Chapter Three

Water and Earthworks

W ater is life. The saying has become a cliché,

but its profundity cannot be overstated.
Think galactically for a moment: Earth is the rare and
and the latter location receives a third of that volume
across the entire year via less intense storms. Think
Southeast Asia versus Great Britain.
tiny blue ball teeming with life amid a solar system—at
least—of rocky gaseous orbs. It is Earth and only
Earth—so far as we know—that is three-quarters water.
Brittleness and
Planet Water. It should therefore be unsurprising that the Quest for Resiliency
nearly all life systems have evolved to harvest, utilize, The most useful way I have found for understanding
and cycle water and the nutrients that are soluble in water’s impact on a place and consequently how to
water. A resilient homesteader and designer, then, must work with it is through the scale of “brittleness.” In
be a water process facilitator. Through an awareness of a world of well-designed water systems, deserts grow
how water affects living systems, we must orchestrate into forests. It is important to remember that many
the interplay of systems in a manner that is vitalized droughts and certainly many of their acute impacts
rather than limited by its presence. are human created. I first heard a place character-
Nothing defines the nature of a place more than water. ized as being brittle or nonbrittle from Allan Savory,
The quantity, qualities, forms, distribution, and intensity the founder of holistic resource management. Having
of its entry into a landscape determine nearly everything done work in some of the most difficult areas of Africa
else that happens ecologically in a place. Though there and having learned how to reverse desertification, Mr.
are many physical aspects of a place, including the type Savory is intimately aware of the interplay among water,
of bedrock, soils, and climate, it is the play of water that climate, and place. His work has resulted in significant
most directly determines an ecosystem’s behavior and regeneration across a range of climates, particularly in
capacity for production or regeneration. Thus, the most harsh desertifying areas of eastern Africa.
optimal design within which to fit human activities in a A brittle landscape is not simply a dry one but one
place starts and ends with water. in which regeneration naturally occurs more slowly. In
To design for and with water, first we must under- simple terms, this means: You clear a forest; you get
stand how to read the tendencies and behaviors of a desert. This is true for the vast majority of acreage
a place as they relate to its hydrology. This is not as between the Mississippi River and the Pacific coast
simple as the sheer volume of water received; a site ranges of the Sierra and Cascades in the United States.
with 120 inches of rain per year can be less resilient In a nonbrittle (resilient) landscape, the rate at which
(more brittle) than a location with 50 inches a year if the ecosystem can rebuild biomass and biodiversity is
the former location receives most of those 120 inches comparably high. Think of New England or the Pacific
in a short period of time via heavy storms (monsoonal) Northwest. There, you cut down a forest and a new one
76 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

grows up in its place even with no replanting or seed- and soil moisture availability across time. Such “humid-
ing. These are places where moss grows on north- and ity distribution” can take many forms, and this chapter
east-facing slopes, where the growing season is short, will focus on each of them individually.
and the dormant (read: rotting and soil accumulation) The challenge and opportunity represented by water
season is short. These are places where precipitation in the landscape can be grasped most easily if you think
usually exceeds evaporation for much of the year, of water as fertilizer. If you had a rivulet, creek, or river
places where life has been lent a big helping hand by of valuable compost running through your landscape,
the soft hand of climate and water availability. what would you do? You’d slow it down, spread it out,
Here in Vermont—a once highly resilient region and distribute it across the site so the plants received
lately moving toward a more arid one—it’s not uncom- its benefits. All water systems on a homestead or farm
mon to see large forest trees reaching 50 feet or more should be thought of in these same terms. The resilient
into the canopy that are growing wholly on bedrock. farmer and homesteader needs to be aware of how
For that kind of phenomenon to occur, you need a place site developments affect the movement and storage of
where the climate promotes seed growth on all levels, water on-site. When faced with the question of where
from water availability to nutrient accumulation. Just to direct water and how, the designer must always be
think of a seed of a hemlock or yellow birch actually tak- asking the same question: How can I slow it, spread
ing root on bare rock: First, a small amount of soil must it, and sink it? Additionally, the following questions
accumulate (from leaf fall); second, the seedling must should always be kept in mind:
survive dry periods in that thin soil-moisture reservoir.
Nonbrittle climates are truly miraculous in the helping • How can I increase the time in which water stays
hand they lend to life. In a brittle place you clear a for- on this site?
est, and even with replanting, seeding, and mulching, • How can I move water from the wettest areas of
the job of redeveloping biomass and biodiversity is a the site to the driest?
difficult and long one—for the biological mantle/forest • How can I water the ridges from the valleys?
was the primary way moisture was captured and stored • How can I use water to move nutrients from where
(and even made in the first place).* In brittle land- they are abundant to where they are scarce (forcing
scapes any action that reduces overall water availability additional questions concerning nutrient sources
or concentrates it into smaller periods of time, rather and sinks)?
than spreading it out, usually creates positive feedback • How can I lay out the site especially in terms of
loops, reinforcing the brittle tendencies further. We see animals/humans such that excess nutrients can be
this happening nearly everywhere on the planet, rang- distributed via gravity downhill? “Animals above
ing from deforestation, ditching, and road construction plants” is usually the best layout.
to poor grazing—not necessarily “overgrazing.” • Where can I capture water from, especially as high
A primary directive of all regenerative, high-func- on the site as possible, and where on the site can I
tioning land-use systems is the leveling out of water store it as high as possible?
availability in the landscape, distributing precipitation • How will I access this water and distribute it?
• How will these systems behave in freeze–thaw
* Forests actually produce their own moisture, including situations and in intense flood or drought events?
rainfall and cloudy humidity—all of which can be harvested • How will these systems be managed over time, and
by plants, through evapotranspiration and the “wringing how will they be changed when the climate gets
out” effect they have on the atmosphere. This is one of wetter or drier, hotter or colder?
the reasons deforestation often leads to desertification,
• How can these systems function if replacement
not just through soil loss but through actual reduction in
moisture: Forests make rain, and removing them creates parts from global trade are not available? How can
drought on multiple levels—in the climate and in the soil. the system be as low tech as possible?
 Water and Earthworks 77

