Barefoot Biodynamics: How Cows, Compost, and Community Helped Me Understand and Apply Steiner’s Agriculture Course

With decades of knowledge and proven, common-sense methods from ＂The Barefoot Farmer,＂ this practical guide to biodynamic principles and practices will appeal to growers of every scale and experience level.

In Barefoot Biodynamics, organic grower Jeff Poppen--＂The Barefoot Farmer＂--combines tales from his personal history in rural Tennessee with the practical applications of biodynamic principles and the deep aspects of the biodynamic methods that continue to make his farm a success today.

Jeff’s friendly, direct, and humorous writing will appeal not only to the biodynamic-curious, but also to farmers and gardeners who have experimented with the biodynamic approach and are looking for a deeper understanding of the practice.

Rooted in the teachings of biodynamic pioneer Rudolf Steiner, Jeff’s unique insights and deep reflections on ＂guiding lines＂ of biodynamic growing are an invaluable resource. Those ＂guiding lines＂ include:

• producing a farm’s fertility using cover crops, compost, and other on-farm inputs
• enjoying the renewing power of farm festivals
• augmenting scientific knowledge with the power of observation and intuition
• avoiding chemical fertilizers
• understanding that carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen make up 95 percent of the physical structure of plants and are freely available in the air around us
• enhancing the availability of critical minerals such as silica and lime through good farming practices
• building humus-rich soil teeming with microbial life
• using homeopathic preparations to heal and enrich the soil

In addition, Jeff walks the reader through the eight lectures on farming given by Steiner in 1924, summarizing important points from each lecture and ＂translating＂ them from Steiner’s profound yet sometimes impenetrable vocabulary into plain language. In Barefoot Biodynamics, Jeff provides new insight into these enigmatic lectures, revealing an often overlooked yet cost-effective farming method rooted in common sense.

Fresh out of the psychedelic sixties, Jeff Poppen began farming in rural Tennessee in 1972 and has been there ever since. At Long Hungry Creek Farm, he and his farm partners tend about six acres of biodynamic vegetable crops, which they sell to wholesale buyers and to restaurants, and tend a herd of about 35 cattle. Jeff is the author of The Best of the Barefoot Farmer and The Best of the Barefoot Farmer II. In addition to his books, Jeff has produced TV shows (some episodes available on the Barefoot Farmer YouTube Channel), written newspaper columns, and lectured at garden clubs and organic conferences for over three decades. Jeff’s farm is the site of the annual Southeast Biodynamic Conference as well as other seasonal farm festivals. He has also mentored other farms and helped with school gardening programs in the Nashville area.

Sandor Ellix Katz is a fermentation revivalist. A self-taught experimentalist who lives in rural Tennessee, his explorations in fermentation developed out of his overlapping interests in cooking, nutrition, and gardening. He is the author of four previous books: Wild Fermentation, The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved, The Art of Fermentation--which won a James Beard Foundation Award in 2013--and Fermentation as Metaphor. The hundreds of fermentation workshops he has taught around the world have helped catalyze a broad revival of the fermentation arts. The New York Times calls Sandor ＂one of the unlikely rock stars of the American food scene.＂ For more information, check out his website: www.wildfermentation.com.