I am at the Artisans of the Grasslands conference  presented by the Savory Institute  … and I am learning so many amazing and eye-opening ways to look at and tend to the earth!

I know, I know… sounds really granola or something.  But, I gotta tell you, it isn’t.  This is all about bringing the earth back to stability and health – from the soil up.

Today, the speakers were so diverse – it was wonderful!  I feel so fortunate to have them all in one building!    Some of these speakers had never heard of holistic grass management, but once they listened to Alan Savory, they knew why they had been invited to speak.  So much of this soil health revolution (sun/soil/grass…) speaks across the board.  Really brain exploding (and very simple) stuff here.  Loved it.

SOME SNIPPETS OF WHAT I LEARNED TODAY

As many of you know, I have Lyme Disease.  One of the remedies that helped me tremendously was the The Paleo Solution (by Robb Wolf).

Robb Wolf was a speaker at the conference and I sat front row.

Below are some of his points – but I won’t do it justice because it was a speech that brought everything full circle.  I was only able to take notes (and remember) some things so it won’t be full circle.  Sorry.

To me, this guy is amazing.  He is a biochemist who suffered an auto-immune disease – and decided to delve into evolution biology thinking that going back to basics might help him figure out what is wrong in his system.  From there, his research make him rethink what he ate… and changing his eating, healed him.

And then he told others…

(As you can see, Robb Wolf doesn’t really fit into the box of ‘holistic grass management’, but his overall message is the same.)

Click to go to the site

OTHER SPEAKERS I HEARD TODAY:

Alan Savory, Dr. Richard Teague, Durukan Dudu, Spencer Smith, Abbey Smith, Jason Rowntree, Nora Gedgaudas (she has some incredible books out there!), Peter Byck, Precious Phiri (amazing African colony success story), Tom Newmark (restoration organic farmer in Costa Rica), Chris Kerston, Tre Cates and Pablo Borelli who gave an incredible talk about the successful wool farmers in Patagonia.

FROM Robb Wolf’s TALK…

Wolf said this was the first time he had presented these new set of thoughts… and I felt so honored to be there!

–He said to read TWILIGHT OF THE MAMMOTH which I just ordered.

–Wolf spoke of the huge, large animals – that used to live on our continent and others – have all been eradicated.  Giant sloths, etc.  What happened?  All indications from paleontologist and archaeologists is that they disappeared when man arrived on their land mass.  Why was this?  We killed them all.  (Which seems likely since we recently almost killed all the American bison.)

–I loved this one… he suggested that now that we have desertified so much of Northern America, we are now a rich land for elephants and rhinos… we should bring them here and let them trim the National forests, State Parks and Oak hills to bring them back to health.

–Goats were suggested for this purpose (trimming the underbrush in the National forests) and they were declined so he figured elephants and rhinos would be a stretch.

–He said that he cannot understand why North Americans say horses are not an indigenous species when they evolved here – but were killed off (ala the large animals and bison).

–Did you know that there are 276 Apple stores… which are all situated within a 20 minute drive of 90% of the population.  Brilliant.

–Along with all of the ideas of local farming, etc, he suggested that horses should be brought back onto local farms to help cure the soil…

–Do you know why there are so many (really fast!) Pronghorn deer in Nevada?  Because their natural predator, the North American Cheetah, is extinct. (I never knew there was a North American Cheetah!)

–Do you know why the large animals of Africa survived when the large animals of other continents didn’t?  Because they evolved alongside man…   In the other continents, man arrived after having learned these amazing skills (fire, weapons) and the large animals couldn’t catch up.

NEED TO GO BACK…

I need to go back to the Conference.  There is so much I am learning… wish I could write it all here for you!  Thanks for sharing with me!