Chapter 45

Tale of Two Bean Fields, Part 2

[The story so far: Ruthann Garcia, her husband conservationist Rick, on a day off, daughter Rachel, age 13, son, Ramon, age 10, her neighbor, farmer and single parent Alexander Murphy, his kids -- Michael, age 11, and Rose, age 9, -- and of course, Ruthann’s good friend, Laura Paruzzi (lately Alexander’s sweetheart), are walking Ruthann's organic soybeans on a hot August Saturday morning.]

The walkers arrayed themselves in natural pairs -- Rick and Alexander on the left nearest the already-walked rows, the boys, next, then the two girls, and finally Laura and Ruthann on the right. Ruthann was nearest the rows to do. She took a deep breath at all the broadleaf cockleburs ahead and off to her right. This was no half-a-day job, even for eight walkers.

The meadowlark yodeled again, sending its sweet, fluted song over the rolling land. The grasshoppers began to move generally ahead of the walkers, springing and ricocheting away like as if they were the target of the sweep through this field.

"You're fishbait, dude," said Michael to the grasshopper that landed on his gloved hand as he reached low for the shank of next Xanthium strumarium, a plant whose deep taproot bit the earth like a snapping turtle on a hooked bluegill. It wouldn't let go.

"Eeee-yah!" Michael exclaimed with the exertion of breaking the cocklebur's hold. Like the others, he leaned the cocklebur root end up against the soybean row where the sun would destroy the root hairs and prevent the plant from grabbing hold again with the next rain (if there were any). The meadowlark replied with another call.

"You sing like that for your girlfriends, Michael?" asked Rick Garcia of the 11 year-old.

"Like what? Like a ninja? Nah, not me," said Michael.

"Sing like the meadowlark, I meant," said Rick.

"Boys don't sing, Dad," said Rachel, "they croak like you."

"Hey, watch it now, girl, I can too sing!" protested Rick.

"The girls like Michael's freckles!" giggled Rose, Michael's sister.

"They do not, frecklehead yourself!" exclaimed Michael.

"Ok, Murphys let's save this for later," counseled the children's father. Alexander did not hear Rachel Garcia's whispered affirmation to Rose on the accuracy of her statement. The weed-pulling continued in silence for a few minutes.

"So, how do you like your organic beans, Ruthie?" asked Laura at the other end of the line of walkers.

"I like them fine, so far. I'll like them better by noon, and even better next year when I can get a little stronger price for them, and not just the regular field run number of $5.93 a bushel right now. I'll like them a lot better the year after that when they are fully certified, and Vinton food-grade, too. Then, ask me if my ledger sheet really likes them, or not," Ruthan replied.

"So why go to all the extra effort when you could have clean beans like Harold Mundt over there? Is it really worth it to you?" pressed Laura.

"Well, most people, I think, anyhow, are getting more and more aware of how what they eat affects their health. In the cities, we've got supermarket meat recalls, in the restaurants, we get food poisonings, on the cruise ships, for crying out loud, hundreds of people get sick from viruses, food-borne or not. Does their travel insurance cover that? The experts say the jury is still out on the nutritional value of organic foods, but I'll tell you what, when you look at the crowds at the farmers markets, and all the organic dairy selections in the regular supermarkets, I think the consumers get it," Ruthann continued.

"Yep, they talking about expanding the agroterrorism program at Iowa State even," added Laura. "All this talk about food safety, and who's trying to fight off consumer pressure for origin labeling? The mainline food industry, that's who."

"That won't last, " said Alexander from four rows away. "The organic market's not the fastest growing segment of American agriculture for no reason. And guess what else, with a weak American dollar right now, US organic, non-GMO products are really appealing to the Europeans, too."

"It's amazing to me," offered Rick, "that the administration is beginning to realize we can't go it alone anymore in Iraq, and that we need U.N. and European help there on the one hand, yet on the other we're still taking the Europeans to the world court for blocking imports of our GMO crops."

"Life is funny, you never know," said Ruthann. "We may see this ground yield three times the value of Harold's beans in time. That's just part of the gamble of farming. And if that doesn't work, and the cockleburs take over, well, cocklburs are a crop, too, in some places. The Chinese and the Hindus use Xanthium strumarium for all kinds of traditional medicines. Yet it's highly toxic to grazing animals -- to cattle, pigs, horses, and poultry. The Chinese call it 'hsi-erh.'"

"You're kidding about growing these, right?" asked Rick as he held out an uprooted cocklebur and stretched a sore back. "Anyhow, just take some credit for your conservation practices on this particular enterprise. Your winter rye cover crop and red clover year in the rotation do more than you might think for cutting erosion and nutrient loss. So good job, partner!"

"Eeee-yah!" said Michael, victorious over another weed.

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Next... Chapter 46.

Thanks for these resources:

Organic Soybean Production by Gene Kuepper, Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas (ATTRA)

Principles of Sustainable Weed Management for Croplands By Preston Sullivan, Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas (ATTRA)

Organic Agriculture Section, Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

CyberHelp for Organic Farmers, British Columbia Rural Capacity Building Through Organic Agriculture (RCBTOA) Project

Medicinal Herbs Online; Cocklebur, Xanthium strumarium

Xanthium strumarium, NewCROP, Center for New Crops & Plant Products, Purdue University

ISU to try for terrorism center; Homeland security grant would create agroterrorism center at ISU, by Rebecca A. Petersen, Ames Tribune, August 06, 2003

Is Organic Food Provably Better? By Marian Burros, New York Times, July 16, 2003, reprinted by the Organic Trade Association (OTA)

Safety Issues Affecting Chinese Herbs: The Case Of Xanthium, Institute for Traditional Medicine

The Upper Basin Chronicles, Chapter 45 was written and edited by John Gabbert.

Upper Mississippi Basin Stakeholder Network and The Upper Basin Chronicles © 2003 Saint Mary's University of Minnesota.

Your comments are invaluable. Please email feedback to (mailto link) The Upper Basin Chronicles, Chapter 45.

The characters presented here are purely fictional, and neither bear resemblance to persons living or dead, nor represent the views or opinions of Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota.