Harland closed the notebook.
“What exactly do you think you proved?”
Toby looked across the orchard.
The answer had changed since April.
“I proved we were paying for separate problems that could sometimes be connected.”
Harland waited.
Toby continued.
“The chickens eat some insects.”
“Some.”
“They disturb some pest habitat.”
“Some.”
“They clean fallen material.”
“Yes.”
“They produce eggs.”
“Obviously.”
“They put manure back.”
“Carefully.”
“I know.”
“And they create work.”
“A lot.”
Harland nodded.
“So?”
“So none of those things saves the farm by itself.”
Toby pointed toward the notebook.
“But together they changed enough costs that Dad didn’t need the twelve-thousand-dollar loan.”
Curtis looked toward Daniel.
“Is that true?”
Daniel nodded.
“I canceled the application.”
Harland turned.
“You didn’t tell me.”
“You would’ve yelled.”
“I am considering it.”
Daniel smiled.
Harland looked back toward the orchard.
For a while nobody spoke.
Then he asked Toby:
“What would you do differently next year?”
Toby answered immediately.
“Fewer birds.”
Harland blinked.
Daniel laughed.
“After all this?”
“Two hundred was too many for the test size.”
Harland nodded.
“Good.”
“Better shelters.”
“Yes.”
“Permanent water points.”
“Yes.”
“Better predator fence.”
“Definitely.”
“Longer rotation.”
“Probably.”
Harland raised an eyebrow.
Toby corrected:
“I need to test longer rotation.”
“Better.”
“Don’t use them in the wet block.”
“Good.”
“Still scout and treat pests they can’t reach.”
Harland nodded.
“That is the first intelligent thing you’ve said all day.”
Toby almost smiled.
Curtis asked, “Would this work for another orchard?”
Toby looked at Harland.
Then answered:
“I don’t know.”
Curtis seemed surprised.
“You don’t?”
“Different soil.”
Toby counted on his fingers.
“Different pest pressure. Different varieties. Different predators. Different labor costs. Different number of chickens.”
He shrugged.
“They’d have to test it.”
Curtis looked at Harland.
Harland finally smiled.
A small one.
“That answer is why I’m still standing here.”
Several neighboring growers visited over the next month.
News in farming communities moved quickly.
Not because Toby became famous.
Because farmers paid attention to anything that might reduce costs without destroying yield.
Some visitors arrived excited.
That made Toby nervous.
One man wanted to release five hundred broilers into a pear orchard after talking to Toby for twenty minutes.
Toby said no.
The man laughed.
“You’re the chicken kid telling me not to use chickens?”
“I’m telling you to test first.”
Another grower assumed the birds eliminated sprays.
“No.”
Toby corrected him.
“They didn’t.”
“Then what’s the point?”
“Less pressure in some parts of the system.”
“That sounds complicated.”
“It is.”
People preferred simple stories.
Toby learned that.
Chickens saved orchard.
Good story.
Not true.
Teenager proved experts wrong.
Good story.
Also not true.
Harland had been right about many problems.
Predators.
Labor.
Mud.
Damage.