What is Regenerative Agriculture?

Disclaimer:  These are my views and my understanding of (regenerative) agriculture.  By no means am I an expert, just a student at YouTube University.  I am not condemning conventional practices or judging other farmers for their practices.  My goal is to bring forth information that will help others develop a better understanding of the ecosystem they are working with.  Many of these points & ideas are going to be in conflict with the practices we are currently employing on our farms (myself included).  Have an open mind and be willing to learn instead of taking everything personally.  Do your own research before implementing any practices on your own operation.  Adaption, not adoption.
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Alright folks, this is where it starts to get good...time to get down to business.

There are multiple definitions that popped up when I did a Google search for "Regenerative Agriculture," but I am not sure that I am in 100% agreement with any of them (imagine that...). If I had to pick one, I would go with Wikipedia's definition:
"Regenerative agriculture is a sub-sector practice of organic farming designed to build soil health or to regenerate unhealthy soils."

Now, if I were to come up with my own definition of regenerative agriculture, it would go something like this:
"Regenerative agriculture is a farming practice where the primary focus is on building and maintaining a healthy, functioning ecosystem by utilizing the natural, native biological and chemical processes that were in place before human interference while minimizing the use of synthetic fertilizer & pesticide."
Wow, what a mouthful...good luck remembering that.  Well, if you are only going to remember one part of this definition, make it the "...utilizing the natural, native biological and chemical processes..." part.

There are more microorganisms in a teaspoon of healthy soil than there are people on this earth.  Think of these microorganisms as your soil livestock; they are key in cycling nutrients through the system by breaking down/eating plant residue and making those nutrients available to whatever plant(s) is now growing in the soil.  Mimicking and utilizing the natural systems available to us will stimulate these soil livestock by providing them the habitat and resources they need in order to thrive.  This is key to the success of the system.  These systems change from one area to another, therefore it is not possible to develop a one size fits all management plan that will be ideal in every region, but the principles remain the same.

For me, on the prairies of southeast Iowa, I need to mimic a tallgrass prairie system.  The tallgrass prairie system is built around a dominant warm season grass like Big Bluestem, for example.  Fortunately we have a really awesome dominant warm season grass that we can build a big part of our system around.  You might have heard of it before...Corn.  It also happens to be the most profitable crop in our rotation.

BUT, there is more to the tallgrass prairie system than just a dominant warm season grass...that is the easy part. There are numerous other plant species living under the canopy in the understory.  Numerous warm and cool season species that help maximize sunlight harvest efficiency, fill the gaps in the growing season when the dominant warm season grass is in dormancy, and to help feed the soil livestock a well balanced diet.  Finding the right plant species to grow alongside our corn is what we need to be focusing on...adding diversity to the system and getting away from our bad habit of growing crops as monocultures. 

Key Aspects of Regenerative Agriculture:  

1. No or Minimal Soil Disturbance:  Disturb the soil as little as possible, whether it be from tillage or performing a field operation in wet conditions, we need to avoid disrupting and destroying the soil structure. And yes, that includes the top 2 inches of soil (vertical tillage, etc).  Every time we till the soil, we are destroying the habitat of our soil livestock and forcing them to rebuild from scratch.  Imagine how little you would get accomplished on your farm if you had to rebuild everything multiple times each year...that is what tillage systems are doing to our soil livestock.
2. Armor on the Soil.  Keep the soil covered/armored with either living plants or plant residue at all times.  Bare soil is exposed to the eroding forces of wind and water, whether it be from rain drops, flowing water, or howling wind...if you can see your soil, you're losing it. Bare soil is also exposed to direct sunlight causing it to heat up to temperatures that put your soil livestock in survival mode or even kills them.
3. Living Root At All Times:  Plants are miniature food (carbon) factories for our soil ecosystem.  Whether it be predator insects, earthworms, microbiology, or the soil water cycle...they all need plants, ideally a diverse mix of plants, growing in the soil and feeding them carbon in order to function properly.
4. Diversity in the System:  Incorporating the first 3 aspects into your system will result in a ecosystem that functions relatively well.  Adding diversity to that system is going to be what kicks it into overdrive.  Diverse cash crop rotations reduce pest populations as they are not allowed to thrive for long periods of time.  Diverse cover crop mixes feed & provide habitat for all aspects of life in & on our soil.  Diverse cover crop mixes also decrease the chance of total failure in severe weather events such as drought, etc...the more species you include in a mix, the greater the chances that SOMETHING will survive.  When it comes to diversity in our ecosystems:  some is better than none, and more is better than less.

Putting all of these aspects into practice will result in a healthy, functioning soil ecosystem that can then be weaned off of synthetic inputs over time.

