Future of Agriculture

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/ AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/ Today’s episode features Headstorm CEO Lawrence King. Lawrence has over 18 years of technology strategy consulting experience. He got his start in agtech with Farmlink over eight years ago where he built an engineering team. That company ran into some hard times, and Lawrence found himself with a talented team of engineers and no work to do. He tapped into his contacts in agtech looking for strategy and engineering talent and Headstorm was born. Today, Headstorm has worked with companies all throughout agriculture and in similar industries who want to implement large-scale technology initiatives in their businesses. He’ll give us a few examples of what that looks like. Also, Headstorm recently announced a product of their own called AGPILOT, which uses generative AI to give ag retailers and other agronomists a new interface to record and access their data which ultimately allows them to better serve farmer customers. Lawrence has a lot of battle-tested wisdom about what works and what doesn’t work in agtech, and he shares a lot of those insights in today’s interview.

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/ AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/ Hemprino: https://www.hemprino.co.nz/ Prime Future Newsletter: https://primefuture.substack.com/ We’ve all heard the stats about how little of what consumers pay makes it back to the farmer or rancher. Some producers, like New Zealand sheep farmer Paul Ensor, are seizing the opportunity to capture more of that value. "A lot of farmers don't know where their produce goes once it leaves the farm gate, but we're very well connected and we know what standards they require for us to grow the wool under. And so it's all about adding value and the best way to do that is be better connected to our end customer, farm to fashion." Paul is capitalizing on this farm to fashion opportunity in a number of ways, including his own natural fiber brand called Hemprino, which is a blend of 80% fine merino wool and 20% hemp. "There's a lot of wool blended with synthetic fibers to give it various attributes, whether to make the yarn stronger or more durable or give it some stretch. So we thought, well, why can't we do that with another natural fiber?" Hemprino has been successful and Paul says he’s having a lot of fun, but running a consumer focused business on top of a farming operation, is not an easy challenge to take on. "The supply chain is very challenging. So like when the wool leaves the farm, it's almost at times up to 18 months before we can have a garment to sell. So just all that managing that time from leaving the farm gate to hitting the store, if you like, has been quite challenging." Paul Ensor of Hemprino talks to guest host Janette Barnard on today’s Future of Agriculture podcast.

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/ AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/ Bayer Announcement: https://www.bayer.com/media/en-us/bayer-pilots-unique-generative-ai-tool-for-agriculture/ Bayer AgPowered Services: https://www.bayer.com/media/en-us/bayer-collaboration-with-microsoft-connects-farm-data-to-address-lack-of-data-interoperability-in-agriculture/ Microsoft World Agri-Tech Reflections: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/industry/blog/sustainability/2024/04/02/world-agri-tech-2024-pioneering-agriculture-resilience-with-ai/ Claudia Roessler World Agri-Tech Reflections on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/claudia-roessler-microsoft_world-agri-tech-2024-pioneering-agriculture-activity-7180973495110057984-Bay4?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop FoA 111: Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning with Jeremy Williams https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/future-of-agriculture-111-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning-with-jeremy-williams-of-monsanto FoA 361: Meet Norm, FBN's AI-Powered Ag Advisor with Kit Barron and Charles Baron https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-361-meet-norm-fbns-ai-powered-ag-advisor-with-kit-barron-and-charles-baron FoA 266:Microsoft Wants to Democratize Data-Driven Agriculture https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-266-microsoft-wants-to-democratize-data-driven-agriculture FoA 345: Alphabet's Moonshot to Scale Sustainable Agriculture via Machine Learning with Dr. Elliott Grant of Mineral https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-345-alphabets-moonshot-to-scale-sustainable-agriculture-via-machine-learning-with-elliott-grant-of-mineral “Yield Maps Killed Agtech Software, Can AI Fix It?” https://tenacious.ventures/insights/yield-maps-killed-agtech-software-can-ai-fix-it Bailey Stockdale LLM Benchmarking:

SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Follow Paul Sullivan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SullivanAgro These Field Report segments are short occasional episodes where we will hear from the people who actually use and hopefully benefit from the innovations we discuss on the show. We’ve already been doing this through the spotlight segments that have aired at the end of about one episode every month. I’ve really enjoyed these sort of customer testimonials that are provided from our quarterly presenting sponsors. So I’m taking what we were doing with those spotlights and creating standalone episodes with a similar concept: only now sometimes it will be associated with the sponsor, and sometimes not - just profiles of farmers and other users of agricultural innovations giving their report from the field. In today’s case, Paul Sullivan is a certified crop consultant and agronomist in Eastern Ontario. He has operated his agronomy services firm, P.T. Sullivan Agro, since 1997, and started using SWAT MAPS in recent years. This part of Ontario which is just outside of Ottawa, is mostly corn, soybeans and wheat. Paul’s work focuses on developing crop plans around nutrient management, pH, pesticides, and some genetic recommendations as well. Before starting the business, Paul spent eight years as a soil and crop advisor with the ministry of agriculture and food covering three counties with the provincial extension group there. So he has a long history of working directly with farmers to solve agronomic problems.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ University of Saskatchewan Precision Agriculture Certificate Program: https://admissions.usask.ca/precision-agriculture.php I wanted to have a conversation about cutting edge tools and the future of digital agriculture, and I definitely think we succeeded in bringing that to you today. Both Steve and Preston are thinking deeply about the best ways to collect and analyze data, think about variability, and utilize this deeper understanding for real world outcomes on farms. Dr. Preston Sorenson is a research associate in the department of soil science at the University of Saskatchewan. His work focuses on mapping soil properties using a range of data sources, usually from satellite imagery and elevation data. He also works a lot with soil sensor systems, in particular for rapid carbon measurements. And carbon measurement is something we definitely get into today. Dr. Steve Shirtliffe is a professor also at the University of Saskatchewan but in the department of plant sciences. As I mentioned in the opener, he pivoted his career about seven years ago from his focus in agronomy to now working in the area broadly referred to as digital agriculture. His focus is on crop imaging and understanding in-field spatial variability and what causes it. Steve and Preston talk about digital tools, ag data, artificial intelligence, and what the future might hold for precision agriculture.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ The Context Network: https://contextnet.com/ Today's episode features Christian Guffy of the Context Network. I wanted to bring Christian on the show to talk about talent and growing a client services firm. I think those are both interesting and important topics that I haven’t done a good job of covering on the show. In client services, which is the business I’m in with the consulting that I do, all you have to sell is your talent. So finding ways to recruit, retain and develop talent is extremely important. It’s important in any business, but especially in a business where your people’s abilities is the only thing you have to offer. Christian had some great perspective on this and some interesting insights into the way Context operates. For some quick background here, and some context on Context: Christian is a Partner at The Context Network and has been with the firm in a variety of roles for 10 years. He has a wide range of experience in working with clients across the food and agriculture value chain with notable focus on the upstream crop and animal sectors. He has worked with clients in the development and execution of strategic plans along with market and competitive intelligence. He has also advised companies on corporate financial planning including capital expenditures, business unit divestitures, and strategic acquisitions. Context's clients are many of the largest companies in the agriculture industry including manufacturers in crop protection, animal health, ag equipment, seeds, processing and handling, and many others.

SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Corteva Agriscience: https://www.corteva.com/ These new Field Report segments are short occasional episodes where we will hear from the people who actually use and hopefully benefit from the innovations we discuss on the show. We’ve already been doing this through the spotlight segments that have aired at the end of about one episode every month. I’ve really enjoyed these sort of customer testimonials that are provided from our quarterly presenting sponsors. So I’m taking what we were doing with those spotlights and creating standalone episodes with a similar concept: only now sometimes it will be associated with the sponsor, and sometimes not - just profiles of farmers and other users of agricultural innovations giving their report from the field. In today’s case, Brett McArtor is a senior research associate at Corteva Agriscience based in Johnston, Iowa. Corteva has three major focuses: crop protection, seed, and digital which supports those other two - and that’s where Brett works. Since graduating from Iowa State, Brett has remained focused on working with farmers to perform trials and research projects on their operations. He thinks of it as farmer-led science to figure out how new products fit into their management systems and affect their bottom line. He also brings that information back to the company to help formulate or position products to better suit farmer needs.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ WonderCow: https://wondercow.com/ The Business of Food Newsletter: https://jenniferbarney.substack.com/ I believe that there are a lot of opportunities for those of us in agriculture in paying attention to food and health trends. I don’t personally love the term “food is medicine”, but obviously poor diet is a major cause of health problems, and we would all be better off to spend more of our time and probably our dollars prioritizing health and nutrition in our food choices. And that includes food supplements. But even I, who loves thinking about cutting edge things in food and ag, was pretty shocked to hear last year of the trend of people including colostrum from cows in their diet. Colostrum being the milk produced by the mother at the time of giving birth. As you’ll hear today, there is a growing number of health-conscious consumers that are looking to the unique nutritive bioactive properties of colostrum and this powder is selling for big bucks. Where there is a health trend - there is an agricultural opportunity. And that’s what we’re going to explore with guest host Jennifer Barney and dairy farmers Rob and Erica Diepersloot who are founders of WonderCow - powdered bovine colostrum for human consumption.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ ProducePay: https://producepay.com/ Today's episode features ProducePay founder Pablo Borquez Schwarzbeck. Born and raised in a 4th generation farming family from Mexico, Pablo brings over 20 years of experience in the fresh produce industry. After growing up on the family farm – Campos Borquez, a premier supplier of fresh asparagus and grapes to the United States and Canada – Pablo went on to work for The Giumarra Companies, managing grower relations in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and the United States. Pablo returned to the family farm as Chief Financial Officer, then went on to complete his MBA at Cornell University, where the idea of ProducePay was started, founded and launched. Last year the company announced that longtime board member and advisor Patrick McCullough would take over as CEO, and Pablo moved at that time into the role of Executive Director of the board. But as you’ll hear in this interview he is just as energized as ever about their mission and their future. We talk about the challenges of the produce trade and why there is so much waste and so many intermediaries involved, why he thinks there in a position to create a better model, what role financial technology has in their ability to pull it off, how interest rates and investor sentiment impact companies like ProducePay, and how his transition has been from founder to CEO to board director. There’s a lot to this story but a good place to start is acknowledging that we all want quality produce to be at the store every time we show up, whether its in season locally or not. For that to happen, there’s a lot of people involved around the world, and a lot of waste along the way. ProducePay may have started as a way to better capitalize farmers, but now they have their focus on how they can help those farmers manage price risk. And the guy who started it all is today’s guest, Pablo Borquez.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Lavoro Agro: https://www.lavoroagro.com/ Software Is Feeding The World Newsletter: https://www.rhishipethe.com/sftw Work with Rhishi: https://www.metaldoglabs.ai/ Brazil has officially overtaken the US to become the top corn exporter in the world. And companies like Lavoro Agro are seizing a huge opportunity to bring more technology to Brazilian farmers. "A US corn farmer is gonna be two times more productive than that Brazilian farmer, and the difference really is gonna come down to technology. And that technology comes in the form of inputs. And inputs is really where Lavoro plays." That's Lavoro's Chief Digital Officer, Alex. Wimbush. Today, he sits down with guest host Rhishi Pethe, who was also his colleague when they both worked at the Climate Corporation. I'm noticing a lot of companies out there almost have like a FOMO about AI and you know, some of these new tools like ChatGPT. Are you feeling the pressure from certain folks, like, Hey, we need to use ChatGPT, or we need to use, you know, whatever the latest shiny object is? This episode is a fascinating exploration of product management, Brazil. In agriculture and ag retail. " I haven't seen yet any real true sort of sustained higher value input plus services plus products plus digital type offering. Rhishi Pethe interviews Lavoro Agro's Alex Wimbush on today's Future of Agriculture podcast.