WEBVTT

00:00:20.365 --> 00:00:24.553
Sunbeams are the essence of poetry.

00:00:25.932 --> 00:00:30.623
Dreams, fantasy, fairy tales; sunbeams.

00:00:31.226 --> 00:00:34.869
And yet, as esoteric
and mystical as sunbeams are,

00:00:34.869 --> 00:00:37.251
they are the energy driver of the planet

00:00:37.256 --> 00:00:41.805
in a very visceral, physical,
scientific, empirical sense.

00:00:42.576 --> 00:00:46.146
But if I asked you to go out
and grab me some sunbeams,

00:00:46.146 --> 00:00:48.115
we know they're valuable, right?

00:00:48.415 --> 00:00:50.785
Well, grab me some;
could you bring them in here?

00:00:50.785 --> 00:00:52.765
Let's talk about sunbeams.

00:00:53.271 --> 00:00:54.897
Children will take you up on this,

00:00:54.897 --> 00:00:59.078
they'll dance around a little while
and try to grab them, but they can't.

00:00:59.900 --> 00:01:01.270
The fact is,

00:01:01.590 --> 00:01:06.080
that something as esoteric
and mystical as sunbeams

00:01:06.080 --> 00:01:11.521
is captured by nature's
photovoltaic array,

00:01:11.521 --> 00:01:14.663
called photosynthesis in plants,


00:01:14.663 --> 00:01:17.213
through the chlorophyll of plants.

00:01:17.213 --> 00:01:19.919
And, specifically, grass.

00:01:20.388 --> 00:01:25.879
So, the problem is that most of us,
in our modern culture,

00:01:25.879 --> 00:01:28.444
are quite disconnected from grass.

00:01:28.444 --> 00:01:32.329
When I say "grass,"
people immediately think of lawns,

00:01:32.329 --> 00:01:35.325
golf courses, maybe a soccer field.

00:01:35.666 --> 00:01:38.658
But you're not thinking about
the kind of grass

00:01:38.658 --> 00:01:40.947
that the Knights
of the Golden Horseshoe found

00:01:40.947 --> 00:01:43.733
in the early 1700s,
when Governor Spotswood,

00:01:43.733 --> 00:01:46.586
the colonial governor
of Virginia sent his friends,

00:01:46.586 --> 00:01:48.701
dubbed the "Knights
of the Golden Horseshoe"

00:01:48.701 --> 00:01:50.177
- they were British after all -

00:01:50.177 --> 00:01:52.077
sent them across the Blue Ridge.

00:01:52.077 --> 00:01:54.618
The British had bumped up here
against the Blue Ridge.

00:01:54.618 --> 00:01:56.858
What was over Afton Mountain?


00:01:56.858 --> 00:01:58.459
What was over there?

00:01:58.459 --> 00:02:01.199
So he sent them over
to discover what was there.

00:02:01.199 --> 00:02:03.438
And what they found, they wrote back,

00:02:03.438 --> 00:02:05.675
and they spent a couple
of weeks, and they said,

00:02:05.675 --> 00:02:08.263
"Everywhere we rode
in the Shenandoah Valley,

00:02:08.263 --> 00:02:10.709
we could take the grass
and tie it in a knot

00:02:10.709 --> 00:02:12.932
above the horse's saddle."

00:02:13.909 --> 00:02:16.438
It was a magnificent silvopasture

00:02:16.438 --> 00:02:21.346
of elk, deer, passenger pigeons,
prairie chickens, pheasants,

00:02:21.346 --> 00:02:25.856
turkey and bison, up to herds
of three to four million.

00:02:25.856 --> 00:02:29.430
Captain Jim Bridger got behind a herd
out in the Black Hills of the Dakotas,

00:02:29.430 --> 00:02:33.862
when he was sent out to explore it,
behind seven million bison.

00:02:33.862 --> 00:02:36.048
Now, that's always intrigued me.

00:02:36.048 --> 00:02:38.509
"Lieutenant, could you come
up here a minute please?

00:02:38.509 --> 00:02:39.816
Sharpen your quill.

00:02:39.816 --> 00:02:42.986
Start counting; one, two,
- you got that?"