Table 3.1. Brittleness Spectrum

Very Nonbrittle Nonbrittle Semi-brittle Brittle Very Brittle

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
High Annual Subtropical and temperate
Tropical rain forests High-rainfall tropical savannas
Production tall-grass prairies
Temperate rain forests Mid-rainfall tropical savannas
Medium Annual Mild- and cold-temperate
Mild-temperate forests Low-rainfall tropical savannas
Production midgrass prairies
Cold-temperate forests Mild- and cold-temperate steppe
(WSRF) and grasslands and shrublands
Low Annual Subarctic Tundra and True deserts:
Production coniferous forests alpine grasslands tropical, mild, cold, Arctic

A standard brittleness spectrum overview showing the WSRF as the nonbrittle zone it is, relative to other zones of the world.
It’s likely, however, that the cold-temperate region of Vermont is actually far less brittle than tropical rain forests, which when
clear-cut take longer to reorganize than the northern hardwood forests of the world.

Typical November/December scene in zone 1, with the spring keeping an ever-decreasing area open as winter rolls in.
78 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

• How can I avoid pumping water in favor of letting November or December. This description of the bucket
gravity do the work? experiment was accurate back when I wrote the first
• Where might toxins be entering the water system, edition. I wanted to leave it in this revised edition
and how can I mitigate that? (Think old septic because it reveals how wet we once were here. Despite
system, driveway with cars, neighbor’s land uphill, the “official climate models” predicting a wetter
and so on.) Northeast United States and despite them still saying
we are getting wetter, we are not. On the contrary, for
Here’s an easy water-assessment strategy that anyone 6 years this bucket test would result in a mostly empty
can afford to do and that some of us may have even done bucket all growing season—about a quarter full. For the
without meaning to. Leave a 5-gallon bucket or similar past three growing seasons the bucket would usually
water-holding container outdoors across the year. Make be empty with only a few weeks here and there where
sure it is in an open area that receives the sunshine and it would climb up an inch or two before evaporating
precipitation affecting the site. Now neglect it. Make again. We have experienced official drought three out
sure it doesn’t fall over, and observe what happens over of three of the past growing seasons for at least some
the course of a growing season or whole year. weeks, and during two of those years for months at
This simple test speaks volumes about your region’s a time. This goes for much of New England and the
climate and your site’s unique microclimate. If the Northeast, not just central Vermont. The climate mod-
bucket fills and stays full, or even half or a quarter els have proven wrong here in recent years and that’s
full, you’re in a water-rich and well-water-distributed interesting from a planning standpoint and backs up my
part of the world. If the bucket remains empty and general message here, which is to plan for all scenarios.
fills a small amount before emptying again, staying
empty much of the time, you are in a semi-arid or arid
region. Everyone else falls somewhere in between. Pay Locating Water
particular attention to the times when the bucket is For the purposes of creating a highly resilient habitat,
empty or full (or on its way toward filling). That means I always aim to locate surface or near-surface (shallow
you have a drought or overflow situation. The bucket well or spring) water resources on any property under
tells you what is happening in the water table, but consideration for development. This may seem to fly
remember that the table itself is much more delayed in the face of the current ease with which we can drill
in its response than the bucket is. During those times deep wells using machinery. However, because such
of the year when the bucket is empty, the table will deeply bored wells require not only the initial high cost
be dropping, and the opposite will be true when it’s of drilling and casing but also a perpetual cost/energy
full or filling. On the surface of the ground you want expenditure of pumping water from depths of 20 to
to ensure that as much water is captured as possible 1,000 feet or more, these deep wells should be seen
throughout the year to create a bucket-full situation: as highly vulnerable to systems failure. Such failures
This way plants are not limited by water scarcity, and range from power outages (a deep well pump needs a
it’s available for all other uses (which we’ll go into in a lot of power), to the pump breaking, to parts for the
moment). Consider yourself lucky if the bucket is even pump being unavailable for small to large periods of
