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- [Man] Montana AG Live

is made possible by

the Montana Department

of Agriculture,

the MSU Extension Service,

the MSU AG Experiment Stations

of the College of Agriculture,

the Montana Wheat

and Barley Committee,

the Montana Bankers Association,

Cashman Nursery and Landscaping,

and the Gallatin Gardeners Club.

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you?

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- Good evening and

welcome to Montana AG Live,

brought to you from

the KUSM Studio

at beautiful Montana State

University in Bozeman.

We've got a great

show for you today.

I know everybody's

really getting excited

with the warm weather

that we've had

after that cold April,

farmers are in

the field planting

as quickly as they can.

Gardeners are out

working in their gardens

and we're just all really ready

to get into all the topics that

we're talking about tonight,

so we've got a great

panel for you tonight.

We're gonna be talking a lot

about organic agriculture,

different alternative crops.

On the anchor position

today is Perry Miller.

Perry does a lot of

work with pulse crops

and also some research

in organic farming.

We have Bob Quinn.

Bob is from Big Sandy and

he's an organic farmer

and probably one of

the, I would say,

premiere larger organic

farmers in the state

and has definitely been a

pioneer in that industry

for us in Montana.

Gary Brester, AG economics.

He's going to talk

about cattle, wheat,

anything that has to do

with agriculture in Montana,

and we all know Toby Day.

As things are beginning to grow,

there's a lot to talk

about in our gardens

and yards and so we'll

go to Toby for that.

I'm Nina Zidack.

I work with the Seed Potato

Certification Program

at MSU here in Bozeman.

I'd like to introduce

our panel tonight.

We have Dylan

Mangle, Don Mathry,

and Sheryl Moregoff.

So thanks for

answering the phones

and first to get

started tonight,

just like to have Bob

explain a little bit

about his farm in Big Sandy,

a little bit about how you

got into organic farming

and how it's working for you.

- Well, thanks Nina.

It's great to be here.

I appreciate very

much the invitation.

The organic, how

it's going is great.

How I got into is a

little longer story.

We started about 30 years ago.

We were selling organic grain

and I began to meet

some organic farmers

and I was quite jealous

that they didn't

have to spray anymore,

and I thought, "Well,

I wonder if this

"could work at our house."

And my dad said, "Oh,

this is really too risky."

So we started with 20 acres,

and that was 1% of our

cropping area at that time,

and my dad said,

"Oh, that's safe.

"We can do that."

And lo and behold,

the first experiment

came back and it was every

bit as good as the chemical

field right next to it,

and so I jumped in head first

and within two years our whole

farm was without chemicals

and within two more

years certified organic,

and never looked back.

To me, it's just

like a great puzzle,

figuring out how to

address wheat problems,

soil fertility problems

and to me, they're

just opportunities

and the market's have

been great to us.

We don't have an

operating note anymore,

after about three years,

and put all my kids

through college with it

and it's been great.

- Great, well, we'll get

into some of those details

on wheat control and

soil management later.

So we'll start off

with Perry, tonight.

Question from eastern Montana,

if I grow peas and lentils

in a cover crop cocktail,

it interferes with

crop insurance.

What can I grow for

legumes in the mix?

- Right, this is a

problem that's been coming

up a little bit, I guess,

because in these

cover crop cocktails,

it's pretty common to

throw peas or lentil seed

in the mix and that, apparently,

is considered as

growing that crop,

and so if you were

planning to come back

with peas or lentils

within a year or two of

that cover crop cocktail

then you'd be in violation

of the crop insurance,

so you have to wait

at least two years

after that cover crop or

choose a difference legume

in the mix and so there

are a couple things.

There's something

called chickling vetch,

that is an annual

legume that you can get

ahold of the seed and it

does a pretty nice job

of fixing nitrogen,

and we're working

on faba beans also,

small seeded faba beans,

which would also do a nice job

of filling that void

so that you didn't

have to have a pea or

a lentil in that mix

for the legume component.

- That's interesting.

I didn't realize that.

So is there any possibility

that in the future

crop insurance

regulations might change

to actually accommodate

incorporating

more cover crops into

the rotation system?

- Anything is possible.

I laugh a little

bit 'cause Bob and I

have been in some

cover crop discussions

and it's a little

more conservative

or resistant to change

than you might think.

- This is really the hope.

The problem with the government

is that they're

always following,

they're hardly ever leading,

and it's up to us, I think,

to be in the leading edge

and try to explain to them

how they're lowering risk

with these kinds of mixtures

and it's actually a benefit

to the insurance people,

because you're lowering risk

and having more possibility

for no insurance

payments required.

- Huh, that's a very

interesting issue.

Toby, from Augusta, this

person has hybrid poplars

that have reached the

end of their life span.

They have cankers in

the upper branches.

They would like to

replant Dakota cottonwoods

and they want to

know if the spores

from the cankers will

transfer to the cottonwoods.

- Well, okay, so

whenever I talk to 'em,

master gunners, I

always tell them

that you have to

be really careful

about any kind of

diseases or insects

that are going in

the same genera.

So since the hybrid poplars

and the Dakota poplars

are all in the same genera,

there's a really good chance

that you can spread

insect and disease issues

to the next tree.

That being said, when

I hear about growths

or cankers on the top

of cottonwood trees,

I'm gonna guess that

that actually is probably

a gall caused by an insect

rather than an actual disease.

I would get it identified.

Bring it to your

county extension agent

or reservation

agent and make sure

that that's exactly what it is.

If it's just the insect,

it's really cosmetic

and really doesn't cause

too much of an issue.

It's a Eriophyid mite

that causes the growth.

If it's a true canker,

then they're decline,

then yes, you can

put in new trees

but first of all, it's

ubiquitous, the Cytospora

or whatever it might be

is pretty much everywhere,

so you can probably still

put in those cottonwoods.

I wouldn't necessarily

say not to,

but there is a chance

that those spores

can go from one

tree to the next.

