Field Work: Recent Episodes
Field Work
Hosted by two commercial row-crop farmers and a dairy farmer, Field Work is a podcast that provides space for frank, realistic discussions about the benefits and challenges of sustainable agriculture. Hosts Zach Johnson, Mitchell Hora, and Tara Vander Dussen (who joined the team in season four) explore the successes and challenges farmers experience as they adopt new practices, while still getting into the weeds on the difficulties.
This is the big one. Five leaders of regenerative agriculture — Rick Clark, Ray Archuleta, Mitchell Hora, Loran Steinlage and of course, Dave Brandt — talk it up in Carroll, Ohio. At 2 hours and some change, this conversation is a long one, but worth your time on a long drive or tractor ride.
Instead of talking it up at Dave Brandt’s Field Day, host Mitchell Hora listened. That resulted in big thoughts, which Mitchell shares with his co-hosts. Zach and Tara aren’t shy about chiming in with their own opinions in this lively episode. Plus: Tara says the big three words.
After attending college in Bismarck, North Dakota, Ryan Bruski returned to his family’s ranch in Ekalaka, Montana, with big ideas. He wanted to graze cows a new way. Instead of letting cattle roam for weeks at a time, Ryan decided to move them more frequently in a regenerative agriculture practice known as “adaptive grazing.” Plus: our first live listener question!
Photo by Eric Melzer for Field Work
Brad Buchanan didn't plan on owning a cattle ranch. He was a city guy who bought land a short drive from Denver, then bought some cows as "lawnmowers." Fifteen years later, he's the proud owner of the Flying B Bar ranch, a grass-fed cattle operation. In August 2021, Mitchell Hora chatted with Brad at his ranch.
As a college professor, Allen Williams had a fancy degree and tenure. In 2000, he quit that job-for-life to become a farmer. But he knew he couldn’t do it the conventional way. So Allen minimized inputs and focused on “net profit per acre,” which he says is more important than yield or “net profit per head.”
Mitchell and Brad Bristle have made a lot of big decisions at a young age. Their father died when they were young, then the hired man running their Michigan farm quit. So at ages 21 and 19, the Bristle Brothers took over. Now they’re in charge of 1,500 acres of wheat, corn, soybeans and alfalfa and they’re pretty much all in on regenerative agriculture.
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After a successful career at the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, Ray Archuleta began preaching about soil health. Mitchell caught up with “Ray the Soil Guy” inside an Ohio seed shed. The pair talked about Ray’s life and the challenges of converting more farmers to regenerative agriculture.
On this episode, Mitchell makes a pilgrimage to Fairfield County, Ohio, to chat with farmer Dave Brandt. Known as "The Godfather of Soil Health," Brandt began experimenting with no-till and cover crops in 1971. "My goal is to show people throughout the United States how they can make more money and not spend so much to get a crop produced," Brandt says.
Farmers are independent people. But there are some things you don’t want to do alone. Like struggle with mental health. In this episode, we talk with soybean farmer Bob Worth about his experience with depression during the 1980s farm crisis. Hosts Mitchell and Tara also discuss new efforts in agriculture to address mental health issues with Kate Downes of New York FarmNet.
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 800-273-8255
Stephanie and Blake Alexandre milk 9,000 cows on 9,000 acres in northern California. Their business — Alexandre Family Farms — is the nation's first certified regenerative dairy. On this episode, Stephanie and Blake talk about A2 milk, dairy family road trips, working with Savory Institute and the Regenerative Alliance on certification, chickens, and selling their products at Whole Food stores.
As CEO of Cultivo, Manuel Piñuela wants to regenerate carbon on 1% of the planet. That’s no easy task. In fact, achieving that goal would require signing up enough farm and forest acreage to cover Texas twice. On this episode, Zach and Mitchell continue trying to unpack the complex world of carbon markets and Mitchell has strong opinions.
Is it Zach’s birthday? You might think so. Because on this episode of Field Work, Joe Liefer of John Deere joins Zach and Mitchell to talk about green tractors, a thing Zach loves. Liefer is an engineer at John Deere who has been working on the company’s autonomous 8R tractor, which doesn’t require a human behind the steering wheel. Instead, it has six pairs of stereo cameras so it doesn’t bump into stuff like, you know, fence posts.
Gabe Brown didn’t grow up on a farm. But today he’s way into regenerative agriculture. On his farm and ranch just outside of Bismarck, North Dakota, Gabe does no-till, cover crops, and a mini-version of mob grazing. He’s also one of the founding partners of Understanding Ag and the author of “Dirt To Soil: One Farmer’s Journey Into Regenerative Agriculture.”
Robert Bonnie grew up on a Kentucky farm. Today, he’s one of the most powerful people in agriculture, serving as a top USDA official in the Biden administration. One of the initiatives he’s working on is the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities, a $1 billion program aimed at reducing the ag sector’s carbon footprint.
