Our world is built on an invisible one we are barely beginning to understand. In The Hidden Half of Nature, geologist David R. Montgomery and biologist Anne Bikle argue that Earth's smallest creatures-microbes-could fundamentally change how we grow food, what we eat and how we practise medicine. The Hidden Half of Nature shares Montgomery and Bikle's efforts to turn a barren patch of ground into a flourishing garden, and Bikle's struggle with cancer. Taking readers deep into the science and history of agriculture and immunology, they show that microbes can provide powerful solutions to the problems plaguing modern agriculture as well as our own bodies. A spellbinding story, The Hidden Half of Nature reveals how we can restore fertility to the land and defeat chronic diseases.

We know that our diet influences our health. But is there more to the adage "you are what you eat?" Connecting the dots from agriculture to medicine, geologist David R. Montgomery and biologist Anne Bikle argue we overlook the other half of a healthy diet: how we grow our food. Journeying from research labs to the fields of regenerative farmers, they uncover scientific and historical evidence for how farming practices-so often disruptive to microbial partnerships-influence soil health and shape the types and amounts of health-promoting minerals, fats and phytochemicals in our crops, meat and dairy-and thus ourselves. Understanding these connections has profound implications for what we eat and how we grow it, now and in the future. A capstone work from lauded authors, What Your Food Ate is a story both sobering and inspiring: what's good for the soil is good for us, too.

Our world is built on an invisible one we are barely beginning to understand. In The Hidden Half of Nature, geologist David R. Montgomery and biologist Anne Bikle argue that Earth's smallest creatures-microbes-could fundamentally change how we grow food, what we eat and how we practise medicine. The Hidden Half of Nature shares Montgomery and Bikle's efforts to turn a barren patch of ground into a flourishing garden, and Bikle's struggle with cancer. Taking readers deep into the science and history of agriculture and immunology, they show that microbes can provide powerful solutions to the problems plaguing modern agriculture as well as our own bodies. A spellbinding story, The Hidden Half of Nature reveals how we can restore fertility to the land and defeat chronic diseases.