Joel Salatin, 59, calls himself a Christian libertarian environmentalist capitalist lunatic farmer. Others who like him call him the most famous farmer in the world, the high priest of the pasture, and the most eclectic thinker from Virginia since Thomas Jefferson. Those who don’t like him call him a bio-terrorist, Typhoid Mary, charlatan, and starvation advocate.

With a room full of debate trophies from high school and college days, ten published books, and a thriving multi-generational family farm, he draws on a lifetime of food, farming and fantasy to entertain and inspire audiences around the world. He’s as comfortable moving cows in a pasture as he is addressing CEOs in a Wall Street business conference. The topics he speaks on range from nitty-gritty how-to for profitable regenerative farming to cultural philosophy like orthodoxy vs. heresy. A wordsmith and master communicator, he prefers to describe his lectures as word performance rather than presentation, and moves audiences from laughs one minute to tears the next, from frustration to hopefulness, often receiving standing ovations. His favorite activity?–Q&A. “I love the interaction,” he says.

He co-owns, with his family, Polyface Farm in Swoope, Virginia. The farm, which was featured in the New York Times bestseller Omnivore’s Dilemma and award-winning documentary Food Inc., services more than 5,000 families, 50 restaurants, 10 retail outlets, and a farmers’ market with salad bar beef, pigaerator pork, pastured poultry, and forestry products. When he’s not on the road speaking, he’s at home on the farm, keeping the callouses on his hands and dirt under his fingernails, mentoring young people, inspiring visitors, and promoting local, regenerative food and farming systems.

Salatin writes The Pastoralist column for Stockman Grass Farmer, granddaddy catalyst for the grass farming movement, and the Pitchfork Pulpit column for Mother Earth News, as well as numerous guest articles for ACRES USA and other publications. He offers food for thought and plans for action by sharing practical, can-do solutions and passionate soliloquies for sustainability on radio programs and podcasts targeting preppers, homesteaders, and foodies.

Mixing mischievous humor with hard-hitting information, Salatin both entertains and moves people. He seldom uses a power-point and often speaks from an outline scribbled on a yellow legal pad, depending on theatrics, style, and compelling content to hold attention and defend innovative positions. The rare combination of prophet and practitioner makes him both a must-read and must-hear in a time desperate for integrity, leadership and example.