At last he made his way to Governor Durnwalder’s office. Before entering, he checked his clothing to make sure that he hadn’t brought along any unwanted souvenirs from the barn and gave his shirt one last pass of the hand to remove any wrinkles. He was dressed to offer the governor a modicum of respect but also a clear reminder that he was, first and foremost, a mountain farmer. The governor’s assistant stood up to greet him with a handshake, commending him for his timely arrival before knocking lightly on the governor’s door and, upon hearing a reply, gestured for Günther to enter.
Out of his element but confident in his mission, Günther thanked the assistant and stepped inside. Durnwalder was just coming out from behind his long wooden desk, filled with sheaves of papers and notebooks and a small stand holding a miniature red-and-white banner imprinted with the red South Tirolean eagle. With the slightly fatigued eyes of a shrewd deal maker and an aggressive handshake that put to rest any question of who was in charge of the proceedings, the governor welcomed Günther and worked through the customary greetings and questions about life in the Upper Vinschgau, a place he loved to visit anytime he could.
They both knew, however, that there was a reason for the meeting, and neither had time to waste. Günther had cows to milk; Durnwalder had hands to pump and deals to seal.
Günther put it all on the table. He had no issues with his neighbors, and even though he was an organic farmer, he didn’t feel any different from his neighbors: They were all trying to find a way to make a living in a challenging world market on relatively small holdings. He wasn’t about to tell someone else how to farm any more than he wanted someone else dictating what practices he used on his own farm . . . but when a farmer’s practices started to impact a neighbor’s ability to farm and make a living, then something had to be done.
Günther explained that it wasn’t just him and his fellow organic farmers who were facing the dilemma of being surrounded by conventional apple farmers spraying pesticides—even conventional livestock farmers were threatened if pesticide residues began to taint their crops. And what was to become of the burgeoning efforts to reclaim the Upper Vinschgau’s reputation as the Breadbasket of the Tirol?
A consummate politician, Durnwalder expressed his concern for Günther’s situation. Similar scenarios would only become more likely as more fruit growers sought out the Vinschgau’s last opportunities for expansion, he agreed. And like any good politician he was quick to seize upon the two best tools for appeasement: compromise and research.
As Günther had expected, the governor suggested a solution: The province’s premiere agricultural research institute, the Laimburg Research Center, would construct a new experimental orchard in the Upper Vinschgau to study pesticide drift and determine what different orchard orientations, spray techniques, and buffer zone policies might be most effective. In fact, Durnwalder indicated that the new orchard would be ideal for determining precisely what approaches would be best suited to Günther’s situation, since the research site would be established on the outskirts of Günther’s village of Laatsch!
Prepared for Durnwalder’s suggestion, Günther had opted to support the research proposal, even though he was worried that it would only lead to a stronger foothold for Big Apple and company. As a compromise, Günther proposed that the research site be established with the condition that no more orchards would be allowed until the results of the research were available and reviewed. Once it was clear how far pesticides were drifting, then any new orchards could be designed in ways that would be less likely to impact their neighbors’ land and health.
Günther was no fool, but he was relatively new to such political machinations. He wanted to believe that the primary purpose of the Laimburg research site really was to study pesticide drift, and he could only hope that the governor had his concerns and the long-term interests of other Upper Vinschgau farmers in mind. Even though he was skeptical, he held out hope that definitive research on the impact of drift and new policies to protect adjacent landowners from drift might help resolve the growing issues. Within twenty minutes they had shaken hands, and Durnwalder welcomed him to return anytime if he needed anything.
Günther couldn’t get out of Bozen fast enough. Little did he realize that there were actually already plans in play for not one but two research sites outside his village—and the researchers were particularly interested in testing out apple, cherry, and apricot varieties that would thrive in the high altitudes of the last frontier for fruit growing in the South Tirol. The “experimental orchard” was, in reality, a Trojan horse sent in by Big Apple, courtesy of the governor.