- Right and always

taking into consideration

that any poplar, cottonwood are

a reasonably short lived tree.

- Mm hmm.

- And so they

naturally could just be

at the end of their lifespan

and renewing a planting

still might be a good option.

- Absolutely.

There's a lot of other

options that are out there

other than cottonwoods,

but the Dakota cottonwood I

know is very popular right now,

and it's not a bad tree, really.

For a lot of situations.

- Okay.

Okay, Gary, I know this

is a frustrating thing

for a lot of people

dealing with the different

cycles with crop prices,

and wheat prices

are low right now.

- Yeah.

- Why?

- It doesn't take much

to be good at economics.

You just have to understand

supply and demand

and especially with grains,

demand is pretty stable,

it doesn't move a lot.

So you really look

at the supply side.

We've had three

years in a row now

of world record

wheat production.

We often think only of

our state or our region,

and say, "How was

wheat last year?

"Do we have a big

crop, small crop?"

The reality of it

is, Montana produces

about 8% of US wheat production.

US produces about 9%

of world production,

so even if the US has a low year

what really matters is that

along with the other 90%

of what's produced

around the world,

and the last three years,

it's just been

very, very strong.

So right now, we

have wheat prices

about where their long

run average has been,

if you look over the long haul.

It's not unusual to see

this rollercoaster effect

of high prices and

low prices as a result

of changes in weather,

and as far as

forecasting prices,

it's very, very easy to do.

You just tell me what world

weather's gonna be this year.

(laughing)

And I'll give you the price.

- There you go.

- Yeah, it's a very

simple process, but again,

it brings up the

really important thing,

was already mentioned earlier,

on the production

side of the importance

of managing price risk,

especially when one

has an opportunity

to market some

grain ahead of time.

The futures or options,

forward contracting

sorts of things.

The importance of trying to

manage the price risk side

is every bit as important

as the production risk side.

- So I'd like to just lob

this one back to Bob now.

How are the organic

wheat prices compared

to conventionally

grown wheat right now?

- Well, last year conventional

prices were bouncing

around three to four dollars

and the organic prices

were 15 or better.

Organic spring wheat

was up to 18 to 20,

so that's very unusual

to be five times more,

but for those that have organic,

they were really making

out like bandits last year,

but we normally

see that the prices

for organic is at least twice

and so to have it five times,

that's quite unusual.

But boy, for the people that had

also a good price

and a good crop,

it was very well

appreciated last year.

- So what is the peak

organic wheat price?

When conventional wheat was

11 or 12 dollars a bushel

what did organic peak out at?

- Well, normally when

the conventional prices

start going up so high, the

organic doesn't keep going

at the same ratio above that.

The thing that's

driving it right now is,

as Gary mentioned,

is supply and demand.

It's a very, much more demand

than we can supply

in this country.

In fact, almost 40% of our grain

for organic is now

being imported,

and this insane.

I mean, local farmers could

be cashing in on these prices,

and yet, the foreign farmers

are the ones cashing in,

and so it's really a paradox

that many of our neighbors

can't pay the chemical bills

because of these low prices,

even with good years and yet,

the conversion

organic is quite slow

and I've had,

however, more calls

in the last six

months than I've had

in the last 20 years.

People calling and asking

how they can convert

and how they can start

the conversion process,

because the future of

high prices for chemicals

and low prices for grains,

when that happens, it's a

death toll for some farms.

- So Bob, I'm sure organic

isn't for everybody.

When you get calls

about, "Is this for me?"

What do you worry

about for a risk factor

for somebody who

might be thinking

that this is gonna

save their farm

or going to be a

real answer for them.

Can anybody succeed at

this or what does it take?

- Anybody who wants

to can succeed.

I believe that.

- Okay.

- But the one's that call

normally are those that want to.

If you don't believe in

it, just like most things,

if you don't believe

in something,

if you think something

will work or will not work,

usually you're right.

If you think it will not

work, you're probably right.

But if you think that it will,

you're also probably right.

And because the people

that believe in something

go out and try to figure

out how to make it work,

and they solve the problems.

The biggest caution I give

people, to answer your

question about the

risks is to start small.

Don't start with the whole farm,

and the best time to start

is before your foreclosure

is imminent, the

best time to start

is when things are

a little bit stable,

so that you're not

really up against a wall

because you can't,

it's very high risk

to do the whole farm at once.

If you start with

20% and do 20% a year

over five years, there's

very little risk of that.

- Okay.

- These are bringing up

lots of very good topics,

and I get to actually answer

a question on organics.

From Springdale, can small,

organic home gardeners

use certified organic

seed potatoes.

If not, why not?

Well, they absolutely can.

The problem with

organic seed potatoes

is that there are very,

very few produced in Montana

and really, nationwide

there are very few organic

seed potatoes raised,

and what I'll just

say at this point.

This is a chance for

me to get on my soapbox

is the most important thing

about growing potatoes

is your home garden is to

grow Montana seed potatoes

because we have very

important seed potato industry

in our state with very

stringent disease tolerances.

And we've actually done surveys

where we've brought seed

in from out of state

and found horrific

levels of disease

that could potentially threaten

our seed potato producers.

One of the interesting

things, though,

about the organic program

is that because there

is such a low supply

of organic seed potatoes,

even an organic

certified farm can plant

conventionally

raised seed potatoes

if they can show that no

certified seed is available,

and so one thing

that we actually do

on a routine basis,

especially there are

a lot of organic farms in

the Missoula Hamilton area,

we will write a

letter to the farm

that they can give to

the state of Montana

saying that through our program

no certified seed was available

of the specific variety

that they were using,

so really the most

important thing

is to grow Montana

certified seed potatoes

and if you can find organic

seed potatoes, absolutely.

They're good to grow,

but definitely a

limit in the supply.

- I'd like to second that, now.

Because I have some

experience with trying

a dry land potato

experiments that we're doing.

