Although Alderspring’s high ranges are still awash with snow, down here at our 5000 foot valley elevation grass is coming with abandon. That’s actually a really good word for what we want to do with that hay pile. Don’t get me wrong—our hay is great, but it doesn’t regenerate like that fine meadow grass. Now, the ranch’s valley meadows are abloom with the yellow of dandelion. Although an introduced “weed” species from Europe, we are happy to have dandelions on our plate of salad bar greens for our beeves. They are very palatable and tasty, and their deep taproots bring minerals back to the surface soils. This diversity translates into beef loaded with nutrients and flavor, the foundation of a great steak.
Unfortunately, not all introduced plant species, or weeds, have the attribute of tasty palatability. Most of these plants were stowaways, cleverly concealed in seed form mixed in the rocks of immigrant ship’s ballast or animal feed. Some found a berth in mud attached to shoes, wagons wheels, or even feet of animal and human. Then, when ship made port, these seeds were dropped, and often found a welcoming home without predators or competition, nurtured to prolific success in the New World’s temperate climate. The perfect storm that followed resulted in the complete restructuring of plant communities on the moister Eastern Seaboard. The arid West, with its expanses of extreme and uninhabitable conditions in the form of deserts or Arctic mountain ranges made spread less rapid. In fact, there are some areas that are fairly weed-free.
The stakes are high in those places because there are vast areas of native plant habitat with a high level of near-pristine functionality. We happen to live in one of them. Central Idaho is home to the largest tract of wilderness in the lower 48 states, and our Hat Creek range is adjacent to it. We live in a place where all-out war has been declared on these weeds, because everything from native and rare plant habitats to wildlife and water quality is at stake.
Virtually everybody but us fights the battle with chemical warfare. It’s because we are certified organic”¦on 72 square miles. For the land managers outside our 72 square, it is 99% chemical warfare. In fact, the EPA cannot approve new chemicals engineered by Dow, Monsanto, and others, quickly enough to keep up with the amazingly adept genetic shift for chemical tolerance that many weed species can pull off. Weed agents from all affected government agencies strategize new chemical mixes each year, based on the latest cutting edge research. They attack weeds with specially outfitted trucks, ATVs, backpacks, river rafts and even helicopters. New discussion of spray nozzles and guns are talked up each year, specifically identifying things like range, concentration and spray drift to non-target species, and the collateral non-target native mortality that can result.
For Alderspring, the weed fight can be tougher at a very personal physical level. Our methodology is like having hand-to-hand combat with every encounter with the enemy, rather than using the guns and bombs that the land management agencies do. When you are crawling on your hands and knees in 110 degree F heat in the rattlesnake infested bottom of Pig Creek stalking leafy spurge with your comrades, it kind of gives you an intimate knowledge of the enemy, and what preferred habitat looks like. Oh”¦and there’s scorpions too.
Last year we hand grubbed some 25 miles of remote roadway to remove spotted knapweed, a pretty purple-flowered opportunistic biennial that you could easily imagine in a backyard wildflower garden. Please don’t plant it in your garden. After over 330 hours of grub and hand pulling time last summer, if one of my crew members spotted it while walking by on your sidewalk, they would most likely attack your garden on just muscle memory and reflex. Knapweed no more. I hope you would understand.
We actively seek combat-ready recruits. I like the small ones the best. Our favorite at this writing are Cyphos. These tank-like weevils are about a centimeter long, and even look like warriors with their armor and long, horn-like probosci. We’ve released 1000s of these in knapweed infested areas that we considered beyond hope. They mine the root center and lay eggs in there, virtually killing the host plant. After 8 years, there are a few of these acreages that are nearly weed free.
Hunters and other recreationists are today’s Johnny knapweedseeds. They carry weed seeds into our remote ranges on their ATVs and pickups, encased in a perfect mud package for rapid springtime germination. That’s why we have to attack roadways first. Also, roadways are the first and often the only place where county spray trucks will venture. A little wind on a boom sprayer invariably causes drift. Drift means we get it on our grass. Contaminated grass means we do not call it organic, and it means fencing that out, so our beeves can’t touch it. I speak from experience when I tell you that it is a huge pain. We have done it several times, when state employees just ignored our large signs painted in yellow, blue and white reflective paint (reading is fundamental), nearly brushing it with their spray boom as they hit the “on” switch.
They said sorry. We started fencing the next day. One pasture just fell out of our long-earned organic certification. Sorry is what they said. We said you have no idea.
It was last summer when we had just finished our second go through of knapweed along the county road that bisects our ranch. I knew it was clean as a whistle when Casey, the county weed supervisor called me. “Hey Glenn. We are going to have to spray knapweed along your section of road today. Just letting you know that we will be doing it, and we’ll have the nozzles in place to try to prevent drift.”
“We got it all Casey. We just finished our second go-thru.” I proudly smiled as I spoke to him on the phone. My crew is awesome. Our weed control is awesome. We are awesome.
“The road super says you have lots of untreated knapweed there. So you have left us no resort but to spray. Apparently your crew is missing it.”
