Some of the basic principles of Biodynamics®

Biodynamic agriculture was inaugurated in 1924 by Austrian scientist Rudolf Steiner . It is the oldest, non-chemical agricultural movement and pre-dates organic agriculture by some twenty years. Biodynamics does more than avoid chemicals and seeks to actively work with the health-giving forces of nature. Biodynamics is a world-wide agricultural movement. Some of the basic principles of Biodynamics are:

Broaden Our Perspective

Just as we need to look at the magnetic field of the whole earth to comprehend the compass, to understand plant life we must expand our view to include all that affects plant growth. No narrow microscopic view will suffice. Plants are utterly open to and formed by influences from the depths of the earth to the heights of the heavens. Therefore our considerations in agriculture must range more broadly than is generally assumed to be relevant.

Reading The Book Of Nature

Everything in nature reveals something of its essential character in its form and gesture. Careful observations of nature -- in shade and full sun, in wet and dry areas, on different soils, will yield a more fluid grasp of the elements. So eventually one learns to read the language of nature. And then one can be creative, bringing new emphasis and balance through specific actions. Practitioners and experimenters over the last seventy years have added tremendously to the body of knowledge known as Biodynamics.

Cosmic Rhythms

The light of the sun, moon, planets and stars reaches the plants in regular rhythms. Each contributes to the life, growth and form of the plant. By understanding the gesture and effect of each rhythm, we can time our ground preparation, sowing, cultivating and harvesting to the advantage of the crops we are raising.

Plant Life Is Intimately Bound Up With The Life Of The Soil

Biodynamics recognizes that soil itself can be alive, and this vitality supports and affects the quality and health of the plants that grow in it. Therefore, one of the fundamental efforts of Biodynamics is to build up stable humus in our soil through composting.

A New View Of Nutrition

We gain our physical strength from the process of breaking down the food we eat. The more vital our food, the more it stimulates our own activity. Thus, Biodynamic farmers and gardeners aim for quality, and not only quantity. Chemical agriculture has developed short-cuts to quantity by adding soluble minerals to the soil. The plants take these up via water, thus by-passing their natural ability to seek from the soil what is needed for health, vitality and growth. The result is a deadened soil and artificially stimulated growth. Biodynamics grows food with a strong connection to a healthy, living soil.

Medicine For The Earth: Biodynamic Preparations

Rudolf Steiner pointed out that a new science of cosmic influences would have to replace old, instinctive wisdom and superstition. Out of his own insight, he introduced what are known as Biodynamic Preparations. Naturally occurring plant and animal materials are combined in specific recipes in certain seasons of the year and then placed in compost piles. These preparations bear concentrated forces within them and are used to organize the chaotic elements within the compost piles. When the process is complete, the resulting Preparations are medicines for the Earth which draw new life forces from the cosmos.

Two of the Preparations are used directly in the field, one on the earth before planting to stimulate soil life, and one on the leaves of growing plants to enhance their capacity to receive the light. Effects of the Preparations have been verified scientifically.

The Farm As The Basic Unit Of Agriculture

In his Agriculture lectures, Rudolf Steiner posed the ideal of the self-contained farm -- that there should be just the right number of animals to provide manure for fertility, and these animals should, in turn, be fed from the farm. We can seek the essential gesture of such a farm also under other circumstances. It has to do with the preservation and recycling of the life-forces with which we are working. Vegetable waste, manure, leaves, food scraps, all contain precious vitality which can be held and put to use for building up the soil if they are handled wisely. Thus, composting is a key activity in Biodynamic work.

The farm is also a teacher, and provides the educational opportunity to imitate nature's wise self-sufficiency within a limited area. Some have also successfully created farms through the association of several parcels of non-contiguous land.

Economics Based On Knowledge Of the Job

Steiner emphasized the absurdity of agricultural economics determined by people who have never actually raised crops or managed a farm. A new approach to this situation has been developed which brings about the association of producers and consumers for their mutual benefit. The Community Supported Agriculture movement was born in the Biodynamic movement and is spreading rapidly. Gardens or farms gather around them a circle of supporters who agree in advance to meet the financial needs of the enterprise and its workers, and these supporters each receive a share of the produce as the season progresses. Thus consumers become connected with the real needs of the earth, the farm and the community; they rejoice in rich harvests, and remain faithful under adverse circumstances.