00:02:42.986 --> 00:02:44.139
(Laughter)

00:02:44.769 --> 00:02:46.935
I have no idea,

00:02:48.735 --> 00:02:53.785
but the legacy of these migratory herds

00:02:53.785 --> 00:02:59.333
that were moved by both natural-
and Native American-lit fires

00:02:59.333 --> 00:03:01.625
as a landscape choreography,

00:03:01.625 --> 00:03:05.577
and these migratory patterns
where they move thousands of miles

00:03:05.577 --> 00:03:09.434
created the soils that we are currently

00:03:09.724 --> 00:03:11.744
mining today in the Midwest,

00:03:11.744 --> 00:03:14.356
and that we already mined in Virginia

00:03:14.356 --> 00:03:17.553
- up to three feet of topsoil
washed off of Virginia -

00:03:17.553 --> 00:03:22.418
during the European
colonialization of the state,

00:03:22.418 --> 00:03:25.574
and up until today,
and it's still washing off today,

00:03:25.574 --> 00:03:30.040
because we have turned this beautiful,
perennial-based system

00:03:30.040 --> 00:03:35.069
into an annually-based tillage system,
which is highly erosive.

00:03:35.069 --> 00:03:36.957
In the Shenandoah Valley, where I live,

00:03:36.957 --> 00:03:40.017
arguably three to five feet
of topsoil have washed out

00:03:40.021 --> 00:03:43.256
and created the turbidity
in today's Chesapeake Bay.

00:03:44.614 --> 00:03:46.532
So how does nature actually work?

00:03:46.532 --> 00:03:51.383
How nature works is sunbeams come down,
it's captured by photosynthesis,

00:03:51.383 --> 00:03:56.042
and converted into biomass;
into vegetable material.

00:03:56.659 --> 00:03:59.044
And if we look at the different
kinds of plants,

00:03:59.044 --> 00:04:02.354
trees, bushes, and grass,

00:04:03.164 --> 00:04:07.715
intuitively, we think,
"Well, what's the most efficacious plant

00:04:07.715 --> 00:04:11.338
to collect these sunbeams
and sequester the carbon?"

00:04:12.936 --> 00:04:14.717
Your mind tends to go to trees,

00:04:14.717 --> 00:04:18.257
because you can see,
"Wow, look at all that biomass!"

00:04:18.257 --> 00:04:23.969
But in actuality,
trees are the least efficient.

00:04:23.969 --> 00:04:28.869
Brush is more efficient, you know,
bushes and brush, and things like that.

00:04:28.869 --> 00:04:32.929
And then, the pinnacle is grass.

00:04:33.467 --> 00:04:36.555
The fact is that
when you look at a forest,

00:04:36.555 --> 00:04:41.279
you're seeing 50 to 80,
maybe 100 years of stored carbon

00:04:41.279 --> 00:04:43.150
all standing visible.

00:04:43.954 --> 00:04:47.837
You're not seeing 80 years of grass

00:04:48.607 --> 00:04:51.227
visible at one time.

00:04:51.607 --> 00:04:55.202
Now, the grass goes through
a growth cycle just like us,

00:04:55.202 --> 00:04:58.981
just like all living things
it goes through a growth cycle.

00:04:58.981 --> 00:05:04.597
It starts slow, and then it accelerates,
and then it goes into senescence.

00:05:04.597 --> 00:05:06.790
So the three stages of grass,


00:05:06.790 --> 00:05:09.670
I call: diaper stage;

00:05:09.670 --> 00:05:15.480
so right here in this pot
I have freshly-eaten diaper stage.

00:05:15.480 --> 00:05:16.902

This is infant grass.

00:05:16.902 --> 00:05:20.221
It's just been grazed,
and it's coming back.

00:05:20.221 --> 00:05:24.634
Here, I have teenage grass, okay?


00:05:24.964 --> 00:05:26.664
Juvenile, fast-growth grass;

00:05:26.664 --> 00:05:29.277
remember when you could eat
a half-gallon of ice cream

00:05:29.277 --> 00:05:31.093
and it didn't go on your hips?

00:05:31.093 --> 00:05:33.907
This is juvenile grass.

00:05:34.377 --> 00:05:39.680
And then we come into more juvenile,
but you see it's starting to brown down,

00:05:39.680 --> 00:05:44.010
and eventually it goes to what I call
"nursing home grass".

