Our Farming Philosophy Healthy Soils- Healthy Plants- Healthy Community
Ollin Farms
believes in the principle of regenartive agriculture. Our goal is to
produce top quality farm products while continuing to regenerare surrounding
ecosystems. We view our farm as a living, connected system and do many
things to ensure the health of the plants, animals, water, and soil that
encompass it.
Whether it is feeding our family or supplying our community, our focus at Ollin Farms
has always been to produce the most nutritious flavorful produce
possible. Our
bionutirent farming model is founded on getting the right nutrients, in the
right proportions into an active, living soil. This includes the small
group of nutrients used to raise most of today’s food products as well
as the numerous micro-nutrients that are needed by humans and animals to
be “healthy”. Where modern agriculture tells us to feed the plant, the
bionutirent model tells us to feed the soil. Ultimately
it is the soil that will determine the health of everything that grows
out of it, including the farm and the community.
We
realize the importance of working with nature, not against it.
Understanding and promoting the natural soil food web and nutrient cycling
in plants allows us to build robust farming systems healthy enough to
naturally fend off disease and insect pressure.
The soil is the great
connector of lives, the source and destination of all. It is the healer
and restorer, by which disease passes into health, age into youth, death
into life. Without proper care for it we can have no community, because
without proper care for it we can have no life.
Given only the health of
the soil, nothing that dies is dead for very long. Within this economy
it seems that death occurs only for the good of life. And having
followed the cycle around, we see that we have not only a description of
the fundamental biological process, but also a metaphor of great beauty
and power. It is impossible to contemplate the life of the soil for
very long without seeing it as analogous to the life of the spirit. No
less than the faithful of religion is the good farmer mindful of the
persistence of life through death, the passage of energy through
changing forms.
And this living topsoil-
living in both the biological sense and in the cultural sense- is the
basic element in the technology of farming.
- Wendell Berry
The Story Behind Our Name:
Ollin is an Aztec word meaning constant motion or transformation. We chose
this name for our farm because of our view of it as a living, changing
organism. No two days on the farm are ever the same and we are
constantly looking for ways to improve our products, services, and
sustainability. The Aztec civilization was a model for sustainable
agriculture. Back when organic farming was the only option, the Aztecs
found ways to efficiently farm difficult locations and were able to feed
huge populations by developing clever distribution systems to quickly get
food from the farmer to the consumer.
