Did you know that a native perennial grass plant can live hundreds of years? And that they can sequester significant amounts of carbon?
Unlike the annual grasses that cover most of our lawns and pastures, native grasses’ roots can be 15 feet deep. Skillful management of grazing – as taught through systems like Holistic Management – support healthy carbon and soil cycles. Sustainable grazing causes the grasses to slough some of their hefty roots to restore carbon and feed microorganisms in the soil, growing healthier soil and thus healthier ecosystems.
Many of the world’s native grasslands have been desertified through overgrazing, making them more prone to flooding and ecologically unhealthy and unproductive. Texas, for example, was a rich grassland just a few hundred years ago. And can be again, through sustainable grazing practices.
In this three-minute video, Holistic Management International former chairwoman Sallie Calhoun talks about how our unintentional mistreatment of our soils – often resulting from overgrazing or general unawareness of the natural cycles – has been putting carbon into our atmosphere throughout civilized human history.
The good news is that she also shares how we can skillfully use grazing management to put carbon back into the soil, and build up healthier soil by supporting natural ecological practices.
We humans can only be as healthy as the ecosystems we live in. Good thing that getting and being healthy is such a fascinating study.
This video is the second in a series of interview clips with 7k-acre Paicine Ranch co-owner and business woman Sallie Calhoun.
Holistic Management founder Allan Savory speaks at TED about reversing desertification of our planet’s grasslands here.
Calhoun shares about Profitability, Native Grasses and Carbon Sequestration in this four-minute video.
In this 4.5-minute video, Calhoun explains how Holistic Management works for us, other people, the planet and profits whether we live on the land or work in an office, or switch from one to the other.
In this 3.5-minute video, we discuss what humans can do as a keystone species to improve ecological resilience.
In this final 5-minute clip we get excited at the prospects of how each of us can help mitigate climate change.
Our retreat center, Clear Sky, is hosting an Introduction to Holistic Management workshop with consensus-builder and HM teacher Jeff Goebel on 26-28 Feb., 2015 outside Cranbrook, B.C. Register here.