Sustaining Sustenance

In the northern hemisphere winter is here.  Even though temperatures are chilly, snow blankets the ground, and winds whistle, those responsible for providing our food are hard at work.  They are maintaining, planning, and providing.  Given conditions across the globe during the continuing pandemic, their work has been multiplied more than we can fully comprehend.  We are grateful.

For many of us obtaining food provided by farms in 2020 and in the new year is a challenge.  Sometimes, there are shortages.  Sometimes, we lack sufficient funds.  Sometimes, we rely on others to shop for us.  Reading The Farm That Feeds Us: A year in the life of an organic farm (words & pictures, an imprint of The Quarto Group, July 21, 2020) written by Nancy Castaldo with illustrations by Ginnie Hsu brings new understanding to us about our food. 

FARMING AND FEEDING

Hurray for farms that supply us with the food we eat!

Some farmers grow crops like corn, tomatoes, and wheat.

Some farmers raise animals, like pigs,

chickens, and cows.  Some do both. 

So begins this book heralding the broad spectrum of activities and accomplishments on our farms.  The first two areas focus on farming and feeding and types of farms.  In the discussion of types of farms industrial versus free range and organic versus non-organic are explained.  The remainder of the book is divided into the four seasons beginning with spring.

We explore eggs and breeds of chickens, fruit orchards with a bit on beehives, preparing the soil for spring crops, machinery and tools used on farms, and picking those early spring crops.  Hens, depending on the kind, can lay between 150 and 300 eggs per year. Peas, lettuces, asparagus and radishes head to the farm markets. New lambs are born in the spring and the wool on adults is sheared.  Several types of sheep with exquisite wool are listed as threatened due to their diminishing numbers.

In summer spring blossoms turn to tiny fruit.  Photosynthesis is working in earnest.  People can come to farms to pick fruit crops.  Strawberries off the plant are the sweetest kind.  Corn is planted for harvesting.  Each variety has a purpose.  More time is spent on the beehives and gathering honey.  Did you know hay is cut three times per season?  Did you know by supporting smaller farms we help to increase food diversity?  Did you know a lot of chefs visit these smaller farms to offer farm to table meals on their menus?  When we buy local, we decrease the cost of transportation and help protect our planet.  While insects are vital to pollination, others need to be discouraged naturally from harming growth.

Apples and pumpkins are gathered in autumn.  Like corn, each variety is noted for taste and use.  Numerous households begin to cook the fruits and vegetables into items to be consumed later or to take to market.  Did you know cover crops are planted in the fall to help safeguard fields?  We learn about breeds of pigs, and the value of other animals like alpacas, cats, dogs, and goats on farms.

The arrival of winter brings a new kind of labor.  There is a lot of maintenance to barns, chicken coops, the beehives, and the machinery.  Wood is chopped to heat the house.  Orchard trees are trimmed.  On cold winter days and nights plans are made for spring by looking at seeds to be planted.  Bread is baked.  And all the animals are feed, watered, cleaned, and sheltered against the weather.  On the final two pages there is a discussion on how we can help small farms by the way we shop and eat.  We need to work together so good food is available to everyone.

Whether you were raised in a gardening family like I was, or have never been near a garden, this book written by Nancy Castaldo has much to offer.  The presentation of the facts is conversational and easily understood by younger readers.  It is as if we are there on the farm on a daily basis as participants.  Readers will appreciate the way two topics are flawlessly offered together.  For example, in the section on orchards, beehives are briefly showcased showing us how they are constructed.  Later in summer they are given their own two-page portion.

Each theme is given two pages.  More specific topics in that area add to our knowledge.  In the piece on milking cows, we are educated on milking machines and breeds of cows.  We are told about the milk each gives us, and other products made from their milk.  Here is a passage from that area and the opening for the chapters under the winter heading.

Brown Swiss

Considered the oldest breed, Brown 

Swiss cattle come from the Alpine

pastures of Switzerland.  Their milk

is excellent for cheese production.

WINTER

Soft snow falls on the farm and all seems quiet.  The growing

season has ended, but the farm is still busy.  There is lots

to do during the winter, inside and outdoors, so that the

farm is ready for the next year.  It is time for the farmer

to catch up on repairs and plan for spring planting.

There is authenticity and a pastoral promise to the artwork we first see on the front and back of the case cover.  The full-color palette is warm and welcoming.  Tiny details ask us to pause and savor each scene.  On the back geometric shapes, like pieces in a quilt, frame these three questions:

Where does our food come from?

What role do farms play?

What's it like to be a farmer?

This is followed by two explanatory sentences.  

On the opening and closing endpapers is a rich, sunny yellow.  Between text on the title page is a resting sheep and a lamb. Chickens, apples, a beehive, and bees enrich the verso and contents pages.

Artist Ginnie Hsu complements and extends the text with her illustrations.  They range in size from double-page pictures to one page and a half, framed with smaller images and to groups of smaller visuals.  Elements are realistically rendered and express animation on the people and animals.  There is a collective camaraderie when people are together.  Even the single workers complete their work with an air of commitment and contentment.  Many of the pictures have small informative labels within them.  

