The basic principle of farming is simplicity itself. Farmers use their environmental knowledge to increase the production of those plants and animals they find most useful and to reduce the production of those they can’t use. Farmers weeded and watered the land to help grow the plants they wanted, such as wheat and rice, and fenced in animals they valued, such as sheep and goats, but they removed weeds and shooed away or killed animals they didn’t like, such as snakes and rats. These activities changed entire landscapes, and plants and animals responded to these new environments, as they
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