Vineyard with Chicken Tractor

Modern winemaking has brought many apparent improvements to wine. In the past, while developing a reputation, California tried to emulate French winemaking, which was based largely on time-honored winemaking traditions. But California became a frontier for modern winemaking techniques, and at some point ventured out on its own. Now many wineries worldwide, French wineries included, are adopting modern methods to produce wines different from those of the past, with a taste that many consumers have now come to view as superior. Wine preferences are influenced by many things, and many still debate whether modern wines are superior or whether the popularity of the modern taste is just another wine trend. But one thing is certain—modern winemaking techniques as well as grape growing practices have increased the ecological footprint of a glass of wine.

The Vineyard

Four years ago, I planted an experimental vineyard at Dancing Rabbit with the idea of having a small winery that would make sustainably grown organic wine. I knew it would be a long road to the time when I was able to produce wine for sale. I still have a long way to go, but I’ve learned a lot since then about what I’m up against in trying to grow grapes organically at DR, and in trying to make wine given the limitations placed on our ways of doing things in an ecovillage. It’s good to live in a place with these limitations though, because I would like to make every stage of grape growing and winemaking have as little impact as possible on the environment. Wine was made and enjoyed for thousands of years without the use of fossil fuel. Granted, not all the chemistry of winemaking or of agriculture was understood for the majority of that history, but modern techniques were developed with the crutch of the abundant energy of fossil fuel, and this abundance is not going to be available much longer. By using our understanding of science and technology both past and present, we can develop ways of making wine that are both superior and have less impact on the planet.

The first challenge in turning soil and sunlight into wine is in growing grapes organically. This is not an easy thing to do, especially in our climate. Our covenants require that all agriculture be done organically, and I personally would not want to do it any other way. Wines made from organic grapes are becoming more common on the west coast as even many huge winemakers like Fetzer are pioneering commercial organic viticulture (or rather a return to it). But since you may know nothing about growing wine grapes, I will begin by telling you that the kind of grapes most respected for wine in the world are of the vinifera species, and they thrive in a Mediterranean climate. That means dry and moderate, whereas in Missouri humid summers make it very difficult to grow vinifera grapes without a lot of pesticides to control disease. Vinifera varieties also can’t make it through the cold winters in our part of Missouri. To deal with these difficulties, most wine vineyards in Missouri grow hybrids that are crosses of vinifera and cold hardy American species, and they use synthetic pesticides to control pests and disease. If you are going to grow grapes organically, the best place to start is by planting the varieties that are most disease resistant. I have chosen to grow hybrids as well as American varieties that are both hardy for our area and known to be resistant to the diseases most prevalent here.

The Hybrid Grape Foch

There are many organic vineyard practices I’m learning about and experimenting with. My main focus is on making the soil healthy, so that the plants will be better able to fight off pests and disease. To do this, I’ve amended the soil with organic cow manure, lime, and wood ash, and I plan to add mycorrhizal fungi to the soil, which can improve uptake of nutrients. I’m also running chickens through the vineyard in a mobile coop, or tractor. As they scratch in the vegetation, they deposit fertilizer, and they have the added benefit of providing eggs, the excess of which can be sold here in the village to pay for their food. In this way, I can have fertilizer that helps pay for itself. All of these soil improvement practices will help build the natural microbial life in the soil that would be killed off by the use of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. This life is essential to the healthy organic growth of plants.

I would like the vineyard to be a more natural setting so that it doesn’t have to be a wildlife dead zone like many agricultural fields. To do this I’m experimenting with maintaining native prairie plants between the rows of grapes. One of the added benefits of this practice is in maintaining a diversity of insect predators, so that pest insect populations can be controlled naturally. This is an experiment for the sake of the wildlife, but it may present a challenge because having more plants around the grapes can sap water from the vines, and if the plants are too tall they restrict air flow and contribute to disease.

Another area where steps can be taken to reduce the impact of a vineyard is in maintenance practices. Currently, I mow around the rows of vines with a scythe, an ancient tool used for mowing grass. It doesn’t require any fuel and though slower than a mower, is efficient in the hands of a strong and skilled user. The scythe allows me to get closer to the vines without worry of damaging them, and can reach the spots under the vines and trellising that the tractor mower cannot reach. Most vineyards use herbicide to control weed competition in the rows of vines, but I simply pile the trimmings from scything around the base of the vine to hold moisture and control weeds. I currently mow with the tractor or scythe about two times a year between the rows to keep the vegetation from getting too high and restricting air flow between rows. The chicken tractor helps keep the vegetation low too because the chickens scratch and stamp the grass down, but it doesn’t make its way through the vineyard quickly enough to do a thorough job, which is why I mow with the tractor.