One of my many, many favorite illustrations is on a partial page.  It shows a garden waiting for early spring crops to be harvested.  It features rows of a variety of radishes, red, yellow, and white.  A little girl, pleased with her efforts, has pulled two from the ground, one in each hand.  Running in front of her is a white bunny, scampering away from a meal for the moment.

Your appreciation for those who grow and raise food will greatly increase reading The Farm That Feeds Us: A year in the life of an organic farm written by Nancy Castaldo with illustrations by Ginnie Hsu.  This collaboration brings to readers an outstanding volume to include in your personal and professional collections.  At the close of the book is a glossary of thirty-four terms.

To discover more about Nancy Castaldo and Ginnie Hsu and their other work, please follow the link attached to their names to access their websites.  Ginnie Hsu's home page is a joyous gallery of art.  Nancy Castaldo has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.  Ginnie Hsu has accounts on Instagram and Twitter.  At the publisher's website you can view several interior images and download a teacher's guide.

Thinking About Our Food

Whenever reflecting about the food we eat, I remember vividly becoming informed about the PBB food contamination in Michigan in the 1970s.  It was years later after the initial poisoning but once I knew, I quit eating beef and drinking milk.  To this day I have not eaten beef and it's only lately I have started to drink milk again.  As recently as May 2016 it is still a topic of concern as evidenced by this article, 43 years after chemical mix-up, Michigan blood shows elevated toxin levels.  Michigan Radio has coverage on this over the course of several years ending in 2014.

Some people zip through the grocery store without giving a thought as to what they are placing in their baskets or carts.  This disaster taught me decades ago to be a careful shopper, spending more time than most looking at labels.  In her debut book, Let's Eat!: Sustainable Food For A Hungry Planet (Orca Book Publishers, February 7, 2017), author Kimberley Veness explores how our food is cultivated and the journey it makes from place to place before it arrives in our kitchens and on our tables.

Do you ever wonder what your groceries would tell you if they could talk?

Within four chapters sources of our food are revealed, on a large scale and from smaller venues, how farming functions in cities and how growing food will look in the future.  Many of our fruits, vegetables and grains come from hundreds and thousands of miles from our homes grown in monocultures.  These extensive farms grow one crop and the pesticides and fertilizers used spread far beyond their point of origin.  The majority of meat comes from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations rather than from animals growing in pastures. Our seafood is similarly raised in aquaculture but even this needs to be better so as to not contaminate our water and lands.  Labels inform us as to the humanely raised meats.  Barcodes on produce tell more than you might think about your food.

People are working whenever financially able and out of necessity to farm within more compact perimeters.  Companion planting works on several levels, plants helping each other in a give and take relationship. Did you know ducks are used in raising rice?  Organic versus non-organic and pasteurized versus raw are discussed.

There are probably more people than they know who live in food deserts.  How can we fix this?  If you look around the city you can see common gardens or community gardens or food forests.  Some foods are now being grown completely inside in specially monitored environments.  More green is becoming visible on roof tops.

What does the future hold for our food?  Some are raising fish and vegetables together; a field called aquaponics.  Many cultures already consume insects realizing their value as providers of protein.  Did you know a hamburger was grown entirely in a laboratory in 2013?  Genetic engineering of food is an option being explored but it is still controversial.  When space pioneers travel to Mars their food will likely be grown using hydroponics.  As with many things in our lives on this planet great strides have been made but we need to change our focus to one of preserving as well as producing.


As key points are supplied by Kimberley Veness they are done in the context of a historical background.  In each of the chapters she includes a From Farm to Table section which is a personal reflection.  Farming Fact paragraphs or sentences are inserted several times in each chapter; informing us of items of interest such as the scientific proof of the happiness we feel when digging in the dirt, the alarming number of pesticides in a single grape or sweet pepper (non-organic) or purple and white carrots were grown before the well-known orange variety.  To challenge readers Kimberley Veness asks us to Chew on This!  In these asides she gives us an assignment such as listing all the food we eat for a day and its country of origin or find a local farm where you can get fresh seasonal food.  In all of these, the body of text and added elements, she speaks with readers in easy conversations.  Here is a passage.

THE "NO-TILL" ZONE
Tilling the ground is like kicking an anthill.  It took a long time for the ants to build the intricate passageways and chambers to make their home functional, and it will take just as long to repair the damage.  Like ants, soil microbes take time to build healthy soil.  Conventional farming, which over-tills the soil, strips away soil nutrients over time.  Because commercial agriculture is all about efficiency, farmers add fertilizers instead of waiting for the soil to regain its natural nutrients.


Throughout the title photographs have been selected and captioned in support of the narrative.  Special charts are included to present information on food labeling.  On the first page of each chapter single color line drawings highlight the main theme.


Whether you read Let's Eat!: Sustainable Food For A Hungry Planet written by Kimberley Veness in a single sitting or a little bit at a time, you will be captivated by the processes used to provide food for this planet's people.  Some of the facts are vivid eye-openers and others give us realistic options.  At the close of the book print, online and video resources are listed with a glossary and index.  This is another fine title in a continuing series.  If you wish to know more about Kimberley Veness the publisher provides an interview on their blog.


Be sure to visit Kid Lit Frenzy hosted by educator Alyson Beecher to view the choices of the other bloggers participating in the 2017 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge.