Regenerative Roots: Cultivating Nature’s Wisdom

There is no greater teacher than nature, and I’m not sure anywhere on God’s green earth is better to observe her immense power than right here in Oklahoma. In the last few weeks, we’ve seen devastating storms destroy homes, lives, businesses, and take out 100-year-old trees like they were tiny, weightless leaves on a breeze. Then that same force can deliver a gentle wind that can feel like it saves your life on a hot summer day. Why nature does what she does takes a perspective that is hard for us humans to comprehend. But the how—well, inthat question/observation, we come to learn and unravel great mysteries and simple sciences.

Somewhere about 100 years ago, someone got the notion that nature wasn’t all that wise and that we could remove her principles and laws from the equation and all would work out well, maybe even better. Since then, we have seen our soils turn lifeless and dwindle, our waterways and aquifers become tainted, the nutrition of our food drop to drastically low levels, and many forms of life disappear.

Remember lightning bugs? How they’d cover the fields in greater numbers than the stars in the sky? They didn’t migrate somewhere else—they died. Remember familyfarms? Most Oklahomans likely grew up on one or went to visit family on one. Where did they go? They didn’t migrate either—they died.  I propose that both the lightning bugs and the family farm had the same predator. So did our food's nutrition, our water's health, and our soil's deep biodiversity. In the context of this article, I would ask a related question: Remember when ganja used to taste good?

Big ag is no friend of ours. Big ag is no friend of the family farm, the lightning bugs, or any of the above-mentioned forms of life. Big ag has infected our society's systems of agriculture, our agricultural education, and our whole way of thinking about nature. Nature isn’t just somethingoutside your window. Nature isn’t just something we take from. It’s YOU. The Bible says we are made from the earth; I know for certain we couldn’t live without her. Our air, our water, our food, our medicine, our homes—we aren’t separate from nature. We are part of nature. In the Native American traditions, this is expressed in the phrase “all our
relations.” If we are part of a system, that means that a part can’t be damaged without it affecting the whole, and conversely, we can’t bless a part without blessing the whole.

Still with me? Good.

This is an introduction and a preface to a column you’ll now find regularly right here in Herbage, about regenerative agriculture. In regenerative agriculture, we work WITH nature, not against her. In regenerative agriculture, we bless everything we touch. The water improves, the soil improves, the air improves—and we do all that as part of farming the most delicious food and ganja you’ve ever tasted.

In a healthy biological system, there is one GIANTdifference when contrasted to what we call these days —“traditional agriculture.” When active biology in soil and water exists, a high-speed network of delivery drivers waits for the call from their plant friends. “Hey bacteria, I’m craving some super bioavailable calcium!” And off it goes with a speedy instant delivery! Whatever a plant wants, whenever it wants it, it gets. Remove the active microbiology, and all of that choice goes away. So kick back, enjoy the smoke from a plant cultivated with choice and love, and come along as we go deep into the practical application and methods of regenerative farming, brought to you by a farmer.

For 26 years, I’ve been a commercial cannabis farmer, and for all of those years, I’ve been an organic farmer. I come from an unbroken chain of farmers and have seen what big ag and government regulations havedone to an industry, to a COMMUNITY, that I love and cherish. I’m the farmer that founded and manages Blue Star Farms Oklahoma. We are the first certified clean green regenerative farm in their global program. But I’m not here to promote our farm; I’m here to share. There isn’t a secret recipe I need tobogart; my fellow farmers aren’t “competition.” I’mhere to promote naturally grown medicine becauseshe has the power to heal body, mind, and spirit. I’m here to promote sound ecological practices because we live here, our children live here, and because we are nature. And like nature, we can destroy or we can heal. 

We can cultivate relief and bring joy.

See ya next month as we begin our deep dive into the world of regenerative agriculture! Thank you for caring about natural medicine, and thank you for caring about “all our relations.”