a quarter full or more most of the year—that puts you time, to time and expertise required to pull up the
in the slim minority of an increasingly water-stressed, pump and fix or replace it. When you consider the fact
drought-prone world. that your water supply is second only to your heat sup-
Here in central Vermont our buckets fill up within 2 ply and more important even than your food supply,
to 3 months, then stay full, dropping an inch or so every you realize how shockingly vulnerable we are when we
now and then in a dry July or August, then overflow- depend on deep wells for our water. Drilled wells are,
ing again before becoming a block of ice sometime in at best, a compromise.
 Water and Earthworks 79

Finding potable water on a site is among the most • Vegetation composition: Sedges and other wet-
primary challenges in human habitat developments, to loving plants are clear indicators of water present
be grouped with only the most pressing and founda- close to the surface. In this part of the world, the
tional needs, including site access and location, solar following plant composition often represents the
access, and slope stability. Even slope angle and soil gradient from dry to wet found on most sites: grasses
quality pale in comparison with the necessity of having and other non-wetland plants—plantain and white
good-quality water in significant enough quantity to clover, sedges, rushes, and cattails. Very wet ground
provision crucial needs. Potable water access, there- is usually easy enough to identify; it’s the seasonally
fore, is near the starting point of my site evaluation and high-water-table land that’s most challenging and
development consultations here in New England. This often crucial to locate because its implications for
should not be surprising, for it was the same way for water locating and planting are enormous.
pioneer settlers to this region: Having no ability to drill
deep wells or pump water, they only considered a site The Art of Dowsing
worth inhabiting for any length of time if there was Dowsing or water witching is the art—some might say
existing spring access or the possibility of developing a science—of locating water presence without physi-
one. What I mean by “spring access” is clear enough: cal surface features. Thought to originate in ancient
a seep or flow of continuous water in potable quality Europe—though probably an art used by many peoples
emerging from the ground. How to tap into that water for millennia—dowsing today in this part of the world
and channel it to a location is covered below. involves walking across land holding a tree branch
Spring development is another matter that is under- (often of willow, alder, or other wet-loving species) or
standably much less clear to anyone who has not metal rods. As the dowser walks over or near the pres-
engaged in the millennia-old task of digging at a wet ence of water, the branch or rods move in such a way
spot of ground to get water. Finding water involves two as to indicate water presence. I’ve witnessed dowsers’
approaches that we like to combine where possible. branches bending sharply and abruptly downward
The first is ecological detective work—reading the and metal rods quickly snapping toward one another
landscape for signs of water—and the second is dows- as the dowser approached a specific spot. They then
ing, which is discussed briefly below. Physical locating will release this movement as the dowser continues
of water involves noticing various factors about the walking, then perform the same motion again when
landscape, including: encountering the same location.
Many a modern human upon hearing about dows-
• Slope size and shape: Springs and areas of high ing will dismiss it out of hand, as I once did However,
water table are most often found at the toe of a witnessing the act of dowsing and its results has a
slope—the larger the slope, the more plentiful the tendency to make one a believer. I for one consider
springs, seeps, and high water table areas usually myself open to the possibilities of dowsing but not an
are and the larger the quantity of water found there.
Water pools underground the same way it does on
the surface: Micro valleys and depressions are more When you consider the fact that
likely to have water underground in the same way your water supply is second only
they hold it aboveground. Groundwater usually to your heat supply and more
expresses itself along the keyline—where land goes important even than your food
from steeper to less steep on a slope. supply, you realize how shockingly
• Other geological features: Water tables tend to vulnerable we are when we depend
surface or at least rise just above and below cliffs on deep wells for our water.
and exposed ledge (bedrock).
80 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