We started with 42

different varieties

and I couldn't find

all those in Montana,

so I ordered from Idaho,

on conventional means,

'cause I'm not part

of the staff, right,

so I ordered from

Idaho and from Colorado

and Montana and Washington

and Maine and Montana,

and the Maine ones were

almost as good as Montana,

but by the time I

got the Colorado,

there was a significant

amount of disease in those,

even though they're

all supposed to be

certified disease free,

so you are doing a very

excellent job here in Montana

and I support you 100%.

- Okay, thanks Bob.

- And I bought mine today,

seed potatoes from Montana.

- All right, all right.

- Just so you know.

I've got them ready to

go later this next week.

- So yeah.

- Just wanna let you know.

- Okay, great, and

that's one of the things

that we've really been

working on addressing

is getting seed potatoes

that are produced in Montana

out throughout the state.

A few years ago we started

a garden seed

distribution network

through our certified

seed program,

and this year we

actually turned it over

to one of our potato farmers,

and so we're delivering

Montana seed potatoes

in two great big circuits,

a western Montana circuit

and eastern Montana circuit

that goes all the way up

to Havre, Glasgow,

back down to Glendive

and back again so

we're really working

at getting those seed

potatoes out there.

- Good, all right.

- Back to Toby,

this is a comment.

So this is a kudos to Toby.

This is from Monarch, last

year they had apple trees

girdled by rabbits.

Toby recommended to bridge graft

and they did that, now the

trees are leafing out, success.

(laughing)

Thanks, Toby.

- That's actually quite amazing,

because a bridge

graft is really not

an easy thing to do.

- Is really difficult.

- Yeah.

- It's very difficult

so that's great.

That does go to

if you have, whether

or not it's rabbits,

but most of the time

it's a weed eater,

it's a lawn mower.

It's something that rakes

off the bark of the tree.

I see that a lot

and you might want

to do something to

protect those trees

because once you take off more

than about about a

half to two thirds

of that bark around that tree.

Then you're gonna see

that tree go south.

The living tissue

is on the outside,

so do some way to

protect your tree,

whether it's rabbits

or just a 13 year old

that goes crazy

with a lawnmower.

- [Nina] Exactly,

and the weed eater.

- Yes.

- Did they get rid

of the rabbits?

I'm sorry.

- Hasenpfeffer.

- So question for

Gary from Great Falls.

Will China pay a premium

for Montana organic

and grass fed beef?

- I don't know.

If you try to think

about the economics

of food production in China

then a lot of the things they do

just don't make any sense.

On the other hand, if

there's a market there

and one of the great

things about markets

is that if they have

a demand for a product

that can be met by

entrepreneurs like Bob here

or others of course

then we'll be able to produce it

but I'm not certain, with China,

it's just so hard to forecast

what they're going to do

and if they're doing something

in terms of a food area

or whether they're

doing something in terms

of protecting their industry

or whether they're trying

to do something else

with another trade issue is

very, very difficult forecast

but if the only

things China wants

is more identity

preserved, identified beef

we can produce that.

You provide a premium

and Bob will step

right up to the plate,

I guarantee that.

Known Bob a long time.

- I've been China

for some food shows

and I can tell you that

the demand for organic

in China is growing.

The one thing, and

Gary mentioned it,

that they told us that

they weren't interested

in a truckload of wheat or

a container load of wheat.

It has to be processed

with US label on it,

and then it will come to China

and will sell in their stores.

People that we talk to said

that they did not trust

the organic certification

that's going on,

at least at that time in China,

in the level of competency

of the manufacturer,

so they want it manufactured

in the United States

or other areas or Europe

where they can really depend

on the organic seal being legit

and the seals being

closed on the packages.

- Interesting.

- So that was one thing

that probably would be the

same with the beef, too.

- Yeah.

- You might have to take

it to a different

level of processing,

but there's certainly demand.

- Okay.

- Bob, did I hear a rumor

that you have beef

back on the farm?

- Yes, that's true, yeah.

- Wow.

- Well, that was, I

hated to lose them,

but when I started

traveling to food shows

in the wintertime, my wife said,

"Well, I'm not gonna

feed all these cows."

(laughing)

And I said, "Okay, that's fair."

So the cows went down the road,

but now we have a new hired man

who's very interested

in the beef

and so we're gonna

be doing grazing

of our cover crops

and intensive grazing,

so we're very excited

about adding that

to the organic niche because

it really goes together.

- So, and this is

extremely good timing,

because a question just

came in from Kalispell

asking if you have had

success with cover crops

and intensive

grazing on your farm.

So how is that working out?

- Well, the intensive grazing

is in it's first year.

(laughing)

- Okay.

- But the cows will be

coming the first of June,

so I can't comment on that,

but Perry and I have

worked very close together

over many years with

different cover crops

and green manures and

soil building crops

and we've come up

now with a rotation

that we rotate those as

well as our cash crops,

and we found that that's

being quite successful.

I've learned one thing

in organic agriculture

that diversity is the

mother of stability,

so the diversity you

have, the more stable

is your operation and

we found that true

not only with the cash crops

but also with the cover crops.

- Okay.

- Nina, I should chime in

'cause we do have a fair

bit of research going on

at MSU that does look

at grazing cover crops.

One piece of it is an organic

project near campus here

where we're actually

using sheep as a model.

- Okay.

- Or grazer to

take down sweet clover

and there's some

real positive things

happening in that.

Then Darren Boss

is doing some work

up at Haver using beef

to take down cover crops

and has got some pretty

good economic stories

or a good economic story

coming out of that,

and we've got some other work

that we're just

finishing up, too,

and I think one of the messages

is we can't, there's really

an economic incentive

to get the grazing part involved

because that brings

in an opportunity

to recover some of those costs

associated with

seeding the cover crop.

But some of the early

data that we're getting

says you can't have your

cake and eat it too.

It looks like we're

actually losing

a little bit of the

nitrogen release

and some of the soil quality

as we're removing some

of that plant tissue

with animals, so that

kind of makes sense.

- Yeah, and it's always

the long run game.

- It is the long run, that's

what's important, yeah.

- Sure.

For Gary, we discussed

the fluctuations in

I know another thing that's

been a little bit disappointing

the last few years

is the cattle market.

Can you explain

what that decline is

and what the trends are?

- Yeah, sure, Nina,

I mean we've seen

two or three years

ago remarkable change

in the cattle markets,

record prices that were hit,

and there's reasons why

there's record prices,

whether it's an organic

or non-organic product,

there just wasn't much

supply of beef around.

There was a large demand.

Pork and poultry

production was stymied

by some disease

problems that they had

within their production systems

and so calf prices went crazy

and cattle prices

and beef prices did,

and people respond.

Markets respond when a

high price is out there.

People respond by producing

more of that product,

exactly what we want

to happen from markets,

and as a result we've

seen two things happen.

Pork and poultry have

been able to very quickly,

because of the way they're

integrated in their structure,

to fix and control

their disease problems,

so their production started

coming up very quickly,

and last year,

somehow, we've added

a billion and a

half pounds of beef

to our beef system and

it wasn't from numbers,

it really was from

feeding cattle heavier.

And as a result, we had some

prices that dropped down

where we hadn't seen

for four or five years.

Now, markets adjust and

we're starting to see

some rationality come back

into the feeder cattle market

and we've had a

pretty good run up

the last two to three months

and it looks like this

fall should be $1.75 ish

sort of price for steer calves

and that's a very,

very solid price,

and it's not $2.90 but it's

also far above right now

what the long run average price

would be for those calves.

If you look at 100 years of data

and adjust it to

today's dollars,

if we're on the trend,

we'd get about $1.50 one

or two for those calves

and we're gonna be substantially

above that this fall,

so it's still a very strong

even though we

had a dip in there

very bullish on the

cattle industry.

There's a whole

number of reasons.

I've talked with

people in the state

in the past about what

some of those cost drivers

are for the cattle industry,

and you mentioned

one, Bob, labor.

The things that you were

doing didn't allow you

to keep those animals around,

and you're wonderful but

you're not that unique, right?

It takes--

- If you're gone, you're gone.

- That's right.

- They don't take care

of themselves.

- They don't take care

of themselves and

so the labor issue

is one of the major

ones why people

have gotten away,

eastern Montana, classic,

from cattle production and

that's not just Montana.

That's all over the country

so I think the future

is really good for those

in the cattle business,

those that are set up

for it on the labor side,

on the grazing side and

have those things in place.

I think things look really well.

I still do, even though

we're coming out of,

as we come out of this low spot

which was pretty low last year.

- That's great, good.

Here's a question for

Toby from Lewistown

and I'm very glad

to get this question

because it piggy backs

on to our discussion

before we went on

the air tonight

and Gary was asking a question.

Well, first of all the

person is commenting

that many trees

in central Montana

were killed by diseases

and need to be replaced,

but what they're

really asking is

what species of shade

trees do you recommend

for central Montana, Lewistown

area would be similar

to Bozeman if you get

out on the prairie,

it's definitely a

harsher environment.

- Right.

- And they can't have disease,

they can't have roots,

they can't raise sidewalks,

they can't die, they

handle the wind.

- Right.

- They can be a windbreak.

The grow fast,

okay, go ahead, now.

- You want a miracle

is what you want.

- That's why you're here.

- First of all, I

kind of question

that there was a lot of trees

that died due to disease.

I don't know exactly

what that statement is

'cause there's a few

diseases that are out there.

We do have some warmer weather.

We do have some insect problems,

'cause we haven't

really gotten that cold.

But I do understand

when we do lose trees

due to winter kill

and things like that.

One of the things,

walk around your neighborhood.

See what's there.

Talk to your neighbors.

We don't do that anymore.

If you see a tree in

somebody's backyard

and you want to know what it is,

go ask them, take a sample.

Bring it to your

extension office.

Now, Lewistown, Montana,

there's a lot of great trees

that you can grow there.

It's not as harsh as, let's

say where I was an agent

in Butte, where it's

difficult to grow

a lot of different trees,

but there's several different

trees that will do well.

One of them that

always comes to mind

is the thornless honeylocust.

I see those in the

Lewistown area.

I think it's a great tree.

I think if you're in

the city of Lewistown

where it's a little bit more,

you have kind of a microclimate.

You could probably

actually get away

with at least silver

maple, maybe Norway maple.

Once you start getting

out of that urban forest

then it gets to where you're

like zone three for sure

but there are a lot

of trees out there.

We could talk about all of them,

but I would just walk

around the neighborhood,

see what's working, see what's,

'cause there's always a

plant nerd like myself

or master gardeners

that will try anything.

There's people like Bob who,

every time I hear that

there's a new vegetable

that he's growing.

There's always

somebody in a community

that's doing something different

and they figure out what

works and what doesn't,

and that's what

I would recommend

is talk to your local nurseries,

talk to local people around

and see what's out there,

but yeah, raising sidewalks,

getting in the sewer,

all that kind of stuff.

- Not that that

happens at my house.

- Yeah.

- I'm just saying.

- Yeah.

- Hypothetically.

- Well there are.

Trees are a benefit but

they can also be a liability

and makings sure that

you have the right tree

in the right place, the

plant in the right place

is always a very

important thing.

- [Gary] And patience

isn't virtue of mine

so I want it to grow fast.

- Right.

- And that causes problems.

- Everybody, I want a tree

that grows really fast.

It's a great shade tree that

won't do any of those things

and that's a myth.

- So can you comment

on some of the maples,

like what's the one, it's maple,

but the name isn't maple?

- [Together] Box elder?

- So box elder is

actually a great tree.

It looks a lot like green ash.

It does well in a lot of areas,

but if you do get a box elder,

make sure that you

get a male box elder.

Because if you have a female,

you will get box

elder bugs in Montana,

and they can be a real nuisance,

but yeah, box elders.

One of the things that

some of the maples

that I see coming out.

Some of these red maples,

they don't do well

in alkaline soils in Montana

and so the red that

you're looking for

is usually a pale,

flesh colored brown

and it just doesn't do well.

(laughing)

- [Bob] Can we tap our

box elder trees for syrup?

- Can you?

You surely can.

- [Bob] Have you seen it done?

- I have not seen it done,

but I'm pretty sure

that you probably could

tap the trees if you wanted to,

but I don't think you're

gonna get a lot of production.

But I'm gonna guess,

I know that they do,

birch was one that I

saw that was tapped

and I thought that was

kind of interesting,

and I've had birch syrup

which I thought was fantastic,

but all my friends and even

some of my family I believe

didn't really like it.

- [Nina] Probably a little

bitter or something.

- It's got a weird taste to it.

- Yeah.

- I'll try anything.

- I can imagine.

- If you bring Bob

back next year,

he'll have tapped it.

- He'll have tapped his--

- I have a box elder

tree sitting out.

- He's gonna go home and--

- And they're one that actually

will do reasonably well

out on the prairie.

- [Bob] Yes, it's a native.

- Yeah.

- Right.

- With a little protection.

This is the burning question I

think about organic gardening

for Bob from Kalispell.

How do you control

weeds without sprays?

- How do you control

weeds without sprays?

Well, you have to start

early and show up often.

(laughing)

With gardens, well, this

is not my strong suit

but I do love gardens

and my best control of weeds

with gardens is a heavy mulch.

So I put lawn clippings

or even straw or leaves

or whatever's available to

mulch the garden very heavily

and then that takes

care of the weeds

once you get the

first flush out.

So that's one trick.

In the fields, we control

weeds with rotations,

so we're breaking up weed cycles

along with disease

cycles and pest cycles

and all the cycles are

broken up with rotation.

Doesn't mean the weeds are gone,

but it means they're manageable.

So we don't try for eradication.

That's not our goal.

Our goal is to have it not

causing economic damage

or lowering the value of the

crop in harvestable bushels

and that sort of thing,

and what we're finding

after several years

that the weeds in our

fields are very diverse

and there's not just

patches of one kind of weed,

and once you've

reached that level

then you know that

your rotations are

- What one weed is

just your nemesis?

- Well, right now the

problem we're having

that we haven't solved yet.

There's a lot of

research going on,

there needs to be more is

with the perennial vine weed.

A creeping jenny.

- Yeah.

- Our perennial weeds

are pretty tough

with Canada thistle,

we're able to control

that with alfalfa if we get

a good stand of alfalfa,

that takes out the

Canada thistle.

Our most problematic weeds

for our chemical neighbors

almost disappeared for

us, like fireweed kosha

is a non-issue.

I think kosha really needs

a lot of soluble nitrogren

to be successful and

go above the wheat.

Without that, the

wheat seems to cover it

and it doesn't take

over like it does

in our neighbors' fields,

but simple weeds that are very

easily killed by chemicals

like penny crest, fan weed,

some of the easier mustards

can be a real problem

for us if they let them

get out of control.

One thing that we can never

do is let weeds go to seed.

So we make sure that

weeds don't go to seed

to build up seed bank.

So we're doing more cultivation.

We try to do shallow

undercutting type of cultivation

so it's minimum till

rather than plowing

or anything like

that but we do try

to keep the weeds

from going to seed

and then rotate so we

are breaking up cycles

of winter annuals

and summer annuals

and we don't allow

those to build up

by having the same kind

of crops year after year.

- That raises a question to

me that I never really thought

of it before, so in organic,

you really can't utilize

the no-till type agriculture

where you're planting

back into the stubble?

- We're working on that.

If we can figure out

a no-till organic,

that'd be the

cat's meow, really.

Rodale has been

working on such a thing

in Pennsylvania and they seem

like they've made some progress,

but when we try to

duplicate it here,

it hasn't really worked,

so we haven't

solved that one yet

but that's the elusive

pie in the sky,

but that would be great

if we could do that.

We're stilling

relying on rotations

and the minimum tillage.

- Okay.

- Nina, I mentioned

this organic project

that we had near town.

The point of that,

actually, is to try

and do something that's

closer to no till,

and that's why we're using

grazing in that study.

In a five year rotation, we

can actually go 36 months

without tillage, so

we haven't figured

out a way to do the

whole five years,

but 36 months in a row

is a pretty good start,

and we've done some

of these things

like the crimp

rolling and what not

that the Rodale

Institute's done,

but in most situations here,

by the time the

plants are big enough

to be susceptible to rolling,

they've used all the

water in the system

and so they're too

close to maturity

and we're not

growing enough mulch

to really make a difference,

so we're still

struggling with that end,

but you know Pat Carr,

a new research scientist

near the Lewistown

area of Moccasin

is really interested

in this topic

and I know he's gonna

get some work underway

and he's gonna get one of

these fancy Chevron rollers

and try some more things

out at that location.

- Okay.

- One of our crops

in our rotation is

alfalfa for soil building

and we also use

it as a cash crop,

the second year for hay.

So when we do our alfalfa,

we actually go about 18 to 20

months without any tillage.

We also use yellow

blossomed sweet clover,

and when that's in our rotation,

we go a year, 12 months

without any cultivation,

so we have aspects

of the rotation

that really allow

for some no tillage

but it's not 100%.

- Okay, okay, Gary a

question from Missoula,

if you could just

kind of comment,

we've been talking a lot

about this organic agriculture

and different methods

and the nuts and bolts

of how to get the work done.

From an economic standpoint,

how sustainable is organic

production of food?

- Well, there's

just so many issues.

First of all, the

scale is something

people need to understand.

Last year, we had about

360 billion dollars

of farm gate sales, so

that's not further process

but off the farm,

farm and ranches,

and organic was

about 6% of that,

so about six billion,

something like that,

so from an overall perspective,

it's relatively small.