00:05:44.010 --> 00:05:45.337
(Laughter)

00:05:45.337 --> 00:05:48.205
Okay? Senescence, the end.

00:05:48.205 --> 00:05:51.612
The role of the herbivore in nature,
if you've ever thought about it,

00:05:51.612 --> 00:05:53.567
and the reason I'm concentrating on this,

00:05:53.567 --> 00:05:57.404
is because herbivores have gotten
a bad rap in recent days,

00:05:57.404 --> 00:06:00.512
cows, climate change and all that stuff.

00:06:01.082 --> 00:06:04.188
You see, the data points

00:06:04.188 --> 00:06:07.558
to study the effect of cows
on the environment

00:06:07.558 --> 00:06:11.204
are all coming from a position


00:06:11.544 --> 00:06:14.134
that does not respect and honor

00:06:14.134 --> 00:06:16.999
the herbivore in it's classic role.

00:06:17.319 --> 00:06:18.582
The role of the herbivore,


00:06:18.582 --> 00:06:21.951
and the reason the planet 
is so full of herbivores,

00:06:21.951 --> 00:06:23.109
think about Africa,


00:06:23.110 --> 00:06:28.445
think about South America, the alpacas,
think about Indochina, yaks,

00:06:28.445 --> 00:06:29.742
they're all over the place.

00:06:29.742 --> 00:06:32.459
Reindeer, caribou,
there's a lot of herbivores,

00:06:32.459 --> 00:06:34.869
groundhogs, prairie dogs,
you know, everything.

00:06:35.537 --> 00:06:36.923
(Laughter)

00:06:36.923 --> 00:06:39.827
Because without them,

00:06:39.827 --> 00:06:42.977
this biomass would simply
turn into

00:06:42.977 --> 00:06:49.607
senescent material, and just volatilize,
and die, and quit growing.

00:06:49.607 --> 00:06:52.817
So the role of the herbivore in nature


00:06:52.817 --> 00:06:58.271
is to take this
as it approaches senescence,

00:06:59.467 --> 00:07:01.453
prune it back,

00:07:02.073 --> 00:07:04.903
just like a viticulturist
would prune a vineyard,

00:07:04.903 --> 00:07:06.902
or an orchardist
would prune an apple tree.

00:07:06.902 --> 00:07:10.683
Does anyone think ill of an orchardist,
"Why are you pruning your apple tree?"

00:07:10.683 --> 00:07:14.412
No, we think that's good, 
we think that's good stewardship.

00:07:14.412 --> 00:07:16.786
And that's exactly
what the herbivores did.

00:07:17.212 --> 00:07:19.852
So, they pruned this back to restart

00:07:20.422 --> 00:07:24.832
this rapid biomass production.

00:07:25.232 --> 00:07:29.498
Without them, it stops;
the whole program stops.

00:07:31.458 --> 00:07:33.541
Now, the problem is,

00:07:33.541 --> 00:07:37.967
how do we duplicate this
if we don't have migratory patterns?

00:07:37.967 --> 00:07:40.370
If we don't have four million
buffalo in a herd,

00:07:40.370 --> 00:07:43.429
if we don't have 10 million
wolves chasing them,

00:07:43.429 --> 00:07:44.644
if we don't have fire,

00:07:44.644 --> 00:07:48.591
if we don't have the magnificent,
amazing choreography of nature,

00:07:48.591 --> 00:07:53.442
how do we duplicate this amazing
principle that hydrated, built soil,

00:07:53.442 --> 00:07:56.734
fed all the mycorrhizae
and the actinomycetes,

00:07:56.734 --> 00:08:00.420
and built the soils
that we're still mining today?

00:08:01.813 --> 00:08:04.261
How do we duplicate
that if we have a system

00:08:04.261 --> 00:08:07.139
of private land ownership and all that?

00:08:07.565 --> 00:08:11.182
Well, we do it with high-tech,
electric fencing.

00:08:11.182 --> 00:08:13.833
Space age, microchip, electric fencing.

