Do you think that our current food system is sustainable?
In this episode, we take a look at the problems with our modern food system and ask whether or not we've created these issues ourselves. We also explore some potential solutions to these problems and how we can work together to create a more sustainable future.
Do you think that our current food system is sustainable?
In this episode, we take a look at the problems with our modern food system and ask whether or not we've created these issues ourselves. We also explore some potential solutions to these problems and how we can work together to create a more sustainable future.
Welcome back to the Grounded in Simplicity Podcast. I'm Danielle from the Rustic Elk joined by my good friend Bonnie from the Not So Modern Housewife. And we are here helping moms get back to basics and find joy and being less busy. And this week we are talking about whether or not we have created our own problems.
Bonnie Von Dohre:I think the thing is, is, like we can we can look at society as a whole. And we can realize that, obviously, like these are going to be generalities. And this doesn't like we're not saying that this is everyone's life, this is everyone's experience. But these are things to keep in mind when you are voting with your dollars. So our first problem being the problems with our food supply and having a scarcity mindset. I know we were kind of talking a little bit offline about talking about, there's this, there's this mindset, or this idea that you need to have money and resources to be able to have healthy food. One thing I've always admired is looking at third world countries, specifically a lot of these communities in Africa, and they are finding ways to grow vegetables by any means necessary. And so it's like, you know, what, if, if they can do it with almost no resources, then, you know, why can't I do it when I have the space to be able to do it. And I have, you know, the money and the resources and the knowledge. But yeah, you know, you go to these other parts of the world and nobody's doing it fancy, nobody's got raised beds, they're finding whatever containers, they can, they're growing it on their front staff, or they're growing it on their roof. And they, you know, one, they approach the problem with a mindset of wanting to solve the problem, like, find a solution. And I think this is something that I mean, really goes across the board, is, when you look at something you can either, like you can be discouraging, and you can point out all the things wrong with it, and all the ways that it's not going to work. Or you can go look at it from a problem solving standpoint, and look at the ways that you can get it to work. And a lot of these places that have no resources, they look at everything from the standpoint of how can I get this to work? Because failure is not an option for them.
Danielle McCoy:Right, that's kind of like here, you know, we only have an acre. And, you know, yes, we live in a first world country, yes, I can go to the grocery store and get food, hopefully I have money, I don't really, but you know, we'll pretend I do. And, but you know, at the same time, especially with all the food shortages that we had, and all of these things that have been going on in the world, and you know, all the recent events, failure isn't an option. So trying to find ways to make you know, it work where we're at, is, you know, I have to find ways to make it work. And if that means that I have to, you know, tear up my entire yard and grow things in places that I don't think they can grow with. And that's what I have to do, or if I have to, you know, build 50, chicken tractors and drag them around my yard and let them clear out a big space. So I can grow vegetables there, and, you know, move, move on to the next chicken tractor, etc. You know, there if there's a will there's a way. And I think, I think that we are, we're spoiled. Yeah, I mean, because even, you know, we go to the grocery. And we have, you know, endless amounts of food available that isn't necessarily even like food. And the way that we view, you know, our diets of needing X amount of calories and not thinking about the nutrition that's involved in those calories. And thinking, Well, you know, I can stuff 10 bags of chips in my cart, for the same price as one package of ground meat, then I'm going to buy the 10 bags of chips, because the chips are gonna go further than the ground meat is. But at the same time, those chips have like, no nutritional
Bonnie Von Dohre:value, right? Yeah. And that's, that's the thing too, is there's this idea that things shouldn't be hard. And if it's hard, then you're like, I can't do it. We just we don't like as a society as a whole. Again, not saying this across the board, but as a whole. Like, we don't think we should ever be uncomfortable. Yes. And if like the things that are uncomfortable are for other people. But it's like you, you have to be uncomfortable to grow. Otherwise you're going to be stuck at where you're at. Right? And you know what if you're okay with being stuck, right where you're at, that's fine. But then stop getting mad at me, because I'm working my butt off, and I'm accomplishing more. Right? Because you chose to stay stuck. I did not. Right. Yeah,
Danielle McCoy:we definitely, at least in the United States, of course, I don't know. You know, I would say probably most first world countries, we were all comfortable. We're all, you know, we're all we are all like, like you said, generalized statements. But we're all well fed. And we have, you know, all of these things right at our fingertips and nothing has to be hard. But at the same time, it's, you know, like, to me, it's not easy to go to the grocery store. Right. Like, I don't remember who it was one of the homesteading bloggers said something about choose your hard. Yeah, I mean, you have to choose your heart it to me, it's hard to go to the grocery store, it takes me all day, I have to drive, you know, a half hour, 45 minutes to the store, I have to spend two hours in the store, I have to make a list before I even go to the store, you got to put all your crap in the cart, you got to put all your crap on the belt, you got to put all your crap in bags, put it back in the car, put it in your car, bring it all the way back home, and then find places for it. That's hard to me. It's not, it's not any more difficult to me to go out to my garden, grab some vegetables, and either make them for dinner or canned them for later or freeze them, etc. Yeah, like you just tell me what difficult thing you want to do. Yeah.
Bonnie Von Dohre:I'm gonna like I'm going to even though we're talking about food, I'm going to use cloth diapering as an example for a second. Because, like you say, you know, choose your heart. And you know, what, if you decide that thing is gonna be your heart. But this is not the hit like this thing over here is not the hill that you're willing to die on. It's okay to choose convenience. And like, that's one thing that we want to make sure we get across with this podcast is you don't have to feel obligated to do all the things just because we're telling you to be uncomfortable. We're not telling you to like, push yourself to your limit.