Now, from an

economic standpoint,

we happen to be very fortunate.

There's probably 50 or

60 countries in the world

where if you want a certain

type of agriculture,

you want your food

produced naturally.

You want your food

produced organically.

You don't care, whatever

the case might be.

The vast majority of

countries in the world

just try to eat anything,

and they don't

have these choices.

Markets allow us

to have a demand

if there's a demand, someone,

the Bob's of the world here.

Bob, we've known each other

20 years, I guess now,

those folks will try

to figure out a way

to meet that demand.

Now, it does mean that you're

probably pay more for food,

and that's okay.

People have choice,

and however you want to do it,

organic production is

gonna have lower yields

and because of labor

and other things,

there's gonna be

some higher costs.

But that's fine.

It's meeting a demand

that's out there,

and so, right now,

I'd call it about 6%.

In Europe, Bob, more

like 15%, 18%, 20%.

- Not quite that high yet.

- Not quite that high yet.

In all of Europe.

Certain parts it is.

- Yeah, yes.

- But isn't it wonderful

that you have a choice?

And if you wanna be

at the farmer's market

to get your tomatoes produced

by Don Mathry over

here, you can.

It's fantastic that we

have these opportunities

and we need to

continue to do research

and we need to continue to

make sure we have entrepreneurs

that can meet that demand

and some can do it

very successfully

and others not so much.

The question about

how we handle weeds.

I grew up on a sugar

beet, malt barley farm,

or got older there, I

don't know if I grew up,

and we did it with

a long handled hoe,

and I don't like that much.

That just isn't what I

want to do with my life,

but not everything has to

be done that way, either,

and so I'll call it 6%

of our food business.

That doesn't mean

it's inconsequential.

It's very important

to a lot of people

and I think it's fantastic

that we have options.

- I think it's also interesting

how we have

conventional farming,

which is, there's

always breakthroughs

on conventional farming and

it's sometimes political.

Whether or not it's GMO

every universities

working on something.

Some kind of breeding

or some type of product.

There's also

independent companies,

but there's also people like Bob

who's out there

and I'm gonna guess

that if I was to go on your farm

and I haven't been on your farm,

but if I was.

- You need to go.

- I bet there would

be an opportunity

to say, "Hey, this is

really working out,

"and there's some new science."

Because you're totally

turning the whole industry

on its head on the

how you do this.

Like I said, throughout Montana,

I always hear about

Bob Quinn, Bob Quinn,

and I think it's

mostly because you have

that entrepreneurial

kind of look to it

about how to move past something

whether or not it's organic

or even conventional,

and I think that

that's really great

that we have people out there,

but I think we need both.

Because of the food supply

that we're looking at.

- One thing that I think

is important to say

that the organic

section is really

the only area of

agriculture I know

that has significant growth,

even though it's quite small,

it's the only one

that's really growing,

and holds I think great

promise in the future.

We hear all the time, I've

heard the last 30 years

about organic will

never feed the world

and we hear that all the time,

mostly from chemical companies.

They don't want to lose

their business, of course,

but I was asked to speak

at a conference in Bangkok

a couple years ago and there

was a paper presented there

from research done in India

and was backed up

with another paper

of research done in Africa

and as you well

know that Asia has

just about two thirds of

the population of the earth

lives in Asia, if you

add Africa, now we're

up to three quarters.

Most of those people are

fed by peasant farmers

and very small plots of land,

and the research

shows if those farmers

changed organic procedures,

that their production

would double to triple.

Increase two to three times,

that is the key to

feeding the world,

and I found that

very, very exciting.

Those people can't

afford chemicals, anyway,

but if they would just go

to things like soil building

and rotations because

absence of chemicals

doesn't mean it's organic,

sustainable organic,

but if you add the

principals of soil building

and rotations, you

can actually see

those yields doubling

and that's three quarters

of the world and

that's where the food

would make a huge difference

to those areas that

are always in deficit.

- One of the things that

Bob just commented on

was organic ag being

the only growth industry

in the state, in terms of crops,

I think Perry could you

comment a little bit

on pulse crops and

the acreage increases

and where we're sitting

now in comparison

to where we were 10 years ago.

- Yeah, pulse crops have

created a whole new industry

in Montana and at one

time the only people

who knew about it

were organic farmers

but it's gotten much,

much bigger than that

as it's gone mainstream,

and so last year, I think

we were, 20 years ago

that the acreage would

have been so small

it wouldn't even be worth

saying how much it was.

Now I think there's 1.2

million acres this past year,

pretty evenly split

between peas and lentils

and not as much with chickpeas.

The numbers I'm

hearing this year

are probably gonna be

in the same ballpark,

maybe a lot more

chickpeas, fewer peas.

Lentil production

looks like it's gonna

be pretty strong again and so

that's been a wonderful

opportunity for Montana,

especially because it

complements wheat production

so well.

- Right.

- Which, again, the organic

guys have known for a long time,

but in this mainstream world

it's really helped manage

weeds better, nutrient

cycles, water use efficiency.

It's just been a really

win-win situation

bringing these crops

to the mainstream now.

- And another beauty of

that, it really helps

with the transition to organic,

because you're halfway there

because of the rotation.

(laughing)

Really.

That's the hardest

thing for people

to introduce new

crops into their farm,

but when they've

done it already,

then it becomes

much more simple.

- So now that we've discussed

this dramatic increase

in pulse crops, Gary

can you comment?

Are we going to produce

ourself into a situation

where we're going to have

an oversupply of lentils

or is the export market gonna

take care of that or what?

- The export market takes

care of most of it now.

We don't need that many lentils

and other legumes

here in the US,

so most of it is

an export market,

but what's happening is

as things get produced,

where you can do it the best,

and where what economists

call your options are low,

so in wheat country.