In the future I would like to graze sheep in the vineyard. Many organic grape growers are using sheep to make the job of mowing easier, because the sheep will do the job without petroleum or human labor. They, like the chickens, also turn vegetation into fertilizer and can provide products like wool, milk, or meat, as an added benefit. Grazing sheep might interfere with the natural balance of the prairie plants between the rows, but they will save labor and petroleum and make a product from the unused space between the vines. The drawback is that organic standards don’t allow livestock to be grazed less than 90 days before harvest, making this a far less viable option for mowing.  I may have to forego becoming certified organic to make my vineyard more sustainable.

Black Locust Post

Water is another resource that is essential to the healthy growth and production of a vineyard. Many vineyards these days use drip irrigation to conserve water and deliver it directly to their vines. I’m in the process of setting up drip irrigation in my vineyard, as well. I hope to eventually catch rainwater off the hoop house located just uphill from the vineyard, but right now I’m using a solar-powered pump to pump water uphill to the hoop house from our swimming pond.

Organic standards also don’t allow the use of treated posts for trellising. The chemicals in treated posts leach into the ground and are nothing I would want around my grapes, so I don’t mind having to pay more for the alternative. For my vineyard, I’m using black locust posts custom cut for me by the folks at Sandhill Farm, an intentional community about three miles away. Black locust is a rot resistant wood that should last about 25 years. We also have osage orange, or hedge post, growing on our land, which lasts as much as 80 years in the ground, but it doesn’t grow nearly as straight as the locust.

Although organic standards are an improvement in farming, I along with many other farmers, feel they don’t go far enough in looking at the system as a whole. I think land should be farmed in a way that is most suitable to its quality and climate, so that it will continue to be productive over the long term. All of Dancing Rabbit’s land is classified by the USDA as highly erodible, and much of its soil eroded away in the past because of unsustainable agricultural practices. The thin soil we have here is the result of row crops being grown on hills that were too steep for bare soil. This adds to the challenge of growing grapes here because they would do much better with a nice, deep topsoil. The great thing about using our land for a vineyard is that grapes are perennial, so the field doesn’t need to be tilled every season and permanent perennial strips can be maintained between the row of vines. For this reason, erosion is far less likely to be a problem and our topsoil can begin to be restored. It seems to me a very suitable and sustainable use of our agricultural land.

In the next article, I’ll talk about my plans to make the winemaking process more sustainable.

I may be writing more articles on this subject because there are so many facets to living sustainably in which, though it may seem we are giving up something we need, we are actually enriching our lives. I invite others at DR to write their own articles for the blog telling of the ways in which living more simply and more sustainably can make our lives richer while at the same time reduce our impact on the planet.

Many people these days would have a hard time imagining life without refrigeration. No doubt refrigerators can be extremely useful, but somehow people managed, and even thrived, without them in the past. Over the past century, our food systems have come to rely more and more on refrigeration for preserving food, while many long-practiced traditions of food preservation have faded from our culture. Because refrigerated food can be shipped across the world and has made food production on an industrial scale easier, it has contributed to a steep decline in the diversity of unique local foods. With this loss of diversity has come a decline in flavor and nutrition. As well, modern chemical engineering has produced food additives to take the place of old methods of preservation, all part of an effort to extend the shelf life of industrially produced processed foods. Since refrigeration consumes a huge amount of energy, this trend has led to a bigger environmental footprint for our foods.

While reading my home cheesemaking book recently, I was intrigued by a recipe for a sheep’s milk cheese called Tomme d’Arles, which is a perfect example of an incredibly creative food designed by the need to preserve milk abundant during part of the year for times when milk was not available.

Cheese curd for mozzarella

For Tomme d’Arles, lambs were raised on spring milk until they were sent to market in late spring, after which the cheese was made from the milk of still lactating ewes. The cheese was salted, dried, and stored in jute sacks. When you wanted to eat the cheese, you rehydrated it in a marinade of local brandy and bay leaves, then aged it in a cellar for 2-3 weeks before eating. Though the cellar is akin to a refrigerator, it uses the natural temperature of the earth to keep the cheese cool while allowing for the growth of microorganisms that add flavor to it. This cheese’s unique combination of flavors is the result of a cheesemaking practice that in no way requires refrigeration.

