Surreal Photos Show How Modern Agriculture Looks Nothing Traditional Farms

Cutting-edge agriculture combines ancient techniques with new innovations and extraordinary scale. The result can look like science fiction.

German photographer Henrik Spohler recently documented agricultural methods including genetic engineering of plants by scientists in Germany, "gigantic outdoor monocultures in the United States" and farming "under glass and plastic in the Netherlands and Spain," to show "places where man has assumed the role of Creator."

He shared some photos here, and you can see more at his website and in his book, "The Third Day."

Scientists grow and measure corn plants at an research facility in Germany.Shittake mushrooms grow on compressed sawdust blocks in Germany, which are designed to mimic dead logs.At facilities like this tomato greenhouse in Middenmeer, Netherlands, scientists have tamed mother nature to grow fresh produce at any time of the year. Inside the greenhouse, farmers grow rows upon rows of perfectly shaped tomatoes. Whether mass-produced fruit tastes as good is another story.Up close, you can see multiple tomato trusses (the fruit-bearing part of the plant) growing from a single plant.The dry, dusty climate in Andalusia, Spain used to make it a poor place to farm. Then farmers began covering the landscape with greenhouses, building a $2.8 billion agriculture industry.Fields in Paso Robles, Calif. may look like the surface of a desolate planet, but they're actually just fallow. Fields are left ploughed but unseeded to let them regain fertility for a later season.Irrigation channels in California transformed an area that used to be covered with dry steppe into one of the most important fruit and vegetable farming regions in North America.Grape vines grow in semi-arid King City, Calif.Prior to planting, soil must be chemically treated to rid it of weeds in the seedbed that would compete with the crop for water and nutrients.The soil is covered with plastic mulch to suppress weeds and conserve water. Plants grow through small slits in the sheeting. Plastic mulch has been praised for preventing rotting fruit, but disposal of the sheeting has become an environmental problem.Here, the soil has been tilled and irrigated in California. Seedlings are beginning to grow.At a vineyard in California, grapes are near the beginning of their growth cycle.Cacti grow in perfect uniformity in Borrego Springs, Calif.

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