Perhaps you missed it, but “superweeds” — unloved plants that thumb their noses at herbicides such as Roundup — were in the news last week. Of course, if you’ve been reading magazines such as Countryside for the past 30-40 years, it’s not news at all that weeds have adapted to plant-killers, requiring more and stronger chemicals in what becomes a never-ending spiral.

Most people missed the story because it wasn’t very widely reported: it wasn’t news because most people don’t care. Very few have any inkling of how this affects them, why it’s important, or even what it all means. They know very little about organic farming because they know very little about where their food comes from.

There is neither time nor space here to provide the background for anyone who has stumbled onto this site accidentally and lacks even a basic understanding of organic farming. But to at least try to provide a frame of reference, let’s just say that organic farmers don’t use synthetic biocides for many reasons, all of which funnel down to their effects on the biosphere, the Living Earth, which includes us. An herbicide — the plant-killer branch of the pesticide family — doesn’t only kill weeds. It kills other plants as well, of course, but through the webs of ecology it can also kill insects and other animals that depend on those plants for food or habitat. This in turn affects higher forms of life that depend on those creatures for sustenance. None of this takes into account the potential deleterious side effects of the chemicals on soil, water, and humans. This doesn’t begin to cover the subject, but it’s enough to get us to the next step.

Herbicides have been used since ancient times: conquering armies spread salt on the land to inhibit food production, thus starving their enemies. Salt has historically been used to control weeds in salt-tolerant crops such as asparagus. But it wasn’t until after World War II, when “better living through chemistry” arrived and the chemical factories of the war machine lay idle, that chemical pesticides and fertilizers transformed agri-culture into industrial agri-business.

Monsanto had been a leading chemical company since 1901, but not until 1945 did it start producing and marketing agricultural chemicals, including 2,4D. In 1960, an Agricultural Division was established. Today, Monsanto is strictly an agribusiness, the largest seed company in the world, and famous for such controversial products as bovine somatotropin (Bst) and herbicides including Ramrod, Lasso, and Roundup. These are based on glyphosate, which Monsanto patented in the 1970s, and which became a cash cow for the company. When the patent ran out in 2000, cheaper products from China flooded the market, and glyphosate use proliferated even more.

Roundup was first sold in 1976. Then there was Roundup D-PAK. Then Roundup Ultra. Then Roundup UltraMAX. Each one was “new and improved.” But a more insidious development was “Roundup Ready” seeds. Through bioengineering, planted crops can resist the deadly effects of the herbicide, making its use even more widespread. Today, 80% of the corn and 90% of the soybeans grown in the U.S. come from Roundup Ready seeds (which of course come only from Monsanto). But if scientists can develop seeds immune to toxic chemicals, so can nature.

We already have the makings of a marvelously complex and intriguing bedtime story for anyone just starting to get involved in organic farming, but this is only the beginning.

For example, while organic farmers shun herbicides in general, if only on principle, glyphosate (and Roundup) have found some support. The chief scientist for a nonprofit organic advocacy group, the Organic Center, recently said, “If glyphosate isn’t the safest herbicide, it comes damn close.” Jeff Gilman, an associate professor of horticulture at the University of Minnesota, takes a very balanced and open-minded but scientific approach to all aspects of gardening. In The Truth About Organic Gardening, he discusses the pros and cons of glyphosate, concluding that properly used, it does have its place. He says “We aren’t surprised if a flame from a flamethrower, a common organic method of weed control, kills frogs, so why are we surprised that a heavy dose of Roundup does?” (Like many in the organic community, he’s bothered less by glyphosate than by the other ingredients in Roundup.)

The story would also involve such interesting twists as the 1996 lawsuit accusing Monsanto of false and misleading advertising by claiming that its glyphosate-based herbicides were “safer than table salt.” There were also accusations — and convictions — involving scientific fraud.