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ TransparentSea: https://www.transparentseafarm.com/ [Video] "How America's Biggest Indoor Shrimp Farm Sells 2 Million Shrimp Every Year": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AK_RQ1uaGs [Video] "Tour of TransparentSea Farm's urban shrimp farm": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wnyi1Sc6pk Today’s featured conversation is with Steve Sutton, founder and CEO of TransparentSEA Farm in Southern California. I’m excited to share this one with you. I became very interested in indoor aquaculture this past year. As I think about vertical farming for vegetables, my biggest concern comes down to spending big dollars on real estate, technology, energy and labor to produce a product that really isn’t that valuable - both in terms of dollars and nutrition. However, with fish, you have a much more valuable product than say lettuce. So, why haven’t we been talking more about indoor aquaculture? That was the question I asked myself, and it turns out, some people HAVE been talking about this - a lot. And it’s exciting, but also carries with it a lot of the same realities as all of indoor agriculture. It was very interesting to get into these realities with Steve on today’s episode. Even if you’re not interested in aquaculture at all, this episode is worth listening to because the parallels to other farming systems are evident. He also calls attention to some serious issues with labeling, and changing consumer behavior that I think is really important for anyone in a food-related industry. But first, a bit of a shrimp farming primer: not only are these little critters delicious, nutritious, high in protein and extremely versatile - i’m trying hard right now not to quote Bubba from Forest Gump - but they are very efficient. They are ready to be harvested in just four months with a feed conversion ratio of 1.4 pounds of feed for one pound of gain. For reference, that’s better than all the other major proteins like chicken, pork, beef, etc. You can also set up an indoor shrimp farm anywhere. Steve’s is relatively close to the ocean, but that’s mostly because he wanted to be close to the demand - he’s making his own saltwater on site, as you’ll hear. Steve’s background is after attending Columbia University he spent a year on Wall Street and decided it wasn’t for him. Wanting to make an impact he got very interested in fisheries which led to a master’s in marine conservation from the University of Miami and a career in aquaculture that ultimately led to him starting TransparenSea which has been in operation for about two years.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Forage Capital Partners: https://foragecapitalpartners.com/ Jim Taylor of Forage Capital Partners. Jim has been involved with financing growth companies for over 20 years and has created and managed seven different funds prior to Forage. He was a founder of three growth equity funds, three subordinated debt funds, and the Farm Credit Canada Ventures direct investment program. Jim has raised and managed over $500 million dollars of growth capital in the Ag food industry. Jim has carved out a reputation for himself as the go-to person for anyone with an ag or food company with a proven product and business model that is ready to take on outside investment for growth. His approach makes so much sense to me as someone who can be a bit skeptical of a lot of what I see in early stage venture capital. But we’ve never covered this on the show, so I’m very excited to share with you this conversation with Jim Taylor.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Kessler Ag Ventures: https://kesslerag.ca/ FoA 398: The Evolution of Precision Agriculture with Cory Willness and Derek Massey of Croptimistic Technology This is the first installment of a new series of the podcast called "Field Reports", where we will hear from the people who actually use and hopefully benefit from the innovations we so regularly discuss on the show. I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, because in this respect, the show has been very one-sided. We hear from the visionaries that are creating new ventures, technologies, programs, research and ideas. But we too rarely hear from those that try them, buy them, and have to make them work in practice and in the field. We’ve been doing this a little bit through the spotlight segments that have aired at the end of about one episode every month. Those are sort of customer testimonials from our quarterly presenting sponsors. I’ve really enjoyed these stories and the tried and true perspectives that come from them. So I’m going to make these short standalone episodes and a regular thing: sometimes with users of the technology from the sponsor, and sometimes not - just profiles of farmers and another users of agricultural innovations. In today’s case, Tyler Kessler owns an independent agronomy consulting business in Southern Saskatchewan alongside his wife, Brooke Dorgan. The company provides a range of agronomic and precision agriculture services for farmers who want to optimize yield, improve soil health, and reduce your environmental impacts. They are also a service provider of SWAT MAPS, our presenting sponsor this quarter. Before incorporating the business in 2015, Tyler worked in ag retail for eight years and spent a couple of years with an ag chemical manufacturer. He says in those days he wasn’t seeing a lot in precision ag that convinced him it was really adding a lot of value to farmers. But then he discovered SWAT MAPS.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Verdi Ag: https://www.verdi.ag/ Arthur Chen is the CEO of Verdi, which is helping to climate-proofing agriculture with the world's first scalable platform to personalize healthcare for plants, helping the world's largest food brands radically optimize farm productivity and sustainability. In 2022, Verdi saved farmers over 7 million liters of water. Prior to Verdi, Arthur conducted precision agriculture research sponsored by Mineral at Google X. Arthur and I talk about variable rate irrigation, gaining traction as a new agtech company, and how technology like Verdi’s can make an impact on the future of agriculture.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Cquesta website: https://cquesta.com/ FOA 200: Drones for Spraying, Seeding, and Pollinating with Rantizo Michael Ott is the CEO of Cquesta, a deep root trait company that helps crops tolerate stress and earns carbon credits to farmers with no change in agronomic practices. Michael is also the Founding CEO and Board Member at Rantizo, the nation's largest drone-spraying company. Before Rantizo, Michael worked in corporate venture capital backed by Monsanto, Novozymes and Bunge, where he invented a patented technology that delivers a tiny amount of nitrogen to a rice seed as it grows. Michael has a Master's degree in Chemistry from the University of Iowa and two decades worth of experience in finance and agriculture. He is an author on five patent applications and has raised over $180 million in investments over the course of his career. Michael was named PrecisionAg 2021 Entrepreneur of the Year. Michael and I talk about Cquesta and what makes this technology unique, what’s not working in the current soil carbon market paradigm, how they plan to bring together seed companies, farmers, carbon credit buyers and others to make this model work, why he jumped right back into another agtech startup right after Rantizo, and more.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Agricultural Economic Insights: https://aei.ag/ AEI.ag Presents Podcast: https://aei.ag/podcast/ David Widmar is an agricultural economist specializing in agricultural trends and the farm economy. Through his research, he supports agribusinesses and farmers in their strategic and planning efforts. David is the Managing Partner of Agricultural Economic Insights, AEI.ag, which he co-founded with Dr. Brent Gloy in 2014. Prior to AEI, David was a researcher with the Department of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University and served as the economist for the Kansas Department of Agriculture. I highly recommend you subscribe to AEI’s content and go check out their podcast, AEI.ag Presents. I especially recommend their season on the 1980s farm crisis. In today’s episode, David and I discuss farmland values, the impact of higher interest rates, how to think about risk, and how to manage volatility in things like markets and inflation.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Cory Willness on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cory-willness-78b76246/ Derek Massey on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/derek-massey-61aa909a/ SWAT Agronomy Podcast: Apple, Spotify FOA 211: Ground Truthing AgTech with Cory Willness: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-211-ground-truthing-agtech-with-cory-willness Cory Willness and Derek Massy are the co-founders of Croptimistic Technology, the creators of SWAT MAPS. Cory is the CEO, and Derek is the CTO. They’ve been working on building precision ag tools for about 20 years together. Cory says he’s the hustler and Derek is the hacker. Derek is an electrical engineer and software developer. His dad was a farmer and Cory came to him in the early 2000s to start building software together. At that time, Cory was an independent crop consultant and the owner of CropPro Consulting, which is a company he still owns today that does agronomic consulting in Western Canada. It’s through these early experiences of building digital tools that Cory and his fellow agronomists on his team could use, that led to them building a company to sell tested and proven technology that they were already using in the field. We talk about many things in this episode, from the evolution of precision agriculture, to building a profitable company in agtech, to why after many years they decided to take on an investor in 2021, and what the future might look like for precision agriculture and agtech more generally.

Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Zordi: https://www.zordi.com/ Casey Call on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/casey-call-03a3b03b/ Technology in agriculture can help reduce production costs and improve efficiencies, but it can also open up new possibilities for quality that goes beyond the average consumers’ expectations. “Our economic picture is to be able to capitalize on growing a better product and supplying a better product to the consumer, but also being able to kind of fix our labor costs and control those to a certain point.” That’s Casey Call, co-founder of Zordi. Which I first thought was a robotics company focused on building robots for greenhouse agriculture. Turns out they are that and more - using their own proprietary technology to build and operate their own greenhouse farms. “Getting people access to this produce is kind of the key. When people start having our strawberries, they're like, oh, well we get it now. And so getting more and more of this infrastructure built, getting more and more access to these things in stores, I think is the path that we're on.” This focus on quality and the latest in technology has some thought-provoking insights on the path forward. “We're gonna have to seek technology solutions. We're gonna have to seek new ways of planting, harvesting, processing, and selling food to people if we want to maintain a good quality of life.” Casey Call was born and raised on a fourth generation family owned vegetable and grain farm in New York State. After completing his degree in Ag Science at Cornell he moved across the country to become the agronomist for Grimmway Farms / Cal Organic in the central valley of California. Earning his MBA on nights and weekends, he eventually went to work at ag management software company, Granular which was later acquired by Dupont. At that time he moved on to become the Head Grower for Plenty, an indoor vertical farming company. All of these experiences led him to become the co-founder of Zordi, where he works alongside founder and CEO Gilwoo Lee to more fully automate fruit and vegetable production in greenhouses. As you’re about to hear, Zordi acquires varieties from around the world, such as Korean and Japanese Strawberries, to grow and manage them with a fleet of harvesting and scouting robots. Then they market and sell those premium varieties through grocery stores. This is a massive project that they’ve taken on, and they’ve made significant progress in a short time. I respect Casey’s perspective as one of the few people I know with firsthand growing experience on family farms, corporate farms, vertical farms, and greenhouse production systems. So it’s interesting to see the ways he’s combining this unique skill set.

Turn your data into actionable value with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/ Toby Kiers, PhD website: https://tobykiers.com/ Toby's TED TALK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjwvaF3P_5Q&t=273s Scientists are discovering incredible interactions between plants' roots and soil dwelling fungi called mycorrhizal fungi. These relationships are integral to how plants function, including of course, our crops. But despite their importance to fundamental aspects of plant development, there's still so much we have yet to learn. "We know, for example, that the fungi, when it colonizes the root system, it can actually change the gene regulation of the plant, such that the plant is no longer able to access nutrients directly from its root system. It kind of creates an addiction onto the fungi that makes it so the plant is giving more carbon to get at the nutrients." That's Dr. Toby Kiers, an evolutionary biologist who studies these mycorrhizal fungi. She shares why this work is so important for biodiversity, for crop development, for soil health and for carbon sequestration. "We did some research that found that about 13 billion tons of CO2 are allocated every year from plants to mycorrhizal networks across the earth, so that that includes all kinds of mycorrhizal fungi, also associated with forests. But that's a huge number, right? That's equivalent to one third of the emissions from fossil fuels." The functions and strategies that these fungi perform in nature will blow your mind, and I can't help but wonder about the possibilities for the future of agriculture. Professor Toby Kiers is an evolutionary biologist who earned her PhD from UC Davis. She has been Professor and University Research Chair of Evolutionary Biology at Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam since 2014. Kiers is famous for uncovering ancient biological markets that take place beneath forest floors, in which different trees and fungi barter for essential resources such as phosphorus and sugar. Kiers co-founded the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks (SPUN).

Put AI to work on your farm: https://farmwave.io/ Prime Future Newsletter by Janette Barnard: https://primefuture.substack.com/ "Cattle Kingdom: The Hidden History of the Cowboy West" by Christopher Knowlton: https://www.amazon.com/Cattle-Kingdom-Hidden-History-Cowboy/dp/1328470253/ref=sr_1_1 " It was a Darwinian struggle across the open range, as it often is in a capitalist society. A struggle to survive, to outcompete, to adapt on the fly, to changing circumstances brought on by new technology, emerging monopolies, changing regulations, fluctuating markets, and fickle weather. From one angle, the story of the Great Beef Bonanza is a record of remarkable human ingenuity and technological advancement. From another, it's a case history of the calamities that befall those who ignore economic or ecological realities in a single-minded pursuit of the American dream. The open range cattle era and its role in shaping America deserve to be more broadly known if only as an instructive cautionary tale." That is a passage from "Cattle Kingdom: The Hidden History of the Cowboy West" by Christopher Nolton. That is going to be the basis for today's very special history episode about an interesting and pivotal time in American history, but also in the history of industrialized agriculture. Joining me for this is the person who recommended "Cattle Kingdom" to me, and someone who has been a regular on the show, Janette Barnard. This book is both instructive about how bubbles form, but also some really pivotal beginnings to what we know today as agriculture, especially on the meat side of the business, which is what Janette covers in her wonderful weekly newsletter called Prime Future.