September/October 2024 - 17

SUSTAINABILITY
Boosting efficiencies
With lower returns and higher
operating and input costs,
grower efficiencies become even
more important. If products
possessing less variability
increase soil efficiency and can
reduce the number of times
growers must go across fields,
regenerative practices can make
a big difference to grower's
bottom lines, Graybill said.
Regenerative practices also
help improve the quality of
crops to where if they store
longer, the crops can be sold
into other or better markets that
pay premiums, said Graybill, a
certified crop advisor (CCA) and
agricultural pest control adviser
(PCA) who works on crop fertility
products including organic,
biological and conventional.
" It starts with the soil, "
Graybill said. " As we
regenerate and build that up
from a biological and mineral
standpoint, there are fewer
inputs that have to go down the
road upfront. "
Because soil that has been beaten up for so many years
Growers are increasingly looking at new ways,
including regenerative agriculture, to solve
agronomic problems.
must be repaired, adopting regenerative practices may not
initially reduce the need for a necessary product and may
not always be accomplished for little cost, he said.
As growers learn and understand more, they realize
some of the early agronomic practices they thought
were good aren't, requiring them to take a step back and
consider how they can change things.
New tools
New testing methods, including tap analysis and
biological soil analysis, can help growers identify
deficiencies or toxicities that cause problems growers
face, Graybill said.
Through remediating and buffering some of the
longtime cropping system practices, growers can
reduce chemical usage. As
growers begin to see some
improvement in practices,
for example, including
adding carbon to nitrogen
applications, the improved
efficiencies may mean
growers can apply less
nitrogen. However, such
practices may not save them
money, but instead, increase
expenses. Through reducing
input application levels,
growers could gain more out
of the change, he said.
As healthier plants with
less disease emerge, growers
can add different types of
compounds into their foliar
sprays or fertilizer mixes,
which can lower disease in
a biological manner rather
than through chemistry. That
can lead to experimenting
with practices including cover
cropping - measures that
don't necessarily remake
grower systems, but in the
long run can improve crops,
Graybill said. Regenerative
practices can also ultimately
lead to growers replacing some of their chemical or
pesticide inputs with biological inputs, he said.
" The biological world is very exciting because now we
realize that these germs, so to speak, that we've been
taught for most of our lives that are all bad and aren't
really necessary aren't all bad, " Graybill said. " It's more
of an imbalance between the good ones and bad ones.
So we begin to experiment with and utilize biologicals,
microorganisms, bacteria and fungi and the compounds
they produce because these organisms are responsible for
producing all kinds of antibiotics, growth hormones and
minerals. We realize we can use these natural organisms
in cropping systems to increase or enhance and/or
outcompete a lot of the so-called pathogenic organisms. "
To help growers start regenerative practices and
explore advanced management concepts through a
biological paradigm, Soilcraft has scheduled its sixth
annual regenerative agriculture conference Jan. 21-23 in
Coeur D' Alene, Idaho. More information is available at
soilcraft.com/soilcraft-educational-conference.
VEGETABLEGROWERSNEWS.COM | 17
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September/October 2024

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of September/October 2024