adherent. I have hired dowsers multiple times on both runs for months on end since it does not deplete the
my own site and for clients who needed to find well pond it draws from unless there’s a very long dry spell.
locations or a spring site. Do the dowsers produce good This pump almost quadruples the pressure of a 25-foot
results? Often, yes, but not always. I look at it this way: fall of water but requires about 5 gallons of water to
If you’re going to spend between $5,000 and $15,000 pass through the pump (the fuel) to push 1 gallon to the
drilling a well (the cost in most US locations, based on top of the 90-foot lift. At the top this water is stored in
typical depths of 100 to 600 feet), spending $50 to $150 five 300-gallon IBC totes that fill in about 21/2 days with
on someone who’s well acquainted with finding water the pump running 24/7. That’s enough water to irrigate
could be an enormous gain, while the potential for loss my garden for 1 to 2 weeks via gravity feed from the
is minor. tote storage location to my garden and zone 1—about a
45-foot fall—easily enough to run drip irrigation there.
I can also gravity feed to my cows and larger field crops
Gravity-Feed Systems if needed from that spot, but have not needed to yet.
For both agricultural and domestic purposes a gravity- The second pump is a massive 3-inch ram I found on
driven system, as opposed to a pump-driven system, Craigslist in my town—amazingly, the only ram pump
is superior for obvious reasons. Gravity is free, never on Craigslist in the United States for the many months
sleeps, and doesn’t break. Pumps, at best, require I had searched. This pump will accept a 3-inch pipe of
maintenance and energy input. To gravity feed water water falling 10 feet from a large pond that will sup-
we must activate the “store water high in the land- ply about 80 GPM that will push about 15 GPM uphill
scape” principle of permaculture; passively, you can about 45 feet to the same tote storage reservoir. Since
only move water downhill. So, the primary directive this much water will quickly drop the pond level from
here is to locate water storages as high as possible but which it draws, I plan to only run this intermittently if
low enough that significant amounts of water are able needed at all. This is essentially a backup to the smaller
to be captured. pump and might not ever be needed. I like it as an
What’s “significant”? you might ask. That depends option because it is powered off a totally different small
on what you are trying to do with the water. For domes- watershed than the other pump and would fill the totes
tic uses a tiny spring can be dug and stored above one’s in about 2 hours (crazy).
home that will harvest 1/30 gallon per minute (GPM)
and stores 200 gallons. For certain agricultural uses, In the Landscape
such as watering twenty cows, that would not suffice, At the WSRF, our primary high water storage serves
and a lower location on the property that can harvest, agricultural purposes (not in-house domestic, though
say, 5 GPM and house a storage of 2,000 gallons might it could in a water emergency) and is composed of the
be needed. The point remains the same: the higher first pond we constructed. Please refer to the map of
the better, so long as you can capture enough water the WSRF on pages 14–15 for pond locations. This
in the time frame in which the cycle of deplete and pond holds about 15,000 gallons of water and was
replenish occurs. built with a mini excavator in about 3 days. It is clay
Since the original printing of this work, I have devel- lined from material on-site and has a surface area of
oped two ram pump systems—one I’ve tested for 2 years approximately 20 by 24 feet.
and one is brand new. The first is a 1-inch ram pump What makes this pond somewhat unique is not its
bought online from Land to House, which draws water size but its water table relationship. The pond has no
about 6 GPM via a 1-inch poly tube falling downhill continuous supply, such as a spring-fed or stream-fed
from a pond 25 feet vertical to the pump. From there it pond. Rather, it’s mostly an exposure of the water
sends water uphill 90 vertical feet with no electricity or table, with large amounts of intermittent surface flow
moving parts except for a brass check valve. This system harvested from the landscape immediately uphill of the
 Water and Earthworks 81

