Growing Pulse Crops

Dr. Sabine Banniza is a professor of pulse crop pathology and a member of the Crop Development Centre (CDC) at the University of Saskatchewan. Her research program is focused on pulse crop pathology with particular emphasis on problems in Saskatchewan. The overarching theme of Dr. Banniza’s research program is to study the biology of fungal and bacterial pathogens and their interaction with host plants.In today’s episode, Dr. Banniza focuses on two important diseases in lentil: Anthracnose and Stemphylium blight. She is an expert on the pathogen biology and plant-pathogen interactions, and she gives us a lot of useful background on when they first started appearing in Canada, how problematic they are, and how to diagnose and manage each of these. “ Using all of the molecular tools we have now, we’re trying to get that resistance from the wild relative into our cultivated species, and then breed race zero resistance as well. Because I think that will help a lot, and it’s really needed in particular now that we see these issues with fungicide insensitivity .” - Sabine Banniza, Ph.D.This Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Sabine Banniza, Ph.D., professor of pulse crop pathology and a member of the Crop Development Centre (CDC) at the University of Saskatchewan.Explore two important diseases in lentil: Anthracnose and Stemphylium blight.Understand the pathogen biology and plant-pathogen interactions of these two lentil diseasesDiscover useful background on when these diseases first started appearing in Canada, how problematic they are, and how to diagnose and manage each of them. Growing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Kyle Okke is an independent crop consultant in Dickinson, North Dakota with his own company, Agile Agronomy. Before starting Agile Agronomy three years ago, he had worked for several years as a regional agronomist in the area with Winfield United. Kyle deals with a wide variety of crops in his area including pulse crops, specifically lentils, chickpeas and field peas. He also has farmer clients that grow durum, wheat, flax, canola, corn, soybeans and sunflowers. In this episode, he discusses the various details about products, timing, water rates, adjuvants, and other considerations for controlling broadleaf weeds.“ You get what you get as far as options for broadleaf control in pulse crops. So there's no perfect product in a broadleaf sense on a post emergent basis. So you're never always going to have excellent activity in everything. That's why there's so much emphasis on fall residuals and spring applied residuals, because that's going to do a lot of the heavy lifting for you that hopefully either you don't apply post-emerge products, or if you do, you keep the weeds small enough that you get the activity you need out of those post-emerge broad leaf products.” - Kyle OkkeThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Kyle Okke, an independent crop consultant in Dickinson, North Dakota with his own company, Agile AgronomyExplore the many considerations needed to be addressed to manage broadleaf weedsUnderstand the value of finding weeds early and selecting the correct surfactants for the type of weed you are targetingDiscover how certain chemicals can uniquely work together to enhance weed controlGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Dr. Kevin McPhee is a pulse crop breeder at Montana State University. He’s been there for just over eight years after building a similar program in pulse crop breeding at North Dakota State University. Prior to that, he was working on pulse crops with the USDA ARS based in Pullman, Washington. Together we discuss the pulse crop breeding program in Montana, including their goals for the program in pea, chickpea and lentils. He describes varieties they’ve released and what’s in the pipeline that growers might want to know about for the future. “  What really separates the winter peas from the spring peas and gives them the advantage is when we have a dry year and there isn't the in-season moisture rains for the spring crop. With the winter peas already in the ground…they don't have to worry about planting them in the spring. That's one big advantage. And then they can take advantage of all of the winter moisture that's in the soil and any of the spring rains that occur. They flower a month ahead of the spring types. So they're well on their way before we get into the heat of the summer and the potential dry conditions, and that's where they shine.” - Dr. Kevin McPheeThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Dr. Kevin McPhee, a pulse crop breeder at Montana State UniversityDiscover new pulse crop varieties that are being introduced and the benefits they offer producersExplore major advantages offered by winter peas that may benefit producers looking to be more water efficientGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Chris Holzapfel is the research manager at the Indian Head Agricultural Research Foundation (IHARF). IHARF is a producer-led not-for-profit organization based in Indian Head, Saskatchewan. Their mandate is to provide extension type work for agricultural research and demonstration, including a lot of work with pulse crops.  