Alternatives in Agriculture Call-In; Reel 2

You have to be on an annual basis there. Once you learn to control your humidity and the spores in the proper condition of the law and those types of things I am enjoying what you're saying but I'm trying to read this next question here live for I believe for you Mark. Is there any resistance from businesses by the organic movement. I think to a certain degree there is there is seems to be much more receptiveness nowadays simply because of the economic situation all agribusinesses being faced with. The what's your experience on resistance. Well I think. People I've wondered in the 13 years that my husband and I have been farming about organic and that sort of thing that I think it's very much changing and I last week there was an expert Zand 60 Minutes about I cannot go on apples. And I think that people are becoming very aware of the pesticides in the air and on our vegetables and fruits. Well didn't we used to have. You're either here or here and now we have an awful lot of folks are trying to find out what they might do in the middle in fact we've mentioned that this big conference the USDA was was by the Audubon Society the fertilizes society the chemicals society and Modell's society for example.

So there's a quite there's quite a change. I'm wondering Larry where do you find out about living mulch systems. Or maybe returning if you have anything to add living mulch systems. Well we've got winter cover crops. You can plan a winter cover crop of Harry birch and plant into that cover crop and and kill it when you plant. So with living until you plant into it if it's living and you're trying to grow a crop in it you run a danger of competition there. Do many of you raise the Rye and for a winter Walcha or not. Yes it's something that I've I've done here in the last two years but last year I experimented with some aerial seeded Harry Vetch and oats into soybeans headed airily seeded with an airplane at the yellow leaf stage and then planted directly that in the spring this past year. But as as with the drought had its toll it certainly had its toll on the germination of that cover crop for

this next year. I have established a different type of cover crop system where I took in oats field in which I harvested the oats harvested the straw and then I worked the ground down and have established a ridges in which I planted hairy vets rye and oats combination which I will plant into then this spring when I was farming I like to seed right in the fall gives you cover and mulch and I think it adds to the soil. The question maybe Larry to you. What is startler what is. I'm sorry Larry. Black what is probiotics and work and you get it instead of antibiotics they say probiotic probiotics. You want to answer. Let's see if our scientist has an idea you can buy them from a number of sources. Probiotics. Well it's kind of a play on the word antibiotic. Probiotic is where you're usually feeding a mixture of beneficial bacteria and fungi. And it's just like eating your lack of bacillus in your

yogurt. It's supposed to do good things for your insides and there is some research data that shows that actually with your hogs some of these bacteria colonized parts of the gut and protect the gut increase motility and to help prevent scars and some other things like that. In your case I hear you Rick. Sorry. I believe pioneer sells some probiotics. There are a number of manufacturers and staying with you. Rick what's the difference in nitrogen phosphate and potash manure and organic sources compared to commercial fertilizer. They say what's the difference. Well you're going to get a slower release and an organic source and that can be good. Sometimes you need to release in a hurry and then maybe that's not so good. Now for example we often put anywhere from 100 to 200 pounds of nitrogen on our right on the can right on the conventional. What do you have in manure is that what 6:7 present nitrogen or what per ton. Something like that. So you'd have put on quite a few time to get much

nitrogen. Well farmers know about how much they have to put on to get how much and you figure 50 percent of the total amount in that manure is going to be available the first year just as a rule of thumb. Larry black How do you account for that. You put on a ton per acre you got about seven pounds of nitrogen versus 150 let's say. Well I guess there's two things to look at it. What kind of yield do I anticipate. What do I want to shoot for a goal on crop yield. And the other is I don't believe that I need the amount of nitrogen that I've been taught and I need it seems like to me that a corn plant only take up so much nitrogen when growing year. And we've been trying our best just to use a crop rotation of the alfalfa plowed down and then we do use cattle manure on that worked in. And we've still been getting sufficient hundred bushels drank corn yields are better. And as far as base and how much nitrogen was there it was fixed. I can't tell you because with how much rain and sunlight we have there's a lot of factors involved.