00:08:13.833 --> 00:08:15.823
It's almost invisible to the eye,

00:08:15.823 --> 00:08:20.277
and yet we can encircle
a herd of a thousand cows

00:08:20.757 --> 00:08:24.277
with an almost invisible wire
that you would never see.

00:08:24.277 --> 00:08:26.510
Visitors to our farm
are told, "Watch the wire."

00:08:26.510 --> 00:08:27.377
They walk into it.

00:08:27.377 --> 00:08:28.727
(Squawks)

00:08:28.727 --> 00:08:29.896
(Laughter)

00:08:29.896 --> 00:08:31.873
It's practically invisible,

00:08:31.873 --> 00:08:36.288
but because it's such a strong
psychological barrier, the cows learn.

00:08:36.288 --> 00:08:38.153
And they can see way better than us.

00:08:38.153 --> 00:08:41.462
In fact, they can see
all the way around their heads,

00:08:41.462 --> 00:08:43.494
except for 30 degrees on their back end.

00:08:43.494 --> 00:08:46.611
So, they can see this,
they know it's there.

00:08:47.281 --> 00:08:53.639
And it allows us to duplicate
this mobbed movement

00:08:53.639 --> 00:08:58.360
that they would have had
in eons before we had private land.

00:09:00.412 --> 00:09:05.395
We call this, "mob-stalking,
herbivorous, solar-conversion,

00:09:05.395 --> 00:09:07.649
lignified, carbon sequestration."

00:09:07.649 --> 00:09:09.487
(Laughter)

00:09:10.545 --> 00:09:14.506
And so, as the biomass gets to this point,

00:09:15.896 --> 00:09:20.569
we prune it back with the herbivore,
and then it begins to grow.

00:09:20.569 --> 00:09:25.101
And as the leaf area begins
to get more and more chlorophyll,

00:09:25.441 --> 00:09:30.054
the growth accelerates and accelerates,
so that from here to here,

00:09:30.764 --> 00:09:33.087
let's just say, for sake of discussion,

00:09:33.087 --> 00:09:38.747
from here to here,
this time period is 20 days.

00:09:38.747 --> 00:09:42.918
From here to here,
the time period is only 10 days.

00:09:44.488 --> 00:09:47.328
So it's accelerating
and then it slows off.

00:09:47.328 --> 00:09:50.652
So what we're doing
is using the herbivore,

00:09:50.652 --> 00:09:54.486
- in this case a cow, it could be a sheep,
a goat, whatever, in this case a cow -

00:09:54.486 --> 00:09:58.527
we're using the animal
in its historic role,

00:09:58.527 --> 00:10:01.193
using high-tech, electric fencing,

00:10:01.193 --> 00:10:06.229
in order to leverage and stimulate
the biomass production.

00:10:06.649 --> 00:10:08.068
The bottom line is


00:10:08.068 --> 00:10:11.926
that in Augusta County where I live,
which is over the mountain,

00:10:11.926 --> 00:10:13.176
in Augusta County,

00:10:13.176 --> 00:10:17.328
the average pasture,
the biomass production,

00:10:17.328 --> 00:10:19.568
if you dry it down and you weigh it,

00:10:19.568 --> 00:10:23.838
the biomass production
on the average acre of grass

00:10:23.838 --> 00:10:28.718
in Augusta County,
is 2500 pounds per year.

00:10:29.564 --> 00:10:30.957
On our farm,

00:10:31.627 --> 00:10:34.882
we've been there almost 60 years,
we've never planted a seed,

00:10:34.882 --> 00:10:37.288
we've never bought a bag
of chemical fertilizer,

00:10:37.288 --> 00:10:43.012
and on our farm we average
well over 10,000 pounds per acre.

00:10:43.936 --> 00:10:48.556
We're all familiar with the tension
between ecology and economy.

00:10:48.579 --> 00:10:51.811
And that there's a battle,
and we can't be environmentally sensitive

00:10:51.811 --> 00:10:53.608
unless we sacrifice the economy.

00:10:53.608 --> 00:10:57.931
And we can't be economically viable
unless we sacrifice the environment.

00:10:57.931 --> 00:11:02.961
I'm here to present to you the notion,

00:11:03.251 --> 00:11:07.851
as a fact, that we can actually have both.

00:11:08.621 --> 00:11:13.737
But what we have to do
is manage things completely differently.