Disclaimer: Hosts Mitchell Hora and Tara Vander Dussen have applied for funding from the USDA’s Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program.
Farmers in 14 states have planted more than 14,000 acres of prairie strips to ease soil erosion. On this episode, Lisa Schulte Moore of Iowa State University explains the science behind planting native grasses and plants. “Prairie strips are oriented perpendicular to that flow of water,” she says. “It's really about slowing that water down, allowing it to infiltrate.”
Food deserts are places with limited access to fruits and vegetables. When the topic popped up in one of his college classes, Kamal Bell decided to do more than just talk about it. Bell started Sankofa Farms, a 12-acre farm in North Carolina. He grows kale, raises farm-fresh eggs and keeps bees there. In this episode, Bell talks about overcoming the challenges he faces as a first-generation Black farmer and why he's committed to helping young people gain valuable agriculture experience.
Lots of scientists give farmers advice. But not many of them have actually farmed. Jonathan Lundgren quit the USDA and started Blue Dasher Farms in South Dakota. In just a few years, he’s learned some things, including how difficult farming is. Lundgren is also the driving force behind Ecdysis Foundation, a research organization that aims to study regenerative farming practices on 1,000 farms.
Tara Vander Dussen makes her Field Work debut at Zach Johnson’s Minnesota farm. In this episode, Tara tells Zach and Mitchell about the wonders of New Mexico: sand dunes, square roads, fainting goats, and how she encourages dairy farmers to be more sustainable. She also seems genuinely surprised at the concept of rain.
Big changes are coming! Tara Vander Dussen, a New Mexico dairy farmer, will be joining Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora as a Field Work co-host. Throughout Season 4, Zach, Mitchell and Tara will be engaging in honest and authentic conversations about the ups and the downs of sustainable agriculture. They’ll learn about prairie strips, talk to the founders of a regenerative dairy farm, visit the “Godfather of Soil Health,” and continue the conversation about agriculture’s role in curbing climate change. The new season launches April 13.
According to the EPA, the agriculture sector of the economy causes 10 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, far behind energy, transportation, and industry. But there’s a lot of interest in how to reduce ag’s carbon footprint. Regenerative practices on the farm, especially using cover crops for soil health, can reduce those emissions by sequestering carbon below ground. Yet carbon markets for ag are still kind of the Wild West. On this episode of Field Work, hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora explore the roles of finance and government in building the markets. Guests are Cristian Barcan, vice president for sustainability for Rabo Agrifinance, one of the biggest agricultural lenders in the U.S., and Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig.
Read more: The roles of finance and government in building the markets
One of the most important resources for farmers interested in sustainable practices is a soil test commonly known as the Haney Test. In this episode, we talk to the developer of the test, Rick Haney, a soil scientist who will retire from USDA Agricultural Research Service on June 30. Rick tells Field Work producer Annie Baxter how he came up with his legendary soil health test — and exactly how it works. We also hear from Indiana farmer Rick Clark about how he converted his 7,000-acre farm from conventional corn and soybean to no-till and diversified his crops. The Haney test played a crucial role.
The two Ricks help lead a brainstorm about scaling up regenerative practices to slow climate change and help farmers be more profitable — with Iowa farmer Brian Hora (Mitchell’s dad), North Carolina farmer Russell Hedrick and Great Plains Regeneration Executive Director Jessica Gnad also joining in.
Our show was recorded at Field Work co-host Mitchell Hora’s field day June 3, 2021, in Washington County, Iowa.
This week on Field Work, Zach and Mitchell talk about the future of tractors with New Holland’s Director of Commercial Marketing, Mark Lowery. First up is a look beyond diesel fuel to the methane powered tractor New Holland is planning to introduce late this year. It will have reduced fuel costs and greatly reduced emissions versus a traditional diesel tractor, with the potential to have essentially zero emissions if it is paired with a bioreactor capturing methane from manure. Later, they talk about autonomous operation, where it is now, where it is probably going next, and why we don’t need to worry about them taking over the world (yet).
Read more: A methane-powered tractor
Research at The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas, over the past couple of decades has advanced the concept of perennial grain crops to the point of commercially available kernza. Mitchell and Zach talk to a Minnesota organic farmer, Luke Peterson, who’s been growing kernza in his fields and cultivating interest in it among other farmers, food processors and retailers. They’re joined by Tessa Peters of The Land Institute who explains where the name came from and why her team is so committed to making perennial grains viable.
Read more: Research at The Land Institute
Marc Schober is director of specialized agriculture solutions for Bremer Bank, the nation’s 9th largest farm lender. Zach and Mitchell ask him about how he decides which #fintech and #agtech solutions are worth recommending to the bank and to farmers. Schober tells Field Work he is bullish on finding ways to incentivize transitions to regenerative ag for farms of all sizes, but less sure of how exactly carbon markets will work, or what changes they can expect with the Biden administration.
