Biodynamics


"I think having land and not ruining
it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want".
(Andy Warhol)

An unspoiled biodynamic oasis

Increasing and maintaining the fertility of the land through the care of its fundamental factor with biodynamic farming: the humus.

There is still much confusion and little information about this type of farming. Some people link it to esoteric or divination practices, but they couldn’t be more wrong. Biodynamics is nothing more than an evolution of organic farming, a system of practices aimed at recovering the soil as it was originally, i.e., fertile, and full of life.

In fact, with the biodynamic method, fertilization, cultivation, and animal husbandry are carried out in ways that respect and increase the fertility and vitality of the soil and at the same time the typical qualities of the plant and animal species, using only natural means: compost produced from solid farmyard manure, plant material as fertilizer, crop rotations, mechanical pest control, and pesticides based on mineral and plant substances.

By vitalizing the soil and increasing its biological activity, plants grow naturally, nourished by the soil ecosystem. Fertilization and soil care are therefore aimed at achieving and maintaining this balance.

“Biodynamic agriculture: two words that imply a way of working, observing, and experiencing the land. A life philosophy to make us appreciate all the harmony of a cultivated field, the changing of seasons and time passing”

Origin

At the end of the 1800s, many farmers turned to Rudolf Steiner, founder of the Anthroposophical Society, for advice on revitalizing the land, as the soil was losing its vitality. Chemical agriculture was still far from being born, and until that time in all the continents and civilizations of our planet, the farmer had always applied organic farming, which remained unchanged until after the end of World War II.

At that time, no one could have imagined what profound changes the earth was about to face, only 50 years later. Steiner had foreseen it all, and in June 1924, just a year before his death, he held a set of conferences in Koberwitz, in Breslau – today known as Poland. It was during these conferences that the concept “biodynamic agriculture” was coined. It is made of two words: biological, referring to the agricultural regime that has always been applied; and dynamic, referring to the natural practices that accelerate the growth of humus.

Steiner’s immense gift to farmers was giving them new ‘weapons’ (which are the Biodynamic preparations) to deal with the disastrous consequences that would materialize 25 years later. Today, Biodynamic Agriculture is officially recognized as a cultivation method by Australia and Switzerland and is the evolution of organic farming and not its variant. It is the new agriculture, the one that will accompany mankind for the centuries to come. (Source: Marcello Lo Sterzo)

The biodynamic way back to nature

Pesticides and chemical agents are meant to kill hostile pathogens, and at the same time sterilize the soil, which slowly depletes and dies so that the plant can feed on artificially supplied fertilizer. On the other hand, thanks to biodynamics, the aim is to recreate the unique life structure that we find today in woodland areas, where more than a billion microorganisms between microflora and microfauna live in one gram of soil: these are the foundations for unique biodiversity. Plants growing in such vivified soil live in symbiosis with these billions of micro-organisms; the soil becomes a natural laboratory that provides the vegetation with the necessary nourishment.

Defense and fertilization are two very important aspects. In the organic regime, chemical fertilizer is prohibited, but organic fertilizer and soil conditioner (manure) are allowed. The former has a purely nutritive function, the latter is more fertilizing. In biodynamics, only manure or green manure (sowing in the autumn and then burying) may be used. The important thing is that one does not seek a fertilizing effect but a supply of organic matter in the soil. Every year 2% of organic matter is mineralized and is not normally replenished. On a biodynamic farm, on the other hand, there is a constant supply of organic matter and therefore the ratio is always positive.

Chiudi ()