Danielle McCoy:There's a difference between being uncomfortable and being overwhelmed. Right,
Bonnie Von Dohre:right, exactly. Like, you know, where I'm at right now. But, so, the cloth diapering example, with my really my two oldest, to me, it was so much easier to throw a load of diapers in the washing machine and wash them than having to go all the way to town to buy a case of diapers. Right? Like, I was like, I don't understand how anyone says that disposables are more convenient. When one they're ridiculously expensive. And two, all I have to do is run a load of laundry. Right? By the time I got to kid number three, cloth diapers were no longer the hill I was willing to die on. Because, you know, I, I went through a lot of mental health struggles after my daughter was born. And then I had a lot of physical health problems after my second son, my youngest was born. And so I just I got behind the laundry, and I just was not like, I had to I had to let something go. And that was the thing I had to let go. Right. I mean, there's it's okay, like,
Danielle McCoy:seasons in life, right? And that, you know, like, it's okay, if you go and went and bought a bag of bread at the store, instead of making your own three loaves every week, or whatever it is. I mean, you have to let things go. You have to, you know, learn the difference between pushing yourself into being in an uncomfortable place and pushing yourself into overwhelm, which is ultimately just going to make you burnout and quit. Right?
Bonnie Von Dohre:And I mean, that's like, you know, let's say you're starting a new habit, you're starting a new routine. When you're first starting that the hardest thing to do is get started. It's just to take that first step, the more steps you take. And the further along you get, and the more things become routine and become automatic for you. You can start to take on more things. And now, the stuff that was overwhelming to you a couple of years ago is not overwhelming now. So it's not to say you couldn't I mean, well, okay, yes, something sometimes they are, but
Danielle McCoy:sorry. I'm just thinking of our jobs.
Bonnie Von Dohre:I'm not going to get on a sidetrack because I could tell you all about my morning trying to label plant markers while my 11 year old is trying to like talk my ear off about whatever video game thing he's got going on right now. I'm like, I'm sorry. I've earbuds in. I'm listening to an audiobook. I don't hear anything you're saying. And yeah, he kept talking Anyway, um, yeah, so choosing our heart. So speaking of audiobooks, I'm actually I'm still working on Monty Don's book that I just forgot the name of. But anyway, one, one thing that I was just listening to him say yesterday was talking about how, you know, we design our garden, like around our kitchen and what we want to eat. And, and he's like, don't play what you're going to harvest off of, like, what you're going to cook for dinner. So don't like, have a meal plan and, and go, these are the ingredients I need. Because that's what's going to end up running us to the grocery store, because it's like, oh, well, I didn't grow that. So I gotta buy it, or it's not ready to harvest yet, so I gotta buy it. Right? Instead, go walk through your garden every day, pick, everything's ready to harvest and then decide what's for dinner? Yeah, so that's definitely one way that we can, like restructure our environment, to make this work better for us. And just, and make it more convenient, because if you, sometimes you really do have to, like reengineer your environment, so that the things you want to do or easier?
Danielle McCoy:Well, it's so hard, I think, because, you know, I think, as a society, we've been conditioned to think that all that food comes from the grocery store, like even people that I know, that were, you know, completely raised in this type of atmosphere and had gardens and all those things, still, you know, feel like, well, the food is at the grocery store. It's, you know what I mean? And so you don't think about the food could also be in my living room, or my backyard or my basement or whatever, like, a lot of people I know have HOAs, which I think are completely ridiculous. And they don't let them have gardens. But you know, where there's a will there's a way I think that, you know, if you want to bad enough, you're gonna find a container, and you're gonna grow a tomato in your window or something. Right. And you might not be everything. But
Bonnie Von Dohre:yeah, you may still end up buying tomatoes. But you're learning the skill of how to keep tomato plants alive. Right. And that's something that's, you know, it's better than nothing. Yeah, I mean, I was, I was fortunate to be able to grow up in a farming community. And I did go to farms a lot for you pick and stuff like that, so that I could, you know, I could buy in bulk and I could freeze and everything. But, yeah, I mean, at the same time, like I think about the, like, Hamburger Helper, and like the chunk that we ate in the 80s and 90s, and all the processed foods. And that was my normal back then. And yeah, like it took it took, like moving away and going out on my own to realize I didn't want to eat that stuff anymore.
Danielle McCoy:Right. But at the same time, that stuff can become so addicting. Well, rice,
Bonnie Von Dohre:sugar, so yeah. Hey, I'm I am. I'm not afraid to sugar. But I did try to you know, control it. I was just having that conversation with my husband this week is he's with gas prices, he's back to working home more. And I don't keep soda in the house. We'll drink it if we go out. Or maybe if we order a pizza, we'll pick up a couple of two liters. But as a general rule, it's just not something I buy on a regular basis. And he's like, you know, without being able to get sodas while I'm at work. I think I'm losing weight. I'm like, Gee, it's funny how that works.
Danielle McCoy:Imagine that.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Guess what? You drink more water? Or you're gonna last me for this? I'm drinking more water now. No, you're out of habit. I am. I set a habit on my phone. That I will drink a glass of water every morning as soon as I wake up before my coffee. And I find myself craving water.
Danielle McCoy:I told you I'm not gonna laugh at you. I'm just gonna talk to you so
Bonnie Von Dohre:drinking coffee now running on like three hours sleep. So
Danielle McCoy:it helps you be more awake though. Like if you drink a water first. But at least for me, if I drink a glass of water when you don't know
Bonnie Von Dohre:you're not willing to it I find I find that Adderall helps keep me awake more.
Danielle McCoy:That might be why you only slept for three hours but
Bonnie Von Dohre:no, it was definitely the last so let's see. Morrow so bad food.
Danielle McCoy:Well, yeah, we were we were talking about food I was gonna bring up that we talked a little bit about calories and how they're not all created equal. Oh, yes. How? Yes, the chips are cheaper than you know the little package hamburger but at the same time. Those calories aren't created equal. And I notice, I've been what groceries we buy for the store, and we're gonna buy even less now, because we just bought a cow, but the groceries that I buy the store, I've been ordering them, because then I'm not going in and impulse buying and buying junk food that I really, really really don't need or want to eat, I just see it. And especially if I take my kids, they'll see, you know, like snack cakes or potato chips or something that they just have, right. And when I go to the store, of course, I'm impulse buying too. But most of the impulse buys are junk that we don't really need at all. And my grocery bill is always higher, so that junk food costs more. You know, it leaves the house more quickly, because I have three kids, they want sugar, but at the same time, it costs more than when I'm just buying you know, ingredients to make meals or make things from scratch, etc. Then if I buy like convenience items, like even if it's apple sauce, if you buy the cups of apple sauce, versus the big jar of applesauce, the cups cost more.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Right. And considering how quickly my children go through a like, bottle of applesauce, there's no way I'm buying this little cups.