00:11:14.187 --> 00:11:20.236
The data points that impugn the lowly cow
as the destroyer of the planet,

00:11:21.826 --> 00:11:27.637
have the wrong object
to have a problem with.

00:11:28.119 --> 00:11:30.118
The problem is not the herbivore.

00:11:30.118 --> 00:11:32.298
The herbivore is doing
what she's always done.

00:11:32.298 --> 00:11:37.234
She's, you know, a 4-wheel-drive,
portable sauerkraut vat,

00:11:37.234 --> 00:11:38.697
(Laughter)

00:11:38.697 --> 00:11:42.357
turning carbohydrate,
fermenting it into meat and milk,

00:11:42.357 --> 00:11:43.751
nutrient-dense food.

00:11:43.751 --> 00:11:46.342
She's doing exactly
what she was supposed to do.

00:11:47.182 --> 00:11:50.602
But she's not being managed
the way the wild herds

00:11:50.602 --> 00:11:54.115
and the migratory patterns
were managed where they moved.

00:11:54.115 --> 00:11:59.166
And they vacated areas long enough
for the forage to go through

00:11:59.166 --> 00:12:05.544
this magnificent 50, 60, 70-day
physiological expression cycle,

00:12:05.544 --> 00:12:09.154
and then be pruned back
and harvested at the appropriate time.

00:12:09.154 --> 00:12:13.352
In fact, what happens on most pastures,


00:12:14.012 --> 00:12:16.732
the grass never even
can grow to this point.

00:12:16.732 --> 00:12:18.218

It's kept very, very short.

00:12:18.218 --> 00:12:21.479
So it's pruned 20 times in a season,

00:12:21.479 --> 00:12:24.853
and you add up all those
couple hundred pounds of time,

00:12:24.853 --> 00:12:28.224
and it comes out to about
2500 pounds per year.

00:12:28.224 --> 00:12:31.768
Instead, we let the forage
come way up here

00:12:31.768 --> 00:12:36.194
to full physiological expression
by denying access.

00:12:36.194 --> 00:12:40.623
We move the cows every day to a new spot,
letting everything else rest

00:12:40.623 --> 00:12:43.900
and go through this rapid
accumulation cycle.

00:12:43.900 --> 00:12:48.849
And what it means is that we triple,
quadruple and even quintuple,

00:12:48.849 --> 00:12:52.577
the amount of forage
that can be produced on a certain area.

00:12:52.577 --> 00:12:56.632
Now, that cow is dropping 50 pounds
of goodies out her back end every day.

00:12:56.634 --> 00:12:58.480
(Laughter)

00:12:59.660 --> 00:13:03.726
So just think about what happens
when you change it

00:13:03.726 --> 00:13:08.711
from 4000 pounds
of manure and urine per acre,

00:13:08.711 --> 00:13:13.135
to 20,000 pounds
of manure and urine per acre.

00:13:13.135 --> 00:13:17.525
Suddenly, you have soil-building capacity.

00:13:17.525 --> 00:13:22.907
So here we are,
not only harvesting way more,

00:13:22.907 --> 00:13:25.387
but we're sequestering way more carbon,

00:13:25.387 --> 00:13:29.762
we're using the animal
in its historic role,

00:13:29.762 --> 00:13:33.896
we're honoring and respecting
the cow-ness of the cow.

00:13:33.896 --> 00:13:38.033
When you feed the herbivore
foreign things like grain,

00:13:38.033 --> 00:13:39.906
and you lock them up in a feedlot,

00:13:39.906 --> 00:13:42.180
and you do all the kinds
of desecrating things.

00:13:42.180 --> 00:13:44.874
I mean the US-duh - I call it the US-duh -

00:13:44.874 --> 00:13:46.108
(Laughter)

00:13:46.110 --> 00:13:51.295
for 30 years laughed at us for doing this.

00:13:51.295 --> 00:13:55.820
They said, "Grind up dead cows;
feed them back to cows."

00:13:55.820 --> 00:13:59.069
And we were branded Luddites
and anti-progressives,

00:13:59.069 --> 00:14:00.706
anti-science, you know.

00:14:00.706 --> 00:14:04.734
"Come on get with the program, Salatin,
what's this grass stuff?"