So today covered "What is Regenerative Agriculture?"  Next up:  "Why Regenerative Agriculture?"

Thanks for reading.  Be sure to leave your questions and comments in the comment section.  I'd love to hear your thoughts!

-Michael

2015 in Photos - Part 2

Here are some photos that I snapped with my phone throughout the year in 2015.  I'm clearly not a professional photographer, so apologies for the lack of quality on some of them.  Definitely was not planning on putting them on a blog when they were taken.  Enjoy!

Check out Part 1 here

Sidedress & Scouting

May 22:  Sidedressing corn on the wide open prairie that is the Havre Farm, mile long rows in this area.  We are sidedressing anhydrous ammonia to provide the nitrogen the crop needs.  We use anhydrous ammonia because it is the cheapest, least processed, and most stable form of nitrogen fertilizer as it is not very susceptible to leaching beyond the root zone or into drainage tile.  By applying the ammonia into a standing crop we greatly reduce the chance that the nitrogen will end up in the nearby creeks & streams and increase the chances that our corn plants will utilize it as planned.

May 22:  Another view of the sidedressing process.  We inject the ammonia into the soil using a mole knife every 60 inches (every other row gap), covering 40 feet with each pass.  We like the 60 inch spacing vs 30 inch spacing as it disturbs less soil with the mole knife (tillage), and the ammonia is (as far as I know) toxic to all lifeforms in the soil.

May 23:  The young corn on the east side of the Home Farm is out of the ground, soaking up the sun.

May 23:  Another view of the young corn on the east side of the Home Farm.

May 23:  The 3 Amigos.  Check out the earthworm burrows.  Think how excited those guys are going to be to have something other than corn stover and soybean stubble to eat this spring when they get to chow on cereal rye!

May 26:  It is amazing what a few days and a nice rain will do to help get everything greened up!

May 26:  No-Till Corn on Corn.

May 26:  No-Till Corn on Corn.

May 26:  No-Till Corn on Corn.

May 28:  Twin row soybeans no-tilled into standing corn stalks.

May 28:  Automatic row shut off or "swath control" is very nice in odd shaped fields like this one.  This corn was planted April 16.

May 28:  Filling in the gaps in the sweetcorn patch by hand.  Not sure who is having more fun here, Grandpa or Abby.

June 2:  Things are looking awful good along the "Big Slough" on the Havre Farm.

June 4:  The corn on the east side of the Home Farm is getting rev'd up!

June 4:  P1197 looking good so far on the west side of the Home Farm.

June 6:  You could say Dad is fairly dedicated to getting the perfect No-Till Corn on Corn shot for his Twitter.

June 7:  The twin row soybeans are up and running.  Eye spy a pesky waterhemp though.  Mother Nature is really hitting us farmers over the head with these herbicide resistant amaranth/pigweeds...what is she trying to tell us?  WE NEED MORE DIVERSITY!

June 9:  Corn on the east side of the Home Farm...rapid growth stage - engaged.

June 12:  It is amazing how much the corn grows in just a few days during the rapid growth stage.

June 15:  More twin row soybeans.

June 21:  Uh oh, wind storm came through and did some damage to the P1197.  Fortunately it was just root lodged and not snapped off...straightened itself out in a few days and ended up being some of our best corn!

June 27:  Looking good, but starting to see the wet spots in the hills of the Home Farm.

July 6:  The "flag leafs" are coming out on the home farm.  This is the final leaf to come out of the whorl just before the tassel emerges.

July 13:  Pollination time on the east side of the Home Farm.  No need to buy a drone when you can climb 100+ feet into the sky on a grain leg!  Good exercise too!

July 13:  Panoramic view of the east side of the Home Farm.  The light colored wet spots on the hills are starting to get a bit bigger.

July 13:  Looking Northwest over the Home Farm from the top of the grain leg.

July 31:  Things are getting pretty far along...pollination is done and over with, now it is time to crank out the ears!

August 20:  Starting to see more light spots develop throughout the field.  You can see the streaks running on an angle in the middle of the photo...we must have missed a sliver with the manure application the previous fall.

August 20:  West side of the Home Farm.  There is a definitely a big difference in color between the two corn hybrids in this photo.

August 24:  This is a photo of one of our soybean fields, taken from an airplane.  The dark strips were treated with iLeVo (seed treatment to control SCN & SDS) whereas the light strips were not.

September 1:  The corn is starting to dry down, and the wet/yellow spots have really grown.

September 4:  The good ol' Case IH 2388 doesn't look to bad immediately after a bath.