Read more: 5 ideas for farmers who want to minimize risk
Field Work hosts Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson talk to cotton farmer Adam Chappell about cotton and sharecropping. Chappell nearly lost his farm 10 years ago to a triple whammy of drought, pigweed and a customer who didn’t pay. He fought his way back to profitability by adopting regenerative practices. Now he uses much less seed, fertilizer, herbicide and irrigation than he used to. He has integrated livestock and figured out what cover crops work best for corn and soybeans, as well as cotton. Now he’s looking into chicken tractors, sheep and downsizing his acreage because his margin is so much better.
Read more: Changes Chappell made on his farm
Farmers from 17 southern states supply more than a third of the world’s cotton and bring in $7 billion a year. But brands and retailers — cotton’s customers — are getting picky about how their cotton is produced. They want to assure their customers that farmers care about the environment. The U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol gives farmers a way to measure and improve soil carbon, greenhouse gas emissions, water use and energy use, among other things. Dr. Andy Jordan, who helped write the protocol, explains how it works to Field Work hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora. They also discuss how the protocol might be adapted to other crops.
Read more: Five questions about the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol
John and Kara Boyd are equally committed to farming and to farm ownership for people of color. John heads the National Black Farmers Association, and Kara runs the Association of American Indian Farmers. They told Field Work hosts Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson they became activists because of their own experiences with a racist USDA. Meanwhile, they are trying to spread the word about cover crops, no-till farming and conservation.
Read more: John and Kara Boyd
For a few years now, Iowa State University Professor Kevin Kimle has been asking students in his ag entrepreneurship classes to take a personality test. What he’s found so far is that compared to the average person, those ag students score pretty low when it comes to openness. He and the Field Work hosts talk about what that lack of openness might mean for trying new practices like cover crops. And after taking the personality test, Zach and Mitchell learn some awkward things about themselves.
Read more: The Big Five Aspects Scale
The Nature Conservancy and Purdue University are among a lot of people in the sustainable ag keen to figure out what it takes to scale conservation practices. Does it come down to the availability of funding? Climate? Soils? What happens if all those factors are pretty equal between, say, two neighboring counties, but the level of adoption of conservation practices varies dramatically between them? Kris Johnson from the TNC and Linda Prokopy from Purdue talk about research in three different states where they compare counties with a robust conservation culture to neighboring counties that aren’t doing much. They talk with Zach and Mitchell about cover crop culture, the importance of collaboration among farmers, government agencies and entrepreneurs, and what they still don’t understand.
Read more: The Magical Dividing Line Between Counties
In some parts of the country, farmers who try out conservation practices run the risk of getting pegged as hippie farmers. But then there are some clusters of farming communities, like Washington County, Iowa, where Field Work podcast co-host Mitchell Hora hails from. Conservation is all the rage there, and they’re not exactly granola-y, hippie types. What gives? How did the culture there turn out so different from where fellow host Zach Johnson farms in Minnesota? Zach and Mitchell embarked on a mission to figure it out, and they met some risk-taking farmers and insightful experts along the way… Plus, is that REALLY Matt Damon???
Watch on YouTube
Special thanks to the Walton Family Foundation for funding the project.
Young farmers coming back to a family operation often have to tease out a place for themselves with hard work, creativity and an entrepreneurial zeal. For Trent Stout, that meant taking on the family seed business and migrating it from being a local corn and soybean dealer to be the go-to source for diverse cover crop seeds. Michael Vittetoe brought cattle to the farm as an integral part of a rotation that relies on cover crops. He might just fold the chickens into the system, too. Hosts Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson hear how some of their peers are making conservation their part of the family business.
Read more: A New Generation Advances the Cause
The Biden administration has ambitious climate mitigation goals, and agriculture has been called upon to be a strong partner. USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack led the department throughout the Obama years and is back at the helm. He talks with Mitchell and Zach about consumer demands for sustainably grown food, how to develop carbon markets that serve farmers first, the need to create more opportunity to sell what’s currently considered waste, and how farmers can make sure their interests are part of any future plans and policies. (Hint: comment here).
Read more: Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack on Climate Solutions
Several Washington County families trace their conservation interests back decades. For Rob Stout and Darrell Steele, their dads’ interest in conservation primed them to be open to the idea of no-till. Still, getting it to work took a lot of perseverance through various failures. Eventually, the planter attachments helped. The early pioneers emerged with a willingness to share what they were learning with other local farmers. Like no-tilling, that generosity persists in Washington County.
Read more: Families that Led the Conservation Charge in Washington County
Steve Berger is a farmer whose name comes up a lot in conversations about Washington County, Iowa. As Field Work hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora sought for clues about the secret sauce behind Washington County’s conservation culture, they knew they had to talk to Steve.