00:14:04.734 --> 00:14:07.543
Forty years later,
there's this sudden global,

00:14:07.543 --> 00:14:10.389
"Oops! Maybe we shouldn't have done that!"

00:14:10.389 --> 00:14:12.238
(Laughter)

00:14:15.023 --> 00:14:21.774
And it's beyond me why we still give
these sophisticated agents of our culture

00:14:23.154 --> 00:14:26.009
the freedom to tell us
what to eat and how to eat.

00:14:26.379 --> 00:14:29.177
And so, the "what-if" of this:

00:14:29.177 --> 00:14:31.481
Just imagine i

00:14:31.901 --> 00:14:34.031
if all of our neighbors did this

00:14:34.031 --> 00:14:38.439
instead of continuous grazing,
where they turn 50 cows into 100 acres

00:14:38.439 --> 00:14:41.879
and just leave them all year,
and the grass can never get above

00:14:42.609 --> 00:14:44.348
what I call diaper grass.

00:14:44.711 --> 00:14:48.907
And it just sits there in, like,
half of first gear.

00:14:48.907 --> 00:14:52.817
There's a lot of analogies
we can make here,

00:14:52.820 --> 00:14:56.704
but the point is that the grass
never accelerates.

00:14:56.704 --> 00:15:01.341
It can't because it's,
"Are they ever gonna get out of diapers?"

00:15:02.251 --> 00:15:04.430
It's the same way the forage is.

00:15:04.882 --> 00:15:07.964
But if we control it,

00:15:08.074 --> 00:15:12.504
so that the animals only access
a tiny little spot each day,

00:15:12.504 --> 00:15:15.558
and create a mosaic pattern, guess what?

00:15:15.569 --> 00:15:18.989
Now we've got moles and voles;
we've got bird nesting sites;

00:15:18.989 --> 00:15:23.184
we've got a continuous
mosaic of pollination,

00:15:23.186 --> 00:15:29.986
of blossoms, red clover, white clover,
and dandelions that are for pollinators.

00:15:29.986 --> 00:15:34.048
You've got all sorts of growth
going on below the ground

00:15:34.048 --> 00:15:36.215
because now we have this biology.

00:15:36.215 --> 00:15:42.031
The soil cools down because
it's got all this nice cool mulch

00:15:42.031 --> 00:15:44.513
that's transpiring and oxygenating.

00:15:44.513 --> 00:15:45.573
(Inhaling)

00:15:45.573 --> 00:15:48.320
I'm inhaling the oxygen out of this plant.

00:15:48.320 --> 00:15:49.430
(Exhaling)

00:15:49.430 --> 00:15:51.692
And it's inhaling my carbon dioxide.


00:15:51.692 --> 00:15:53.632
Isn't that cool?

00:15:53.632 --> 00:15:56.987
And tomorrow it goes through a frog,
and then it goes into a goldenrod,

00:15:56.987 --> 00:16:00.357
and then it comes back,
and it's this wonderful connection.

00:16:00.357 --> 00:16:02.117
And so, what if?

00:16:02.670 --> 00:16:09.250
What if U.Va would serve this kind of meat
instead of the concentration camp meat?

00:16:10.408 --> 00:16:13.444
(Applause)

00:16:17.334 --> 00:16:21.103
What if McDonald's served this?

00:16:21.963 --> 00:16:24.593
What if Burger King served this?

00:16:25.573 --> 00:16:27.445
What if you ate this? 


00:16:27.445 --> 00:16:29.595
And what if I ate this?

00:16:29.595 --> 00:16:34.761
As a blessed way to participate

00:16:34.761 --> 00:16:41.463
in the most healing, amazing,
nurturing choreography of nature.

00:16:41.900 --> 00:16:44.876
By respecting the cow-ness of the cow.

00:16:44.876 --> 00:16:49.142
Using her as an herbivore
in her historic role.

00:16:49.911 --> 00:16:53.545
And participating
in the nurturing of the planet.

00:16:53.886 --> 00:16:57.126
Thank you for letting me share
something that's very simple with you.

00:16:57.126 --> 00:16:58.275
Thank you.

00:16:58.275 --> 00:16:59.589
(Applause)