September 7:  Anticipation is growing, the Home Farm is getting closer everyday!

September 20:  Harvest begins!  Unfortunately I lost most of my photos of the harvest season as my phone decided it had seen enough of this life...so I had to search the social medias in order to track these down.  My sister, Bethany, is a much better photographer than me.

September 24:  Meals on wheels!  Thank goodness we have some awesome support back home to keep us going! PC- Bethany

September 25:  My brother-in-law Ike getting in on the action!  Can't forget his sidekick "Chip" (Bethany) was along for the ride too.  PC- Bethany

September 25:  Harvest season:  the only time it is not weird to tell someone to "go dump your load" multiple times a day.  PC- Bethany

 September 25:  Its a tough job, but somebody has to do it.  PC- Bethany

September 25:  Sometimes you simply need to look at things from a different angle to find their beauty.  PC- Bethany

September 26:  This corn is on fire! (Que Alicia Keys voice)

September 26:  Fill em up!

October 10:  Finally getting to take a bite out of the Home Farm!

October 20:  Wyatt decided he wasn't going to let everyone else have all the fun!  Just in the nick of time, too...this was the final day of harvest.  Whew.

November 2:  No time to rest after harvest...that manure ain't gonna pump itself!

December 7:  Out with the old...  Sent the 2388 down the road to Tennessee where she was going to get back to business helping finish up soybean harvest.

December 7:  In with the new:  Lexion 585R.  Looks like Michael has some homework to do in figuring out how this thing works...

Thanks for reading!
-Michael

2015 in Photos - Part 1

Here are some photos that I snapped with my phone throughout the year in 2015.  I'm clearly not a professional photographer, so apologies for the lack of quality on some of them.  Definitely was not planning on putting them on a blog when they were taken.  Enjoy!

Spring 2015 - Equipment and Field Preparation

December 12, 2014:  Getting some late season fall ammonia applied on the home farm.

March 12:  Swapping wheels to the big floaters on the 4930 sprayer.  The skinny tires fit between the rows for in-crop spraying, but the big floaters cause less compaction and are critical to minimize soil damage in the spring.

March 12:  4930 Sprayer wheel swap.  Not exactly an easy task to maneuver those massive wheels

March 17:  Cereal Rye starting to green up in the spring.  This rye was flown on with an airplane prior to corn harvest in 2014.

April 7:  Planting season preparations.  John Deere 8430 pulling a Great Plains YP2425 twin row planter.  This planter covers a 60 foot swath, planting 24 sets of "twin rows" spaced every 30 inches with each pass across the field.  We use it to plant soybeans.

April 7:  Looking out over the Home Farm on a gloomy day.  This field has been continuously no-tilled since the early 90's.

April 14:  Planting season preparations.  John Deere 8225R pulling a Kinze 3600 planter.  This planter covers a 40 foot swath, planting 16 single rows spaced every 30 inches with each pass across the field.  This planter is equipped to apply fertilizer in the seed furrow, as well as on top of the ground behind the closing wheels. We use it to plant corn.

April 14:  Dad and Grandpa getting everything hooked up.  Not exactly a simple task.  "Where does this one go again...?"

Spring 2015 - Corn Planting

April 16:  The planter is rolling!  Planting our first corn of the season.

April 21:  Houston, we have germination.

April 23:  The Cereal Rye is up and running, ready to enter it's rapid growth stage.

April 27:  Fixing a broken drainage tile.  Don't want any holes in your rubber boots on a day like this.

April 27:  Driving the International 1066 home from fixing the tile.  Sometimes you just gotta set it at half throttle and enjoy the ride.

April 30:  Planting corn on the Home Farm.  Can still see the manure injection knife streaks from the previous fall running on an angle.

April 30:  The earthworms gobble up soybean residue in a hurry on a long term no-till field like this.  Things are going to look much different (greener) planting this field in 2017.  Cereal rye cover crop was precision drilled in October 2016.

April 30:  Planting season is a sprint.  When conditions are fit, you have to make hay while the sun (and moon) shines.

May 1:  Doing some landscaping work in my backyard.

May 2:  No-Till Corn on Corn planting.

May 4:  The Home Farm after planting, but before corn emergence.

May 6:  This is the corn that was planted April 16.

Spring 2015:  Soybean Planting

May 13:  Things don't always go as planned.

May 13:  When it rains, it pours.  May 13 was just one of those days...

May 15:  No-Tilling soybeans into green cereal rye.

May 15:  No-Tilling soybeans into green cereal rye.

May 18:  Even though some days are worse than others, it is hard to complain when this is the view out your office window.

Thanks for reading!  Check out Part 2 HERE.

-Michael