Ecosystem Biomimic: Wetland

Ponds are one of the best examples of how human deficiencies present within them. It does not mat-
impact can be a positive influence on an ecosys- ter whether an ecosystem has significant amounts
tem. In areas without direct human intervention, of human disturbance or not—the effects of lack-
landscapes comprising hilly and mountainous ing depressions in a landscape are the same: low
terrain (where the climate allows) often develop a relative habitat opportunities, lack of stormwater
gradient of wetlands, from those adjacent to river infiltration, and a consequent high tendency of
channels in the bottomlands to mid-elevation wet- these watersheds to experience flash flooding.
lands to high-elevation depressions near the ridges Humans have a capacity to be conscious eco-
of the watershed. These wetlands serve crucial system change agents. With this potent ability
functions, ranging from animal and plant habitat comes a responsibility to identify limiting factors
to groundwater recharge and stormwater runoff/ to ecosystem health and to stimulate the emer-
flood reduction. To the detriment of ecosystems, gence of systems that reduce such limits so that
they are scarce in many regions, even where the biodiversity and biomass increase in the system
climate allows for ponds and wetlands to form. as a whole. All regenerative work is part of this
Ponds and wetlands need depressions to process. Ponds are one of the most regenerative
develop, but glacial action and the influences of anthropogenic systems because of the potent
mass wasting make their appearance relatively impact they provide related to these two func-
rare in most landscapes. This represents an tions. On our research farm site, both habitat and
enormous example of underutilized ecosystems; groundwater recharge/stormwater pulse absorp-
biological systems that are not optimized in terms tion can be easily seen, and both of these functions
of biodiversity or biomass because of the structural manifested immediately after construction.

pond (with the help of ditches aimed toward the pond). shunted into them by swales (when they overflow)
As such, the pond rises and falls throughout the year and ditches, then to retain that water without letting
in accord with the table’s variations. When significant it leave the site into the river. Quickly, this held water
surface-flow events occur—anything above 1/4 inch of begins to seep back into the water table—essentially
rain or so—the pond captures hundreds to thousands representing a “reverse spring” effect. This reverse
of gallons of water, depending on the saturation level spring is the most regenerative aquifer-recharge action
of the soils before the storm. that can occur in a landscape and is “naturally” found
Often, this capture will be immediately infiltrated in mid- to high-elevation wetlands.
back into the local aquifer. For example, we have wit-
nessed multiple-inch rain events here when this and the Domestic Uses
other ponds’ levels increase from before-event levels of Similar to water for use in the landscape, domestic (in-
1 to 4 feet below capacity to multiple inches and some- house potable) water is best gravity fed from a reliable
times feet above those levels, only to fall back down source found and developed high in the landscape. The
close to their prestorm level within a few days after classic vernacular strategies for spring locating, devel-
the event. This shows the spectacular ability of ponds oping, and utilizing are the most resilient approaches
to serve as water table buffers: to capture the water to this age-old problem of human habitat. There are
82 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

several books on the market covering spring develop- (2) store that water for arid periods, and (3) distribute
ment in detail, so the scope of this section will not that water when necessary, across the site.
include that, but it will cover the basics of locating, This can be accomplished in myriad ways. The most
developing, distributing, and utilizing gravity-fed water common method many of us are familiar with is also the
from the landscape in the home. most destructive and most vulnerable to failure: pump-
ing groundwater from deep aquifers and irrigating with
it—for example, on a 2,000-acre midwestern farm. This
Slowing and Infiltrating Water approach not only uses a slowly replenishing resource
Regenerative influences on a landscape—and thereby (deep groundwater deposits), it’s energy intensive and
influences that promote resiliency in the human habitat expensive and has many failure points, from pump to
that the land supports—must always involve providing irrigation lines. It’s also wasteful of the water resource
water to plants (and soil biology) in as even a manner itself unless it involves drip irrigation. Conversely, we
as possible across the year. Since no climate is so kind aim to “irrigate” using the freely provided service of rain
as to reliably provide even moisture provision (though and snow from the sky. This means we must adapt the
certain maritime hyper-nonbrittle places, such as parts land and our systems to capture, store, and distribute
of the United Kingdom, come close), the regenerative the water that falls from the sky (a renewable resource,
farmer and homesteader must configure her landscape not fossil water) as effectively as possible. This involves
to (1) capture as much water as is reasonably possible, using the soil of the site itself as the primary storage
mechanism and ponds/paddies as secondary storages.
POINT SOURCE NUTRIENT DISTRIBUTION Activating this cycle involves various aspects of the
Curtain fertigation with concentrated nutrient sources land-infrastructure system. First, we must select deep-
rooted vegetation and arrange these plantings in such a
way as to slow, spread, and sink water. These plantings
1,015'
should represent enough of the site as is needed to har-
barnyard ness moisture in the landscape—especially crucial in
manure pile arid regions. Second, we must promote organic matter–
1,000'
barn rich topsoil at all possible points because that is the
best location in which to store water. It’s the largest
998'
swale storage resource available on most sites, and increasing
organic matter creates huge gains in other aspects of

to lower swales, ponds, studio

and pasture

990'
Primary Mechanisms
for Slowing, Spreading,
and Sinking Water
980'