Unfortunately, it would be only a matter of days before Günther would come to regret his conciliatory response to Durnwalder’s suggestion. The governor had made his first move, and Big Apple was about to assert control of two more coveted agricultural parcels, all in the blink of an eye. It’s better to play chess at home than in the halls of power.
Bozen was a city of compromises. But to hold on to the organic certification that kept his farm afloat, Günther wasn’t allowed any compromises. He would have to find more allies among his community if his farm was going to survive.
A natural nexus point, the city of Bozen owes its existence to the scouring powers of ice and water. Since the Ice Age gouged its way through the Alps, the Eisack River has continued to tear away at the precipitous valley that runs southward from the heights of the Brenner Pass, the historic passageway between what are now the countries of Italy and Austria. Completely channelized by the time it reaches Bozen, the Eisack River dumps into the Adige, and the combined power of two rivers surges toward Verona and the Adriatic Sea.
Bozen/Bolzano is also a point of cultural confluence. A vibrant point of fusion for Mediterranean and Tirolean cultures, it is the meeting place for white bread and dark bread, wine and beer, pasta and dumplings, Italian frivolity and Teutonic precision. In its role as the capital city for the autonomous province of Südtirol—known by Italians as the Alto-Adige, or “Upper Adige”—the city bridges the historic divide between its Tirolean heritage and its contemporary Italian realities.
The idea of “Italy” originated in the early nineteenth century, but it never really transpired until Rome was designated as the capital of the collective city-states that ultimately combined and gave it the approximate boot shape that we now consider to be Italy. However, the boot would have been more of a low-cut version had it not been for a geography professor from Florence, Ettore Tolomei, who was tinkering with what a modern nation-state might look like in two dimensions.
Intrigued by the concept of watersheds as political delineations, he drew a line, not so much in the sand as in the mountains, and he proposed, by way of maps and even invented Italian location names, a northern national boundary that would bring the Alto-Adige into the new Italian fold. Few bothered to ask the inhabitants of what would eventually become the South Tirol about their opinion in this matter, but sometimes maps transform backroom imagination and topographic logic into political reality, leaving democratic inquiry behind.
In the end, the concept of the Alto-Adige became a hot topic among Italian nationalists who promoted the idea of an “unredeemed” (irredenta) Italy—a country that wouldn’t be complete until it extended to its “natural” borders. That’s why Tolomei’s concept of the watershed delineation became so important—and it’s a nutshell version of how the Tirol became divided into North and South. Simple enough in theory, but enter World War I from stage left and World War II from stage right, and the drama and complexity heightened.
The so-called Alto-Adige territory was part of the bait used by the emerging Allied Powers to entice Italy to join their cause. The 1915 Treaty of London dictated that the Alto-Adige would be ceded to Italy following a victory of the Allies, if Italy agreed to join the alliance. Once the Great War was over, the Treaty of St. Germain in 1919 broke up the Habsburg Empire and granted the territory to Italy. The I
talian Fascists began moving in shortly thereafter, taking over rail, mail, water, electrical, and school systems. Bozen was the nucleus for the takeover, and the goal was clear: Italianize the region. Not only did the Italians take over civil authority, but they also tried to outlaw the native German dialect, even in the local schools and churches. “Catacomb schools” and underground resistance groups grew in proportion to the intensity of the territorial and cultural takeover.
The Second World War only complicated the situation. Straddling the embattled zone between the European Axis Powers, the inhabitants of what the international community was increasingly recognizing as the Alto-Adige were caught between the grinding cogs of Mussolini’s and Hitler’s war machines. Faced with unsavory biddings for allegiance by each of two terrible choices, they had no good options and no real say in the outcome. By the end of the Second World War, they found themselves still part of Italy.