A plan to meet with him in August 2020 during their spin around the county fell apart, unfortunately — Steve’s farm had just suffered storm damage. But in early 2021, Mitchell got a chance to sit down with Steve to talk about his early adoption of no-till and cover crops, which in large part was driven by his desire to have a competitive advantage over other farmers. A heads up: Steve makes frequent reference to some of the folks in our earlier episodes. So be sure to listen to our episode about Jim Frier, who was the Iowa State Extension Director in the area for many years, and the episode about Paul Reed and Dave Moeller, who helped area farmers figure out how to adjust their equipment to make no-till work.
Watch video on YouTube
In our episode dropping March 31, you can also hear from other Washington County farmers on the “bleeding edge” of no-till, whose pioneering work set the table for future generations.
Special thanks to the Walton Family Foundation for funding the project.
Paul Reed and Dave Moeller explain to Zach and Mitchell that the modern planter row unit was designed to provide good seed to soil contact in the dry, cloddy seedbed of a conventionally tilled field. And why that created a different set of problems in cool, wet early season, no-till fields. They start with the release of the John Deere MaxEmerge row unit in 1972 and follow the development of planter technology right through today’s precision technology, describing how their constant experimentation and collaboration with other pioneers like Howard Martin and Eugene Keeton led to successful no-tilling and a business selling planter attachments. Zach also gets some advice on how to set up his own planter.
Read more: Zach and Mitchell go to planter school
Mitchell and Zach are trying to understand how Mitchell’s home county in Southeast Iowa developed such a strong conservation culture. Jim Frier, now 88, showed up to the interview with a box full of documentation of all the work he put into educating farmers: flyers from the twilight meetings and field days he organized, which could attract as many as 500 attendees, articles he penned promoting conservation tillage, including one that wondered, back in the 60s, whether traditional tillage systems were on their way out, and photos he took of equipment attachments folks were designing to make no-till work with their existing planters. To be sure, there were a lot of other key people who helped build a conservation movement in Washington County, but Jim Frier teaches us the value of cheerleaders.
Read more: Evening meetings helped launch a conservation culture
Video: Mr. Johnson Goes to Washington (County, That Is)
In August 2020, our intrepid Field Work hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora sleuthed around in Washington County, Iowa, in search of the origin story of its robust conservation culture. Zach had his camera handy to document the experience for us. This video is just the start.
Watch the video on YouTube.
Season 3 of Field Work will feature a special series exploring how the conservation culture of Washington County, Iowa took root.
For more on what Zach learned in Washington County, Iowa, check out this blog post where he wrote about the value of networking.
This project is supported by the Walton Family Foundation, working for solutions so nature and people can thrive together.
On this episode of Field Work, hosts Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson talk money with the founders of two startups. Sami Tellatin says FarmRaise will be a one-stop shop to help farmers apply for grants and loans. And FarmRaise will do all the paperwork! Robyn O’Brien helps lead rePlant Capital, a new venture capital fund that invests in farmers who implement regenerative practices. Replant is working with Danone, and other big food companies whose customers want to know more about sourcing.
Read more: New Ideas in Ag Finance
President Joe Biden has said he wants to pay farmers to grow cover crops and put land into conservation. How will that work? He also has big plans to reduce and capture carbon emissions, which could spell opportunities for farmers. But the science is still tenuous and the math would have to pencil out. Zach and Mitchell tap Farm Journal News Director John Herath for an overview of how the Biden administration is addressing sustainable ag and who farmers need to pay attention to. Then former USDA Undersecretary Bill Northey discusses his takeaways after serving as the first head of Farm Programs and Conservation, where he brought FSA, RMA and NRCS together under one mission area.
Read more: Five things to keep an eye on in the Biden administration
Farmers Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora are back with more honest and authentic conversations about the ups and the downs of sustainable agriculture. They'll explore new sustainability standards for crops like cotton and the outlook for conservation under the Biden administration. This season, Zach and Mitchell also travel to Mitchell's home county in southeast Iowa for a special miniseries on how generations of farmers there built a deep conservation culture. The new season launches March 3, 2021.
The world has changed in some massive ways since Field Work hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora sat down to record the first episodes of the season back in December. We’re now living amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. At the beginning of 2020, farm incomes were expected to rise. Now they’re projected to dip as commodity prices slump. So that raises the question: what is the outlook for sustainable ag in this environment? What becomes harder-- and what becomes easier-- for farmers wanting to swap ideas about conservation practices? What are the roadblocks or advantages to trying something new right now? In our season finale, Zach and Mitchell discuss these questions with Lauren Lurkins, the Director of Environmental Policy at the Illinois Farm Bureau.
Samantha Schmidgall, the Agronomy Marketing Manager with Ag View FS in Walnut, IL, is driven by the cooperative foundation of her agricultural retail company.
