Best smell in the world!

Charlie Weissinger: “This right here is my favorite smell in the world.”

Grabbing a handful of some of the most fertile soil on the planet.

In Rolling Fork, a few feet away from the banks of Deer Creek (and within sight of Georgianna, an antebellum home which has recently been restored to its earlier grandeur), we found ourselves standing at the edge of a freshly plowed field owned by Charlie Weissinger and his family, recalling the words of Hank Burdine's introduction to his book, Dust in the Road:

Because of the historic annual floods, the riparian banks of the rivers and streams were replenished during each high-water cycle with silt and humus accumulated from over 41 percent of the continental United States and two provinces of Canada. The excess rainwater from the Appalachian Mountains to the Rocky Mountains came right through our font door. In its path was left possibly the most fertile soil on earth. It has been said of Deer Creek, which at one time began on the east bank of the Mississippi River, “God could have made better dirt than Deer Creek, but He figured He just didn't need to.”

Charlie, whose family has farmed land in that area for many generations, after inviting us to take up a handful of that rich soil and give it a good sniff, talked with us about farming — mostly cotton, soybeans, and corn — and flooding's impact on crops and wildlife. He then gave us a tour of his catfish ponds and talked about the specific challenges of fish farming. 

Since we had a date with the flood control museum in Vicksburg at 1:00, we opted to speedily eat our no-frills picnic lunch in the Weissinger tractor shed, where Charlie told us about the equipment stored there and what it does.

A quick group portrait with our host, and we were off again . . .

At the catfish ponds

Explaining how planters work

Because how often do you get to do a group photo in a tractor shed?