Wheat and barley and fallow

and if the option of

fallow in some years is low

and some years it's high,

because you need the

extra water that's going

to be retained, but

as you develop a,

we call it comparative

advantage in doing this.

Whether the market,

demand declines, goes up,

if you can out compete

whoever else is producing

these crops, that's

what really matters,

and so I think we have an

area, northeastern Montana,

that they're able to

compete with the world

on the production side

and that's what matters.

Looking for the things

you're really good at.

We're really good at

Montana feeder cattle

and we're really good

at malting barley

and we're pretty darn good

at sugar beets, right?

And we're good at wheat.

- And seed potatoes.

- And so we're good at this.

Really good.

- Don't forget

the seed potatoes.

- Don't forget

the seed potatoes.

Yeah.

- Toby, you're

supposed to elbow.

- You just about got

ejected out of that chair.

- We worked on this before.

We really are good--

- [Together] At seed potatoes.

- That's right.

- And they go all

over the country.

When you're good at something,

that's what matters.

And getting better.

- And so Gary mentions

a comparative advantage

and one of the key things

with pulse crops is their

pretty disease susceptible

as a group.

- Yeah.

- Well, we have this

nice, dry climate.

- Right.

- That sometimes limits yields

and whatnot, but at least

it keeps disease at bay,

so that's become really

important in those pulse crops.

- And it's the same

climate that gives us high

protein spring wheat, I mean.

If you can get a yield, you

mentioned that earlier, right?

So there's advantages to being,

I hate to say this folks, dry.

But there are some

things that it can help

as opposed to a

very, very wet year.

- And as far as

selling your lentils,

I think we should

go on a campaign

to get us to eat more lentils.

- Yes.

- They're very high

in nutrition, and we're

talking about the cost of food

and organic lentils,

per serving,

is still a very small

price on your plate

if you buy the package in

the store without processing

and for me that

is really the key

for people who are

looking to cut costs

is just buy less processed food.

- [Nina] Right, buy whole foods.

- Toby, you have to

go see his place.

I'm done.

(laughing)

I guarantee you, you will

eat lentils up there,

'cause he'll fix you lunch.

- Yeah.

- He does every time.

- We eat what we grow

and we grow what we eat.

- He does, he really does.

You will have lunch

there, trust me.

- Knowing that I will

take every opportunity

to take it back to potatoes,

we have a question

from Missoula.

How close together

do you plant potatoes

and how do you know

when to harvest?

Well, that's a very

variable answer.

I would say anywhere

from six to 12 inches

and part of it is what

is your objective.

Would you like to grow some

nice creamers for the summer?

You can definitely plant

them closer together.

If you want to raise some

really nice, big baking potatoes

or some really big

potatoes for boiling

and cooking later

on, then go ahead

and plant them a

little farther apart,

and I actually met a

woman this last week

who was asking me about

her potato harvest

and she said, "I got all

of these small potatoes,

"and I just need to learn

how to grow bigger potatoes."

We started talking about

how she planted her potatoes

and she said, "Well, I put

four seeds in each hole."

- Oh.

- Oh, boy.

- That'll do it.

- Yeah.

- I've also found that

anybody that grows,

and I know somebody's

gonna call me, that's fine.

But anybody that

grows them in boxes

or tires or everything

that you see on Pinterest

and the internet, everybody

I've ever talked to

says that the potatoes

are really small.

You might get one big potato

and then the rest of

them are really small,

so if you want larger

baking potatoes,

don't grow 'em in these

bins and barrels and tires.

They're gonna be too small.

- And if you're gonna

go out in the dry land,

and put your potatoes in the

field without irrigation,

our experiments have

shown that we need nine

square feet per plant

so that's three feet

between each row and three

feet between each plant

and if we do that, our

potato plants produce

nearly as much as irrigated

ones, plant per plant.

We only have a third as

many and that's okay,

but the size and the

production is just fine.

The plants do not

cover the ground

like you do with

irrigated field.

- [Nina] So that creates

a bit of a more weeding.

- You have to do some

more weeding, yeah,

but in the dry areas, if

you can get those weeds

out in June, usually it quits

raining at the end of June

and new weeds don't

come if there's no rain.

So it's okay.

- And the other

thing about potatoes,

if you don't have a

lot of garden space.

Do like me, don't

plant potatoes.

Buy 'em in the grocery

store, 'cause they're cheap.

- Exactly, exactly.

We have some great local options

in our grocery stores here.

- The also issue, sometimes

you get small potatoes

'cause you've been

planting in the same spot

over and over.

- Right.

- And Don Mathry told me,

Gary, you've got to get them

over there somewhere

else, so there's that.

Do you like 'em potted on hills?

That's what the

seed potato guys do,

so do you like 'em on

hills to get more size?

- I plant mine four

to six inches deep

and then when they're

about eight inches tall,

then I start hilling 'em,

and I'll hill 'em a couple times

and as I'm hilling, I'll

sprinkle a little fertilizer in

as I'm hilling, but yeah,

the hilling is important

because as the potatoes grow,

if they grow too

close to the surface

they'll turn green

because the potatoes

themselves will

actually photosynthesize

and you'll get bitter potatoes.

- And then they can push

out a little bit more.

- Right, right.

- Little looser soil.

- A little bit looser

soil and then, definitely,

you can add compost

at that stage,

although, just with

a bit of caution,

any addition of organic

material can promote scab

and scab can definitely be

a big problem with potatoes.

- But it never really goes away

once it's in the soil, right?

- Well, the most important

control measure for scab

really is to keep your

soil evenly moist.

Is to never let it

completely dry out 100%.

If you can keep it evenly moist,

you'll reduce your

scab significantly,

but some varieties are just

very prone to scab issues.

- Simple question, Nina.

Too early to plant potatoes?

- Oh, now's a good

time to plant potatoes.

- Right now's a good time?

- Yep, now's a great time to

plant potatoes even in Bozeman,

so yeah, the

Manhattan guys are--

- It's the middle of May.

- Yeah, yeah.

