The Self-Fed Farm and Garden: A Return to the Roots of the Organic Method, by Eliot Coleman

Reviewed by Michael Glos

The author of this book will not be new to most people involved in market farming. As one of modern Organics' “OGs,” Eliot Coleman is a well-respected voice in refining organic methods, extending seasons, developing small-farm-scale tools, and protecting Real organic farming. His New Organic Grower and subsequent Four-Season Harvest and the Winter Harvest Handbook were essential reading when we were starting out in the 90s. We learned to farm “pre-internet,” and these dense reference books were essential resources as we built our farm.

The Self-Fed Farm and Garden is different from the step-by-step approach of his previous books. He makes the case that farming can be done in a way that doesn’t rely on off-farm inputs. You can grow all your own fertility with green manures and keep improving the soil.

Deep roots can bring up minerals, and legumes can fix nitrogen from the air. He realizes this premise will take some convincing for generations of organic farmers who have relied on large applications of organic fertilizers, manures, and compost to fuel their production.

We have all used cover crops, but few of us have found a way to incorporate them to

fully replace off-farm inputs. Coleman relies on both his own experience and quotes farmers and researchers from the last 100+ years to support his case. He refers to “on-farm soil fertility creation and management processes as information inputs rather than product inputs.”

But growing all your own fertility is quite complex. Importing off-farm inputs

has proven more popular, even though it takes a lot of effort and expense. While organic farmers can’t use chemical fertilizers, they can use imported fertility from non-organic sources. I’ve been to many recent talks where the organic presenters talk about primarily using fish and crab meal, composted chicken manure, and even Chilean nitrate to boost production. This is especially common in stationary high-tunnel production, where cover crops are rarely used. Few of us could have imagined how popular “Organic” would become and that most of it would be fueled by “input substitution” to achieve maximum yields. Coleman’s writing helps to convince us that it is possible, and better, to return to some of the original premises of what makes Organic organic.

Much of the book is spent proving that a farm can improve its soil while producing nutritious, dense, bountiful food. He cites well-known researchers like Liberty Hyde Bailey and Edward Faulkner, as well as obscure university researchers who questioned the transition to chemical agriculture. Unlike most of his books, it isn’t until well into the second half of the book that he delves into more details on his rotations, cover crops he relies on, and how the whole system works. A detailed description of his 19-month crop rotation of rye and vetch is especially effective in building fertility for subsequent crops. Rather than the standard practice of tilling in fall-sown Rye/Vetch the following spring/early summer, he lets them reach maturity and produce seed. The fully mature crop is flail-mowed in August and allowed to regrow from all the seed before being tilled under the following spring. The other cover crops he relies on are not especially unique, but he harnesses the traits of each one to meet his goal of producing all of his on-farm fertility.

As someone who has a bedside table full of partially read books that have put me to sleep after a long day of farming, I’m glad to report this one did not join that pile. I read it, intrigued to learn how we could make our system better. The book is full of pictures of Coleman’s Four Season Farm in Maine to show his ideas in action. An appendix shows possible crop rotations integrated with cover crops to fuel the system.

To have a “self-fed farm,” you really need to understand soil, how to access the fertility in the soil, and how to grow all your own nitrogen. But relying fully on cover crops is a leap of faith in ourselves and our soil that many of us have been afraid to make. While A Self-Fed Farm does not contain all the information needed to transition to nutrient input independence, Coleman

provides a strong case to encourage more of us to try.