Growing the Future

Dan opens with a thin patch in a field and the question of what the roots would say before more fertilizer goes on. Darren explains why he sees compaction in nearly every field he walks, and how his team checks with a shovel in late June. Kevin explains what happens below ground when pore space is lost, and how microbes, fungi and roots affect soil structure.Wayne walks through a soybean example. He reads a soil test and then a tissue test from compacted and less-compacted areas of the same field, and shows why leaf appearance and a single soil value can mislead. The audience asks about tillage, cover crops, crop choice, potatoes and how fast any response should show up. The panel is clear that its research is early.Key Topics• The shovel check: comparing a problem patch with a better area• How compaction limits roots, oxygen and water infiltration• Soil biology, aggregates and mycorrhizal fungi• Reading a soil test and a tissue test together• No-till, cover crops and living rootsResources Mentioned• A&L Canada Labs Vitalis soil health testing Connect With Crop Aid:Cropaidnutrition.comConnect with Growing the FutureWebsite: growingthefuture.caYouTube: Growing the FutureInstagram: @growingthefuturepodcastLinkedIn: Growing the FutureSubscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag. Register for the Convergence Conference at convergence.ag and stay updated by subscribing to the Growing the Future Podcast at growingthefuturepodcast.ca.

Joe wanted his farm’s information out of his head and in one place, and eventually something he could hand to the next generation. Since this summer he has built it by talking to Claude Code, with no coding. Dan shares Joe’s portal on screen, so listeners on audio only will miss some of the visuals.The portal reads load check-ins from grain company portals and takes each load out of inventory. It also tracks budget against actuals, contract deliveries, equipment service and a daily crew report. Joe set it up so a son or a crew member sees only the pages they have been given.The second half covers the hard parts. The process that runs without a babysitter took the most training, and Joe went from eleven agents down to one main agent. A viewer asks who reviews AI-built code for security, and Joe says it has only been checked through the AI, so Dan points to the “doomsday file” idea and a security routine for the next cohort.Key Topics• Building a farm portal by talking to Claude Code, with no coding• Real-time grain inventory, budget against actuals, and contract tracking• Access by person, and a daily report that replaces chasing the crew• Why one main agent replaced eleven, and why automation drifts• Security and review of AI-built systemsResources Mentioned• Claude Code• John Deere Operations Center (the one connection Joe built through an API)Connect with Growing the FutureWebsite: growingthefuture.caYouTube: Growing the FutureInstagram: @growingthefuturepodcastLinkedIn: Growing the FutureSubscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag. Register for the Convergence Conference at convergence.ag and stay updated by subscribing to the Growing the Future Podcast at growingthefuturepodcast.ca.

Nitrogen is one of the biggest checks on the farm, and most of the air over the field is nitrogen the crop cannot use. Dan opens with Fritz Haber, Carl Bosch and Thomas Hager’s The Alchemy of Air, then asks the practical question. What would it take to make some of your own nitrogen where you use it?Chris explains how the system works. Cold plasma breaks the bond in air nitrogen, and the nitrogen is captured in water as nitrate. The product tests under 1 percent nitrate, so it is sold on an equivalent ratio and used to fill the gap in a fertility program. Chris is open about what the company has learned. Water quality decides results, uniform foliar coverage beats banding, and spoon-feeding across several passes works better than one.The cost stack and the daily work follow, and the conversation closes on who this suits and who should wait. The audience Q&A covers tank mixing, tissue tests, freezing, storage and 2027 capacity.Key Topics• How plasma-activated water turns air, water and electricity into plant-available nitrate• Why water quality (TDS, chlorine, metals) decides both results and machine life• Reading an equivalent ratio against a lab analysis of under 1 percent• Replacing part of the nitrogen program, spoon-feeding, and in-furrow support• Upfront cost, daily maintenance and who the system fitsResources Mentioned• The Alchemy of Air by Thomas Hager• Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch• Olds College trial work on the productConnect• Nytro AgConnect with Growing the FutureWebsite: growingthefuture.caYouTube: Growing the FutureInstagram: @growingthefuturepodcastLinkedIn: Growing the FutureSubscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag. Register for the Convergence Conference at convergence.ag and stay updated by subscribing to the Growing the Future Podcast at growingthefuturepodcast.ca.

