Restoring ecosystems is no easy task as we try to repair some of the damage humans have done to planet earth. And food production can be very hard on nature, especially if those practices don’t take whole ecosystems into account.
Author and agroecologist Nicole Masters has made a study of regenerating our food production systems and she says you have to start small, very small, with microorganisms in the soil that our food grows in.
Masters wrote the book “For the Love of Soil: Strategies to Regenerate our Food Production Systems” and she’s coming to Boise next week to talk about her work. She joins Idaho Matters, along with Jessica Harrold, the Program Coordinator at the Ada Soil & Water Conservation District to talk more.
Read the full transcript below:
GEMMA GAUDETTE: From the studios of Boise State Public Radio news. You're listening to Idaho Matters. Restoring ecosystems is no easy task, and as we try to repair some of the damage humans have done to the planet Earth and food production can be very hard on nature, especially if those practices don't take whole ecosystems into account. Author and agriculture ecologist. If I'm sure I got that wrong, Nicole Masters has made a study of regenerating our food production systems, and she says you have to start small, very small with microorganisms in the soil that our food grows in. Masters wrote the book For the Love of Soil Strategies to Regenerate Our Food Production Systems, and she's coming to Boise next week to talk about her work. She's joining us now along with Jessica Harold, the program coordinator at the Ada Soil and Water Conservation District. I want to welcome both of you to the program.
NICOLE MASTERS: Thanks so much for having us on. Thank you.
GAUDETTE: Oh, okay. So, Nicole, first off, how do we how do we say what you do for a living, since I'm sure I butchered that agroecologist.
MASTERS: So it sounds like I'm angry about ecology, but agro meaning agriculture.
GAUDETTE: Okay, gotcha. Okay. Thank you for the clarification. So, Nicole, I'm curious, how did you get started looking at basically dirt?
MASTERS: Oh, see, that's swearing in my community. Dirt. Okay, um, I think a lifelong passion. My family will certainly tell stories of me eating a lot of dirt as a child, but from New Zealand, just seeing incredible losses in biodiversity and water quality and erosion from probably the age of five, you know, really saying to my parents, you know, why is this happening? So yeah, it's a life journey.
GAUDETTE: You know, Nicole, I know you spent a lot of time talking with farmers and growers as well as ranchers, and you discuss building healthier soil. So what have you learned from them?
MASTERS: Oh, my goodness. I learned so much from every producer that I work with. I think the the privilege of being able to travel to different communities and see some of the real challenges that ranchers and farmers are facing on the ground and, and how much a poor advice they've been given, quite frankly, and how we really can regenerate ecosystems in some of the most extreme environments.
GAUDETTE: Mhm. So, Jessica, you wanted to bring Nicole to the Treasure Valley so that she could share some of her ideas with local farmers at Harvest and Hearth, and we discussed that event a little while ago. But why do you want her to come to Boise in particular?
JESSICA HARROLD: We think that just with our, um, super agricultural industry here, um, having her be a resource to all of our local producers, since we have so many farms in the area, is really valuable, and she has so much great information, not only for our really large scale farms and ranches, but also our small growers as well. And I think the community in general, and I'm so excited that we have a. So many presentations with her while she's in town that really appealed to everyone. And there are so many opportunities to hear what she has to say about restoring this ecosystem function. And I think it's really applicable to not only our farms, but all of our wild open spaces as well. Looking at the foothills and all of our rangelands.
GAUDETTE: And Nicole, a lot of food producers are trying to imitate a natural systems as they grow our food. I'm curious about the benefit of doing that.
MASTERS: Oh, I like that. You said a lot. We are seeing this growing really, really rapidly. I think what we're seeing is that there's so much adaptability that needs to be built into the system, and that happens from our underground workforce. So really, how do we have ecosystems that work despite the variations that we're seeing in climate and stress. And, um, yeah, it's just it's amazing what happens when you start to connect to that underground workforce and really what microbiology do in terms of water holding capacity and nutrients. And I think so many ecosystems have become so degraded that we can't even imagine what it looks like when we start to bring vibrant life back to, to farms and ranches.
GAUDETTE: I love that how you call it that underground workforce. I literally had this image of little ants with like like, you know, hard hats on doing all of this work under the soil. But, um, but I mean, oh, go ahead.
MASTERS: No, no, but it's very much like that. So it's almost like imagining it's a city underneath the ground. And that city has services from hospitals to schools to a local pub. Um, and then how how there are ways that we disrupt that ecosystem and then how there's ways we could build it back. Yeah.
GAUDETTE: Okay. So speaking of that disruption, I mean, Nicole, can we really recover degraded landscapes if we make the soil healthier?
MASTERS: Absolutely. Um, it's just that it's a journey, not a destination. So what I find is the people that are doing an incredible job, they're not at the end of that, it's like, how good can you get it? You know, how much water can we hold, how much production can we create, and how profitable can we make productive ecosystems?
GAUDETTE: So then I know, Nicole, you have a lot of really good advice for farmers and ranchers, but can we talk about those, you know, those backyard farmers, right. Maybe folks that just have their own backyard gardens, can they learn something about helping the soil?
MASTERS: Yeah, absolutely. So I don't think it matters what scale you're on. And it's quite interesting. When I work with large producers, they say, oh, it's only possible on a small scale, and you work with small guys and they're like, oh, it's only possible on a big scale. And it's like every scale is possible. But I find as home gardeners or vegetable producers, there's so many more tools that we have, um, and so many more ways that we can rapidly bring life back. So yeah, I'm excited about what you can do in your own backyard to just really grow the most nutrient dense, flavorful production that you possibly can. And and those flavor profiles come from microbiology.
GAUDETTE: So what would you say is the maybe easiest thing that the average person can do to keep soil healthy?
MASTERS: I think often the first thing is really just to stop what you're doing right now. That's killing everything. You know, if I had to. Yeah, yeah. If I had to say number one to stop, stop some of those actions. So I think some of these insecticides, the seed treatments are some of the worst things that we could be doing. Um, you know, and really don't give us the benefit that it's kind of marketed as being. So I think getting insecticides and fungicides and pesticides out of that ecosystem. Um, yeah. So especially for home gardeners, you know, people with lawns, even the lawn use chemical use in this country is phenomenal. Like some of the biggest polluters are actually your backyard producers or just home landscapes or turf. So really getting interested in how do we do this in a more ecological way?
GAUDETTE: Mm. Nicole. Jessica. Sorry, I only have about a minute left, but I do want to note that that Nicole will be the keynote speaker at Harvest and Hearth. So, um, give us information on that really quickly.
HARROLD: Yes. She will be our keynote for the Harvest and Hearth event, February 10th. But we do also have a free option for the public the night before. So February 9th, starting at 7:00 pm, we have restoring ecosystem function from the micro to the macro that will be held at College of Idaho. And you can register for that event online, um at Ada swcd. Org. It is free, but we do just ask for pre-registration. Um, we expect it to be pretty popular.
GAUDETTE: Well, I want to thank both of you for coming on the program today. Nicole, a pleasure to talk with you.
MASTERS: You too. Thank you so much.
GAUDETTE: Absolutely. We've been talking with author Nicole Masters and Jessica Harrold with the aid of Soil and Water Conservation District. We've been discussing how fixing the soil can actually help produce healthier food while helping the planet. As I mentioned, Nicole will be the keynote speaker at the Harvest and Hearth workshop, as well as at the College of Idaho. This will all happen next week. We will put links to all of those events on our website Boise State Public Radio News. Org. Thanks so much for listening to Idaho Matters. Boise State Public Radio and Idaho Matters are members of the NPR network. It's an independent coalition of public media podcasters.