Denise changing the subject back to the US viewers interested in starting an organic orchard on a part time basis. And they wonder how many acres you would suggest as a minimum so that you can make some profit at it but they still want it to be I believe part time and part time part time. We we planted 800 trees and six acres. And that's pretty hefty to take care of with all our other farming that we do and that's to make a profit. I think Iowa State says you have to have about 10 acres. I'm not real sure of the amounts that they they give. There's various. You can plant density of trees with the size of trees with the various size of dwarf trees. So it differs you could you could plant many more than 800 acre or eight eight hundred apple trees per six acres. Now you say that's what I would you and I would suggest asking about an area extension person or Iowa state there's a good horticultural department at Iowa State.

You're talking about five acres might be enough for part time and you learn a little more and then you can add on more of it. Again you have to think about the how long term that takes to get that started and we might want to you know do some planning a few One year a few next year and that so you'll eventually have a full orchard. Larry startler from Kirkwood What are the chances of combining the Conservation Reserve the 10 year program with raising hardwood trees. Very good chance and I might add there are many other crops too and that's my line of thinking we need to. Really get up on the plants which are approved and the things which really have been encouraged to be done on the long term set aside in the 10 year program. There's really been some very interesting things and the results seem to be excellent in terms of soil erosion reducing soil erosion as far as wildlife and the attitude of those who live in town as well as those who live next door. We have assumed that the 10 year program has just the objective of taking

land out of production and it does. But what we need to also think about it as a potential cash income and using the time to get the crops established. OK. Pardon me Rick Exner from Iowa State University social scientist. I bet you have been asked this question for a while. Why don't you experiment more with a more board plow. Well that's all. One word Plow's. Real good if you need to get rid of the alfalfa stand. It's good if you want to bury some weed seeds there on the surface but. It's not so good for some other kinds of weeds. It's not so good for soil erosion and it takes quite a lot of gasoline to pull the mould board plus the soil. So there's some good reasons to explore some other alternatives right now. Larry black I'll turn to you this viewer says the show said there were no natural insecticides. Well we didn't intend to say that. There are a lot of ways to control insects. It was with what's called natural they mentioned pyrethrum for example do you want to mention some others are.

I I really haven't used anything. I'll tell you on my operation should I. You know it was just like last year my neighbors are really sprayed for spider mites but I didn't seem to have the problem and I think it goes back to the tilt of the soil how much useless and how much life is in the soil. It's just like when it rains. If we have a hard rain does it go down or run off and I think it depends on what the characteristics of your soil is. Mark you want to add anything to that that you think you have less trouble with disease and insects or not. Or can you measure that. Well I think it all comes back to the basics. Chet most most farmers have been locked into their corn and soybean rotation where they become solely dependent on on other other sources of control. For a person to make a transition out of that you have to go to the basics of a rotation. There's many different types of rotations. The 85 farm bill implications are going to make some of these things mandatory for people. I think it's something we need to look at. Like I mentioned earlier I think oats is a crop that we need to

be plenty more of in Iowa. There's there's many ways a person can do things very easily without costing you the farm. Denise they want to challenge you a little bit. Beautiful idea about Alfalfa But when you can't sell it and Uncle Sam won't help what do you do. Well I don't know as a dairy farm raised alfalfa year Sharon had experienced the drought we've been hunting for a lot of alfalfa and I know that there's been a real market for of course given a disastrous year you're going to find that sort of thing. The challenge is is to go out there and and contact those Wisconsin farmers those Idaho farmers or those California farmers where they don't raise that. Hay on their own on their own and and tell them you can give them a high protein alfalfa and then raise a good crop. There's definitely have to have that. That good crop in order to sell it. Larry Stadler is there a handbook that lists the various chemicals and their side effects. In

other words a consolidated case of information so I don't have to look up every chemical. Herve I'm afraid. Maybe not. You don't have to have one. We don't have one and we get accused of not having that. There are as Denise has pointed out earlier there is good information that from Iowa State University on the effects of the chemicals but I'm afraid this is getting on over into the combination of the integrated use of natural methods and the chemical methods. Mark Mei's you what would you say what you're making as far as the living and earning in dollars because they want to know. We've talked about a lot of things but how do you come out as far as actually making money. The past two years have been extremely difficult. There's there's no getting around it myself. I I've gone through a transition period here in the last three years of changing my entire tillage system which obviously comes down to quite a large capital outlay at this point to my

financial situation is one in which my bills are paid. I keep up with them very earnestly as far as dollars and cents. Let's say I'm doing OK. You want Larry you or the other farmer here. Do you want to reveal some of your profit side. Well I didn't take a trip to Florida this winter I guess at least when I went to the bank paid off all my notes I had some money left over. And that always makes me feel good. And I guess it depends on the individual. You know we could get $10 a bushel for corn some soup. People still complain. So I guess it's up to each individual farmer operation what their needs are. Larry startler they're asking about frontier herbs again. How do you get in touch on it. Call of Norway Iowa and they're very helpful. Norway Norway Iowa. OK you well you all seem to know about it. And is this something that that is just an interest factor like using it for yourself and given the forgive. Or is this a real profit picture.