The Italian government was able to exert most of its power in the cities and valleys, the places where the regional infrastructure was concentrated. The higher and more remotely you lived, the easier it was to maintain a rebellious spirit and a semblance of independence. The embers of the old Tirolean identity were carefully tended until finally, in 1972, Italy granted the South Tirol a unique form of political autonomy, allowing the region a governance system that would allow it to protect its cultural heritage and determine the best allocation of the bulk of its tax base.
In the end the South Tirol solution became an international model for cultural coexistence amid challenging political boundaries. With autonomy secured, more wealth shifted to the seat of provincial government in Bozen. Tourism and industrial development began to help fill the coffers of the autonomous province, gradually transforming it into one of the wealthiest regions of Italy.
With wealth comes power, and a call for conformity. But Malsers, people who lived at the outer reaches of provincial power and on the edges of Swiss and Austrian cultures, had a reputation for doing things a little differently. Famous for growing grain, they also knew how to go against the grain.
On the long drive back from Bozen, flanked on either side of the road by fruit trees for almost the entire 50-mile (80 km) distance, Günther wondered how successful a group of Querdenkers might be in finding common ground, much less standing their ground in the face of such political and economic power. Watching for the telltale black with red and white trim that signified a police car, he was driving as fast as he could up the valley, back toward his cows, but he could see Bozen closing in fast from behind.
About 15 miles (23 km) from Mals, the valley floor of the Vinschgau rose up quickly, albeit with the geological vestiges of a heavy list down toward the southern left side. Perched on the upper side of the valley sat Schlanders, a rustic jewel of a village overlooking a mosaic of fruit production. The highway horseshoed its way around the village and then immediately twisted its way around the adjacent smaller village of Kortsch before shooting straight out into yet another gauntlet of orchards. From the road, the apple plantations and their fettered minions all looked the same. But there was one clear exception amid all the rest, farther down and hidden from the roadside.
As he passed the exit for Kortsch, Günther pushed down on the gas pedal a bit more, peering out the driver’s-side window and into what was fast becoming a sea of white blossoms, wondering how Ägidius Wellenzohn’s trees and vines were faring with the spring weather.
If other fruit farmers followed Ägidius’s lead, there wouldn’t be a need to test for pesticide drift—much less worry about coexistence.
The first time I met Ägidius, he was waiting for our media team at the edge of his orchard, casually leaning on the empty end of a bladeless scythe. We’d come to document how he had managed an organic orchard for thirty years, just down the valley from his home in Mals.
As someone who loves to mow with a scythe, I was perplexed. Not only was Ägidius’s red metal scythe missing a blade, but he also had it turned upside down, with the rubber-coated handle looking more like a well-worn tool than a grip. Indeed, when I pointed to his scythe and noted that it seemed to be missing an important part, Ägidius smiled ever so slightly, and without a word he picked it up, walked over to a patch of weeds several feet tall, and swung the bladeless instrument in one broad, sweeping gesture, breaking and bending the stems of the weeds but leaving them in place. It was our first lesson in how Ägidius turns the whole idea of fruit production upside down in almost everything he does. For three decades, he has been blazing a new path forward, in his own quiet way.
That path, as it turns out, isn’t particularly well mown. Excessive mowing would only interrupt nature’s processes and diminish the natural biodiversity that provides the ecological balance he is looking for in his orchard. “I actually don’t want to do anything, but rather be a human in the Garden of Eden as it is envisaged by God—just live without having to work so that nature does the work for me. I only want to intervene in the natural processes to regulate things a bit and to steer a little, but nature does the rest. Nature is perfect—she doesn’t need humans; humans need nature.”
Despite his parents and his neighbors suggesting that he was getting lazy when he began to forgo conventional orcharding techniques and shift to organic methods, Ägidius let the weeds grow—and the hedges, the insects, and the dwarfed fruit trees. Farming in nature’s image is a messy business, particularly in the eyes of a Tirolean culture steeped in an appreciation for order and control.