“If we're not doing what our farmers and our farmer-based board want us to do, we're not checking the box of doing the right thing that day,” she said.
In recent years, her farmer community has encouraged the company to embrace sustainable ag technologies and practices.
“We might have one or two growers that suggest, you know, hey, can you look at this? Can you see if this is cost effective for us? And when we find those things, we're implementing them across our company,” she explained.
Over time, the addition of these conservation practices has evolved into a core philosophy of how they run their business.
“Trying to be the leader in conservation is something that we truly take pride in and our customer owners do as well,” Schmidgall said.
Agricultural retailers have a significant impact on the types of agronomic practices farmers adopt in the communities they serve.
Farmers rely on these companies for everything from seeds and inputs to essential agronomic advice. That role of trusted adviser gives retailers influence with the farmers they work with.
Trust In Food, in collaboration with Environmental Defense Fund, recently published a report called “Growing for the future: Business lessons from ag retail’s conservation leaders”.
The report notes, “More so than almost any other stakeholder, ag retailers are positioned to play an influential role in the continuous improvement of sustainability across the agricultural value chain.”
But many retailers prefer conventional growing over sustainable ag.
“Retailers can be a roadblock to adopting sustainable ag practices if they’re not into conservation,” said Field Work co-host Mitchell Hora, a farmer in Iowa.
That’s why Hora, along with fellow farmer and co-host Zach Johnson, wanted to hear from folks on the retail side who have made conservation a top priority.
Malcolm Stambaugh works with Schmidgall at Ag View FS as a Crop Specialist. In 2012, he began working with his farmers to implement 4R nutrient management.
4R Nutrient Stewardship is an efficient framework for applying nutrients that emphasizes using the right fertilizer source, the right rate, at the right time, and in the right place.
Since 2012, Stambaugh has helped 16 growers participate in the 4R program, and was recognized as one of the 4R advocates of the year in 2019.
Along with their 4R work, Ag View FS encourages all their salesmen to use the ‘maximum return rate on nitrogen,’ or MRTN, tool to calculate the most profitable rate of nitrogen application for each grower.
“Just to make sure that we're doing the right thing economically and we're doing the right thing agronomically,” Schmidgall explained. “It doesn't do any good for anyone to put on an excess of nitrogen that's not getting used in the right way.”
Schmidgall has seen that as more growers adopt conservation nitrogen application techniques, it sparks interest in the larger community.
“When people in the area see that we have more of these enduring farmer 4R advocates… there's a lot of guys that are asking, ‘How do I do that? How do I be a part of that?” she said.
That initial interest in conservation opens the door for Ag View FS to introduce those growers to a whole set of sustainable practices that could benefit their operation.
“It's not only fertilizer, it's not only doing the 4R practices, but it's soil sampling on a grid. It's VRT (variable rate technology) application of lime, phosphates and potassium. It's no applications on frozen ground. It's utilizing cover crops,” she said.
Schmidgall and Stambaugh see that it’s going to take years to refine the best uses of newly developing conservation techniques. Right now, they’re collecting data on the best uses of these techniques. That information will guide their company over the coming decade.
“So right now we're doing the legwork, doing the trials to figure out what's going to work, what isn't working,” Schmidgall said. “And if you're not working with an ag retailer who's interested in doing those trials and working with those products, there's a potential for you to get left behind.”
Crop prices ain’t what they used to be, so some farmers have sought out additional sources of income. On this episode of Field Work, Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora talk to Pat Duncanson, a fifth generation corn and soybean farmer in Minnesota who has installed multiple solar panels on his land. We also hear from Fritz Ebinger, who works with farmers to assess their options for solar panels or wind turbines.
There’s a whole world of funding that can help to bring conservation practices onto a farm, but wading through the web of federal, state, and private programs can feel like a full time job of its own. So Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora bring on Kevin Norton, the Associate Chief of the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to learn about government cost share programs. Then, Wisconsin dairy farmers Tom Zwald and Todd Doornink explain how their farming community has banded together to find money for sustainable agriculture on their own through the Western Wisconsin Conservation Council.
Be sure to check out a video of Mitchell’s visit to Tom’s farm on our YouTube channel, where Tom describes what he’s doing on the crop side of his farm to protect water, and how his dairy is also re-using water multiple times in its operation.
Food companies are seeing a lot more demand from consumers for sustainably-grown food. But how is that demand translating into actual incentives for farmers to adopt conservation practices? In this episode, we bring you the conversation Field Work co-host Mitchell Hora moderated in November 2019 at the Sustainable Agriculture Summit. Panelists included Unilever’s Stefani Millie Grant and Ben Crook from Hellman’s Mayonnaise, who explain how big food companies are trying to encourage more farmers to use sustainable ag practices, and farmer Scott Henry, who participated in Unilever’s sustainable soy program.
