What’s it like to be a farmer?
Gardening is like farming without a lot of worries. Gardeners don’t have to make money on their crop. They don’t have to pay taxes or borrow money from the bank. Gardening is fun; farming is business. But gardeners and farmers make the same kinds of decisions. So learning how to take care of a garden can help you understand what it’s like to take care of a farm.
Farming Today(The World Garden)
Suddenly you’re in a farmer’s boots and blue jeans. You’re riding a tractor in an enormous field. Yikes! Your small garden is now a huge farm! What are you going to do now? How much fertilizer will your soil need? What pesticides should you use?
You don’t have time or money to test every part of your land for soil ph. So, you’ll do what farmers have done for thousands of years. You’ll estimate, or use what you know to make a good guess.
You’re also going to estimate how much fertilizer your soil needs. And you’ll follow this rule-more is better than less. By adding more fertilizer than you think you need, you make sure that even your worst soil has enough nutrients.
Then you remember reading about a new kind of truck that can help you take the guesswork out of soil testing and fertilizing. You must have a phone call to the department. Someone from the company brings a truck to your farm and takes you for a ride.
Wow! This truck is amazing. It has a computer on board. Data about your soil is put into the computer. The data come from soil tests, pictures of your land taken by satellites, and soil maps made by the government. The computer hums as it analyzes the data. Then it chooses the exact amounts of nutrients that are best for your soil. The truck mixes the nutrients together to make a special fertilizer-just for your land! A few seconds later, the fertilizer comes pouring out.
computerize soil map like this one are analyze by a computer in the cab of the truck. The different colors represent different kinds of soil.
In no time at all, this super new machine fertilizes all your fields and your ride is over. You can’t believe what it can do! It makes decisions for you.
. You’d never use too much fertilizer again. And that would be good news for the environment. You remember how fertilizers polluted a nearby stream. Then you close your eyes and imagine your fields at harvest time, Because your soil has just the right kinds of nutrients, your crops should be larger than ever! Finally, you shake your head and wonder, “Farming sure is changing. What will it be like in the future?”
Bypassing the Farm
(The World Garden)
Someday food may be produced without growing crops . Imagine growing food without planting crops! A new method may be used to do that.
Tissue culture is a method of growing living tissues outside an organism. To make a tissue culture, scientists remove tissue from an organism and place the tissue in a growing medium. A medium is a liquid that contains growth hormones, water, and nutrients.
Scientists are using tissue cultures to grow cells of crop plants. For example, one scientist made a tissue culture of the juice sacs inside an orange. The juice sacs multiplied on their own and produced orange juice-without any orange trees! In the future, tissue-culture factories, like the ones shown here, may produce foods.
Farming in Space
The year is 2060. You just came from your job in the crop chamber, You and 10,000 other people live and work in a giant wheel spinning in space. As you begin a letter to your grandparents back on Earth, you remember visiting their farm when you were a kid. Things sure were different then!
“Dear Granddad and Grandmother,? you write, “You should see how fast plants grow in space! Out here, crops grow all year long. And they get 24 hours of sunlight every day. No wonder we space farmers produce lots of food in our space station!!
Besides, our crops aren’t harmed by any insects .. Everything that comes on board our space station is checked to make sure no pests are brought inside. So, we can farm without pesticides.
“And the work is fun! Most of us space farmers are also doing experiments in genetic engineering. I’m developing a new kind of ‘super com.’ It grows in hot and cold temperatures. Pretty soon we’ll ship some super corn back to Earth. You’ll be able to grow corn in winter and in summer.”
You close your letter, but add a P.S. “Sometimes I look out at our beautiful planet Earth, and it reminds me of why I’m here. We space farmers don’t want to do your job. We can’t produce all the food for people on Earth. We just want to find new and better ways for Earth farmers to farm. We’re trying to help you grow more food in ways that will protect Earth’s soil and water!”
