Soil Foodweb Insights
November 2011
FOOD
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SUSTAINABLE
STUDIES INSTITUTE
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This Month
This month Insights talked with Brant Bordsen, grower of the largest pumpkin west of the Rockies.
As a grower who has adopted sustainability, SFI was excited to hear his success story. Earthfort is
having a special on brewer bags for our 5-gallon bucket brewer!
Sustainable methods break records
By Michael Rost
Sustainability is breaking records down in
the pumpkin patch.
Brant Bordsen is one of many pumpkin
growers throughout the world who compete in
yearly pumpkin weigh-offs. Using sustainable practices, Bordsen has been tipping scales and growing
world class pumpkins.
Bordsen is the city attorney for Marysville,
Live Oak and Gridley, California. He works for the law
firm Rich, Fuidge, Morris and Lane. Bordsen started
growing pumpkins on the farm where he grew up.
He grew his first big pumpkin as a child.
“Pumpkins were an early fascination,” Bordsen said. “I remember growing an astoundingly large
pumpkin, (at the time), in my pre-teens. I’ve always
been preferential towards pumpkins, the fall and the
harvest.”
Bordsen got his bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from UC Davis. Even after getting his law
degree, Bordsen kept up his hobbies and enjoyed
agricultural pursuits.
“About 13 years ago a farmer friend made a
$1 bet that he could grow a bigger pumpkin than I
could. Of course, the farmer thought he could beat
the lawyer. I ended up winning that bet. He wanted
to try again the next year. I won again, so he gave
up. After that I started going to the pumpkin weighoffs,” Bordsen said.
Brant Bordsen broke records with his
pumpkin that weighed 1,693 lbs.
Bordsen has been participating in weighoffs for the past 11 years. He placed high in the last
2 years. In 2010 Bordsen won second place at the
Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival. Half Moon
Bay is one of the oldest and largest local festivals in
California and a premier pumpkin weigh-off in the
United States. Bordsen also took first place at the Elk
Grove, CA contest that year with his pumpkin that
weighed 1,645.5 lbs. This pumpkin broke the California record and was the largest pumpkin grown west
of the Rocky Mountains. He broke that record the
following year.
Edited by Michael Rost
Designed by Adam Lindsley
Copyright ©2011 Earthfort.
Bordsen’s pumpkin was used in a pumpkin scultpture
exhibit at the New York Botanical Garden
“This year I grew a pumpkin that was 1,693 lbs. It was
the 4th largest pumpkin in the world this year. Unfortunately I once again took 2nd place at Half Moon
Bay. Wouldn’t you know it, the grower of the 3rd
largest pumpkin in the world decided to show up to
the same contest? However, as part of an event held
by the New York Botanical Garden, the four largest
pumpkins in the world and their growers were flown
to New York to participate in a holiday exhibition. So
it was good enough for a trip to New York,” Bordsen
said.
Bordsen credits his success to sustainable
growing practices. He doesn’t use inorganic fertilizers
and tests his soil biology regularly with Soil
Foodweb Oregon. After reading Teaming with Microbes, and the foreword by Dr. Elaine Ingham, he
became interested in alternative methods to
growing crops.
“I became intrigued with the idea that if you
let the biology feed the
plant then the plant can feed itself. After reading that
book I contacted Soil Foodweb Oregon. I first started
soil testing three years ago. I regularly follow the
recommendations from the testing and have had
much success,” Bordsen said.
Sustainability is catching on with pumpkin
growers. Bordsen cited Don Langevin, author of multiple pumpkin growing instructional books, as an
example of increased awareness of sustainable practices.
“Langevin has written four books about
growing large pumpkins. The first
three books, titled How-to-Grow World Class Giant
Pumpkins I, II, and III, recommended using conventional methods with many inorganic inputs.
His fourth book is titled How-to-Grow World Class
Giant Pumpkins - The All-Organic Way. Apparently
Mr. Langevin felt it was important to emphasize the
importance of organic growing in his fourth book. I
think that’s a good indicator that the pumpkin growing community is recognizing that traditional methods aren’t the most sophisticated way of approaching growing,” Bordsen said.
Bordsen views sustainability as a better
method compared to conventional practices. He’s
had experience utilizing both approaches.
“I used to pull out the pesticides and really
hammer on the bugs. I think that can be really hard
on the plants. I think using compost tea and compost
in an intelligent way can eliminate the need for pesticides and herbicides. Using conventional methods
is more difficult compared to letting the plant decide
what it needs and when it needs it. You can do
things in life the hard way or the easy way. I learned
the hard way. I made as many mistakes as you can
make growing pumpkins before I wised up. Sustainability has reduced the amount of work I’ve had to
do,” Bordsen said.
Bordsen also credits some of his success to
Shake and Grow, a plant nutritional supplement
available out of Yuba City, California. Please visit
www.shakeandgrow.com for more information.
Holiday lab closures
The Soil Foodweb Oregon lab will be closed for Thanksgiving weekend. Please ensure that samples are
mailed to us so they arrive before November 24th or after the 27th. The lab will be closed
Nov. 24th-27th. We want to make sure samples are processed correctly for accurate results. Samples
arriving during the lab closure may need to be reprocessed.
Soil order of the month
Soil Foodweb Insights is proud to present another installment of our soil order of the month! This month we
are looking at...
Aridisols
Aridisols are soils that form in arid climates. Presence of organic matter and vegetation is usually reduced
in these environments, significantly impacting the development of surface and subsurface soil. The limited
amount of moisture creates some subsurface horizon development, however. Aridisols are also characterized by increased levels of calcium carbonate (CaCO3), gypsum and soluble salts. High accumulations of these
minerals can cause salinization.
Aridisols are limited mostly to grazing resulting from the limited amount of moisture. They cannot be used
for agriculture unless irrigation water is available. Aridisols can be significantly impacted by overgrazing in
these regions and can be heavily degraded without proper land management.
Below is a map of the general area (darker colored) covered by aridisols around the world.
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