Special thanks to the host partners for inviting Field Work to record at the 2019 Sustainable Agriculture Summit. It’s an annual gathering for major food companies, government agencies, academics, conservation groups, and farmers committed to advancing a coordinated and comprehensive approach to driving change in agriculture sustainability. The Host Partners are Field to Market and Innovation Center for U.S. Dairy. The next summit will be held in Phoenix, AZ in November 2020.
There are certain regenerative practices that help to put carbon back into the ground, which can be beneficial for crops, soil, and the broader environment. Some companies are trying to provide another benefit to these practices -- a way for farmers to get paid. Through emerging carbon markets, companies trying to offset their carbon emissions can pay farmers for the services that take carbon out of the atmosphere. This week, Field Work hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora talk to Christophe Jose, the co-founder of Nori, one of the companies working to make this possible, about the challenges and benefits of carbon markets.
Water plays an important role in all of our lives. But how much do we actually understand key water topics, like the share of Americans who get their water shut off or the biggest causes of pollution? Field Work co-host Zach Johnson talks to Andi Egbert from the American Public Media Research Lab as well as Kinsie Rayburn and Drew Slattery from Farm Journal’s Trust in Food initiative about research into average Americans’ and farmers’ understanding of key water issues.
Farmers often get the advice that they should “start small” when it comes to conservation practices. But Indiana farmer Rick Clark of Clark Land and Cattle is proof that you can do regenerative ag at scale. He raises no-till soybeans, no-till corn, and has had great success planting cover crops on his 7,000 acre farm. What’s more, this is the first year that all his acres will be grown without chemicals as he transitions to organic. Field Work co-host Mitchell Hora visited Clark’s farm to learn about his journey as a farmer. And he learned the secrets to Rick’s massive cost savings of $670,000 a year.
After a big bet on growing asparagus backfired, the Nuss family had to rethink their approach to running Nuss Farms. Tim and Tyler Nuss, the 5th generation on the farm and the hosts of The Modern Acre podcast, join Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson to talk about how their family decided to embrace regenerative agriculture. Featuring: pastured poultry, diversifying your business, how to change an old school farmer’s mind, and a really bad chicken joke.
Like much of the world, agriculture is facing a lot of uncertainty and change from COVID-19. In this bonus episode, Field Work host Mitchell Hora hops on the mic in his home studio to talk to AgriTalk host Chip Flory about the biggest challenges and solutions facing farmers right now. The two talk about the pork, dairy, and ethanol industries and the role sustainable agriculture could play as farmers assess how to diversify their crops and boost their bottom lines.
The word “organic” is familiar to a lot of consumers -- in the last decade we’ve seen a rise in organic foods in our grocery stores and markets. And there’s a whole raft of standards, developed by federal regulators, that farmers have to meet in order to certify as organic. That kind of check list does not exist for food grown according to “regenerative” principles, which are gaining traction in conservation circles. Field Work hosts Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson talk to Eric Jackson from Pipeline Foods and Sara Harper from Grounded Growth about the differences, markets and challenges of regenerative and organic practices.
Growing hemp was illegal in the U.S. for decades. But recent changes in federal law have opened the door to growing the crop. So as farmers across the country begin to experiment with hemp, hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora decide to learn more about commercial hemp production. In October, Mitchell visited Scott Thellman at Juniper Hill Farms in Kansas to hear about his first stab at growing industrial hemp. They talk sourcing seeds, keeping hemp under legal THC limits, harvesting with chainsaws, and much more.
Tim Hammerich is the founder of AgGrad, an agribusiness recruiting company, and the host of the Future of Agriculture podcast. He joins Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora to talk about the latest innovations in farming, the changing skill sets agriculture demands, and the essential role of data management in sustainable ag. They also discuss the reasons why it’s so hard to recruit young people into ag and why more farmers should think of themselves as CEOs.
Edge-of-field practices like bioreactors, buffers and wetlands filter a farm’s runoff before it reaches nearby waterways. Mitchell Hora and Zach Johnson bring on Professor Amy Kaleita from the Iowa State University Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering to explain how edge of field practices work and who might be able to install them on their land. Farmer Mike Ehlers also joins the show to talk about his experience installing a bioreactor and why conservation practices are important to him. Also included: kayaking in drainage ditches, magic wood chips, and a dead zone in the Gulf of New Mexico.
Maybe it seems crazy to some row crop farmers to add livestock into their field rotation. But for Michael Vittetoe, the benefits of adding cattle to his Iowa farm have been plentiful. Hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora talk with Michael about how livestock integration adds carbon back into the ground, helps to keep soil cool and moist, and saves money on resources. It has also become a new revenue stream. Also in this episode, Zach chats with Dave Scott, a sheep farmer in Montana, who’s at a pro level with his grazing management practices. He’s been able to get his soils to work for him in a such a way that he no longer needs fertilizer applications.