For. Obviously a limited part time within again within the Arab oil industry. You've got the the medicinals you've got the human food you've got the potpourri you've got the wild Crafton you've got the whole situation and it's very exciting and Frontier are going to come more from the actual edible edible herbs and where a lot of their market is their national distributor and that's when you're contacting these people. They're right in the midst of that herb Herb district distribution in the United States. Now this is not something where you're going to get into it and then find out that there's no market. Well again you have to explore those Marines you have to know and they'll give you answers about what they need. You know what. What kind they distributed that you think they're dependable have been in for a long time. Yes. OK. OK Rick. It is chicken and hog manure usable as fertilizer instead of fertilizer I mean I'd say usable as fertilizer but then whichever way is it usable. Oh. It's great. I'd take chicken manure over anhydrous any day.

Because in addition to having quite a lot of nitrogen I think chicken manure is up around 12 percent or something like that. You've got to think about the other things that you're doing you're feeding your soil by putting some of that carbon in there and giving the bacteria something to eat and the worms. And getting a lot of good things going in your Silversides just supplying the nutrients they ask you to explain green manure. Well I'd be like. Alfalfa or. Kind of Legume or or oat cover crop that you would plow down. It's like it's like manure only it's green you're you're amending your soil with that green stuff. So it's accumulated some nutrients sometimes it's taken some nutrients out of the air and then you're putting them back into the soil giving it tilt anyway and as well. Larry Stadler in case they didn't hear it earlier what about shrimp and catfish farming in Iowa. I assume that they're looking at the Poly culture of doing both simultaneously and in Iowa. That's not really permissible at this point. Now talking about the future in

my mind there is no question that what we're going to see these technologies come in both shrimp and catfish is shrimp too much for Southern. Can we compete with the Southern boys on shrimp. Well remember we believe greatly in the the indoor intensive closed loop systems where you can do do these production systems right through the winter or whatever and we think that's important to be able to do it 12 months of the year. Larry do you have an opinion on it. You've seen some others doing it. I haven't seen a bay in my area doing it but I see the potential there. But grain Amaranth does grain Amaranthe have a future in Iowa. Amaranthe. I think it's something that we should study. Look at a lot more from state of. We know we can and there's been a lot of research done here and it can be raised here. The biggest question I have about Amaranthe myself is is it is a high risk crop fires harvest ability in the fall. Because to find seed is it don't take much wind to put it on the ground and any time you raise any type of a especially crop you want to make sure you know the whole

characteristic of it. When you planet now you harvest it and before you even anticipate playing it because you need to know the market demand of it as well as if there's any risk involved and most things do have some sort of risk. Small If you're going to expire. All right. Thank you. Denise our southwest Iowa farmer is that correct. You call it South West dairy farmer and specialty. And they say where is the best place to plant a strawberry patch. Where it gets good too. And this goes with apples any of these these early fruit. It these are early blossoming things it's good not to have a southern exposure. Our field that we have is is north and it's on it. It's on a high high ridge and it's nice flat area and it's got a good Northern Exposure so that it's it's not there's not a lot of sun in the early spring to bring on blossoms early. What about the soil type of

soil. We find we have a Marshall Marshall soil and what ours are and I know that strawberries do very well in the sand and only type of soil that we've found that they do very well and I think again it has to do with the health of the soil and we we cultivate with the rotovator and between the rows of our our strawberries and we have a nice spongy type of soil that they grow in. Rick. How would you compare dry fertilizer with liquid starter. Bike cost. Mostly I'd look at the cost because. From what we've seen we really haven't seen any difference in Krop performance. Ok to Denise how many acres do you have in asparagus. We don't have. I'd say at the most we have I'd say a quarter of an acre when we just we'd like to expand on that because it's a good crop and it's there's a good demand for it. Can you handle a half an acre or. Oh I wouldn't mind having I think an acre

