial for 40 years yet grass grows as good as ever.
That’s a fair point... nutrients are moved, they don’t appear out of thin air. Your straw example is exactly the kind of closed-loop thinking I believe Jason was inferring during our conversation. Using your example carbon in, bedding used, nutrients returned, no salts needed.
Maybe nutrients do, in a way, appear out of thin air once your soil has recovered. Manufactured out of your regenerated soil microbes, air, and sunlight.
"No added ingredients needed"
Agree, in that case the ingredients would be time, effort, and knowledge. Maybe another framing would be "no added artificial ingredients" if we're continuing the food label comparison.
This reframing of hay as nutrient input rather than just feed cost is solid. The comparison between synthetic fertilizer as "salt that kills the unseen workforce" versus hay-through-cattle as multi-functional makes the economics way clearer. I've been thinking alot about how bale-grazing placement could basically turn cattle into precision fertilizer spreaders without the fuel and equipment costs. Dunno why more operations don't calculate the NPK value of hay imports when comparing it to syntehtic inputs.
Exactly. Once you see cattle as nutrient movers instead of just consumers, bale grazing starts to look like precision application without equipment. And agreed, very few folks actually account for the nutrient and biological value of imported hay when comparing it to synthetic inputs. Thank you for your comment and continuing our conversation in rethinking the regenerative model!
Why does regenerative exclude the needs of the farmers? Hay can be sold. Soil cannot. Farmers need money now. Its not even an economics question, its a purely needs question.
That's where the community aspect comes in because you raise a very REAL concern. Nothing is free. We've talked about this in piece we did last week. More often than not successful regenerative farms are supported by a vast community support system, there are no lone wolves in regenerative ag.
Yes, and buying in hay is cheaper than buying more land to grow it on. But your gain is another farm's loss. Myself I buy in straw for winter bedding that ends up on the fields as fertiliser. Haven't bought artificial for 40 years yet grass grows as good as ever.
That’s a fair point... nutrients are moved, they don’t appear out of thin air. Your straw example is exactly the kind of closed-loop thinking I believe Jason was inferring during our conversation. Using your example carbon in, bedding used, nutrients returned, no salts needed.