The “New Mexico Milk Maid,” Tara Vander Dussen, reaches people around the world with her social media posts shedding light on the dairy industry. She’s even had the chance to speak before the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization Committee on World Food Security. Tara tells Zach and Mitchell about the challenges of farming in the dry southwest, the latest sustainable technologies on dairy farms, and what it’s like to be an international ambassador for American dairy farmers
Field Work hostsMitchell Hora and Zach Johnson kick off Season 2 by catching up on what happened in their fields since they last met up in the studio. Zach tells Mitchell last fall was full of challenges due to constant rain. Down in tropical Iowa, Mitchell’s harvest was pretty uncomplicated. They discuss the new things they’d like to try this year and important considerations, like how to properly pronounce the word “wheat.” Be sure to listen to the end of the show, past the conclusion of the music, for a super funny voicemail left on Field Work’s new hotline.
Farmers Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora are back with more honest and authentic conversations about the ups and the downs of sustainable agriculture. They’ll explore how farmers’ failures with cover crops and strip till can give way to revelations, and how producers on the frontlines are figuring out how to pay for costly technologies like bioreactors to make their farms more sustainable. This season, Zach and Mitchell also look beyond row crops and start examining trends in animal agriculture. The new season launches March 11, 2020.
For our last episode of the season, we bring you our first live show ever, recorded at Farmfest in Morgan, Minnesota. Zach and Mitchell round out the season by bringing back some pals you heard from in earlier episodes, including their dads. Nathan Johnson and Brian Hora reflect on how their challenges with farming have been different from their sons’ and how the new generation is leading the charge of experimenting with sustainable practices. Field Work friend Jodi DeJong-Hughes, a University of Minnesota soil scientist, also returns to the show. (With her usual wit, she says she’s just glad she didn’t get killed off after episode 1). She and cover crop expert Cody Nelson of Soil RX deftly answer tough audience questions about how and why to adopt sustainable practices. Finally, Zach reveals that he and Mitchell have, in fact, achieved their goal of procuring a helicopter. Be sure to listen all the way through to find out what happens to it.
We know that corn and soybeans are the most economically viable crops we have on farms, at least in the Midwest, and that’s why they dominate the ag systems here. But there are efforts underway to add in a third crop. Third crops can be helpful for breaking up weed cycles, fixing more carbon and nitrogen in the soil, and possibly even increasing yields. Zach and Mitchell talk with farmer Darin Voigt along with Nick Jordan, a professor of agricultural ecology at the University of Minnesota, about how to integrate third crops and what the roadblocks may be to doing so.
Field Work host Zach Johnson has tried planting cover crops a few times on his heavy clay soils in Central Minnesota, but has had nothing but failures. In this episode, Ken Franzky, an agronomist with Centrol Crop Consulting, gives Zach some insights into how to try again. Ken tells Zach and Mitchell that his recs on aerial applications, herbicide rotations, and seed mixes vary a lot by geography. “I haven't seen a cover crop system that's a one size fits all approach,” he says.
Many farmers care about soil health, water quality, and about being good neighbors to each other and to people in nearby towns and cities. But sometimes it may feel like what farmers do individually doesn’t make much of a difference. In this episode, Zach and Mitchell talk about what it looks like when farmers start working together, as well as with others in their watersheds. Iowa farmer Ray Gaesser, Texas A&M research scientist Liz Haney, and the ag director at the Environmental Initiative in Minneapolis, Greg Bohrer, weigh in.
Resources:
Cedar River Watershed Partnership
Cover Crop Insurance Incentives
Midwest Row Crop Collaborative
Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP)
Consumers are demanding more sustainably grown food. So are big food companies. But how willing are they to offset the costs — and the risks — that farmers bear as they change up their practices? Zach and Mitchell talk with Jerry Lynch, the chief sustainability officer at General Mills, about supply chain incentives for growers.
Resources:
General Mills Regenerative Agriculture Initiative
Our production team is taking a break the week of Independence Day. We’ll be back with more great conversations July 10th.
There are a lot of technologies available these days like sensors, geo-mapping, robots, and all sorts of other big data tools. The idea behind them, of course, is to make farming more efficient, and ultimately more profitable. Those technologies can also help growers farm more sustainably. Mitchell and Zach talk with precision ag expert Raj Khosla and Illinois farmer Michael Ganschow and try to parse how good some of the tech really is at this point, especially when it comes to nitrogen sensors. Zach and Mitchell also contemplate a world where robots take over. Skynet is becoming aware, people.