would be all right. I think we're close enough in southwest Iowa that we could market if we if we went out and explore the markets in Omaha and I think even into Des Moines and who picks them. Mostly we do. I do. Is that right. Yeah. And my husband dies. And and and the asparagus especially since it is so small that the other crops were covered before the strawberries and raspberries we hire. Neighbor kids to do that. Another question for you Denise. Do you analyze the nutrients in the manure before you use it. Well that's kind of my husband's department and we we mostly we keep soil testing and we don't and we've not really analyzed the manure but we do soil testing on our all over on our farm. Do you compost a manure before you use it. Now we've been working up to doing that and it's pretty labor intensive. It's enough to try to get them in or out of the way where it's not supposed to be. And so we do make piles of it we try it we make attempts to turn it but it's a very intensive system that takes a lot of time and we're trying to work into that.

Were you the one that said you had drip irrigation. Yes. Would you tell us more about it. The listener wants to know. OK. We have. I don't know the details like says pomp or anything like that but we have a deep well on our farm that's 160 feet deep and we have a sister that. Well dumps into and then we have a pump that pumps out of that we have an underground pipe system that goes out north to our to our strawberries and raspberries. How many eggs are you talking about. You know we can cover two acres and add a watering and say it. And you know I don't know all the details about it but we can arrogated this summer we irrigate it twice a day and we'd we'd alternate acres at that time once in the morning once at night. LARRY Styler We're back. You're a fish specialist I guess. I'll take that. OK this person says they've seen fish in ponds in South America and they wonder about southern Iowa. Will it work there to get a fish crop in farm ponds. What's the

future. They asked. If you're going to talk pond farming and an annual crop. You're going to need to select your species really well they get a four to five ounce fillet coming out of that. And so I would say it definitely does work. I would not plan to do it with catfish as they do as they may be thinking I would look at some of the species that are going to have a growth rate tolerate a wider temperature water variety and. And get into an annual harvest status. The question happens to be the same one on catfish so we'll move on. Larry black What are the chances of certification of organic meat. And I think we sort of covered that but you think is it coming this year or. Well the the term organic will be used for the same certified organic. Yes and that's another thing. And right now the USDA doesn't want to have anything to have seen certified organic from the last report that was out. As far as using the word organic in has state on our meats. I think we'll see that in effect in July of 89. Well I'll tell you in our audience we have folks that know a lot about a lot of things. Here's a fellow who knows something about the wing

being in Africa. Do you Larry I've never had anything to do with it. Well he says he's available to grow in the states so you don't know anybody else. So I'm sorry Rick. You know in the garden we go to the wing bean. They they take a very long season. So you're lucky if you get lucky to get much of a crop unless they've developed shorter season varieties. You'd think it might be for more for Tennessee. A quick one for Dinda for the raspberry lady and that is the or heritage brand are they black or white. They want to know their BlackBerry. OK and now you did. Excuse me. There are red raspberry people like the black raspberries and they're always asking for red black raspberries black raspberries or very virus prone and they're very they're more difficult they're not very difficult but they're more difficult to grow. The red raspberry is easier again that fits in with our management system of our farm. And I don't know these are wonderful raspberries but you do have to educate your

pickers that they come in the fall instead of early in the season we felt like that added into our. It went right along with our orchard. We would have people out there picking raspberries as they were out there coming out to pick pick apples. To our soil scientist from Iowa State. What kind of green manure grows best and how high would you let it grow for you plowed under. Well you know you can get a grass to grow. You know you can plant right and get that stuff to grow. Reille grow wonderfully but it can get away from you too. So you either need to plant it at a light enough rate that you can handle it somehow. Plan how you're going to deal with it and make sure that you deal with it before it gets taller than about a foot because it's going to start getting Woody and when it does that. It'll tie up nitrogen after you plowed in. Of course you can grow a variety of legumes to Harry which is something that practical farmers has is working with Larry black could a person add value if you had organic popcorn to sell or by cleaning and bagging it