I was horrified. “When did he look? Are you sure he was looking on the piece that we marked with our “NO SPRAY” signs?” We put those signs along every road that passes through Alderspring, all told, about 60 miles worth. The law says that if you put those signs up, the weeds are your problem, unless you are rotten steward of your roadway. Then the County has every right to spray because you did not do your due diligence. In other words, you are not awesome.
In fact, you are just another one of those hippie slacker organic freak longhair tree-huggin’ flakes. And if we drop the ball on our no-spray signs, we just fall smack-dab into their stereotypic box: “See? I told you those people are no good. Can’t even take care of their road! There was knapweed everywhere!”
I jumped in the pickup and roared over there, and cruised the entire stretch. I speed dialed Casey: “Casey. It’s Glenn. I am right here right now, and there is not one knapweed. I have plenty of alfalfa and gum weed.”
Silence. Breathing. “Hmmm. I work for him. And if the Super says I gotta spray, then I gotta spray. He’s just down the road from you, getting ready to work on paving a section. Go talk to him.”
I roared off to find the road crew. Several yellow dump trucks full of smoking hot bitumen and a paver were running just a mile past the flag-girl who was holding a detour sign in the hot sun. I asked her if she could raise the Super on the radio. She nodded, and did.
After explaining my situation to him, I could hear his gravelly voice over the truck loudspeaker: “Tell him to wait.” Wait I did. And did some more. I watched the summer heat waves shimmering over the pavement, distorting my view of the yellow equipment just down the road. Fifteen minutes went by. I waited some more. I asked the girl to raise him again.
“Tell him to wait some more.” I waited. Remember”¦we are awesome. Awesomely, I waited as sweat dripped from my hat brim onto the hot pavement. It evaporated in minutes. Flag-girl kept busy texting. She was sweating too. You could cook a pot of coffee on that asphalt. I waited some more. After a half an hour, I asked Flag-girl again, and the radio crackled back: “Tell him I don’t have time for this.”
I thanked her, got in my pickup and left. I called Casey. He said it turned out he was called off from the spray emergency. Somehow, that urgent knapweed situation”¦evaporated. My guess is that Casey told him that the purple blooms he saw were none other than alfalfa. Not everyone is a botanist, after all. They are only two of the most common plants in Custer County.
Yet again, Alderspring averted another potential spray drift situation. It isn’t only about our beeves. It’s about our plant communities above, and the soil biota below. Chemical herbicides kill not only target weeds, but the collateral damage can go deep into the soil profile, killing bacteria like antibiotics do to your gut. Unfortunately, we don’t have a “yogurt” to recolonize lost life underground. Often I can see a spray signature that has long lost the blue dye marker that is mixed in with the chemical brew. I can see it because there is a complete lack of native plants in the area. They killed it all, and recolonization is probably unlikely until that soil biota returns.
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A few weeks ago, I was in Lucky’s, a natural foods supermarket in Jackson, Wyoming. I checked out their beef, as I always do (this way, Caryl always knows where to find me). “I see you have grass fed. Do you have any grass fed organic?”
“All of our grass fed guys are organic.” She followed my eyes down to the case. “Which producer are you wondering about?”
I pointed to the closest one.
“Oh”¦well they aren’t certified. But they are antibiotic and hormone free. And that is about as close to organic as you can get.”
I smiled. About as close as that cosmic iceball Pluto is to the Sun. “Are any certified?”
“Um”¦no. Not really. Not like really certified. But they are organic. Just not certified.”
I smiled again at the separation of organic from certified. That would be like serving apple pie sans apples. But it’s still apple pie.
Not.
My kettle was starting to boil. I carefully limited my words to a simple “Thank you,” mostly because I would have horrified my dear daughter Melanie with mortal embarrassment had I launched then and there into a lesson in the truth about organic. In front of the whole supermarket (maybe a crowd would gather to add a new level to dear daughter’s horror) I could say something about the truth, like that the antibiotic and hormone free statement is just the tippy top of the organic iceberg. I wish I could take them all to Pig Creek on their hands and knees, or join our fencing crew to fence out a botched spray job. I wish I could educate them all that their “just not certified” producer can and probably does use a multitude of chemicals on their land and beeves even with the hormone and antibiotic claim. I haven’t yet met one that doesn’t.
But I kept my mouth shut. Melanie’s eyes say, “Thank you.”
Even with our work on weeds added to the antibiotic and hormone free claim, we’ve just barely skimmed the surface of how chemical free organic is. Sure, organic has its big producer’s problems, and government bureaucratese. But every small organic producer I have met (yes, every) is committed.
For Alderspring, Organic is a deep commitment in time, money and passion. Why passion? Because you, our partners, have entrusted your wellness and that of your loved ones to us. And we will practically die trying before we betray it. And we’ll gladly open our ranch and records to organic inspectors each year. We’ll enjoy their visit. We always learn new things, as do they.
Thanks for riding with us on the journey.
Glenn, Caryl and girls.
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