Early on, some scientists and many organic farmers were concerned about herbicide resistance to glyphosate. Monsanto, naturally, dismissed such concerns. Now they can’t, because farmers across the country are finding weeds that are unaffected by the herbicide. At least nine species are known to be immune, affecting millions of acres in more than 20 Midwestern and Southern states. And the other chemical companies are taking notice.

Now, here’s what should be the real news in this story: What has this taught us?

Don’t be silly. We haven’t learned a doggone thing. Here’s how the agribusiness industry is facing this challenge:

The other ag chemical companies see Monsanto’s trouble as an opportunity to revive the older, even more dangerous herbicides that Roundup displaced, including 2,4-D and dicamba. What’s much, much worse, they’re taking a page from Monsanto’s book and developing bioengineered seeds to match their own brands of herbicides. According to The Wall Street Journal, Dow Chemical Co., DuPont Co., Bayer AG, BASF SE and Syngenta AG are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to develop genetically modified (GM, or “Frankenstein”) soybean, corn and cotton seeds that can survive a dousing by their house-brand herbicides.

Have they lost their minds? Can’t any halfway intelligent individual see the handwriting on the wall?

Obviously not. Said Dan Dyer, head of soybean research and development at Syngenta: “The herbicide business used to be good before Roundup nearly wiped it out. Now it is getting fun again.”

Fun. As I said last week, the really terrifying thing is that some people actually like what the world is becoming. —Jd Belanger

Note: There will be no blog here next Friday. See you in two weeks.

“Twenty-one gardens!!! Is that a typo in your last post, or are you crazy?”

If forced to choose one or the other, I’d have to admit that was not a typo. There are 21, more or less, depending on how you count them. And if I told you they contain more than 30,000 daffodils and other spring bulbs, you would certainly opt for the crazy. But it all started innocently enough.

We have always had a garden, of course. Diane and I both grew up with flowers and vegetables. But when we got our own place and for a long time after, I was the consummate self-sufficient homesteader. Flowers were a waste of time and resources: If you couldn’t eat it, I didn’t plant it.

This is a part of one of my 21 gardens, with just a few of my 30,000 spring bulbs. This “South Lawn” garden requires absolutely no input or maintenance, except for being mowed once a year, in late summer.

I’m not sure when that changed, but I do recall mentioning how much I enjoyed the “Grandma’s Garden” mix of old-fashioned annuals I’d planted — and how many readers were surprised that I’d planted flowers. (Somehow, that was in an article I wrote evaluating different potatoes, for one of the last issues of the old Blair & Ketchum’s Country Journal.)

The earlier focus on food didn’t indicate a lack of appreciation for beauty or anything like that. It had more to do with the wise allocation of resources. When you’re trying to produce all of your own food, plus running a publishing business on a shoestring budget, you have to set priorities. Flowers don’t rank very high in a struggle for survival.

All of this was highly evident at our office on the edge of a small town in southern Wisconsin. It had a spacious front lawn. Even back then I hated lawns as wasteful (to say nothing of boring), but I wanted the place to look nice and make a good impression on passers-by, if only to cheer up the world a tiny bit. So we planted fruit trees, and a “demonstration garden” featuring plants that were of interest to homesteaders, but which most people (at that time) were unfamiliar with. There was a lot of comfrey, and Jerusalem artichokes, but also munchie-type vegetables the Countryside staff enjoyed at break time.

As seems to be the story of my life, just as the apple trees were starting to bear, we moved. At first the Up North office was in our house, on a very, very dusty gravel road leading to a popular fishing lake, meaning being outdoors in summer was seldom pleasant; inside the boundaries of the Chequamegon National Forest, meaning clay soil in the shade as well as everything from rabbits and deer to black bears and bobcats; and to top it off, in Zone 3, where it’s tough to grow even iceberg lettuce and snow peas. I did, however, plant a nice patch of tulips and daffodils to brighten up the roadside in spring. The daffodils, at least, are still there.