yourself or maybe even soybeans. Yes. The more labor intensive are the more profit there is. There is a bigger demand growing in the state of Iowa for getting pumped corn than ever before. And also with the delight on soybeans I mentioned Venton soybeans quite a bit but there's other varieties like only 79 and pride soybeans. Anything a slight Hylan there's a good market for you know when you see a market but you've got to you've got to take them in somewhere you can take to the elevator. Normally you there's about three options you are going to take them home cleaned and bagged and you're going to sell them in that way or you're going to take them and deliver them to a wholesaler or they're going to come pick them up direct off the farm owners are getting to be more people doing it from different states willing to come to the farm and pick up off the farm. Well it's interesting because I'll bet when you go home the folks who see you on Main Street they'll call you the raspberry lady because we have another one for that. What what kind of dollars can you get from beekeeping. Are you up on keeping again. We have so much on our farm to

take care of that we've not incorporated peas on the farm only through our neighbor who has kept beehives there. We have hives in the neighborhood and we figure where we we're benefiting from those those bees that are and there's a number of hives so we're not doing that ourselves so I know we have a very active beekeepers in Iowa. I believe there is a little surplus problem isn't there. Pardon. I'm a beekeeper. Are you what are you wanted. Answer Yes on that one. Just in a rough way. I think you could figure on maybe an $80 gross per hive and then you have to think about keeping your equipment out of that. And how much time you put into it to get louder. You need a good location but you also need a location close enough to home that you don't spend all day getting out there to a lot of farmers who would be in a good position to have a good location right where they live or someone who lives in town that wants to have a little sideline business. Right. But I am right on I that there is a surplus production of money right now. Is that true. This last year was a Brong per year for honey because of the drought.

Why is that. Well that's because the bees brought in nectar and it was practically honey when they brought it in. They didn't have to spend a lot of energy bringing it down. Thank you. We did learn more Larry Statler. What about low cost irrigation concepts would you elaborate on that with about a minute. And you talk low cost to me. You may be talking to black plastic pipe with the put together with with plastic fittings with holes drilled in it with an 8 inch bit. Now that's low cost and I have seen that function you can go all the way from that to say that's high labor Well what do you want to market. You know do you want to save costs. Would you want to raise your costs. Denise is of course talking to the drip irrigation is one of the most efficient known and that's why she's getting the getting the quantity of water she needs out of her farm well. And to me that's a low cost situation opposed to putting down a 60 80 100 dollar a foot. Well you know for. Supply can you answer this one. What about crop insurance for alternative crops.

I have really gotten upset about this whole subject of insurance. To be honest with you anyway I don't know if we have time but any. It's been kicked around a lot. And you can buy insurance some of the contract growers it may be high it may be low but I just say go looking for your insurance competitively purchase it and. And and get it. And the federal co-op programs now do allow that federal crop insurance. It's all inclusive basically. Let me ask you this question came in is there a use for a Belgian end. Is this a possibility. I'll pass on that one. Is that Larry. You know of anybody that's making a profit on it. I don't right now. OK. That's been kicked around a lot you realize this right now. See this one says there is an apple greater and polish you're in are the gold mine orchard of Guthrie Center and the face orchards of Fort Madison.

Excuse me. OK. But I think on a commercial scale I mean these are small commercial orchards and I think they're larger you know competitive market. Here's one we haven't touched on is there a market for rabbits. Low cholesterol and so on. Larry we've had a real problem in the last two weeks because one of the major buyers in eastern Iowa has gone out of the market. We're encouraged about the the market for rabbit. And you stated why the quality of the meat the efficiency and the fact that rabbit meat is all around Caple been used a lot of ways in the nutrition the institutional markets. I'm afraid it's like a lot of the special new meats it's going to take us a year or two to get some more acceptance in the marketplace. We're high on it. What about garlic. Interesting. One of the first deliveries that I prepared was on the merits of garlic and now we're seeing it come back in as a health food and the condition of the heart. And I guess I for one happen to believe it. It makes a lot of sense to me. Again you're going to look at some of the better markets being right now and some of the Eastern States.

All right fine. Thank you very much. We won't have any big wrap up here we'll just say thank you to our panel. And that too we've had Larry Stadler Mark Maise Larry black Denise O'BRIEN And Rick Exner. And we appreciate that you've been on with us here. For Iowa Public Television. I'm Chet Randolph thanks for joining us. Have a good week. Do. You. Do. You. Do.

You. Do. Major funding for this program was provided by friends of Iowa Public Television