• Vegetation and soils

• Swales and mounds
nutrient-laden runoff fertilizes crops • Terraces and paddies (see chapter 5 for
and pasture downslope
more on paddies)
Dispersal of nutrient-concentrated runoff through cropping • Ponds
areas to reduce runoff from site into local watershed and
fertilize food plants at the WSRF.
 Water and Earthworks 83

Soil improvement in 3 years: The sample at the left was taken from halfway up a swale mound while the one on the right is
from the bottom of the swale. The original subsoil material from which these are derived is the exact same.

site performance. Third, we must shape the land in such water systems on resiliency are no different. By build-
a way as to slow, spread, and sink water. It is this third ing deep, high-organic-matter soils, water flow across
aspect we call “earthworks,” and although it is only one the surface of the land (what we’re trying to avoid) is
of three primary approaches to fundamental site resil- greatly reduced.
iency, it is the one that must be performed before much
work should happen on the other aspects, because of
the disruptive nature of changing land shape.
An Agriculture as
Diverse as the Landscape
Water-Holding Effects of Vegetation and Soils Only about 10 percent of the state in which I live,
Varieties and layouts of vegetation contribute significantly Vermont, is composed of “agricultural” land, while the
to the overall water balance. All things being equal, from vast majority of the state is too wet, dry, steep, shallow
a strictly water management approach, the ideal situation soiled, or infertile to reliably support conventional field-
involves deep-rooting perennial plants covering the based crop production, though it’s been tried before.
entire surface of a site—think an oak forest. In practical Vermonters once farmed much of the state’s non-“ag”
terms perennial plants won’t cover the entire site but at land, clearing about three-quarters of the state by the
a minimum will be planted along the contour in a regular mid-1800s, mostly for pasture. Devastating soil erosion
pattern that slows the flow of water as it moves across the resulted, along with rapidly decreasing yields.
slope. When water hits the planted hedgerow (and the As we enter the twenty-first century, land that is
mound of detritus and root-lifted soil beneath it), much— still clear of forest represents Vermont’s most forgiving
sometimes all—of it slows and sinks into the ground. landscape—generally, low-angle slopes with deep, well-
Naturally, the deeper, lighter, richer in organic mat- drained soils supporting (usually with constant inputs)
ter a soil is, the more readily it can absorb water and pasture and annual row crops such as corn and grass
the more deeply it can infiltrate that water. All aspects for hay. Currently, nearly all of Vermont’s food produc-
of biological health and productivity are increased tion is derived from one-tenth of its land base, and this
as soil depth and health increases, and the effects of land’s capacity shrinks in both area and output each
84 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

truly sustainable cold-climate agricultural systems.

Permaculture, with its emphasis on low-input, self-
fertilizing, diverse crop arrangements (otherwise
known as “guilds”) and no-till approach, is particularly
suited to producing food and fuel crops on degraded
and sensitive landscapes (which is most of the United
States) that reliably fail under large-scale, mechanized,
input-dependent, soil-exposing, tillage agriculture.
close to contour on contour Land design needs to continually adapt to US hill lands,
cold-climate, and abused soils.
While perfectly on-contour plantings slow-spread-sink
water best, they pose management challenges in mowing Successful versions of “agriculture for the
and harvesting. hills” from elsewhere—such as the oak, walnut,
and chestnut pasture agroforestry systems of the
year. “Prime soil” lands, having been abused for nearly Mediterranean—are not likely to succeed here by
two centuries, continue to lose significant production simply attempting to replicate them. Establishing
capacity each year as mechanized, tillage-based farm- reliable, sustaining, and regionalized food systems
ing compacts soil structure, exposes the soil to erosion, is an innovative process requiring researching and
and damages soil health through continual inputs of developing techniques that function across the
liquid fertilizer. The actual acreage of “prime soil” majority of our landscape. Here in Vermont that
land is also shrinking under the influence of suburban means a “new-old” hybrid agriculture for rocky, thin,
sprawl and transportation developments. infertile, seasonally inundated land. This involves at
As the need to establish a more resilient, sustainable, least three primary strategies:
local, and secure resource base becomes increasingly
clear, we are confronted with the need to produce a 1. Identifying and breeding new plant and animal vari-
reliable supply of food and fuel from the vast majority eties (and reviving formerly used heirloom varieties)
of our landscape that we have not yet managed to utilize that are optimized for the diverse conditions of the
productively without incurring significant damage. In a cold-climate landscape.
future of diminishing resources and increasing stressors 2. Developing cultivation techniques such as con-
such as climate change, sociopolitical instability, and tour swale-mound planting that help buffer both
economic insolvency, we will need to generate value droughty and inundated land conditions to allow
sustainably on the majority of our landscape without production of a much wider array of plants than
depending upon one unit of production’s sustaining would otherwise be possible in the same location.
nine units of consumption. 3. Changing the scale and mechanics of production
How do we produce lasting value on challenging systems from large to small, and mechanized to
landscapes with poorly drained, droughty, or degraded, human- and animal-powered, and making other
infertile soil? Fortunately, this has already been done adaptations in the ways we can produce on the vast
to a large extent in other parts of the world. Both variety of land types.
degraded and inherently challenging landscapes can be
regenerated and maintained as highly productive, low- Relocalization in the cold-climate regions of the
input, no-till, perennial agricultural systems offering world will involve the skillful use of the incredible
yields of fruits, nuts, fiber, fuel, meat, milk, and even diversity that our landscape contains, from the acidic
perennial grains and vegetables. conditions of a pine plantation to the anoxic clay soils
In North America, however, we have few examples of a wet, abandoned field to the thin, dry, dead soils of
of such systems and need to look elsewhere to find an abandoned steep pasture.
 Water and Earthworks 85

Utilizing “marginal” lands requires significantly more

skill and care than “prime” agricultural lands with erosion, Currently, nearly all of Vermont’s
infertility, or simply lack of production easily resulting food production is derived from
from their mistreatment. “Marginal” lands also represent one-tenth of its land base, and this
some of the most important and sensitive ecosystems on land’s capacity shrinks in both area
the planet, while containing possibilities for some of the and output each year.
highest crop yields possible anywhere—the largest food
staple in the world is rice grown in poorly drained wet
soils. Use of these landscapes must be undertaken with irrigates deepening plant roots and delivers oxygen
careful planning and great understanding of the existing and nutrients. Both the swales/ditches and the
opportunities and challenges of the site. mounds below are planted with nitrogen-fixing
Fortunately, gleaning yields from these ecosystems plants and dynamic accumulators, helping to build
can be done in ways that not only promote the health soil structure and soil biology, creating conditions
of the natural ecosystem but offer human yields as well. that eventually support a larger array of plants to
Site specific by necessity, agriculture for “marginal” thrive in the same location. After an initial establish-
lands must be highly diverse—given the astounding ment period with “heavy giving” plants (as opposed
variation in landscape conditions present beyond the to “heavy feeding” plants), species that would
typical large, flat agricultural field. Farming landscapes otherwise not be supported on such sites can thrive.
other than typical “ag” land not only requires it but These include more sensitive fruit trees, berries,
benefits from humans working in synergy with the local and other multiuse food and fuel trees and shrubs.
ecosystem as beneficial members of the site’s living • Mulching with fungi-inoculated wood chips helps
community to support ongoing fertility development keep soil moisture optimal, build healthy soil biol-
and long-term yields. I’ll now outline approaches par- ogy, and suppress weeds.
ticular to several commonly found growing conditions. • Drip irrigation systems that allow a very small amount
of water and energy to be applied precisely across a
Droughty and Rocky Land landscape at timely intervals allow the establishment
Land that is dry and sloped presents an interesting of plants that would otherwise be unable to survive.
challenge for agriculture in the cold climates of the
world and elsewhere. Overall strategies for dealing suc- Seasonally Inundated Land
cessfully with these conditions involve the following: An enormous amount of Earth’s landscape is
underutilized because of perched water tables and
• Species selections for plants that can not only low-angle slopes underlain by poorly drained clay
handle but actually thrive in dry, poor soil and soils. Useful responses to such conditions involve
improve the soil for different future plants. Rocky similar approaches: for one, selecting species that are
soils, in particular, are most suited to a perennial- well suited to perennially or seasonally wet condi-
focused agriculture. Example species include Rubus tions and inundated conditions. Species particularly
species (blackberry and raspberry), chokecherry well adapted to wet conditions include currants and
(Prunus spp.), black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia), gooseberries (Ribes spp.), elderberries (Sambucus
buffaloberry (Shepherdia argentea), and various canadensis), cranberries (Vaccinium spp.) and high-
other berry and nut shrubs and trees. bush cranberries (Viburnum spp.), chokecherry
• Earthworks such as on-contour swaling, in which (Aronia spp.), willow (Salix spp.) and alder (Alnus
ditches are dug along contour to slow and trap spp.), and many others. Other useful strategies include
water as it travels across the slope. This allows grafting non-wet-tolerant species onto wet-tolerant
water infiltration into the soil horizon, where it rootstock, such as pears onto hawthorn or quince.
86 The Resilient Farm and Homestead