They're ready to go, so.

A question for Toby from Helena,

and evidently this

question has been asked

and not answered yet.

Can you grow

hydrangeas in Helena

and how long during the

growing season do they bloom?

- So, yes, you can grow

hydrangeas in Helena.

Unfortunately,

they're not the ones

that you see, again on

Pinterest, and all the internet.

It's very hard to get

those pink and blue colors

without acidic soil and you

don't have it in Helena.

There is a white one called

Annabelle that is grown

just about everywhere

and it'll flower

probably for several weeks.

Probably three

weeks in the spring,

but it is, it's white,

and that might

turn somebody off.

- We have it and it's great.

We gave up on colors.

- Right.

- Because colors, we

have alkaline soil

and so you're not

gonna get the colors.

- So you can have the white one,

take an organic spray

paint and paint 'em blue

and then you'll be happy.

- Just take a picture.

(laughing)

- That's right.

- [Perry] What's a hydrangea?

- A hydrangea is a plant

that's really grown in

areas that have

more acidic soil.

- A flower.

- Usually kind of...

Yeah, sorry, shaded areas.

- If I can't eat it,

I'm not interested.

- If you go to Seattle,

you'll see tons of 'em.

- You ask your wife.

- Okay.

(laughing)

It's an informative show.

- A question for

Bob from Eureka.

Do large scale organic

producers in Montana

use organic approved pesticides,

so like biorational products?

- Well, they're forbidden

from using chemically

compounded pesticides.

- Right.

- Somebody mentioned, it's

already been mentioned before,

maybe Perry did, because

of our climate here,

we have very few pests.

They used to not go

through the winter.

That has changed the

last couple years,

but still, for us, the

biggest pest we have,

the most serious one were

grasshopper infestation,

and we haven't had a grasshopper

infestation now since '88,

that destroyed all the crops.

Normally they're coming

every drought cycle

but they've missed

the last one or two,

I don't know why.

But for that infestation,

we used a nosema locusta

which is a biological control.

It's a very small parasite

that, when the

grasshoppers eat it,

they get sick and then

the other grasshoppers

eat their buddies who are sick

and they pass it

through the whole group,

and it's very, very efficient

when the grasshoppers

are very, very thick,

so that was a very good control,

and that was when

I was in transition

with our organic and we'd

sprayed the non-organic

fields with malathion,

killed everything.

All the grasshoppers

and everything else,

all the good bugs also died,

but within 10 days, the

grasshoppers were back.

- Right, 'cause with all

that rain to land around,

they just migrate in.

- They just kept on coming.

- Moving way.

- And so they came

in and finished off

what the ones who had

been poisoned didn't eat,

so harvest time, that field

had very little to harvest

and the hopper was

full of grasshoppers,

and my organic field,

the grasshoppers

and then the middle

of the field,

or the rest of the field,

I should say, was clean.

There's no grasshoppers

in the combine tank

and the crop was

completely spared,

so it made a believer out of me.

- I should say for those

that are looking for,

'cause there are

organic pesticides

and there are biologicals

like Bob was talking about,

if you do not want to use

a conventional pesticide,

there are pesticides

that are organic.

They are OMRI approved.

- Yeah.

- If you look at the

label, it's OMRI,

which is the Organic

Materials Research Institute.

- Institute, yeah.

- Yeah.

And that way you will know

that you can use that.

- Yeah, it's really important.

- So even if you have a garden,

look for the OMRI approved

if you wanna be organic.

- Okay, very good.

So, Gary, a question

getting back to both organic

and beef, how are they

going about developing

markets for organic beef?

- Well, I think the biggest

part is less development

and finding where that demand

is and trying to meet it,

and there's certainly great

producers who are able

to do that.

Again, they become very,

for their operation,

very efficient at doing it.

I think the markets

are out there.

I think the bigger

problem on the beef side

is probably having supply.

- Consistent.

- Being able to produce

the product, yeah,

consistent supply.

Because now you're talking

about all the feed ingredients

as well as opposed to your

cropping side of things.

Now you're talking about

all the feed ingredients

that have to go into that animal

and of course, now, with

the animal gets sick,

antibiotics, so there is,

the market is probably there.

It's just a really hard one

to produce enough product for.

- I think a future market for

beef is the grass fed organic.

That's even a niche of a niche,

but there's a huge

demand for that,

and it's a growing demand.

- Okay.

- Significantly.

- So we're coming to

the end here really fast

and Bob, just a little

bit more than a minute,

one of the things that we

really haven't discussed

is what does it take,

working through the state

to become an organic farmer?

If you could just talk a

little bit about that process.

- Well, the Montana

Department of Agriculture

has an organic section

that certifies farms

in Montana and they're

a very good resource.

I would call them as

soon as you decided

that that's the

way you want to go

and they will help

you, step by step,

with the certification process

and even suggest

maybe some rotations

and some crops to

get you started.

I would find organic neighbors

or the closest

ones in your area.

They're gonna be

your best resource

because they know what

works in your region.

Even Montana is more

or less one region,

but there's still many,

many micro climates,

and if you ask your neighbors

and see what's work for them,

you'll be far down the

road without having

to trial and error so

many things yourself.

If I had two suggestions,

those were the two

I'd start with.

- Okay.

- And start small.

- Right, and then how

many years is the process?

- Well, it's three years

from your last application

of a prohibited substance.

So Montana, normally

we're not spraying

after the harvest,

so the third crop

actually can be

sold for organic.

So you're only

missing two crops.

Once normally is summer fall.

One crop is all you're

looking at really

that's in transition.

One for summer, fall

and then the third one

can be sold as organic.

Not so bad, not so tough.

- Okay, great, well, thank you

and I think Bob's case

study on organic farming

here stimulating some

great conversation

and we'll look forward to

some similar conversation

next week with Jeff

Littlefield, who does work

in biological weed control.

So we'll be back in

some of the same topics

and we'll see you next week.

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