How Agricultural Technology Has Shaped Your Thanksgiving Feast

For nearly 400 years, Americans have been celebrating days of thanksgiving, a tradition that dates back to the first autumn harvest feast shared by Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians.  This celebration of the Pilgrim's first bounty, with guidance from Native Americans, included wild fowl like turkey, indigenous fruits and vegetables, potatoes and more.

Agriculture across the United States has changed since that time, and so has the "traditional" Thanksgiving dinner.  Knowledge sharing and the application of new technologies have helped transform food production in this country to be one of the more efficient and abundant in the world.

Humble Beginnings

You might remember learning about the story of Squanto, a Native American man who taught the Pilgrims how to plant corn and fertilize crops with fish. A common food production method among Native Americans at the time was called the Three Sisters Garden, which included corn, beans and squash planted in a companion garden.  Fish were often buried underneath corn rows for fertilizer, then beans were planted next to the corn to grow up the stalks as a trellis. The squash (or pumpkin) were planted so that the leaves would cover the soil, similar to a mulch.

This garden provided two benefits: The produce, eaten together, offered a balanced, nutritious (and storable) meal, and the garden was an example of how crops were grown together or in succession to achieve benefits similar to many modern crop rotations.

From the Three Sisters to Modern Production

The adoption of new technologies, like the combustion engine and mechanical harvesting, then modern crop protection products and seed breeding including biotechnology, spring-boarded the agriculture industry to the level of production and efficiency we enjoy today.  Regardless, many agricultural systems still have roots in principles from the Three Sisters Garden.

First, corn continues to be a staple crop for people in America, both for its nutritional value and multitude of uses for food, fuel and manufacturing.  Most farmers who plant corn do so in rotation with some type of legume, like soybeans, peanuts, or alfalfa.  Crop rotations provide many benefits, including pest management by changing the crops that serve pest hosts.  A benefit unique to rotating legume crops is that they put nitrogen back in the soil because of special nodules in their roots, fertilizing the other crops in rotation.

Another modern agricultural practice that can be linked to the Three Sisters Garden is the concept of conservation tillage for weed control.  Weeds are an issue anywhere crops are grown.  In the Three Sisters Garden, squash leaves shaded the soil surrounding the bean and corn crops, preventing weeds from flourishing.

Many farmers today use conservation tillage or no-till practices.  This practice involves leaving all or part of a harvested crop's residue in the field (like corn stalks), and planting the next season's crop directly into the residue.  Farmers use the previous season's residue to "shade" out weeds, much like the squash leaves.  Conservation tillage has been shown to reduce the need for pesticide applications, retain soil moisture, prevent run-off, and improve overall soil health and biodiversity.

Yet another iteration of the components of the Three Sisters Garden has been introduced to the agriculture industry over the past two decades: GMOs, or genetically modified crops, in order to address specific needs, such as insect or disease resistance.  As of 2014, around 90 percent of all corn and soybeans planted in the US are GM herbicide and/or insect resistant varieties.  In addition, new drought tolerant corn, including a GM variety, is helping farmers protect yields during drought conditions.  A small percentage of squash are also GMO, developed for disease resistance. Each of these traits helps reduce the amount of inputs needed to produce a crop, especially in terms of pesticide reduction.

Importance of Technology

Ongoing agricultural innovation in seeds breeding and crop protection is critical to helping farmers continue to produce an abundant, affordable and sustainable food supply. Nature challenges farmers in many ways every growing season. We must maintain appropriate incentives for researchers to innovate and ensure regulations remain based on sound science to meet these challenges. If we do, farmers can keep putting Thanksgiving dinner on our tables for generations to come.