Holzapfel started in his role at IHARF in 2005 and over the years they've grown to now conducting 40 to 50 small plot trials as well as some field scale research on crops relevant to the area.He shares some of the research they’ve done with seeding rates, fertility and with supplementing phosphorus in particular. “ Phosphorus is, without a doubt, by a large margin, the most important nutrient to manage. That's the one that we've gotten the most consistent responses to in our work…You know with phosphorus you're almost fertilizing the soil as much as you are the plants.” - Chris HolzapfelThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Chris Holzapfel, the research manager at the Indian Head Agricultural Research Foundation (IHARF)Discover the soil and weather particulars of the Saskatchewan regionExplore the research being done to evaluate different seeding rates and their impact on competing with different weed populationsLearn about the potential benefits of a phosphorus supplement and how to evaluate its benefit on your operationRead more about IHARF at their websiteGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Dr. Brian Jenks is a weed scientist at North Dakota State University based in Minot. Jenks has been in this role since 1997 and over that time he has seen an alarming rise in resistance to many of our herbicides from certain weeds, especially in kochia. In this episode, Jenks shares about the latest in kochia management including what’s working and not working, which products have built up resistance and which products are still effective. We also talk about a few other key weeds like palmer amaranth, wild oat and green foxtail. “ And if there's anybody listening who's thinking about using Tough on lentil, please call me before you use it because there's some things that you need to know. I mean just reading the label, you're not going to have sufficient information because all they say on there is spray 6 to 20 ounces and oh, by the way, you can tank mix with Metribuzin. Well, that is a recipe for potential disaster if you do that. Because we need to talk rates, we need to talk timing, we need to talk adjuvants, and I'm encouraging growers to do this only as a last resort because you will see severe injury.” - Dr. Brian JenksThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Dr. Brian Jenks, a weed scientist at North Dakota State University based in Minot, NDDiscover the rising risk of herbicide resistance in weed management especially with the weed kochiaLearn the process to evaluate the type of kochia resistance producers may be facing and how to get that service for freeUnderstand the significance of a weed being on the noxious weed list and the impact that has on producersContact Dr. Brian Jenks with any of your weed biology or herbicide questions at (701) 857-7677Growing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

After a tough year in 2023, agronomist Jeannie Rude and Northeast Montana farmer Blake Rasmussen were part of a project to create a video about their experiences with Real Ag Radio’s Shaun Haney. That video documented the far reaching impacts root rot can have on farmers and the local community. Blake is a fifth generation farmer on an operation that has included lentils and chickpeas in their rotations for the past 25 years. He has also been an active member of the Northern Pulse Growers Association for the past five years. Jeannie Rude is an agronomist with Pro Coop also located in northeast Montana.  She returns to the podcast time with Blake to share their experiences with root rots. “ The root diseases impact the lentil crop and that has an impact on the grower, the health of their soils, and the health of their farm economics. We just got this awesome Columbia grain pulse facility completed in the last few years. So it affects everything from the soil health right down to Main Street in this community.” - Jeannie RudeThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Northeast Montana farmer Blake Rasmussen and hear again from Northeast Montana agronomist Jeannie RudeDiscover the impact Blake had while participating in the Gulf Food Show in DubaiExplore the longterm challenges root rots presents for producers and the lack of information regarding it for how to manage itLearn about the efforts being made to better identify the cause of these issues and what can be done to improve their managementWatch the video featuring Jeannie and Blake on the Real Agriculture YouTube channel coordinated by the Pulse Crops Working Group with funding from the North Central IPM Center. Growing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Dr. Ian Burke is a weed scientist at Washington State University. His work focuses on weed biology and ecology, and he does a lot of work with herbicides. Dr. Burke discusses his research evaluating herbicides for use in peas, lentils and chickpeas and how to manage herbicide carry over issues that can impact these crops. This is the deep dive into herbicide carry over that you might not have even realized you needed.“ We have not enough moisture during the summer to break down the herbicides and not enough heat units during the winter to break down the herbicides. So we really have sort of a perfect storm, a very unique situation, in the United States where herbicides applied in our important rotational crop like wheat persists for far longer than than anywhere else.”  - Ian Burke, Ph.D.This Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Ian Burke, Ph.D. and learn about cropping systems in his area of the Pacific NorthwestUnderstand herbicide carryover and the factors that causes herbicide persistence like the characteristics of the products themselves, environmental conditions, and soil propertiesDiscover how farmers can manage herbicide carryover while still maintaining the efficacy of their herbicide program. Growing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Paul Kanning is a farmer in Montana who grows mostly red lentils and yellow peas as well as wheat and canola. He also serves as the chairman of the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council. Lewi Crow is a Risk Management Specialist with the USDA Risk Management Agency that services Wyoming, Montana and the Dakotas. Lewi and Paul talk about the importance of RMA and crop insurance, but also the process behind developing crop insurance programs for pulse crops. “ As an individual farmer, I have to provide them data and the way I do that is by making transactions, right? And so selling pulses in the fall helps establish the harvest price for the fall. That's the only way that they can come up with the data is by farmers putting product out in the stream… That makes the whole wheel turn.” - Paul Kanning ”...some of the things that I do with that is reviewing plant dates, basically just kind of pulling apart crop programs and reviewing all aspects of it that goes on with rates and t-yields for individual counties, rotation requirements, various things that farmers tend to encounter when choosing crop insurance.”  - Lewi CrowThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Paul Kanning, a pulse crop farmer in Montana and the chairman of the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council, and Lewi Crow, a Risk Management Specialist with the USDA Risk Management Agency Understand what the RMA provides for producers and the insight they can offer when making production decisionsMake a note of these important dates:January 15th is when the harvest price is released Beginning of March is when projected prices for this 2025 crop year are releasedMarch 15th is the sales closing date for most of the spring seeded crops so Lewi recommends reviewing your crop insurance prior to that date Growing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Chuck Penner founded Leftfield Commodity Research in 2010. The company provides market analysis and economic research focused on the crops that are important to farmers in Western Canada and the northern parts of the US. Penner shares about the global marketplace for peas, chickpeas and lentils. This episode was recorded on January 10th, 2025.“ One of the things that I've been telling Canadian farmers… is to forget about being the only show in town anymore. Now you have Australia producing more red lentils than Canada does. You have Russia, you have Kazakhstan, and you have the US production going up there as well too…So you need to think globally about not just demand, but the supplies as well.” - Chuck PennerPenner shares about drivers both on the supply side and the demand side that are impacting the trajectory of these global and domestic markets. Through his many newsletters and research projects he aims to keep producers informed about the current state of industries they need to know about. He shares the potential impact on the pulse crop market of different tariffs and what that could mean for producers“ In some ways geopolitics is a factor that's always there, but this year it's kind of amped up a lot and not just in Canadian-US trade, but Canada and India and Canada and China and those types of things where you have potential for those sudden moves.”  - Chuck PennerThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Chuck Penner founder of Leftfield Commodity Research where they provide market analysis and economic research focused on the crops in Western Canada and the northern parts of the USExplore the potential impact of tariffs on the pulse crop markets and what producers need to knowDiscover the growing global pulse crop markets and the impact that can have on North American pricesGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Dr. Clain Jones is Montana State University Extension’s soil fertility specialist. In this role he covers anything that has to do with fertilizer or nutrient cycling in both agriculture as well as home/garden systems. He started at MSU as a tenure track faculty member in 2006, and has ended up doing quite a bit of work with pulse crops over the years. He joins me today to talk about fertility in pulses, the importance of inoculation, nitrogen credits, soil pH, and the overall importance of pulse crops to soil health.“Adding five pounds of sulfur per acre to lentils, what we found at least here in Bozeman, was that nitrogen fixation increased at a much faster rate than yield did. What that told us was that by applying sulfur, maybe we're not going to see a huge yield response, but we're going to contribute a lot more nitrogen both to that crop and to the next crop.” - Dr. Clain JonesDr. Jones stresses the importance of plant nutrition and pH when it comes to optimizing a pulse crop's ability to fix nitrogen. Limestone deposits in the soil can make pH values highly variable even within a field. This can make accurate soil testing a challenge. An acidic pH has a significant impact on rhizobia viability as they don’t tolerate low pH values very well. Along with pH, many micronutrients such as sulfur, potassium and phosphorus also need to be considered when assessing overall soil health and nitrogen fixation efficiency.“We have low phosphorus because our high levels of calcium tie up that phosphorus making it less available to crops. Knowing that phosphorus is essential for nitrogen fixation, my gut feel is that phosphorus is probably the nutrient most limiting nitrogen fixation and probably pulse crop growth in our two state region.”  - Dr. Clain JonesThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Dr. Clain Jones, the Montana State University Extension’s soil fertility specialistDiscover the impact of pH and micronutrients on a pulse crop’s ability to fix nitrogenExplore the recommended testing and values of soil nutrition to allow for optimal nitrogen fixationGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Kim Sauressig is a fourth generation farmer in Central North Dakota where he grows a wide range of crops including corn, wheat, durum, barley, soybeans, lentils, chickpeas and pinto beans. He also raised cattle until a few years ago when they decided to focus exclusively on crops. When not farming, Kim chairs the North Dakota Dry Pea & Lentil Council and has a seat on the USA Dry Pea & Lentil Council where he serves as the chair of the research committee. Kim shares his journey into pulse crops, what roles they play in his overall rotations, the value of associations like the USA Dry Pea & Lentil Council, and why he believes more farmers should consider including pulse crops in their crop rotations. “So we started seeding pintos and we were putting a little bit of “N” down. My agronomist called me and he got our soil test back from the laboratory and he is like, just drop your fertilizer. He said, “You don't have to put anything down.” And I truthfully, honestly think that that's because the lentils from the two years previous had fixated it in there. We didn't need it anymore.” - Kim SauressigKim highlights the many benefits of pulse crops that he has experienced including their nitrogen fixation capabilities and their efficiency with water use. Through his work on the North Dakota Dry Pea and Lentil Council and the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council he has expanded his personal network to include many agronomists and research scientists that have really helped him not only fine tune his operation but also support future pulse crop growers. He goes on to share the many advantages the councils offers producers by way of research and financial support.“Your revenue protections and your crop insurances and stuff, that's kind of directly put together by the US Dry Pea and Lentil Council….They were a dog in the fight that helped get dollars to come back into the specialty crop side of things. I mean we're talking millions and millions of dollars that went back to producers that were growing pulse crops that were very, very beneficial.”  - Kim SauressigThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Kim Sauressig, a fourth generation farmer in Central North Dakota, chair of the North Dakota Dry Pea & Lentil Council and chair of the research committee on the USA Dry Pea & Lentil CouncilDiscover Kim’s experiences with pulse crops and the insights he has gained from participating in both the North Dakota Dry Pea and Lentil Council and the USA Dry Pea and Lentil CouncilGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

At the time of this interview, Steve Sebesta was the director of the Foundation Seed Program at North Dakota State University and the Deputy Commissioner of the North Dakota State Seed Department. Steve has since retired from these positions, so we were very lucky to capture his years of experience and expertise in this area before his retirement. In this episode, Steve discusses the critical role of the foundation seedstocks program, how the plant variety protection act works and why seed needs to be certified.“North Dakota is a little unique compared to most other states in that we have a county seed increase program. So when a new variety is released and we have foundation seed available, the counties decide whether or not they want to produce seed in their county of that new variety. And if they do, then their county grower, who is typically an experienced grower, will produce seed essentially for the county. It's not his seed. He doesn't have ownership of it. It's for the county seed grower. So it's a really good way to increase the amount of seed available of a brand new variety very quickly.” - Steve SebestaGermination success, variety identification and weed presence contribute to the certification of seed that allows for the label required for selling seed in North Dakota. North Dakota has the largest seed certification agency in the country, with between 250,000 and 300,000 acres of seed production every year. Of that, field peas is their third largest crop, with over 21,000 acres in 2023. “A lot of the public varieties were funded by government programs, federal government programs. And so they needed a way to try to incentivize investment in research and development and production of new varieties. So they implemented the Plant Variety Protection Act which gives the variety owner the exclusive authority to determine who can and cannot produce seed of their product and market that seed. So there are a lot of infringements that are possible on a PVP variety that people need to be aware of.”  - Steve SebestaThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Steve Sebesta who recently retired as the director of the Foundation Seed Program at North Dakota State University and the Deputy Commissioner of the North Dakota State Seed DepartmentDiscover the function, purpose and process of the Foundation Seed Program as well as the requirements that must be met for seed to be labeled as certifiedGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Nicole Atchison is the CEO of PURIS Holdings, a vertically-integrated plant-based food company that operates from field to fork in primarily yellow peas. Nicole leads the agriculture side of the business, including contracting with growers, seed development and breeding, and innovation in product development. Her brother Tyler leads the ingredient side of the business. PURIS operates throughout the entire supply chain from developing genetics to developing new markets. “So if you're making a high protein cereal, you need a different pea protein than if you're making a plant-based beverage, which is still using a pea protein. But those two pea proteins are slightly different. And that's really the innovation that we do on our processing side, is we create these different proteins with different functionalities so that they can work in these different applications.”  - Nicole AtchisonAtchison describes the wet protein processing they are using that provides a unique protein stream with a lot of potential for furthering plant-based protein production. She sees potential for pulse proteins in providing protein sources for both consumer beverages and medical nutrition. As they ramp up production, PURIS Holdings is also active in ongoing efforts to regulate the impact of foreign pulse crop processing and imports affecting both global and domestic markets.“I'm a huge advocate for pulse based ingredients because I do think that as much as we want and encourage people to have and eat whole pulses, that's not where the American consumer is today. We like convenient foods, packaged and processed. That's where our market is. And so we need to be able to drive these crops into those channels as well and that's why processing is so critical to the market.” - Nicole AtchisonThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Nicole Atchison is the CEO of PURIS HoldingsDiscover the journey PURIS Holdings has taken to develop plant-based proteins and their initial introduction to pulse cropsExplore the global ingredient market for pulses and the operations of processing pulse cropsGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Dr. Eric von Wettberg is a professor at the University of Vermont and the director of the Vermont Agriculture Experiment Station. His research program focuses on understanding crop domestication as a means to harness the diversity of crop wild relatives to breed crops with improved climate resilience and stress tolerance. In this episode we discuss Von Wettberg’s work in pulses, his adventures in germplasm collection, the challenges and opportunities of maintaining genetic diversity, and the importance of protecting crop wild relatives. “We're never fully done with collecting germplasm because there might be more out there and those plants are in a natural habitat. That habitat is not static, so they may be changing over time. There's diseases in some natural populations and disease resistance can actually evolve. So we need to be collecting germplasm continually, and we should even have preserves or parks that hold crop wild relatives. To let them evolve so that we can let evolution generate more resistant varieties for us.”  - Dr. Eric von WettbergVon Wettberg shares his concern with the loss of genetic variation in crops, particularly pulses, as a result of human cultivation and selection. A lack of genetic variation reduces resilience of these crops to expected effects of climate change such as drought and disease. In his research group, they are using a new collection of the wild relatives of chickpea to restore genetic variation to cultivated chickpea, and to better understand the genetic basis of flowering time and drought tolerance. “Any mutation, whether it's a new mutation or an old mutation, is helpful. But by collecting, we're more likely to find the old mutations… By looking in wild populations, there's just been more time for those mutations to occur, which makes them a helpful place to look.” - Dr. Eric von WettbergThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Dr. Eric von Wettberg is a professor at the University of Vermont and the director of the Vermont Agriculture Experiment StationExplore the impact the loss of genetic variation can have on crop varieties and what is being done to mitigate that riskGrowing Pulse Crops is produced by Dr. Audrey Kalil and hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast. 

Charlie Cahill developed his knowledge of dryland farming during the 1990s, ultimately becoming what one nominator called “the go-to guy” for information on agronomic practices and seed genetics in the region. A graduate of Montana State University, Cahill has served on the board of the Montana Seed Growers Association and helped create the pulse checkoff program in Montana, which allows growers a voice in how their contributions are invested around the state.“Farmers traditionally have been used to being able to keep and trade their own seed amongst other growers, and this has been going on (for) an exceptional amount of time. Well, if you don't have money to actually go into the breeding programs, you don't get new stuff. And if you look at all of the crops that have money in them: corn, canola, soybeans. We spend a lot of money for the seed, but at the same time, you'll notice we also get really neat stuff.” - Charlie CahillCahill joins the show to talk about the current state of the seed industry in Montana, some inside information on the seed business and what’s driving seed choices, and trying to bring together market demand and producer needs into a valuable and profitable seed technology. “The demand right now is far outstripping the supply on (lentil) seed.  We are probably one of the largest sellers of lentil seed in the United States and we're sold out at the moment, and our production was okay. So that gives you an idea.” - Charlie CahillThis Week on Growing Pulse Crops:Meet Charlie Cahill of Cahill Seeds, and learn about the history of pulse seed production in MontanaLearn about some of the drivers of pulse crop seed developmentHear more about what buyers of pulses are looking for in genetics in the futureDiscover what it’s like be an independent seed producerGrowing Pulse Crops Podcast is hosted by Tim Hammerich of the Future of Agriculture Podcast.