Bio-dynamic agriculture | François Bouchet

It was on the land, after fifty years of experience and teaching, that François Bouchet acquired sufficient mastery of bio-dynamics to write this practical and inspiring book steeped in bath pragmatism and intuition.The author was first and foremost a farmer. He expresses himself in terms that are concrete and tangible. His account of the successive errors that have led wine-growing to the edge of the abyss is irrevocable- his diagnosis is assured and his vision of the remedies is clear and convincing. But François Bouchet is also a poet, eager to share his feeling for the magic of this world, whether it be animal, vegetable, mineral or sidereal. His book is also a manual. It contains, in rigorous and meticulous detail, a collection of recipes of aH the preparations that make up the pharmacopoeia of the bio-dynamic wine-grower and gardener. And that in itself is revolutionary, as these details have never been so clearly explained.Viticulturist and teacher François Bouchet founded a consulting firm which has helped hundreds of wine estates in France and elsewhere in Europe convert to bio-dynamics. A wine-grower himself, Bouchet began by converting his own family estate in 1962- since then, his activities have been inseparable from the history of bio-dynamic wine-growing. He was an advisor at Demeter (the ecological association supporting Rudolf Steiner's bio-dynamic method) and helped create the Union of Bio-dynamic Farmers. He passed away in December 2005.