Not that Ägidius doesn’t own a tractor. He does. He simply prefers not to use it any more than he has to. He mows the tractor paths between the rows of trees once per year, usually in late July. After mowing the paths, he takes his bladeless scythe, turns it on its head—along with most other conventions in modern agriculture—and knocks down the weeds between the trees with its rubber handle. Breaking the stems slows the growth of weeds while retaining the necessary habitat for the beneficial insects residing in his 7.5 acres (3 ha) of chemical-free Paradise. As the weeds become senescent, they drop their seed, leaving more of the nutrients for the surrounding fruit trees and the table and wine grapes trellised amid the rows of apples, pears, and apricots.
Most surprisingly, Ägidius doesn’t own a spray machine. He doesn’t even spray copper and sulfur solutions on his fruit trees and vines, as do most other organic orchardists. Copper helps prevent fungal diseases in cooler weather, while sulfur is particularly effective against those worrisome threats in hotter temperatures. While neither of these organically derived chemicals poses serious threat to humans or the environment, copper is a heavy metal that can interfere with a plant’s ability to absorb nutrients from the soil once it reaches high levels. In fact, one critique of organic fruit growing—both by insiders and by conventional farmers—is that many organic fruit growers rely too heavily on copper and thereby overload the soil in their orchards and vineyards.
But Ägidius takes a different approach—perhaps even a radical approach—from most organic farmers. If his strategy could be summarized in a word, it would be the one written in bright yellow on the brown T-shirt he was wearing when we first met him: G’MIATLICH. A beloved term in the South Tirol dialect, g’miatlich derives from the high German gemütlich, meaning “easygoing, mellow, chill, or going with the flow.” The more I learned about Ägidius’s methods, the more I began to think of that T-shirt as his farm uniform. As he explains it, his low-key approach fosters biodiversity, the linchpin to his success: “For me, biodiversity is essential, a basic requirement, and it is important that many different plants, insects, and creatures exist to complement one another. That’s all very important, that there is a big diversity so that the system can take care of itself without humans having to intervene.”
Querdenker extraordinaire, Ägidius is a pedestrian observer, not a distracted tractor driver. As he walked us through his orchard, pointing out a stunning array of fruits that would rival those of any conve
ntionally managed orchard in appearance, he was constantly scanning the vertical layers of his orchard—from soil to trunk to branches to uppermost tip—regularly pushing his wire-rimmed glasses back up the bridge of his nose as they slipped with the rise and fall of his head. Tall and trim, he had farmer’s hands that seemed perfectly formed to the size of the robust fruits he picked for us to sample, occasionally cutting one open with a pocketknife. With long forearms and muscular legs, Ägidius possesses the perfect build for pruning and picking. In his fifties, he climbs a tree ladder like most schoolkids bound up steps. Only the gray in his day-or-two-old beard hints at his age as he darts through his fruit trees and vines with the agility of a free-ranging pollinator.
Ägidius plants his fruit trees at half the density of his conventional colleagues and he prunes less aggressively, both of which cut his yields and seem at first to be an unreasonable economic compromise. When I asked how that low density can ever pay off, his tightly maintained smile melted into a full grin, and he tipped the apple cart: He essentially has no inputs. Virtually zero. Not even compost or manure. His low-key approach to managing the vegetation in his orchard maintains a self-perpetuating cycle of fertility. And he needs only enough diesel fuel to mow his tractor paths once a year between the rows of fruits and then to haul the harvest back to his home in the village of Glurns, one of the smallest walled villages in Europe and the architectural gem of Mals. When costs are down, profits are up, and Ägidius is completely content with a modest income and a table never wanting for superb food and drink.
By the time we had made the full round of Ägidius’s fruit trees and vines, I’d consumed enough dietary fiber for the better part of a week. The fruits were worthy of a study by the Dutch masters—and certainly eye candy for any tourist brochure. I marveled at the lack of disease and insect damage, not to mention the heavy fruit-set on the trees and vines.
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