I mention Tomme d’Arles because it is an example of how great things can come from trying to accomplish a goal (preserving milk) without the use of fossil fuel or massive energy inputs. Those who invented this cheese, and the many thousands of cheeses in the world, were not consciously avoiding using refrigeration, because it was never available to them. But they were still able to accomplish the same goal, and in the end made a unique product that never would have come about had they been using refrigeration to preserve their milk.

Last year the Milkweed Mercantile hosted a workshop on fermented foods taught by Sandor Katz, author of Wild Fermentation. Attendees, me included, learned about how people extended the life of vegetables, fruit, meat and dairy products without the use of strange chemicals or artificial refrigeration. One of the great things about natural methods of food preservation is that they allow us to make the most of our local foods. Instead of eating “fresh” produce or animal products grown out of season and shipped from across the world, we can eat our own local foods preserved as pickles, salted or smoked, or turned into dairy and meat products.

Tatsoi

This fall I had an abundance of tatsoi, a mustard green, and to preserve it this winter, I’ve fermented it naturally in a brine (salt) solution with garlic, onions, and hot peppers. You just throw all the ingredients in a crock, or in this case a bucket, and let it sit in a cool place. No starter culture is needed as the pickle is fermented by local bacteria. This common Korean pickle, kimchi, is a traditional way of preserving fish (normally an ingredient), but it also uses Chinese cabbages and radishes. It is ready to eat in as little as 3 days, but can be stored in a crock in a root cellar for months. According to my pickling book, kimchi pickles produce bacteriocins, antibiotics that can target harmful bacteria such as listeria and botulism.

Kimchi made from tatsoi

To learn more about unique regional sustainable foods and food politics, I recommend BBC Radio’s Food Programme podcast.  Every time they talk about food, it is with an eye to producing it sustainably.  Though it is about British food, it is still relevant and inspiring in the US.

The Milkweed Mercantile (on Halloween)

Over two years ago now, I wrote two articles exploring economic issues at Dancing Rabbit. They sort of got lost in the March Hare limbo that has existed since then, and now that I am the new MH editor I thought I’d finally let them see the light of day. Actually both of them were posted on my blog a while back so if you ever went there you might have read them. This one is the first. Some basic DR facts may be out of date, but I think the general concepts have not changed much. This one is fairly long, so without further ado…   

The economic system we develop here at DR is vital to the survival and growth of our community. If we are to serve as a model for sustainable societies, it is important that our community be not only ecologically sustainable, but economically sustainable. If we cannot find sustainable ways to meet our basic needs, generate income, and trade and buy goods we will not be a viable model for sustainable living. Though we have in many ways achieved our goal of living more sustainably than most Americans, we are still dependent on the unsustainable global economy for most of our income and livelihood. This dependency contributes greatly to our impact on the planet. Creating a healthy economy based on the same principles of sustainability we employ in our everyday lives at DR will make us an even better model for a new way of living.

But developing a vibrant and ecologically sustainable economy is not easy. Part of the challenge at DR is that we are living in both the sustainable and the unsustainable economy. In our ideal world we would produce everything we consumed, so we had control over our resources and could ensure that production was sustainable. We are far from that and probably will be for the near future. Instead, we bring in resources and money from outside our local economy and we pay out money and resources to the larger economy. We have to have as much coming in from outside as we do going out or we are operating with a deficit. Trade deficits are talked about in the national news, but they can exist on a smaller scale as well. Maintaining a trade deficit will jeopardize the sustainability of our economy. If we can produce something to sell from our domestic resources to offset this deficit we will have a more viable economy. But we have to be careful, because we don’t want to export all our natural resources either.   

Dan raises vegetables throughout the year in his hoop house for sale at DR

To give an example, we could produce our own food here or, to save us the trouble, we could pay local farmers to produce our food for us. A local farmer could grow beans for us, but unless that farmer is buying anything from us and giving back to our community, we will be running a deficit. Our money is going out but not being recirculated in our economy. When someone is growing beans here, the money we pay the grower will likely stay within the community.   

Currently there are many ways we send money out of the community. Health care is a big negative cash flow, though we do provide some of our own care here in the form of home remedies, massage, yoga, etc. However, most of us still go to the local hospital and dentist when we have a major problem. As well, construction-related expenses are a massive flow out of our community, though some members of our community do construction work or sell materials. Other ways we send money out of the community are orders from the natural foods distributor, other groceries, power system components, vehicle-related and other transportation expenses, computers, and entertainment-related expenses. Some people here offset money sent out of the community by bringing in income through their jobs. This positive cash flow is a slightly more complicated matter.   

