A Word with Erin Schneider

Erin Schneider at work.
Photo from www.hilltopcommunityfarm.org

 Erin Schneider will lead UW-MANIAC members to create a soil quilt and learn about how soil plays an integral role in our lives. We caught up with her to get some more information on how she came to do what she loves.

 

 What made you interested in sustainable farming, especially soil?

 Wow, that's a great question and hard to be brief.

I grew up planting trees and tending to my mother's vegetable and flower gardens and from a ripe young age I was schooled in dirt. Later, I studied soil science and biology and have continued to dig holes, play in the dirt, teach others through my work in conservation education. So you could say that the soil got under my skin and when I returned to Wisconsin, I thought, how much more Midwest can you get than feeding people? 

 

So I've always approached farming from a conservation perspective, that you feed, care, and grow soil first and there are inherent social, economic, and ecological benefits built into this baseline practice. Tending the soil also requires us to think for the long-term, which is another tenet of sustainable agriculture, that you are planning and caring for the land and tending crops so that the land will take care of the next 7 generations. I've also been fortunate to travel to other countries supporting farmer to farmer delegations; Regardless of where you sit on the agricultural value chain, farmers everywhere in the world understand the language of compost, of soil. From there, you can launch into sharing sustainable techniques and practices and explore the 'how you do it is what you get' parameters that comes with farming, or any profession really.

 

 So you could say my interest in growing food, working with the soil is a kind of life journey. That life starts and ends with the soil and is the Earth's largest, living, breathing organism and collective geologic slate, yet so much of the lifeforms in the soil itself remains a mystery and unseen. So I think it's a combination of practicality, that the health of the soil directly impacts the health of my farm ecosystem and therefore what I am able to feed and provide for my community, as well as an unending palette of possibilities for learning, unleashing curiosity, creativity and the opportunity to connect so many different disciplines and ways of knowing in the world--all of this being right beneath our feet. I can't help but smile at the irony, that we're standing atop of the answers to life mysteries every day and yet we are so easily blinded to what goes on under the surface of things.

 

Photo by Rhonda Janke, Parideeza Farm Art

 

What makes 2015, the International Year of Soils, so special to you?

 The reasons are many...and people will just have to come and engage in conversation. I will say that the soil is finally getting the universal attention that it deserves.

 

 On a more personal level, as a farmer, scientist and educator, I rely on research, data and technique to help guide me in sustainable land management and stewardship of soil resources. Yet science and technique only get you so far. To grow food sustainably you need a bit of love and commitment, for the Earth, for yourself and your community. For example, science helps inform me of the dangers of UV rays on my skin. Because I love my life and want to take care of my body, I follow through with this information and use sunscreen, wear light clothing tend to my own skin. So if the soil is the 'skin of the Earth' and food comes from the soil, from the Earth, and we are what we eat, don't we want to love that part of ourselves that is life-giving and makes us want to love life?

 

 Part of the soil quilt project entails sharing the stories, artifacts and the quilt itself with farmers in Senegal. With luck I will be traveling there in the late fall/winter again. I have been involved in farmer to farmer training, supporting women vegetable farmers there. So sharing the project with women farmers there is an expression of farmer/community solidarity and mutual support from our respective 'soil sisters' on both sides of the Atlantic. The non-lingual nature of the quilt itself is also a learning tool, and I hope that we can share a mutual understanding and respect for caring for the soil, how it is alive, and how the soil cares for us in return.

 

 

"I hope that we can share a mutual understanding and a respect for caring for the soil, how it is alive, and how the soil cares for us in return."

 

What do you hope people will get out of this event?

 I hope people will gain a (re)newed appreciation for soil and understanding of the 'Earth's Skin' and overall we start to get at the heart and soil in terms of what it means to build resilient food systems and our own connections to food, the land, and each other.

 

 MANIAC has been an invaluable learning community for me over the years and I hope people will leave satisfied that they helped provide insight and feedback regarding future activities with the Soil Quilt project, regardless of making a piece of the quilt. I hope people feel welcome and invited to create the soil quilt and leave the satisfaction in knowing that they helped launch and guide a project that extends from the soil, through our hands and hearts both in Wisconsin and around the world.

Photo by Rhonda Janke, Parideeza Farm Art

 

Any additional comments or information MANIACs should be aware of?

I've dug a lot of holes in my day, physically mapping soils, planting trees, growing crops, metaphorically helping myself and others 'dig and grow character', and personally to feel connected to something larger than myself. When you start to dig, the engagement between soil and shovel can be further leveraged through your heart and hands. The reason is practice; manual taskwork (especially during group conversation) often enables slower, deeper, more reflective exchanges to take place. You enter the 'zone' and a rhythm takes over. A bit of imagination never hurt as it can be a scary thing to stare into a dark and shapeless hole, when most of the life is unseen in the 'dirt'. Your mind starts to visualize a home for the young seedling, you realize you are not alone, but aided by millions of microbes, hundreds of arthropods, all the elements seen and unseen that make life happen. So in a nutshell, I hope people will have fun playing in the dirt with me and collaborating with the soil along the way.

 

 

Don't forget to register for Stories and Stitches: Weaving the Great Soil Quilt on April 21 at 8:00am. Register Here