Danielle McCoy:Right? Exactly.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Well, and you know, honestly, I think that we have tricked ourselves into believing that this food is cheaper. When in reality, it's not like, I mean, we talked, you talked about the bag of potato chips, it's definitely nine ounces of food. And it's like $4 for that. That's like that's more expensive than hamburger. Right, bigger.
Danielle McCoy:Exactly. And it's more filling up front, you know, if you compare to apples to apples, if you're only eating a small portion of the hamburger, and you have passed around to everybody, and you weren't mixing it with anything else, like putting it in Chile or something, you know, to stretch it further, then of course, it's going to be more filling to eat the potato chips.
Bonnie Von Dohre:And I mean maybe like speaking of water, that's a cheap way that we can fill ourselves up and not consumed so many calories. And I mean, granted, yes, like, the recommendation, I think, is to drink glass of water before your dinner or something like that. But not just that, like the the meals that you can cook where you can incorporate more liquid, it's or more fiber and more vegetables, things like that is you know is gonna fill you up more. And then you're not having to use as much meat. Like, you know, I'm trying to figure out how I can stretch my grocery budget for the week. And so I went and I bought four pounds of hamburger and that is going to make at least four meals for my entire family. And you know, I'm gonna mix it with like I've got canned diced tomatoes, and I've got barley and I've got like the frozen diced vegetables and stuff. There's things I'm going to add in to each of those recipes, so that we will
Danielle McCoy:be filled up. Alright, you're not saying hamburger patties with it. Right? Or meatloaf. Make Meatloaf? I know
Bonnie Von Dohre:I can make way Well, I don't know I'm we are when we make meatloaf. It doesn't go a long ways. I think that's the problem. Yeah. It's just well the problem. I mean, my family will it given if left to their own devices. My family will sit there and eat just a slab of meat and no vegetables or anything else.
Danielle McCoy:But I don't have a problem. Thankfully,
Bonnie Von Dohre:like so this is like this is why I make shepherd's pie. It's the only way and get my husband eat Lima beets.
Danielle McCoy:You put lima beans and your shepherd's pie? Yes. Although I don't think
Bonnie Von Dohre:I have any lime beans this time. Fine. It tastes good, whatever. I don't like
Danielle McCoy:it. I'm with your husband on this.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Well, and like recipes like that. So like my, my grandmother was born and raised in Ireland, she came to the States and when she was 17. And she just her family lives on this little like two room house on inish turf off the coast of Kelly mayo. And I think she's one of like six kids. So you want to talk about like stretching a food but the food budget and living thrifty like she was the master at it. And anytime we would go to stay with her. All of the leftovers for the week, would all go into a pot. And that pot would like become some kind of dinner by the end of the week. And I'm pretty sure that's really where the original recipe for shepherd's pie. And probably a lot of other things probably were the original recipe for jumbo Elia and chili and all of our regional dishes. Were just ways to use up the leftovers. Right. And I think we've I think we even mentioned a different episode like talking about ways to make a roast and then like use it in three meals.
Danielle McCoy:I think we'd use chicken.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah, we talked about chicken but you can do it. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, there there are ways to me and you No, I
Danielle McCoy:think another thing is a lot of people think that we need, you know, tomatoes in the middle of January. And tomatoes cost more in the middle of January than they do in the middle of June.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Unless you're in Florida. Well, yeah,
Danielle McCoy:but I'm talking about normal people body.
Bonnie Von Dohre:All right to show Floridians are not normal.
Danielle McCoy:But regardless, you know, for you, it would be a bad idea to buy tomatoes in the middle of June, I would imagine, because they're not in season in Florida, in
Bonnie Von Dohre:the middle of our seasons over by June, right. So
Danielle McCoy:you know, same thing goes by them in season, even if you're buying them from the grocery store, and it's gonna be less expensive than buying them out of season. So you know, right, think about that in advance, you know, and make extra so that, you know, like, buy a little bit extra, if it's on sale, even if you're not going to use it right. Now, you can take that extra portion, you can put it in the freezer, and you can, you know, use it later. I mean, as long as you're cooking the food and using the food, then you're stretching your food dollars, the same amount of space.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Right? And I mean, obviously, like, if you don't have the freezer space, if you don't have the equipment to can or whatever, you're not going to be able to store stuff around, right, or as much stuff. And so, you know, you're you're gonna have to live even more seasonally, you know, and that's just, that's just the reality of it. Because I mean, I think we've seen that our, our food supply is not guaranteed. And I mean, the fact that we're two years into this, and I'm still seeing empty shelves, and I mean, and honestly, like, as a retailer, I'm still getting I'm still have delays, getting supplies and things from my suppliers. Like it's like, I don't know why it's still broken two years later, but and the way current world events are going, it may get even more broken before it gets better. But you know, and that's, I think that's why community is so important.
Danielle McCoy:Yeah, but we have our talking points,
Bonnie Von Dohre:that I was like, we should probably should like, move along, if you're buying from local community, or bartering, or whatever you're doing. But if you're getting stuff locally, you really have no choice where to live seasonally, because there if it's not in season, they're not selling it.