Presently there are basically three ways money is brought into the community (and these are the three ways most people survive here): by members who come here with an established means of making money; by members who come here with savings that will allow them to live without a stable income for a while until they can find a way to make money; and by businesses started here that have customers from outside DR. I would hazard a guess that most of the positive cash flow into the community comes from the people who arrive with savings or inherit money. A large portion of the non-savings positive cash flow is from web-based businesses that are run by a relatively small number of community members. Some other sources of income for the community are mid-wifery, FIC (Fed. Of Intentional Comm.)work, non-profit consulting and management, and consensus and facilitation training. A small amount is brought in through the visitor program but this does not cover the costs of the program.   

Money brought into the community through outside jobs and savings is then cycled through the economy in the form of construction jobs and the sale of other small scale goods and services provided by community members. DR itself also pays some members for certain jobs. It’s possible for someone to survive here working for other people who have a stable income, and often people with money are looking for help and willing to pay for it. However, right now I would doubt whether we could say we have a thriving economy that could provide income for many people who weren’t already set up in some way. People who come here with ready-made income sources are essential for the existence of our economy in these early stages (and it will always be helpful to have some percentage of our population arrive with income sources). They can keep our economy afloat until it is healthy and diverse enough that it can provide the community’s basic needs.   

When I think about economy at DR, I get a sinking feeling that our economy is not really sustainable (or viable) in that instead of bringing in money from outside the community, we are living largely off savings. Some build their houses with their savings and others pay people to help them build their houses. Savings are a good source of income for DR and there is no doubt that this sector of the economy is vital to new people becoming established here, but it is questionable that it would be sustainable if the flow of new members slowed and everyone was living in largely finished houses. Unless those people who arrive with savings (like me) can find ways to make income here they will eventually run out of money.   

Another nagging doubt about the sustainability of our economy is the question of whether we are really setting an example for sustainability if our economy is based largely on the the internet and member savings. Setting an example to me means having sustainable businesses and trade that prove an economy can be set up from the ground up along principles of sustainability. These businesses and trade would be based on our knowledge and skills, and on land and resources that we control, instead of being based on distant lands and resources, and unsustainable systems. In addition, by creating businesses and trade that go beyond our community we can offer sustainable alternatives to the global economy and bring in income to offset what we are paying out.   

If we can come up with creative ways to generate income and produce our basic needs at DR we can build a more stable economic foundation. Other intentional communities that have been able to survive have had some main cottage industry to generate revenue from outside the community. Twin Oaks makes tofu and hammocks, Acorn has a seed business, East Wind makes nut butters, and Sandhill sells sorghum and honey. We could potentially have many different cottage industries here. A good place to start is with the products people here already buy from outside DR. These are the low hanging fruit and will provide three benefits at once: Someone at DR will have an income source; that money will stay in our economy; and we will not have to go outside DR to meet a basic need. The added benefit is that with our local currency, dollars don’t have to be exchanged at all. Construction is one of the low hanging basic services we are already providing for ourselves, but there are many more potential business ideas. Food is something we spend a lot of money on and since we have plenty of land available for growing food this could be a lucrative means of income for someone or a group of people.   

At Dancing Rabbit we are unique from and have advantages over some other intentional communities because we have a diversity of potential income sources. This makes DR attractive to people who don’t want to be limited in the work they do in their lives. Individuals or groups can start their own businesses that will then eventually provide jobs for others. The Milkweed Mercantile is an example of this kind of business. Ziggy and April’s natural building workshops will build community infrastructure while bringing revenue into our economy and educating others in living more sustainably. There is a lot of expertise here, and a lot of people out there who want to learn from us and would want to buy the things we produce sustainably. We aren’t tapping into this potential nearly enough now, though hopefully as people get more established we will. I hope that we will realize what a resource we are and how many people are willing to support us by paying for what we have to offer. What better way to generate income for our community than by helping others do what we all came here to do– live more sustainably.   

So we need to build our own sustainable businesses at DR to meet our basic needs and offset the flow of money out of our community. That is easier said than done. In the next article I will explore the challenges of starting a sustainable production business here.

Sandhill Farm, home to friends of Dancing Rabbit, is a small neighboring intentional community here in northeastern Missouri.

Sandhill has been practicing organic agriculture and gardening since 1974 on 135 acres, and the community provides most of its own food, including vegetables, fruits, herbs, sorghum syrup, honey, chickens, and turkeys. This video gives us a glimpse into how members of the community actually grow their own food, and how this lifestyle is central to community life at Sandhill Farm.

Hopefully this is the first of future DRTV: Neighbors videos!