Texas loses an organic gardening giant

Gardeners and nature lovers are mourning the death today of Malcolm Beck, a beloved central and south Texas organic gardening guru. Malcolm began his career in sustainable agriculture as a family farmer in the 1950s, raising and selling organic produce near San Antonio, Texas. Later, he turned to helping others find alternatives to conventional agricultural methods and materials through his business, Garden-Ville. Malcolm was a prolific author and promoted sustainable horticulture and agriculture in his books: Garden-Ville Method, Lessons in Nature, TheSecret Life of Compost, Texas Organic Vegetable Gardening, Texas Bug Book: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, and numerous other titles.

I had the honor to write a feature story about Malcolm in 2006 for the San Antonio Express News. I’ve posted the article below. Malcolm was a treasure and he will be missed.

Malcolm Beck Says Soil Holds Cure for Climate
October 14, 2006
San Antonio Express-News

San Antonio took a double shot this year when tenacious drought collided with one of the hottest summers on record. Living with severe water restrictions is no fun, but what we experienced this summer may just be a small taste of the future. While the scientists and pundits huddle in think tanks trying to decide how to save the planet, one San Antonio man seems to have the answers to how we can patch up Mother Earth and make global warming a fading memory.

Malcolm Beck, founder of Garden-Ville, understands nature. A tall, lanky man with white hair and beard, he could double as a lean Santa Claus. He walks briskly as he talks, nonstop, pointing out massive piles of compost and mulches at various stages of "readiness." He worries about the difficulties that lie ahead if the powers that be can't find a way to get us out of our global crisis.

"We've got the knowledge now to understand nature," he affirms, "but we're not using it to understand nature. We're using it to try to improve nature. We can't improve what the master designer put together. It will come back to haunt us."

Beck faults the misuse of our soils as the primary cause of our environment-gone-awry: "Our biggest problem worldwide is that most of our farmland no longer has the organic matter for life and energy it once had." According to Beck, the farmlands across the United States originally had an organic content of 30 percent to 80 percent. Today, most farmland is down to 20 percent or less of what it should be.

"This is a drop in organic content of between 70 to 90 percent in 60 years," says Beck.

What does losing organic matter have to do with global warming? Beck believes that this erosion of the topsoil causes the runoff of water into our lakes and streams, where it is lost forever. "This thinner layer of topsoil can't hold and trap water, leaving barren subsoil. Since this subsoil cannot support plant life and because plants hold water in the soil and capture carbon dioxide from the air, the earth is left with an overabundance of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and soils that cannot sustain life," explains Beck.

Retired Marine Lt. Col. William Holmberg, steering-committee member of the Sustainable Energy Coalition and former scientist with the Environmental Protection Agency, confirms that "all we need to do to offset the carbon dioxide we are putting into the atmosphere each year from burning transportation fuels is to increase the organic content of our farmland just one-tenth of 1 percent each year."

Beck and Holmberg have worked together and agree that "conservation tillage, "especially "no-till" farming and the use of mulch and compost, will provide the necessary organic content to sufficiently decrease the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to safer levels. The liberal use of compost accomplishes more than reconstituting the earth's soil. Composting also conserves water. Healthy soil and water conservation are two ends of the same stick, and Beck believes that this summer's water crisis could have been averted if our soils were healthy.

"A mulch layer of leaves, twigs, grass, compost or any organic material from man's waste stream will protect the soil from the baking sun and drying winds. The mulch holds heavy rains in place until they soak in. This prevents floods and soil erosion," Beck says, adding, "Even though organic-rich soil can absorb and hold more water, plants grown in organic-rich soil actually require less water to grow.”

It's little wonder that Beck has become known as the compost "king" of South Texas. Bob Webster, local radio talk show host and owner of Shades of Green Nursery, has observed Beck for many years.

"Malcolm started out as the area's first organic farmer," says Webster. "He worked on building his soils and fields until his organic crops were better than any conventional crops around. He eventually got into making compost and his compost got such a reputation that people started wanting to buy it from him."

Beck is retired now and is spreading the gospel about soil conservation, organic farming and nature's lessons throughout the world. He recently returned from a whirlwind tour of South Africa, where he delivered speeches and presentations on composting, soil and water conservation, insects and natural living. By year's end, he will have given 70 or more talks to farm groups, garden clubs, churches, universities, Master Gardeners, county agents and community groups. He has written and co-authored numerous books and articles, many of which can be found on his Web site, malcolmbeck.com.

Beck advises that not only farmers but average homeowners use compost on their lawns and gardens. He discourages the use of chemical fertilizers.

"One-half inch of compost applied in the fall and watered in well will do more to keep a lawn healthy than the best chemical program. Compost acts as a chelating agent, preventing micronutrients, especially zinc and iron, from locking up in our alkaline soils," Beck writes in his book Lessons in Nature. Unlike chemical fertilizers, Beck says, compost can be used on lawns year-round.

Beck also advocates the practice of leaving grass clippings in place after mowing, and shredding up fallen leaves and spreading them on the lawn.

"Mulching the lawn with compost in the fall is the closest thing to a cure-all there is," says Beck. Beck doesn't believe that one must purchase an expensive machine to make perfectly good compost. A free-standing pile or a homemade wire cage both work fine. It's the ingredients that go into the compost pile or bin that make the difference.

"To build the compost pile, start adding organic materials as they become available," instructs Beck. "Use all kitchen and yard organic waste except meat unless you have a pile large enough for burying the meat very deep. Grinding the larger twigs and leaves will make them compost faster, or you can just throw them in and later pick or screen them out. Adding horse or cow manure up to 25 percent or chicken manure up to 10 percent makes a good rich compost. To inoculate - or get those microorganisms working - in the beginning, a commercial inoculator can be purchased, or a few shovels of garden soil will do the job.

Jerry Parsons, professor and extension horticulturist for Texas Cooperative Extension, has known Beck for more than 30 years. "To know Beck," says Parsons, "is to be a friend ... and to respect him as the most honest person you have ever met. I coined a phrase about Malcolm many years ago when someone was saying he was just being 'organic' to make more money. I told this person that nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, someone would have to explain dishonesty to Malcolm - it is such a foreign concept for him." 

Nature is just as honest as Beck. "Nature is easily understood, but for a lot of people Nature is too obvious," he says. "They look right past the clues. To understand nature, walk into the woods and meadows and allow your five senses to feed your brain. Then you must use your brain to think."

Oh, what mankind could accomplish with an honest attitude and a thinking brain, and, of course, Santa Claus.