He grew up in north-central Massachusetts, an area Shepard dubs “the industrial wasteland,” where plastic and manufacturing were a way of life. “The river at the bottom of the hill where we lived ran different colors every day, depending on what color dyes they were dumping into it,” says Shepard. When the Cuyahoga River in Ohio caught on fire, the young Shepard asked his mother why it made the news. “I said, ‘Ours catches fire once a month,’ and she explained to me rivers weren’t supposed to do that.” 

An environmental awareness began to stir in Shepard. He got a degree in ecology, and then, in 1989, secured a piece of land in Alaska, five miles away from the nearest road and 300 miles away from Anchorage, and discovered most of his food was shipped from Seattle. That supply chain didn’t make sense to Shepard. “I was surrounded by blueberries and lingonberries and all kinds of different food products that the indigenous cultures ate for time immemorial. So I thought, why not redesign my ecosystem?” 

Photography via Mark Shepard.

Shepard is now 35 years into his program, with hundreds of properties he’s restored across North America, all bought and paid for, free and clear. He operates his farm as well as a diversified enterprise based on smart real estate investments, selling plants, consulting and selling large, whole-sale quantities of a handful of native and non-native plant crops, such as hazelnuts and asparagus. 

Combining principles from permaculture, agroforestry and ecology, Shepard pioneered what he calls restoration agriculture. This new method of farming produces food in a way that restores land and ecosystems by establishing natural communities based primarily on native, perennial plants that are high in nutrients, carbohydrates, protein and oils. 

Shepard’s intentionally designed Alaskan ecosystem, supplemented with animal proteins, supplied all his food while enhancing, not degrading, the land, and he realized that restoration agriculture, a system based on native, perennial plant crops, could work anywhere. “I got good at it,” he says, “and took it right to the corn belt.”

In 1995, Shepard acquired land in Wisconsin that was degraded from years of intensive, industrial agriculture. He put his restoration skills to the test and reintroduced native food crops, including oaks, cherries, hazelnuts, chestnuts, apples, gooseberries and fungi. By restoring the Midwestern plant communities that were present before industrial farming, Shepard noticed increased soil fertility and a better appearance–it also stored water more effectively. 

Cows, hazelnuts, chestnuts, asparagus, grass and alders at New Forest Farm.

His methods stand in sharp contrast to farming annual crops, which destroys soil and existing perennial ecosystems. “You plant seeds that grow for a few months, and it’s done,” says Shepard. “You’ve created a desert, and there’s no longer a rich, abundant ecosystem.” 

Shepard’s method manages ecological succession to optimize ecosystem health while using far less labor than traditional farming. “Right now, my ‘farming’ is that I’m a glorified hunter-gatherer, except I don’t have to go out looking for things,” he says. “They’re right where I planted them and they stay within fences. It’s really wonderful.” 

Instead of buying into traditional farming, Shepard carved his own path in a way that felt meaningful. “I wanted to help accomplish massive ecological restoration, at scale, as fast as possible,” he says. His advice for farmers who want to change to a perennial agriculture system is to start researching perennial plants that would naturally co-exist in one’s ecosystem. Plant some of those plants right away, and more over time while still relying on annual crops to make ends meet. He recognizes that it’s difficult for small-scale farmers to make a living, but his methods prioritize restoring ecosystems and using creative, diversified income sources to support the cash flow from farming.

The post Meet the Midwestern Farmer Restoring the Land by Growing Native Plants appeared first on Modern Farmer.

Yet, it’s not the same for all crops, everywhere. Each spring, along a hidden dirt road in northern Maine, my mother squats calve-deep in ditch muck to gather the edible, curled fronds of the ostrich fern, a delicacy that appears year after year regardless of rain, drought or fungus. While small-scale farms increasingly rely upon innovative technology to hedge their bets on a harvestable crop—think Kernza, complicated, mechanical planters or expensive, hybrid seeds—native, perennial crops, like my mother’s fiddleheads, persist regardless of an erratic growing season. This begs the question—what if annual crops can’t offer us the sustainable future we, as farmers and consumers, need? 

Finding an old way to farm

Mark Shepard’s New Forest Farm enterprise is built upon what he calls restoration agriculture: growing perennial food crops in a way that mimics native ecological systems. “We need to trust natural plant communities because they’re tried and true. They’ve done alright through just about every disaster that’s been thrown their way,” says Shepard. 

Native, perennial plant species—such as fiddleheads—are often better equipped to succeed than non-native, annual plants because they’ve evolved within an ecosystem for millennia. Native plants thrive with fewer or no inputs and, due to genetic diversity, are better equipped to survive in our changing climate. Because of this, landscaping with native species is already widely popular. 

