Applied Biodynamics — Issue 059 (Winter 2007–2008)

Applied Biodynamics Issue 059 (Winter 2007–2008) brings together the living geometry of the vortex, the many uses of Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray, a striking quackgrass and soil-renewal report, prize-winning biodynamic vegetables, animal gratitude, university teaching, and community preparation making.

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Vortex forms and the midwinter spiral

John Blackwood distinguishes a spiral formed in a plane from a spiral organized around a point. When these two movements meet in three-dimensional space, they form a vortex. He follows this living form through water, shells, palm growth, tornadoes, and the biodynamic stirring vessel.

In Blackwood's biodynamic account, the vortex brings the earthly center and the cosmic plane into relationship. Stirring repeatedly gathers water into ordered movement, releases it into enlivened chaos, and gathers it again from the opposite direction. The midwinter spiral carries the same inward and outward gesture as people walk toward a dark center and then turn toward the returning light.

Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray

This issue formally expands the name Pfeiffer BD Field Spray to Pfeiffer BD Field and Garden Spray. The formula remains the same: BD 500 is combined with BD 502, 503, 504, 505, 506, and 507.

The issue presents the spray as a versatile support for living soil and plant development. It can be applied to green manure, cover crops, stubble, crop residues, or sod before incorporation; used in sheet composting; prepared as a seed bath to support germination; and used foliarly to support flowering and fruit set in tomatoes, peppers, squash, and other crops. Current preparation and application details are in JPI's Pfeiffer spray instructions.

Goodbye quackgrass

Mike and Mary Jayne Richmond had managed a 100-by-200-foot Michigan garden organically for fifteen years while persistent quackgrass remained established in the clay loam. Mike treated half the garden with Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray and followed a purposeful sequence of cultivation and cover crops.

1. Apply Field and Garden Spray to the quackgrass area in early June, then disk the treated ground.
2. Leave the soil fallow for two weeks, disk again, and sow rye.
3. Turn the rye under in late July and sow Japanese millet.
4. Apply Field and Garden Spray again in October and incorporate the knee-high millet.

After the second cultivation, Richmond could push his hand into the soil to wrist depth for the first time. Two weeks after the autumn treatment, the millet was incorporated and the soil was dark and friable. He judged the treated ground better than the adjacent plot managed organically for fifteen years. In the following season, weeding was greatly reduced while the garden fed the family and thirteen CSA customers, supported four thriving bee colonies, and helped sustain rotationally grazed sheep.

The account presents Field and Garden Spray, cultivation, rye, and Japanese millet as a coherent soil-building rhythm that transformed a difficult weed situation into fertile, productive ground.

Prize-winning biodynamic produce

The Evergreen Elm biodynamic gardening team entered twenty-nine exhibits at the 2007 McKean County Fair. They received twenty-four first-place blue ribbons, one third-place ribbon, and two fourth-place ribbons. Their Selke Biodynamic Cherry Tomato also won first place.

L. A. Rotheraine credited the results to the team's cooperation, rigorous chemical-free growing, seed work, and consistent use of Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray. The fair results offered a public demonstration of the excellent quality achieved through their biodynamic practice.

Gratitude toward the animal

Nancy Jewel Poer's meditation addresses a beef animal before slaughter with responsibility, gratitude, and reverence. The animal has lived through milk, pasture, weather, movement, hunger, rest, and the full arc of bovine life. Its body nourishes human beings, while its organs help carry plant substances through the making of BD 502–506.

The meditation places ethical partnership at the center of preparation making: the animal's gift is met with consciousness, skill, gratitude, and service to renewed life.

Biodynamics enters the university

At Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, JPI board president Gena Nonini taught the first Foundation for Applied Biodynamics course to twenty-five students from farming, viticulture, rice production, landscaping, gardening, and university programs.

The course joined biodynamic history, the farm organism, Goethean thinking, forces and substances, certification, calendar work, and direct preparation making. Participants learned to make BD 500 Horn Manure and Barrel Compound. This union of conceptual foundation, exact method, practical work, and shared observation provides a strong model for biodynamic education.

Youth and community preparation making

At JPI's Michaelmas gathering, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, and friends filled more than 1,200 cow horns. Each young participant filled at least 100 horns and received a patch, and the horns were placed in a large pit for winter transformation into BD 500. A photograph in the issue also records JPI staff and volunteers filling 7,000 horns overall.

JPI's open house brought visitors through the farm, offices, root cellar, preparation facilities, educational displays, and hanging yarrow bladders. These events demonstrate how biodynamics is transmitted: people encounter the materials, do the work with their hands, understand its purpose, and join the seasonal rhythm.

Further signs of renewal

A note of thanks reports that a maple treated with Tree Harmonizer turned yellow with red leaf tips for the first time and was experienced as having a loving presence. Hunter Francis also remembers Peter Dukich as a gardener, carpenter, Waldorf teacher, Camphill participant, musician, and lifelong teacher of biodynamics and Anthroposophy who helped hundreds of people experience the relationship among daily life, the Earth, and spirit.

Key topics covered

• Spiral and vortex geometry as a living relationship of center, circumference, earth, and cosmos.
• The unchanged Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray formula and its uses for soil, residues, cover crops, seed, foliage, and sheet composting.
• The Richmond garden's positive quackgrass, soil-structure, productivity, bee, and CSA results.
• Evergreen Elm's twenty-four first-place ribbons from twenty-nine county-fair entries.
• Animal gratitude and ethical partnership in biodynamic preparation making.
• Cal Poly teaching, youth horn filling, JPI community education, and the legacy of Peter Dukich.

Explore related resources

• Pfeiffer Field and Garden Spray and current instructions
• BD 500 Horn Manure and current instructions
• BD 501 Horn Silica
• Complete Set of Biodynamic Compost Preparations
• Barrel Compound, also called Barrel Compost outside the United States
• Weeds and What They Tell Us by Ehrenfried Pfeiffer

Articles in this issue

• Vortex Forms and Midwinter Spirals — John Blackwood
• Pfeiffer BD Field and Garden Spray: A New Name for the Pfeiffer BD Field Spray
• Meditative Thoughts for a Beef Animal Before Slaughter for Meat and Biodynamic Preparations — Nancy Jewel Poer
• Goodbye Quackgrass — Christy Korrow
• Evergreen Elm: Achieving Success With the Help of the Pfeiffer BD Field and Garden Spray
• Gena Nonini Initiates University Course in Biodynamics — Hunter Francis
• Michaelmas Gathering at JPI Introduces Scouts to Biodynamics
• JPI Open House — August 25, 2007
• In Memoriam: Peter Dukich (1915–2007) — Hunter Francis

Citation

Source: Applied Biodynamics, Issue No. 59, Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Bio-Dynamics, Winter 2007–2008.