Danielle McCoy:I bought it so much. It's so much cheaper to live seasonally. And it's and it's healthier, to live seasonally than it is to try to eat tomatoes in the middle of January, there's like no nutritional value, because they were grown and picked, you know, when they were still green. And right away,
Bonnie Von Dohre:say there's no nutritional value, but as much as right. And I mean, I would still say you know, if you just gotta have your tomatoes, the middle of the winter, again, it goes back to the Choose your heart. But it's better than nothing. But ideally, you know, yes, we'll want to try to go towards eating seasonally. But you know what, I like guacamole. And a lot of times the guacamole is coming from Mexican avocados. So it is what it is. Right.
Danielle McCoy:I mean, you know, there's certain things that but you know, at the same time, if it wasn't available to you, it wouldn't be the
Bonnie Von Dohre:end of the world. Right? You find ways to work around it.
Danielle McCoy:Exactly. Which brings us to that lovely community and how nobody seems to want community anymore.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yes. Well, I mean, it's, Look, I get it, there are just some people that are hard to like, and I am an introvert, and I will avoid crowds. And I will avoid going to town on the weekends because it's two people out there. But when I find my people, like I, I feel seen. And I can spend all day with my people. The hard thing is the number of people out there who see this lifestyle and are just like, you know, you're wasting your time you're wasting your money. This is costing you too much money, you know, just, you know, just all across the board. And that's, you know, and I don't want to spend time with those people because again, like they're not looking at anything from a problem solving mindset. They're just looking at everything that's wrong with the lifestyle that I've chosen or everything that could go wrong,
Danielle McCoy:right. We're everything that's wrong with the world and you're not fixing it. I'm trying to right Yeah,
Bonnie Von Dohre:right. And you know, I'm a murderer and why am I harming innocent animals when I can just go buy meat from Walmart.
Danielle McCoy:I'm pretty sure we're on the you shouldn't buy meat. it all now? I'm pretty sure that's
Bonnie Von Dohre:Oh, that's right. We're supposed to be eating lentils. Yes. Yeah.
Danielle McCoy:Yeah, they're apparently contrary to scientific proof. Definitely nutritionally equivalent to protein.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Here's the thing, folks, I haven't I got an A in my college nutrition class. There are no plant based proteins that are a complete protein. Now, you like the reason beans and rice are so popular and low, low income areas? Or why they gained popularity in low income areas? Is Yes, when you combine a starch and Elysium, then you get a mostly complete protein. But it's still it's still rice and beans at the end of the day.
Danielle McCoy:I'm not getting into this. I will get on a soapbox.
Bonnie Von Dohre:It's I mean, and what really gets me is like, people that are like, Oh, well, if you're doing this, if you're like, if you're raising animals for meat, then you must not care about the animals. No, I'm raising animals for meat, because I care about the animals. Like, I, I saw how commercial animals were being raised. And like, I was, like, you know, what, if I can, if I can keep even some animals from that being there, the only life they know, then it's better than nothing. Right? I mean, I'm not going to stop Purdue and Tyson from their, you know, mass production of meat, chickens. But if I can have, you know, my couple dozen over here that are enjoying a free range life are enjoying sunshine and grass and fresh air and all this before it's time, then at least I'm giving that couple dozen chickens a better life. Right, you know. But, yeah, so I don't know, I don't know how he kind of got off. But the thing is, like, we can't we just we can't shun all community. Like we need. We need community and there's a definite purpose for it in this lifestyle. But you have to find your tribe. Like you have to find your people.
Danielle McCoy:It baffles me that people want to live in urban areas. But they don't want.
Bonnie Von Dohre:community don't want to. They don't want to deal with people. Well,
Danielle McCoy:there's, like, I don't understand that. I want to live in a rural area for lots of reasons. But part of this because I'm an introvert and don't do well in crowds and urban areas make me cringe.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah, same here. You know, and I mean, like, society as a whole has changed so much. Because, you know, and granted, I don't, I guess maybe it's just because of where I grew up. I grew up in a farming community. It was nothing for someone to just stop by because they saw your car in the driveway, they wanted to say hi.
Danielle McCoy:Right? Even in rural areas, that's not so common anymore.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Well, right. That's the thing. Like, if my neighbors are stopping by my house, it's probably going to be to tell me what I'm doing wrong. Or like to criticize something,
Danielle McCoy:or that your dog is out or something, right?
Bonnie Von Dohre:Like, no one's coming to see me. And or no one's like, wants to ask me a question. It's, we've become a very self centered society where it's all about how everything affects me. And I don't know, like we have to. I mean, I think we correct that by getting back to community. But like, we need to stop looking at everything from our own lens. Like we need to kind of look, have more empathy, look at things from another person's point of view. We're not all gonna do things the same. And I mean, honestly, like, one thing that has really driven me nuts with the homesteading trend is the pet livestock trend that's gone along with it. Because now, like, that's the standard that we're supposed to hold all of our livestock to. Right? And if it's not necessarily the what's best for them, it's just what makes us feel better as humans. Like, we're treating them like a human child. Then we see that as we're, we're doing the best thing for them. When in reality, the best thing for them is to go live out in a herd and do do goat things. Do pig things like
Danielle McCoy:Right, right. I think We, because we've gotten so detached from our food, because everybody buys it at the grocery store. I think it's very, very difficult for us to detach our emotions from it. Right. And, you know, I think, I mean, I see a lot of people that say that they could never butcher an animal. Because it makes them uncomfortable. But here we are, again, at the you have to do things that make you uncomfortable. Right. And, you know, I don't, I don't feel like it's right to pawn that responsibility off on somebody else.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Right. And I mean, killing it. Killing anything should not be easy and comfortable.
Danielle McCoy:Right, exactly. Like it's not like we're sitting there smiling and laughing and carrying on carrying on.
Bonnie Von Dohre:I mean, okay, yeah, maybe when we're posing for a picture, but like, I mean, again, that's a that's a snapshot. And I'm smiling because otherwise the resting bitchface takes over. Okay. I need to smile, otherwise, everyone's gonna ask me what's wrong. All right.
Danielle McCoy:But I hate my husband does that
Bonnie Von Dohre:it's just my face. My face is distraught. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make that face out loud. Yeah, it's, you know, honestly, I have my husband do most of the killing part. Because I have a hard time with it.
