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Straw mulch, a ground cover of white clover interplanted with the crops, and temporary flooding all provide effective weed control in my fields.

Masanobu Fukuoka

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Masanobu Fukuoka
Age: 93 †
Born: 1914
Born: February 2
Died: 2007
Died: August 16
Agronomist
Botanist
Environmentalist
Farmer
Philosopher
Teacher
Writer
Cover
Clover
Effective
Clovers
Provide
Flooding
Ground
Straw
Fields
Straws
Control
Crops
White
Weed
Temporary
Mulch

More quotes by Masanobu Fukuoka

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The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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As we kill nature, we are killing ourselves, and God incarnate as the world as well.
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Farming is not just for growing crops, it is for the cultivation...o f human beings!
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Of course, I have made mistakes . . . just as every grower does. However, I never really think of them as mistakes!
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I started natural farming after the war with just one small plot, but gradually I acquired additional acreage by taking over surrounding pieces of abandoned land and caring for them by hand.
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Unless people can become natural people, there can be neither natural farming nor natural food.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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We receive our nourishment from the Mother Earth. So we should put our hands together in an attitude of prayer and say please and thank you when dealing with nature.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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One thing is all things. To resolve one matter, one must resolve all matters. Changing one thing changes all things. Once I made the decision to sow rice in the fall, I found that I could also stop transplanting, and plowing, and applying chemical fertilizers, and preparing compost, and spraying pesticides.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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If you do not try to make food delicious, you will find that nature has made it so.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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One of the most important discoveries I made in those early years was that to succeed at natural farming, you have to get rid of your expectations. Such products of the mind are often incorrect or unrealistic . . . and can lead you to think you've made a mistake if they're not met.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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I believe that even 'returning-to-nature' and anti pollution activities, no matter how commendable, are not moving toward a genuine solution if they are carried out solely in reaction to the over development of the present age.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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Life on a small farm might seem primitive, but by living such a life we become able to discover the Great Path. I believe that one who deeply respects his neighborhood and everyday world in which he lives will be shown the greatest of all worlds.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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Gradually I came to realize that the process of saving the desert of the human heart and revegetating the actual desert is actually the same thing.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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Weeds play an important part in building soil fertility and in balancing the biological community . . .
Masanobu Fukuoka
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Left alone, the earth maintains its own fertility, in accordance with the orderly cycle of plant and animal life.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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If a farmer does abandon his or her tame fields completely to nature, mistakes and destruction are inevitable.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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There is no time in modern agriculture for a farmer to write a poem or compose a song
Masanobu Fukuoka
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The real path to natural farming requires that a person know what unaltered nature is, so that he or she can instinctively understand what needs to be done - and what must not be done - to work in harmony with its processes.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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I believe that a revolution can begin from this one strand of straw. Seen at a glance, this rice straw may appear light and insignificant. Hardly anyone would believe that it could start a revolution. But I have come to realize the weight and power of this straw. For me, this revolution is very real.
Masanobu Fukuoka
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As far as my planting program goes, I simply broadcast rye and barley seed on separate fields in the fall . . . while the rice in those areas is still standing. A few weeks after that I harvest the rice, and then spread its straw back over the fields as mulch.
Masanobu Fukuoka