Resources:
Raj Khosla at Colorado State
Michael Ganschow
The Illinois Nutrient Research & Education Council
Cover crops blanket the soil from the time you harvest one crop until you plant the next. And there’s a long list of benefits they provide: they can replenish soil in between planting, prevent soil erosion, slow water down, pull moisture deeper into the soil, and increase soil organic matter over time. For Doug Adams, an Iowa farmer and soil conservation technician at USDA-NRCS, cover crops also provide a way to recycle his nutrient dollars. In this episode, he tells Zach and Mitchell about how much he hates seeing valuable fertilizer leak out of his system, as it’s never coming back. “If I can get a good cover crop established,” he says, “it will help sequester some of those nitrates and other fertilizer and keep it from getting flushed out of my system.” Also in this episode: Mitchell explains what it means to “keep it squatchy,” and Zach weighs in on how to speak Minnesotan to earthworms.
Farmers collect a lot of data on fields, inputs, and yields. But many questions remain about how to use the data and who to share it with. Zach and Mitchell talk to Charles Baron of Farmers Business Network and John McGuire of Simplified Technology Services about what farmers have to gain or lose in sharing their data, especially when it relates to sustainable ag practices.
Many farmers have heard the alarming statistic that we’re losing topsoil to erosion about 10 times faster than it can be replenished. We want to keep our soil healthy and intact so we can continue farming and be more resilient in the face of increased severe weather events. In this episode, Zach and Mitchell talk to Jim Isermann of the Soil Health Partnership, an initiative of the National Corn Growers Association. Jim tells the guys that building soil health takes time, but it’s something every farmer can improve, whether they’re starting with high quality or poor quality ground.
Resources:
Soil Health Partnership
Nutrient management is an art as much as it is a science. And nitrogen, in particular, can be a difficult nutrient to manage. Understanding how it behaves in soil systems can help farmers increase its uptake and minimize nitrogen loss to the environment, where it can pollute water. University of Minnesota extension specialist Brad Carlson and Minnesota farmer Mark Bauer have been working together for years to figure out the best plan for nutrient stewardship on Mark’s farm. They share their insights with Zach and Mitchell and get nerdy about nitrogen.
Resources:
Nitrogen Smart
Sometimes the hurdles to sustainable practices come from people right in a farmer’s network: family, landowners, neighbors, seed dealers, and lenders. Bryan and Lauren Biegler, farmers in Minnesota, join Zach and Mitchell to discuss how they fought back the image of being “hippie farmers” as they started strip tilling and planting cover crops. Mollie Aronowitz, a land manager at the People’s Company in Iowa, and Randy Dell from the Nature Conservancy also offer helpful insights into landlord/farmer dynamics around conservation.
Resources:
Bryan and Lauren Biegler
People’s Company
Collaboration is Key for Farmers and Landowners
There are a lot of big questions to consider for farmers interested in trying out cover crops. Perhaps the most important one, according to cover crop coach Steve Groff, is this: what do you want to accomplish? Zach and Mitchell talk with Steve about the benefits of cover crops, the roadblocks to their adoption, and why he thinks farmers need cover crop mentors.
We explore the benefits and downsides of drain tile with Rodney Rulon, an Indiana farmer, and Matt Helmers, the director of the Iowa Nutrient Research Center at Iowa State University. Drain tiles dry out and warm up fields, boost productivity, and extend growing seasons, which can make them important economically. But they can also have negative effects on water quality. Zach and Mitchell talk with their guests about how to offset some of those negative effects within the farm’s system.
Resources:
Drainage Water Quality Impacts Study
Study looking at impacts of nitrogen application timing and cover crop inclusion on subsurface drainage water quality
Conservation tillage can provide a lot of benefits. It increases water filtration, reduces erosion, and improves soil productivity. But some farmers worry about weed control challenges and lower yields. University of Minnesota extension specialist Jodi DeJong-Hughes joins Zach and Mitchell to talk about conservation tillage, including a recent study she did assessing different tillage practices. And North Dakota farmer Mike Langseth, who participated in the study, weighs in with his experiences. But will Zach’s “friend” be persuaded to reduce tillage on his farm?
Resources:
Upper Midwest Tillage Guide
University of Minnesota Soil Management and Health
North Dakota State University Strip Till Guide
In this episode, you’ll learn about our hosts and what drives their interest in sustainable agriculture. Zach Johnson, a farmer near Alexandria, Minnesota, also hosts the popular MN Millennial Farmer series on YouTube. Zach’s experiments with cover crops and conservation tillage have been a “disaster” so far. But he really wants to figure out how to make them work. Meanwhile, co-host Mitchell Hora has seen a lot of success with conservation practices on his southeastern Iowa farm and in his role as a soil health consultant. Their different geographies and perspectives set the table for lively conversations.
Field Work is a podcast that showcases frank, realistic discussions about the benefits and challenges of adopting sustainable ag practices. It’s hosted by two commercial row crop farmers, Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora. They’re two guys who believe farming needs to become more sustainable but know first-hand what kinds of trade-offs might be necessary. Join them for a great season of conversations starting Wednesday, May 1.