Danielle McCoy:Yeah, you know, my husband also does most of the killing but you know, once he, you know, like, when we're doing chickens once, once they bleed out, it's, you know, I'm, I'm writing they're doing the process, and I can do it, I have done it, but not writing not my favorite thing. Like, like, usually goes
Bonnie Von Dohre:faster. So I like it's more humane to have him do it.
Danielle McCoy:Right. Like, when we go hunting, he usually does the hunting. Sorry. And I finally shot a deer. And I remember, I just I shook for like, three hours. So I mean, it's not easy, guys. It's not like, you know, we're going out, you know, all excited that we're going to take life, it's more that we know, that we need to eat. And you know, and yes, there's food in the grocery store. But that food in the grocery store lived a far worse life than any of the food that you find out in the wild, or that was raised on a small family farm. You know, even if it was only the end of their lives that were terrible. You know, they still, you know, the food at the grocery store lived a terrible life in comparison to the food that you raise yourself or was raised on a small farm near you or, you know, whatever. Yeah. And we have to realize that, you know, we all there's circled alive and we all have to eat.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yes. Well, and like if you look back at the Native Americans when they were hunting and stuff, like they would actually say a prayer every time. You know, they harvested, right? Because, like they weren't acknowledging that that animal gave its life to sustain our lives. Right. It was like it was a it was a passing of the lifeforce energy. So yeah. And so, I mean, I still think I think that's one thing that we have the honor of being able to experience as homesteaders and raising our own meat is that we can, we can understand the significance of that.
Danielle McCoy:Right. And I think that's, you know, kind of where we get into, you know, whether or not we should be eating meat, protein, et cetera, et cetera, is because your, you know, your average person hasn't experienced that they haven't experienced how animals should be raised. You know, they only see you know, the big broad picture of, you know, like CAFOs and things like that, and it's not, that's not how they should be raised. You know, we're fighting the same fight in that arena. Because, you know, we don't like it. They don't like it. I don't think anybody really like I don't even think the farmers that actually do it like it it's just a means to an end. This episode
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Danielle McCoy:That's the number one problem that chickens have. If they're not ill, and it's not winter, is they're just stressed out?
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah. So, you know, it's, there's a lot of like, so I think I think that farmers are doing their best, I mean, grania they are, you know, they're having to do things on such a large scale nowadays, that they, they have to, like, they can't give everything that personal attention that we can do on a small scale. Right? You know, it's kind of like why I get really annoyed with people that are giving chicken advice, but like, they only have six chickens.
Danielle McCoy:Like, I didn't even start with six chickens.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Right? It's just, it's like, you know, you have to do things so much differently, the more you get, right, and the larger scale you expand to. So it's, you know, it's easy to say, hey, you need to like pick up your chickens every single day, and make sure they have good weight and make sure they don't have lice, and you know, all this kind of stuff. It's like, when you got 50 chickens, you're not picking up 50 chickens every single day. Like, that's what I mean, I had a hard day,
Danielle McCoy:I had a whole seven rabbits and didn't catch the eye infection until, you know, like three, three or four days into open eyes. Because even though there's only seven. I mean, I grabbed them and look at them. But it's not something that you necessarily notice. You know what I mean, right? Well, when you got
Bonnie Von Dohre:all of them, right, they're all in varying stages of the eye opening. And rabbits learn, like constantly moving. I was trying to get a picture of some of our new little kits this morning. And I just don't know how to do it as a video. Because the one just kept jumping, like their eyes are still closed. Right. But it felt that it felt me pull the hair back off of the nest and so just jumping in place. So yeah, I mean, it's stuff happens like it. We don't intend for it to happen.
Danielle McCoy:All right, but we're all you know, we're only human. We're not, you know, nobody's perfect and right. I put up the monocropping cropping and globalization of food because we kind of went off on that and started
Bonnie Von Dohre:to I know, cut, like, everything's getting blended together. Yeah,
Danielle McCoy:that's all right. I see this anyways. Well, that's
Bonnie Von Dohre:true. If you're, if you if you're just listening to us, you can actually go to my YouTube channel that also modern housewife and see our lovely bullet points on the screen.
Danielle McCoy:Farmers you know, regardless, I, I love monocropping I think it's the bane of human existence, because, you know, we've depleted our soils. And it requires all these petrochemicals in order to be, you know, efficient and productive and have high yields so that we can, you know, feed the masses. And I think it's a terrible it's a terrible farming model, in my opinion, but at the same time, I realized that farmers that are doing this are just trying to do their best. Yeah, well, of course, because
Bonnie Von Dohre:well, right. I mean, yeah, there's got to be able to pay the bills and feed their families. Right. Yeah. And it's like, you know, I, I actually remember when the no till movement really started to gain ground in the 90s. When like when when roundup really became popular because the farmers I mean for for generations, but especially like this last 3040 years, have been dealing with their kids don't want to take over the farm. And they're having and yet like they're their buyers like their grain buyers or milk buyers or whoever they have, like They're like, you have to produce more, or else you're not worth the pickup to us. Right, they have to do a certain scale just to be able to sell their product. Because otherwise, the people don't want to come and pick it up from them, because it's not worth the gas to come and get it apparently. And so they're having to they're having to farm 1000s of acres to keep up with demand and to have enough product to be able to sell. But they're having to do it with less and less physical labor. Right. So they're having to rely on more equipment and anything that can cut out that that labor costs are that Lina that labor piece of it. Right? So yeah, we've become reliant on mono cropping, because you can't exactly run a combine through a field that's been companion planted, because now you've got beans and corn going into the same Hopper, and that's not gonna work. Right. And then you know, and, and the big selling point with the no till movement is, hey, you can cut out steps, you don't have to till your fields before you plant anymore, because you can just spray this, it'll kill the weeds. And oh, look, we've actually developed these soybeans in this corn that won't be killed by our pesticide or herbicide. Yeah. So now you don't have to worry about weeds choking out your crops, just spray this over the top and everything will be fine. Like it just it just progressed. But again, it was sold as look at how much labor and time we can save you.