In addition, on-contour swales and island mounds growth rate where soils are heavy or wet, including
(at various scales) simultaneously lower the water table species such as black locust, goumi, elderberry, cur-
in the immediate area of a crop plant while raising up rant, gooseberry, cherry, peach, and apple. The pattern
the plant itself. Systems in Europe have practiced tree- seems to exist across all species except truly wet-loving
based agriculture in wetlands for thousands of years plants such as sedges—and we don’t aim to grow sedge!
under the name hugelkulture, in which they utilize Why do plants tend to prefer a swale or mounded
woody debris to help form the raised planting mounds. location? The answer seems to come in two parts. The
Gradually, the woody material breaks down into soil, first has to do with our wet climate and high water
feeding the plants over time while catching leaves and table. In desert climates a mounded planting would
other nutrient-rich debris that circulate via wind cur- be much more drought stressed because it’s “high and
rents in the area. dry”—the land on a mound is more exposed to the
drying effects of the atmosphere (wind and sun). Such
Swales and Mounds plants in a dry climate would often do more poorly. In
We call the wave pattern of mounds and ditches this climate we have found that getting above the high
aligned with the contour or any landform which water table and periodic inundation caused by rainy
checks the flow of water “swales.” They can be made periods and snowmelt is of prime value.
of woody debris (a hugelkulture strategy), soil, or some The second reason is more universal: A flat piece of
combination of the two. The effects they have on water ground has less surface area than a wave-shaped piece
movement down a slope are desirable and the same: of ground. Biological activity and soil health is concen-
They check water’s movement as it descends and trated most heavily in the upper layers of the soil at
force it to stop or slow, allowing it time to infiltrate the land–atmosphere interface; this is where organ-
into the ground below. At the WSRF, we make swales isms have the highest capacity to metabolize, where
with the native earth on-site by pulling soil from roots are most perfuse, and where organic matter is
uphill downhill, forming a mound. We then use these highest as a result. So this is where most plant feeding
high-surface-area drier locations for cropping. A swale occurs. When we contour a piece of ground and turn a
“waters” the area immediately below the mounded flat patch of ground into one wave or a mound shape,
location and, depending on soil type and rainfall we instantly add surface area and soil-area interface.
amount, can disperse water that would have run off This relates back to a primary permaculture design
the surface into the soil well below the swale—5, 10, strategy: The edge is where the action is. Swales and
even 20 feet downhill. This “capture, store, and even mounds create edge—highly productive edge—and we
out” of moisture is one of the reasons swales are such get more land from making them: Literally, our acre-
a soil- and plant-regeneration tool. age is increased when we contour the land. This last
The productivity of swales and mounds can be reason is profound, and the results we’ve witnessed
astounding. At the WSRF, we have noticed that all spe- are surprising.* We now only wish we had contoured
cies of plants respond positively to being on a mound nearly the entire farm in the early years. Hindsight is
if there is enough moisture present, and the increase always 20/20, to be sure.
in growth and health seems to vary from moderate to
extreme. On average it can be said that a given plant * While these are two primary reasons for swale value, they
at the research farm will grow at least half again as are only relative to water capture. The fact that swales
fast as the same plant rooted in flat, unmounded, and and mounds are composed of loosened, aerated material
unswaled earth nearby. On our second site this pattern probably also accounts for the high productivity they offer.
Sepp Holzer actually calls his mounds “raised beds” to
has almost reversed itself on much more arid sandy
indicate this effect. In the United States raised beds usually
soils rather than the heavier clayey soils of the original refer to garden beds with soil retained via constructed
site. Often, we’ve seen plants respond with twice the materials such as timber.