Farming With the Wild 377in the New Mexico–Arizona–Mexico Bootheel region – both as means of regener-
ating the land. A few ranchers were making peace with large carnivores, while some
dairy and beef farmers were bucking the livestock feedlot model and perfecting the
art of small-scale rotational pasture systems. A Kansas geneticist was pursuing a vision
of creating, through classical plant breeding, a self-seeding prairie of perennial grains
that would require little fertilizer and no tilling, ideally adapted to its place on the
land. The reassemblage of former free-roaming grassland species such as the bison,
prairie dog, ferret, wolf and elk was beginning to take nascent shape in fragmented
areas of the Great Plains. Throughout the mid-elevation coffee farms of Central
America, biologists were discovering the critical link between habitat remaining on
forest-shaded coffee farms and declining populations of migratory songbirds.
There are more examples, many more, of people tuning in to both the small pic-
ture of their own farms and ranches and to the broader landscape, working in
partnership with, rather than against, the surrounding natural world. It is time to
give a name to what can only be described as a gathering movement: fanning with
the wild.
This book has been the result of a multi-year research project to document and
chronicle on-the-ground efforts to restore wild habitats within farming and ranch-
ing regions across the country. My interest in taking on such a challenging topic
came from various personal experiences and sources of inspiration throughout the
1990s. As the owner of a remote 100-year-old apple orchard in Northern Califor-
nia’s Anderson Valley, one frequented by wild turkeys, bobcats, screech owls,
gophers, pileated woodpeckers, black bears (who eat fruit by the limb and must be
discouraged if harvests are to be sustained), as well as an additional cast of wildlife
too numerous to list, I was naturally inclined. As a freelance writer who reported
on the organic industry for many years, I ultimately became convinced that the
standards set for organic farm management had not necessarily taken into account
a farm’s impact on its watershed and surrounding ecosystems. One particular
assignment for Whole Earth Magazine triggered a host of questions that led me to
write further articles in Sierra and Orion Afield. Finally, as a part-time activist who
had attended numerous presentations about the need for wildlands connectivity
across the landscape, I encouraged John Davis and Mark Ritchie, programme offic-
ers at the Foundation for Deep Ecology, and Paula MacKay of the Wildlands Project
to help me organize and host a conference on the topic. Held in January 2000, the
small retreat resulted in the formation of the Wild Farm Alliance, now led by a
nationally placed steering committee and advisory board of farmers, naturalists, edu-
cators, writers, gardeners and others that spend copious hours each month discussing
the successes and shortcomings of promoting agricultural systems that are truly com-
patible with the full range of wild Nature. The need to produce a book that could
help further the establishment of conservation communities across the country
emerged as key tool for the organization. I eagerly volunteered and convinced my
long-time collaborator, photographer and graphic designer Roberto Carra, to join
me. Our hope was to assemble a vision of what interconnected, fully functional eco-
systems and healthy farming communities might look like. We wanted to focus on