Danielle McCoy:And how high are your productivity? Right? Because in farming, it's all about yield and how much right? Well, we're, you know, snuffed out by weeds, the more yield and the higher yield, the more money you make there,
Bonnie Von Dohre:there is this narrative that without, without GMOs, we can't produce enough food to feed the world. The problem with that is, I mean, yes, I realize, in a lot of ways here in the US, we have, we have been able to increase the amount of food we produce per acre. I'm not necessarily convinced that GMOs had a hand in that. And you can also see other countries that were sold GMOs as you know, this Godsend that's going to solve all their problems. And, I mean, in put all these farmers out of business, and I mean, a lot of them ended up having to file bankruptcy, and they committed suicide, because the crops fail, or they
Danielle McCoy:put in India was a big one.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah. I mean, you're talking about a culture where just failure is not an option, like, it's not that they don't have a backup. But so much like they put such a high moral value on your productivity, that you are literally worthless as a person if you cannot produce and provide for your family. So it's not it's not the perfect solution that we want to pretend it is.
Danielle McCoy:Well, you know, you start looking at all these countries that have banned them and don't import our crops, because, you know, there's no guarantee of violence.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah, right. Well, there's
Danielle McCoy:no guarantee even I know, I think it was in Canada. There's no guarantee that rapeseed from Canada is going to be non GMO, because there's so much GMO rapeseed in Canada. I know, it's Canada. And I know it's right, that they stopped being able to export to certain countries anymore, even if they had organic or non GMO, because there's no guarantee that it is because it's all it's right next to one another. And there's all this cross pollination going on. And there's no guarantee
Bonnie Von Dohre:that Yeah, and I mean, that's what we've run into issues with soybeans and corn, like, okay, yes. Like, technically speaking, you cannot buy GMO seed. Unless you are under a contract for like, you have to sign a contract for it. But that doesn't mean that it hasn't cross pollinated, and hurt the genetic components of non GMO seeds. Right. And like, I know, for instance, Baker Creek rare seeds.com, they, they test their corn, their heirloom corn to make sure that it does not contain GMO, genetic material. And there are a number of corn varieties that they have stopped selling, because they could not find any of the seed that was not cross pollinated with GMOs. Right. I mean, it's not to say that it doesn't exist, you know, there. There are still corn and soybeans out there that are non GMO. But it's it's something that we have to keep in mind that it's like this isn't. This isn't the innocent thing that they want us to think it is.
Danielle McCoy:No, I mean, at least I don't. I don't think it is, I think that you know, but it's a problem that we've created for ourselves because, you know there. We've globalized Dude to the point of no return. And but at the same time, now we have all of these GMO crops and things that we can't even export to different countries. And so these countries are having to produce their own. And I think, you know, at least here in the US, you know, a lot of people look at GMOs as you know, this panacea still, and I don't really think they are, I think we have to farm on such a large scale most of the time, or it looks like we do that we don't see a way around it. But I think, you know, if we looked at things from a more, you know, regenerative agriculture type of thing, and more people were involved in the production of food instead of, you know, what is it like less than 2% of our population farms, right? If we're involved in in the production of food, instead of everybody thinking that food comes from the grocery store. And that kind of goes back to the whole community thing. And, you know, being more involved in the community and realizing that, you know, somebody told me a long time ago that without globalizing food that half the world wouldn't eat. I don't think that's true. I think that there is a change. Right, exactly. We might not be eating bananas and avocados. But, you know, I think, I think if we looked at it from less of a scarcity mindset, and started looking at it from a more abundant mindset, we would realize that, you know, if we're willing to choose our heart and put some work in a lot of these problems that we have with rising food costs, and shortages and fuel costs, and all these things, and fertilizer and grain and all these things that have like gone sky high, I don't think it would be as big of a problem. Not saying it wouldn't exist, it just wouldn't be as noticeable.
Bonnie Von Dohre:I mean, I think if we had the resources, we wouldn't be in a better position to be able to opt out. Right? Like, oh, you know, oh, sorry, that, you know, the flower is too expensive. And so I'm going to use my alternative instead. All right, you know, as an example. I mean, like you mentioned, regenerative agriculture, and the thing that I see most common is there's this idea that it's not possible to do it on a large scale. And I mean, my thing is like, nature has provided us everything, we need to be able to produce food, and be able to grow food. Like if you, if you left, a forest whose own devices like it would create its own food forest, essentially, the things would pop up where they thrive the best. And other things would grow in other areas. There's one theory that the rain forest is actually a food forest that was planted by the native tribes. Because like, there's the the placement of trees, and the spread, like the the availability of like certain trees and certain species and areas where they don't believe they're originally native things like that. And and they were, I mean, granted, yes, I realized that was during a time when we had a much lower population. But I, I think that if, again, if enough people approached it from a problem solving mentality, and looked at, okay, how, like, how can we recreate this on a large scale? Or to what scale? Could we recreate this? Then I think we'd be a lot better off because otherwise, I can see us burning all of the fertility out of the soil. If we keep it the rate we're going.
Danielle McCoy:We pretty much have. Yeah,
Bonnie Von Dohre:I mean, yeah.
Danielle McCoy:I mean, I mean, I look out at the fields around here, and there's there's not
Bonnie Von Dohre:there decibels. Yeah.
Danielle McCoy:I mean, yeah. And, you know, we're creating the same problem that we had, you know, that led to the Great Depression, during the Great Depression, because we've, you know, depleted our soil to the point where, you know, how do you fix it, and I don't think that you can fix it without animal agriculture. First off, because you need those inputs that you cannot get from, you know, petrochemicals, you just you can't, right. I mean,
Bonnie Von Dohre:honestly, like, can we really do chop and drop on 1000s of acres? That's, I mean, yes, sure. Maybe we can maybe like maybe go and take all the corn silage and spread it all over the fields. And, and replant. I mean, you know, maybe someone out there has figured out the science and that's our solution to large scale regenerative agriculture. But yeah, it's one that Megan that I follow on, I think I think her name is like Megan dairy girl or something like that on tick tock. And she gets she gets all the people coming out of the woodwork that want to slam on commercial dairy production, right. Meanwhile, I want to come live in her dairy barn but that's just for cows have waterbeds.
