When I signed the contract to purchase the first 40 acres here, was not thrilled with the land. The Soil in the fields was totally depleted, heavy in ag chemical residue and salts and could not grow anything without massive inputs. Erosion was a major malfunction with a huge wide and deep open wound across the entire property. The West half of the property was in marginally better shape after 30 years of being in CRP but was still weak with only a few patches of semi fertile soil. In another way it was exponentially worse as the two erosion cuts were much deeper and wider, just hidden more from view by the Russian Olives, masses of blackberries, multifloral roses and sedge. The wooded section was the only healthy place on the property, if you did not count the walls of honeysuckle that were thick on the edges to about 50 feet in. So I was thinking about what it was like when I bought the first piece of land here and what it is like now. I fired up Google Earth to see if in the Historical feature if there was a 2007 or 2008 shot of the property. And there was! This is the 2007 taken 3 weeks after I signed the Contract. The newest pic is this 2020 Image. The Sat will take a new image in July of 2024 from what I am told. I am very much looking forward to that image update. I am liking the visual comparisons from the space images if not the Tax Assessor, USDA and NCRS using them to use them to spy and collect data with the updated images. This 2020 image was taken a Month earlier in the 13 years after the 2007 image. I don't want to go too much into the adjacent properties I have purchased over the years as they are their own experiments of sorts. The West is being left alone and is totally overgrown and wild other than a pipe line runs through the center of it and the pipeline operator mows the width of the easement every year. The North is a hybrid experiment and a cross between conventional and restorative farming practices. 3 years grain crops Corn/Beans/Corn followed by 3 years of grass and clover mix pasture and hay. Corn Yields have rose from a 157BPA to 225BPA since implementing this strategy and Beans went from a average BPA (Bushels per acre) of 39 to 62. The Clover/Orchard Grass cycle is not as profitable as the grain crops selling just the hay, but when you figure in the cattle that run on it in the spring and fall that equation changes for the better. The original 40acres was by far in the worst shape and what I had to work with in the beginning. And I couldn't grow a turnip on it without a lot of inputs. The soil was basically nothing more than a growing medium with almost zero organic matter and a totally dead nutrient and microbial environment. The West half was planned to become the lake and ponds long ago. That was the only way to correct the erosion problem in the deep cuts that were being called waterways. Well the only viable way without trucking in a lot of fill dirt. The CRP Contract Expired in 2008 and I did not make any friends at the USDA/FSA/NCRS office when I refused to renew it. Under their guidance and mandates that West side had became a disaster of overgrown invasive species and erosion that got a little deeper every year. And yes I got the lecture that only the Government has the knowledge and resources to properly manage highly erodible land......... I will just let the pictures of it under Government directives and edicts and under my guidance and edicts speak for themselves as to who is more better at land management. The First thing I did in 2008 was fence a square off and put a hay ring in the middle of it. Then I kept my horse in that square for 2 years, not solely in that area, I let them run the East Side from the woods to the South Road. I sold all but 2 of the horses off and brought the Irish Dexter Cattle in and kept them in the same square for 2 more years, Basically the horses and Cattle both spent the night in the square and went back out on the pasture in the mornings. While in the square they heavily fertilized it. Year 4 I moved the wean pigs into the square and let them add their own fertilizer to it and till it all up deep with their rooting. Year 6 I put the three 32x96 high tunnels in that square and turned the sides outside of the tunnels into the Market Garden/Field in now very rich fertile soil with only traces of the chemical residues and salts left. During the day the horses and cattle were depositing fertilizer all over the South and Central pasture and after 13 years added a lot of nutrients and life back into the soil, just at much lower concentrations than in the overnight square area. The main priority was correcting the East side Erosion before it got as deep and as bad as the West Side problem. A really simple fix for correcting that. I dug out a 6' deep in the center stock pond and build a series of small berms a foot high and the width of the low spot leading to the West side. You can see how much of the stock pond has filled in with Sediment between 2007 and 2020 That Sediment is top soil that is no longer being exported to the Gulf of Mexico and a bonus I am getting free land from my neighbors erosion! The Berms slowed the water and are also sediment traps. By 2020 they were no longer visible and the erosion cut had been refilled and raised up. I could have done the same on the West side Erosion problems but it would have taken 40-60 years to correct the problem and a whole lot bigger berms. So in 2022 I built 3 Big Berms called Dams and let the whole area of low spots and erosion fill up with water. A much better solution all the way around anyway. I didn't have the money to do the dams early on and when I did have the money I didn't have the time LOL. Then came the point that I had both the money and the time In the next Sat over pass and image taking the Difference between 2020 and 2024 will be even more notably different than 2007-2020 Here is a September 2001 image of the entire farm as it is now. I bought more land with the intent of using it for 10-12 years for income and selling it off when the price had went up enough to make a respectable profit. I bought that side land for $1300-$2400 per acres and sold it off for $5250- $7380 per acre. I will probably sell the North 80 in the next 5-6 years I paid $850 per acre for it and it currently appraises for $6,175 per acre. I Lease the entire West 40 as a hunting lease in 5 year lease blocks. I will never sell the original South East 40. I am on the fence about selling the West 40 and just keeping and living on and working the original 40. The Pipeline running through the middle of it, and the rocks that get pretty heavy on the West 40 make it undesirable as Ag with the rocks and well no one seems to want a diesel fuel pipeline running through the middle of their land. The 2011 image of the 40 still looks pretty bad but the building blocks were laid and in place and the land reversion was well underway. It is a very good hunting property though. I paid $3200 per acre for it when it was auctioned. More than I wanted to, but I didn't want adjacent neighbors, particularly the ones bidding against me. They had plans of clear cutting the entire property and building a big house and barn and making it a horse property and stable and were of a Arabic Muslim Nature. I really expected them to bid it up a lot higher and was shocked when the Auctioneer said sold to me. I am generally not a racist and not one to hate someone over religion.... The one Exception to that is that I absolutely hate, despise and loathe Muslims/Islam of any skin tone. I was going to win that auction at any price even if I had to borrow the money to do it. I just am not going to have Muslims living that close to me! If I do sell, it will be to the guys that have been leasing it for the last 8 years with a first right of refusal written in. They have no interest in building or living rural, they just want to hunt, shoot shit and party out there now and then and always leave it like they found it. And the first right of refusal will allow me to buy it back at fair market value if they ever decide to sell it. I am very far removed from the Green Weenie Tree hugging, toad licking and gender confused Leftist. I do however see the value in Permaculture based agriculture and living within nature as friends rather than living with her in a constant war and battle all of the time. It took 150 years of farming to basically destroy the South East original 40. From where we are now it will take another 40-60 years to completely heal and restore it. It was not broken over night and I was never under any illusion that it could be fixed over night. LOL yes the Original 40 is my life and it is a good and productive life. Everyone has at one point or another told me "That Won't Work!" "You Can't Do That!" "You can't make a living doing (Insert pretty much everything I have scratched out a good living DOING). I walk my own path, on my own terms and in my own way. I have NEVER really cared one way or the other what others think of me or how I do things I only share what I do because there might be others out there that will learn something or be inspired to punch out of their boxes and find that they are a Rogue to.
Wasn't it the USDA/FSA/NCRS that told you that you couldn't/wouldn't be able to build your ponds and lake without their advice and financial aid? You should try and mend fences with them, maybe invite them out for a fish fry or something, just to rub it in a little (or a lot).  If those guys at the USDA from back 2008 are still around you could invite them too.  Give them all the nickel tour complete with photos..
" Year 4 I moved the wean pigs into the square and let them add their own fertilizer to it and till it all up deep with their rooting. " KK, I was told pig poop was not good for the soil. In fact, was told there is nothing you can do with it so most simply find a place to bury it. Is this not true?
Much of our midwest farm land has been poorly managed, for years, by big corporate farms, unfortunately. Once they convinced Congress that corn (previously bought at pennies per pound) made a terrific ethanol crop, and the price skyrocketed, the rape of the bread basket of North America began. Even today, we see too many fields dedicated to a crop that is VERY rough on the soil, requiring far too much additives to keep it viable, as well as much acreage previously dedicated to other grain crops, now growing corn. What's the result? Higher food prices, across the board. And land that needs a serious recovery!
It compost very well in a HOT Pile that kills the pathogens shared between hog and human. In the field the beetles, maggots, sun and rain break it down the same way leaving it harmless. The malfunctions happen when people put it fresh into their gardens without hot composting. It also depends a lot on what their diet is and how many chemical controls are used. A pasture hogs poop is wholly different thing than a confinement hogs poop.
Everyone from back then has retired and their children have taken over the positions. The Snowy Egret makes better company than Government Agencies
Id much rather have a conservation with a snappin turtle eating my bait than any government official lol
Yeah, but you would get to rub their faces in the fact that you did it your way and everything worked out fine, and that you didn't need their advice or money!  Can't do that with a snapping turtle!  My late Father had a love hate relationship with the USDA and the County Agents. Loved the farm policies that benefited him, including a couple of ponds, and hated all of the paperwork. One pet peeve was no-matter what you wanted to do the first two questions that they asked was #1-Have you tested the soil? and #2-Has soil been limed recently?
I warned a friend 10 years ago about enrolling a 20 acre piece of her land into CRP and all of the strings attached that basically would put all of her land under their rules and restrictions. She went ahead enrolled anyway....... Her CRP Contract will expire October 1st and she is having a party to celebrate it. She almost forgot that she had to fill out paperwork for it to not auto renew. If I don't fill out the farm census worst they can do is fine me $100 that they have no mechanism in place to collect and make lots of threats to withhold my subsidies and payments that I DO NOT GET because I am totally independent of the USDA. If she doesn't fill it out they withhold her CRP Payments and any other payments she might have signed up for. CRP/WET lands USDA Guaranteed loans, Subsidies all have strings attached and you better read the fine print very carefully before signing. As far as their Fisheries Biologist and Engineer designing my bodies of water it was a thanks but no thanks! Then REALLY NO THANKs! THEN GTFO my property!!!