Polyculture including hazelnuts, chestnuts, grapes, apples, and pasture. Together, these crops yield 2.5 times that of any individual component of the system. Photography via New Forest Farm.

Start with small changes

Farmers don’t need to make a whole-sale switch to native species to reap ecological benefits while tapping into an emerging, native-plant market. Small changes, such as converting a single, sub-prime field into a food forest,where a selection of diverse edible plants are grown mimicking the structure of a forest, can be effective. Shepard’s New Forest Farm began with annual crops and transitioned to perennial crops over time. 

Native species can also be included in techniques that many sustainability-minded farmers already employ. For example, hedgerows could be planted with species of American hazelnut, with the small, harvested crop offered in community-supported agriculture boxes or at farmer’s markets. 

Don Tipping of Siskiyou Seeds offers small quantities of unique crops—some of which are native plants—at farmer’s markets and sells them to customers, who are intrigued by the novel product. Although the success of a product can be hit or miss, as with products at any farmer’s market, sometimes, Tipping’s products sell out, with customers asking for them at the next market. He plans to experiment soon with plant-infused beverages. 

In addition, because native plant species support more biodiversity than non-natives, farmers looking to attract beneficial insects for pollination and pest control could plant alley crops of native species that provide food for pollinators and humans, such as sunchokes. 

Expand on silvopasture techniques

Much of the shift that farmers must make to incorporate native plants as food crops relies more on mindset than technique. For example, take silvopasture, which is a method of integrating foraging livestock and wooded areas. Farmers such as Kirsten Marra and Chris Wellington of Muddy Roots Farm use silvopasture practices to help feed and shelter livestock. In such a system, oaks and other nut trees are already key. “We know where all our hardwood stands are in the woods, so we choose our ends [of the pasture rotation] to finish the pigs under the nut trees. Tree nuts are high in fat and contribute to nice marbling of the meat; the unsaturated fatty acids help increase flavor and juiciness. They are also a good source of carbohydrates and protein. They’re very good for the animals, and they create a nice fat-cap or fat layer,” says Marra. 

In their woodland and field pasture system, the pigs are happier, fatter and healthier, all while eating far less grain—about two buckets a day for 10 pigs—which Marra and Wellington say the pigs don’t touch until yummier foods (including annual vegetable scraps) are gone. But this system also helps the environment. The pigs are rotated frequently to prevent any damage to the land, and their wallowing creates vernal pools, their foot traffic presses seeds into the soil and their munching keeps invasive species in check. 

To take a system like this one step further, creative farmers can use trees to produce crops for livestock and people—and not just using acorns or chestnuts. For example, linden tree leaves are great in salads, and their fruit and flowers make a unique (and delicate) chocolate substitute. 

Chris Wellington at Muddy Roots Farm.

A new market

While demand for native plant foods is different from that of annual agricultural crops, a market does exist. Elderberries are particularly trendy, but other native, perennial crops such as sunchokes, pawpaws and even chestnuts are also popular. Still others—such as hazelnuts, ramps and mushrooms—are already in demand at farmer’s markets and by wholesalers alike. 

On a national level, websites such as Foraged offer farmers an opportunity to reach a wider audience, with some of the website’s popular crops including boysenberries and American Ginseng. 

Using these native, perennial foods instead of annual crops often amounts to a simple substitution, such as frying fiddleheads instead of asparagus, using mashed sunchokes instead of mashed potatoes or using pawpaws in place of bananas in bread. 

Pigs at Muddy Roots Farm. Photography via Muddy Roots Farm.

Long term changes 

Changes in our food system must come at the policy level, but some of these changes are happening already. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) now recognizes the importance of agroforestry techniques by offering agroforestry grants and funding. More recently, the US Office of Global Food Security released its Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils, which advocates for returning to more traditional crops that grow better in certain climates. 

Douglas Tallamy, author of Bringing Nature Home and other books, worries that farmers will over-spray native plant crops and thus mitigate any environmental benefits. But if we work to change consumers’ expectations for Instagrammable, blemish-free food and restore our environments with healthy, resilient plants, we can find a balance between harvest and hope for the future of agriculture. 

This isn’t a utopian dream. Consumers’ increased interest in hyper-local foods and regenerative, sustainable agriculture offers support for new ways of farming. Plus, changes in perspective can occur on a crop-by-crop basis as innovative farmers showcase unconventional, native plant foods, even if those foods aren’t staple, dinner-table commodities right now. A great example of crop success is kale, which was once a mere garnish but is now a popular superfood. 

With agriculture facing more climate pressure, tenuous land access and fewer resources than ever before, now is the time to make small or farm-wide changes toward planting native, perennial species as crops, even if the path forward seems untraditional or unusual. 

Says Chris Wellington of Muddy Roots farm, “They called us crazy for wanting to raise pigs in the woods.” 

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