Danielle McCoy:Oh wow. Um,
Bonnie Von Dohre:but anyway, so or I think it's technically her parents, the parents barn, she actually just moved her herd, to her fiance's farm because they're getting married, but whatever. So, so a lot of people come on her Tiktok talking about how, like the cows are causing global warming, you know, don't worry about the cities and the smog, and the fuel and all the, you know, Petro, gasoline and all this. It's the cows. So, and she like, I think her degree was in it was in dairy science. But she's like, she's very good at the Science piece of dairy operations and everything. And they're, like, the entire dairy industry is actually going to be carbon neutral, like in the next five years, because of the amount of manure that they're turning around and like putting onto their fields.
Danielle McCoy:Because cows sequester carbon, it's a thing.
Bonnie Von Dohre:And, yeah, like, yeah, they, it balances. I mean, really, the only piece they have to figure out or they have to work towards now is, like getting the barns as energy efficient as possible, right. But just, like, if we're just talking about the methane that cows produce, they're offsetting it by spraying that manure on the field, which is also the same, the same field they're using to grow the food for the cows, and, you know, whatever else, they're also good, right?
Danielle McCoy:I think if more people, you know, instead of thinking of things and how we can do things on such a large scale, like we could do a smaller scale a lot more. Right? Well, you know, accomplish the same, the same means to the same end, because, you know, you start to feed people and not every, I realize not everybody wants to farm not everybody wants to have a garden and all those things. But, you know, we use our landmass in such terrible way. Like it's, and then, you know, we keep getting people out of farming. And so fewer people are growing even more food than they were, you know, a decade ago. And it just keeps getting less and less and less as we burn, you know, make this big urban areas, we have all this urban sprawl that eats up even more lands that could have been used, you know, more efficiently to actually feed people instead of, you know, having a pavement paradise. Yeah,
Bonnie Von Dohre:I mean, that's like that's becoming a huge problem here in Florida is I don't, I don't think a lot of people realize that Florida was one of the top beef producers in the country. And I mean, granted, like, yes, our orange groves have taken a hit because of citrus greening. And there was a push to convert a lot of those groves to peaches. But more and more, we're just seeing the groves ripped up and sold to developers. And the same thing with the cattle ranchers. So you know, they can't like they, they can't keep up with the sprawl that's happening. I mean, they're getting, you know, whether they sell or not, everything's gonna get developed up around them.
Danielle McCoy:Like when we when we lived in Bozeman, my husband worked for the dairy company there, he was a truck driver for him. And his boss told him that dairy used to be in the middle of nowhere, right, and now it's in the middle of town. And it just keeps getting worse and worse. And the sprawl just keeps spreading in what used to be an itty bitty little Western farming community with, you know, big dairy farms and cattle, beef and all those things, is now this big, you know, urban center in the middle of absolutely nowhere. But, you know, it's, you know, very, very populated and, you know, for the size of it and what used to be farmland, no longer is that all got taken up by, you know, housing and, you know, businesses and all of these things that,
Bonnie Von Dohre:yeah, when I first moved down here, I lived on a horse farm in Tampa, and it was on the end of the dead end road. And we had an orange grove next door, which we could go riding in the Orange Grove, but you went out out our street, and it was, I mean, we're full on in the middle of town. Right. And ultimately, like, we had a, essentially an orphanage on the one side of us. They call it children's home. So but there were families that lived there, but then who actually worked for the orphanage and then there were the kids who don't live there. But once the owners of the citrus grove made the decision that they were going to sell and move up here to Brooksville. Then, like the farm that I lived on, it was only 10 acres and she's like, I might as well sell too because I don't want to have houses right there next to the horsepower ARDS, right? You know, and that's not to mention, like, you get people that end up building right up against a farm, all of a sudden, like, you're getting all these calls because of the smell the flies, you know, and all of the form things, right?
Danielle McCoy:That's literally just part of producing your food.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Right. And I mean, guess what, like, I mean, those stalls were cleaned twice a day, the manure was hauled out once a week, you know, everything was immaculate, but there still going to be flies and smell, it's just, it is what it is not to mention dust during the dry season. And it's just not worth dealing with that headache. Because someone like someone is going to get a wild hair up their butt and decide to make your life miserable.
Danielle McCoy:I mean, we definitely have a lot of urban sprawl here, you know, especially, you know, you get down around the Indianapolis area, or up in Fort Wayne, or over towards Chicago, and Hammond and Gary. But here, what I've noticed is in the rural areas, like where we live, the farmer's children sold off an acre with a house on it, and maybe a barn, and I kept the rest of it and the cash crop everything,
Bonnie Von Dohre:though, yeah. So you can't
Danielle McCoy:buy like it's very, very difficult to find large tracts of land in Indiana, well, in northern Indiana anyway. And if you do, it's harder than heck to buy them, because there are no comparable properties to them. And so a bank doesn't want to lend money on a 25 acre property, because everything around you is one. So it makes it difficult for people that do want to do something and actually, you know, try to, you know, farm it in some way regeneratively or however, and have their own little, you know, homestead or community or whatever it may be, it makes it very, very difficult.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah. Do you guys have cough tax there? Do you know? No, I
Danielle McCoy:don't think so.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Is the thing in Ohio, and I can't ever it's commercial agriculture, something. So basically, your property taxes are based off of the value of the crop that you sell that year. And what ends up happening in Ohio is like, they'll have, you know, pretty standard years where the taxes stay the same. And then maybe one year, like prices shoot up. And now, they're taxed on that higher value for for the crop. And then that's when all of a sudden you start seeing these little lots on the outskirts of fields go up for sale and end up with houses on him. Because they had to sell off a few acres to pay the taxes for that year.
Danielle McCoy:I don't think that we do. I don't know anybody specifically that owns a farming business that could tell me otherwise? And we certainly don't. But I don't think we have that we may have in the past.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah, it kind of I don't agree with it. I mean, granted, one, I've been out of Ohio for a while. And I don't like totally understand it. But one thing that I noticed the most when I went up. Or one time when I went up is there used to be buffers between areas like to control runoff and control erosion. And this was one of those years where they were going to end up having to owe a lot more in taxes. So they started plowing into those buffers to try to plant as much crop as possible, because they were going to have to sell more to pay more taxes that year. And the problem that I see is that now you're have less erosion control. And it's going to be harder on the ecosystem in the long run. And I mean, honestly, I feel like that's just a government created problem, like the way that they've set that
Danielle McCoy:tax up. I think most things are government created problems, but
Bonnie Von Dohre:well. So yes, I guess to sum up, I mean, the biggest thing with any of these is definitely like one, if you're if you're buying your food shop or your dog or vote with your dollars, you know if like if you don't agree with the practice, practices of a certain product practices of a certain company, then don't support that company. Right. And I'm not saying like we all need to jump on social media and declare that everyone boycotts X, Y and Z because honestly, I hate that. It's very rarely based on facts. It's always based on someone's emotional opinion and, you know, a decision they made the spur of the moment. But also, like, it doesn't have to be an all or nothing, either. You know, if if all you can do is produce a little bit more of your food, then that's just less that's going towards the big operations or going towards, you know, supporting a system that you don't agree with.
Danielle McCoy:Right Got it, you know, it gets you closer to being able to opt out eventually, even if you're not in a position to do so no. So that in the future, you'll already have that knowledge. Even if you just did you know, the bare minimum little bit that you were able to do when you were able to do it.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yeah. And for the parts that you can't do find members of your community that can help with those parts. Right, like, even outside of your comfort zone.
Danielle McCoy:Yes, yes. But even like a lot of local farmers markets and stuff, they take food stamps, and snap, and all of those things, almost any vendor, you know, there are ways to, you know, spend your food dollars in a more local economy. So that you're not because, you know, in one way, shape or form, you're paying for that globalized food economy. Right, because you're, you're paying for it to travel all this miles you're paying for, you know, you're paying for it nutritionally, because the products, while they do have nutritional value, are nutritionally inferior to something that was grown locally, especially if it was grown locally, in an organic or regenerative way, based off, you know, as opposed to something that was grown, you know, halfway around the world and was raised, using petrochemicals to spray all the weeds to kill them off. And all of those different things. I mean, you know, you have to learn to use your money more, more wisely, I
Bonnie Von Dohre:guess. Yeah, I mean, really, like, the more your food has to travel, the more it's going to be impacted by like increased fuel costs. So if you're buying locally, yes, that farmer may have had to pay more in fertilizer or pay more in, you know, diesel for the tractor, or whatever. But it's still a whole lot better than what it actually costs to ship stuff across the country or across the world.
Danielle McCoy:Right. And, you know, find your people and, you know, find, find a community and look into, you know, community gardens and things like that if you're in a more urban or suburban area, so that, you know, you can learn those skills where there's a will there's a way you have to get out of your comfort zone. I don't like people either. So.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yes, sometimes, I don't know. I can say sometimes you have to grin and bear it. But I even get in trouble when I just tried to grin and bear it. So well. Yeah.
Danielle McCoy:But you know, your your people are out there. They might not be where you expect to find them. They might not be, you know, exactly like you, of course, but
Bonnie Von Dohre:you might be in Florida on your people might be in Indiana. Yeah.
Danielle McCoy:See. But yeah, I'll have people here. But that's another thing, though, you know, your community to in our modern world, your community does not necessarily have to be right there. Yes, you need community right there. So that, you know, you can maybe learn to work together to provide your food and all of those things. But at the same time, you know, like, I can text Bonnie and ask her a question.
Bonnie Von Dohre:And she does.
Danielle McCoy:Bonnie doesn't ask me questions. And then I
Bonnie Von Dohre:turn around, and I turn around and texture coffee meme, and tick tock videos.
Danielle McCoy:You keep me sane.
Bonnie Von Dohre:It's usually because Bonnie is just trying to keep her head above water. Let's just face it.
Danielle McCoy:I gave up. I gave up trying to do that. All right, you can find them online, too.
Bonnie Von Dohre:Yes. Are there no weeks, and sometimes you find them online, and then you meet them in person? Sometime that's actually pretty much how I met most of my local chicken and goat people. Yeah, in my local horse people.
Danielle McCoy:We I've done that with a few people where we found hay or meat or something and met people. I met them online. And then you know, we ended up meeting because they lived locally. So Right. So yeah, that's possible. It's possible, but we created our own problems. Well, to sum it up.
Bonnie Von Dohre:All right. I mean, I can't say things were working perfectly. 100 years ago, we just had a different set of problems. Oh, yeah. I don't, I don't necessarily think that things change for the better in all regards. So
Danielle McCoy:no, I think we have, you know, our so called solutions have actually made problems worse and compounded them and created more and more problems. And then we try to come up with more solutions. And you know, because humans are obviously smarter than nature. We like to think so. Yeah, no, I think that's the biggest problem of all.
Bonnie Von Dohre:We all want to play God. And it doesn't work
Danielle McCoy:that way. No, it never works out in the end.
Bonnie Von Dohre:All right, well, I think that is it for this week. And we'll catch you next time. Thank you for listening to this episode of the ground and simplicity podcast. If we were able to help you in any way, please share this episode with a friend. And also leave us a review on Apple podcasts. You can also join us over on Patreon at grounded simplicity, and help to support this podcast as well as become a patron and get a behind the scenes look at the creation of our podcast and even have some input on future episodes.