When we moved the office to the former Nightingale tavern on the highway, I went wild. We built a long berm across the gravel parking lot and planted it with trees, shrubs, annuals and perennials of many kinds. It was awesome. For a year or two.

The tavern out in the woods in the middle of nowhere had also been a gas station (and more… but of course, except for the dance hall, skating rink, trap shoot and convenience store, the little house out back and the rooms upstairs are just rumors.) We knew the underground gas tanks had been removed, but there were some older tanks everyone had forgotten about, that were now leaking… right under the gorgeous new berm.

The LUST (Leaking Underground Storage Tank) cleanup was a nightmare. The berm was replaced afterwards, sort of. But it was never the same.

And a short time after that, the state bought the bermed strip to widen the highway, and that was the end of that garden.

Which brings us to the 32 acres we now call home. It’s only a few miles south of the aforementioned highway but with a south slope and in growing Zone 4, especially these past few years.

Shortly after buying the property I planted a few daffodils and a bunch of Muscari armenicum. The next fall, a few more. After a while they add up, especially when they look so nice and you get so good at planting them that a “few” becomes “a few thousand” at a time.

Deer and rabbits don’t bother daffodils and muscari, and of course, the bulbs multiply. Amazingly (to me), this year even the tulips came back. Experience has taught me to treat tulips as annuals. Last year I planted 200 of them in a large “50” to celebrate our 50^th wedding anniversary, fully expecting them to die out by now. Wouldn’t you know it, this spring they came back bigger and bolder and better than last year! I suppose that “50” will last forever, now. (I hope that’s a good omen.)

Meanwhile, I got interested in conifers. White and red pine, black and white spruce, and tamarack and balsam are natives here, and the former owner planted dozens of Colorado blue spruce. I added Serbian spruce, Concolor fir, and Limber, Austrian, and Mugo pines. This has evolved into a collection of several hundred trees, including more than a dozen varieties of white pine (Pinus strobus): trees with curly needles; pendulous weeping trees; miniature, dwarf, intermediate and full-size; and the gorgeous golden P. strobus “Louie.”

Hostas are a later addition. We only have about 75 different varieties, so far. But spring is here and the garden centers will be opening in a few weeks…

We still eat from our gardens. But we don’t have to plant as much for two as we did when six gathered around the dining table, three of them 6-ft. teenage boys. Combine that with having plenty of time and horticultural interests that are not only unabated but growing, and yes, I have 21 gardens.

And now that I’ve looked back like this, I don’t think I’m crazy, either. What I see here is the evolution of life, beyond the sidewalks.

Diane, in the lily garden in July.

Writing a blog is neither as easy nor as interesting as I’d thought it would be. But that’s no excuse for slacking off the way I have.

A much better “excuse” would be the eye surgery. With the cataract, I had trouble seeing. Without it, I’m still having trouble, because my glasses don’t work. But I’m not getting new glasses until after the other eye is done. Excuses, excuses.

Reasons are something else. One of the main ones is that I seriously doubted whether anyone was reading my posts. (Or my book either, for that matter. To a writer’s mind, the two are related.) Our mantra is “Love me or hate me, but please spare me your indifference.” Writers can’t stand rejection, but being ignored is even worse.

In the good old days when I was an editor I quickly knew when I hit a nerve because I got postcards and letters, and in extreme cases even telephone calls, from irate subscribers cancelling their subscriptions. Along with the occasional love letter, of course. These days, a few comments, and that’s it. Lately, even the spammers have been ignoring me. So why bother?

Then, yesterday, the publisher emailed me a report, complete with charts and colored graphs and percentages and all manner of wonderful (I’m sure) data I don’t even pretend to understand. The bottom line is, some people are reading this! Or at least they were. My slovenly lack of dedication and reliability has resulted in many clicking on this site and seeing nothing new, leaving within 10 seconds.

So I have resolved to do better. My goal is to have a fresh post every Friday morning.

I realize that many blogs are merely diaries of daily activities, which would be relatively easy to report — if there were any activities worthy of comment. That’s what Beyond the Sidewalks was, 30-40 years ago. But that’s when I was actually doing something, and it was only once a month. Here’s an abridged sample from the Countryside of August, 1971:

The pace I told you about last time has slackened a bit, with the heavy spring schedule behind us. Just a bit, though. Here’s a rundown on some of the latest activities at Countryside:

In early June, I was show superintendent at the Kid and Buck Show put on by the Wisconsin Dairy Goat Association… and it was fun! As you know, showing goats or rabbits isn’t really my cup of tea, even though I write about such shows for Countryside’s Rabbit World and Dairy Goat Guide. I do think showing has much to recommend it, especially for people who are really into goats or rabbits (or any other animals, for that matter). There just never seemed to be much relationship between homestead animals and show animals so far as I was concerned. Anyway, actually getting involved makes something like this more interesting, and I’m sure I learned a few things too.

Those late oats planted at Lillie’s are growing, but it’s too soon to tell if they’ll beat the heat. We have the scythe all sharpened up, so if they amount to anything, we’ll have some information on harvesting grain on a small scale.

The potatoes, beans, Jerusalem artichokes and a few other things we planted among the rocks at Stoney Brook (the bulldozer still isn’t running) are doing fine, and for some reason, the garden here at Countryside is unusually weed-free this year. We need rain badly… it’s been a very dry season right here, although rain has fallen all around us… but we’re in good shape anyway.

I don’t know if I mentioned this, but the chicks we got this year were a grab-bag… guaranteed to be heavy breeds, but that’s it. And I’m thinking of starting a chicken zoo.

We have birds I’ve only seen in pictures. Red ones, white ones, black ones, brown ones, chickens colored like pheasants, chickens with feathers on their feet, and the prize has a big mop on its head. That’s a Polish. There are Buff Orpingtons, Barred Rocks, and Heaven only knows what else. All supposedly purebred, but a really motley assortment. Actually, it makes the chicken yard very interesting. How they shape up for the table and feed conversion remains to be seen.

My sister Gretchen was here for awhile, helping out with the gardening in the morning, and doing a little writing afternoons. Man, what a life! That’s the way I started out here, but the “business” got to be too much. I’d get bored stiff in the garden all day long, I’m afraid, and sitting at a typewriter for 40 hours a week is a ridiculous way to spend your life, so my ideal was (is) to work a few hours a day in the barn or garden or shop, work a few hours at the desk, then have some time for a swim or other relaxing exercise, and wind up the day with some non-business type reading or just plain contemplation. We manage that on a weekly basis, but not daily. Anyway, I just wanted to warn you that if you read anything this time that doesn’t quite sound like me… it’s Gret.

She was doing something on home-made noodles, which interested me because I guess I just never thought that much about noodles. I was surprised to learn you don’t bake them or anything like that: they’re just dried… paste. We were discussing this when Judy Ramsdale piped up from her corner that she makes noodles all the time. So, Gret and Judy ended up in the kitchen making noodles. Sometimes it’s a wonder how we ever get any magazines published around here, let alone three of them.

It goes on like that for another thousand words or so, about the geese we just acquired, the article on solar energy I was writing for Organic Gardening & Farming magazine (an interview with Dr. Farrington Daniels, who wrote Direct Use of the Sun’s Energy in 1964), and an overnight “vacation” spent camping at our planned future homestead in the woods (which never did pan out). And I did that every month, for 30 years.

What could I tell you about the past month? You already know about the eye surgery. I went to meetings of the Taylor County Master Gardeners, the Northern Wisconsin Hosta Society, and the Thorp Town & Country Garden club (where I put on a fruit tree pruning demonstration). Pruned a bunch of apple trees here, too. Whoopee-ding. Nothing to write home about, much less anything to share with strangers.

I can hardly wait ‘til Friday, to see what I come up with. It will be interesting.