Duemosegaard (Dove Lake Farm) has been run organically for the past 14 years, but since the fall of 2023 we are in the process of converting our land using regenerative farming practices.
Of course organic farming is better than traditional farming, but it’s still been endless tracts of monoculture. We simply need more diversity in our natural landscapes, thus providing an environment which is home to other species and yet also provides for our food production. We also need to adjust our ways of farming to cease using heavy machinery, which in the past 14 years of organic farming has (ironically) compacted and destroyed the intricate structure of our natural humus on our now denuded soil. Ultimately, we hope to prepare for the future by stepping away from “conventional” farming entirely and adapting our land for climate change by not exposing the delicate top soil by ploughing. Regenerative agriculture instead restores the soil and allows the microorganisms to do their job undisturbed; sequestering water, creating shade, biodiversity, and providing natural fertiliser by mulching past crops and by rotating ruminants and chickens.
The conversion takes place with advice and expertise from agronomist Steen Nørhede and with Jørn Jakobsen and Heather putting his ideas into practice. Steen gives a vivid expression to what regenerative agriculture is in practice when he describes his own farm as follows, “Since 2017, I have worked intensively with the cultivation of grassland mixtures consisting of 10-26 different plant species in the same field for grazing animals. We grow polyculture mixtures with 7-10 different types of cereals, pulses and oil plants, which are sown in the field at the same time and harvested ‘in one fell swoop’ with a conventional combine harvester. The crop mixture is used as concentrated feed for ruminants, pigs and poultry.”
Under Steen’s guidance, in autumn 2023 we have planted several hundred nut trees (hazel, walnut and chestnut) in long rows on 2.5 hectares of the farm’s 19 hectares as an our first step. With a mixed selection of fruit bushes (blackcurrants, raspberries, gooseberries, and redcurrants) in between the larger trees, with wide alleys of nitrogen boosting cover crops sown while the soil rests now for 5 years.
It is a long-term investment for the future and we feel good about that as we watch the tentative return of wildlife to this undisturbed new Eden. As I write on this May morning in 2024 the leaves on our small nut trees begin to sprout, the ground cover begins to flourish above the soil and the roots bring new life for the microorganisms below.
Duemosegaard 