You paid for the nitrogen and put it down the tube on the drill. How much of it did the crop actually use? And if you cannot say, what is next year’s rate based on?Greg Patterson of A&L Laboratories Canada has spent 35 years building nitrogen models for variable rate, starting in the mid-1990s with corn, tobacco and potatoes. In this first live session of Engine of the Soil Season 2, he shows how those models changed, from a heavy calculation to simpler indexes, and why the rate depends on more than a nitrate test. Trevor Thornton, who uses the models with growers in Manitoba, adds what he sees at the farm gate in a year when budgets are tight. Melissa Werkema joins for a frank exchange on boron, balance and what agronomists owe the people they advise.What’s Inside• Why Greg says a good year gets only about 45 to 50 percent of applied nitrogen into the crop, and about 15 percent of potassium• How potassium sets up nitrogen use, including his rule of thumb of about three pounds of potassium for each pound of nitrogen early in the season• The potassium to magnesium ratio he aims for, about 0.25 to 0.35, and the 10 to 30 percent more nitrogen his models call for when it falls below 0.15• Why liming without revisiting the nitrogen rate can hurt crop quality, because nitrogen use efficiency rises with calcium base saturation• Nitrogen holding capacity: why a sandy soil may hold only about 70 pounds of ammonium nitrogen from one application, and when to split it• Why estimated nitrogen release and soil moisture often matter more than temperature, and what a 2.5 acre grid shows that a bulk nitrate sample hides• How Trevor’s clients spend variable rate dollars, in his experience: about half the time the same money placed differently, a fifth to a quarter of the time more, and a quarter to 30 percent of the time less• Cutting costs in a tight year: Greg’s advice to pull back on marginal acres first, and Trevor’s flags-in-the-field method for variable rate without a million-dollar machineRelated Episode:Your Soil Type Is Costing You Yield GTF Podcast: Where Does 46% of Your Nitrogen Actually Go? Connect with Growing the FutureWebsite: growingthefuture.caYouTube: Growing the FutureInstagram: @growingthefuturepodcastLinkedIn: Growing the FutureSubscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag. Register for the Convergence Conference at convergence.ag and stay updated by subscribing to the Growing the Future Podcast at growingthefuturepodcast.ca.

Fewer listings than last year. Bigger packages. The highest dollar value of farmland listed for sale in ten years. In April, Tim Hammond told the room the market was splitting, with good land still climbing and average land moving sideways. Six months later he is back with a different word for what he sees: not a weakening market so much as a maturing one, with supply and demand closer to balance than they have been in years.Tim, of Hammond Realty, has been in farmland for thirty years. In this live session with Dan Aberhart he takes the questions on people’s minds: what affordability does to the next decision, why access to capital came out on top when the room was polled, and how a transfer of around $50 billion in farmland, mostly inside families, actually gets done.What’s Inside• Why Tim calls this market maturing and not weakening, and what that looks like in practice: sideways, a little up, a little down• How listings can fall in number and still hit a ten-year high in dollar value, and why a September to August crop year is the fairer way to count• Why he takes technical analysis of land values seriously if it is read over a hundred years, and what a 20 percent pullback would mean for lenders in his view (he is not predicting one)• Land as an input or as an investment: how a producer buying to produce thinks differently from a buyer chasing an asset• Why a 5,000 acre package was easier to sell than a 500 acre one three years ago, and why that has reversed• What the room said in a live poll: more people looking to buy or transfer than to sell, and financing as the biggest obstacle• Why a succession plan is one thing and carrying it out is another, and the quarterback role an advisor can play• The Hammond Huddle: one meeting with the accountant, lawyer, lender, wealth advisor and insurance advisor, the dangers, opportunities and strengths exercise, and the risks no one had named, from digital passwords to an unfinished to-do list• When to list (off the combine), why auctions suit only some packages, and why pasture demand is risingDan opens on the numbers: fewer listings, bigger farm packages, and a ten-year high in the dollar value of farmland listed, close to double with the Monette Farms sale included. Tim explains how he counted by crop year and why this looks like a maturing market. He covers affordability, the technical analysis work he and Trent did on land values, and the difference between buying land as an input and as an asset.The room is polled twice: what people are trying to do (buy, sell, transfer) and what stands in the way. Financing comes out on top. Tim says that for families the hard part is carrying a plan out, and he describes the Hammond Huddle he held in September for his own family and advisors, with his kids in the room.The session closes with audience questions on irrigated and pasture land, which regions are active, when to list, and auctions.Key Topics• Maturing versus weakening markets• Affordability and access to capital• Land as an input versus an investment• Family transfer and the role of advisors• Timing a listing and choosing how to sellResources Mentioned• Trent Klarenbach’s technical analysis of farmland values and his newsletter (klarenbach.ca)• Strategic Coach: the dangers, opportunities and strengths exercise, and the three-years-from-now question• Farm Credit Canada’s farm equity analysis, cited by DanConnect with Growing the FutureWebsite: growingthefuture.caYouTube: Growing the FutureInstagram: @growingthefuturepodcastLinkedIn: Growing the FutureSubscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag. Register for the Convergence Conference at convergence.ag and stay updated by subscribing to the Growing the Future Podcast at growingthefuturepodcast.ca.