Episode 168: "Debunked by Nature" and Lessons from Farm Life with Mollie Engelhart

In this episode, commercial indoor producer Kirk Mersil shares his journey managing a 10,000-square-foot controlled-environment facility through an unexpected crop health crisis. Facing harvest losses exceeding 50% due to extreme plant brittleness and severe quality collapse, Kirk resisted conventional advice to destroy the operation and instead partnered with researcher and consultant Heber Hall to diagnose the root physiological drivers behind the outbreak. Drawing on plant pathology and biochemistry, Heber explains that Fusarium is not inherently an aggressive pathogen, but rather a ubiquitous fungal endophyte capable of conferring disease protection and facilitating nutrient reduction in healthy crops. By shifting away from pathogen eradication toward terrain management, their collaboration demonstrates how regulating fertility inputs, sustaining photosynthetic sugar supply, and preventing oxidative cascades can downregulate pathogenic gene expression and restore resilient crop health. In this episode, some of the topics discussed are: How Fusarium naturally functions as a beneficial endophyte in most plants and only turns pathogenic under specific environmental or nutritional stress.

Lloyd Murdock grew up in Oklahoma, earned his PhD in soils at Virginia Tech, and found his way to the University of Kentucky while stationed at nearby Fort Knox. He has spent more than four decades there as Extension Soils Specialist, and is now Professor Emeritus at the UK Research and Education Center in Princeton, Kentucky. Lloyd helped make no-till wheat standard practice in Kentucky. He also contributed research behind the soil penetrometer and developed an algorithm for variable-rate nitrogen in wheat. For the past decade or more, he has focused on breaking down fragipan soils with annual ryegrass. He still consults with farmers. In this episode, John and Lloyd discuss: Why fragipans leave many eastern U.S. crops growing on just two feet of soil above a concrete-like layer. How annual ryegrass roots break down the fragipan at 3/4 of an inch to 2 1/2 inches per year. A farmer who broke through more than a foot of fragipan with only four ryegrass crops in seven years. How most roots stall above 300 psi of soil resistance, and why annual ryegrass can push through. Why subsoiling only pays when more than 30% of a field has significant compaction. How Kentucky's state average wheat yield climbed from the 40s to 70 bushels by doing small things right. Why many farmers fear annual ryegrass, and how drones make fall seeding into standing crops easier. How chlorophyll sensors and a high-nitrogen reference strip help fine-tune wheat nitrogen rates. Additional Resources To read the University of Kentucky's guide to fragipan remediation with annual ryegrass, please visit: https://publications.mgcafe.uky.edu/agr-250 To learn more about Lloyd's fragipan research, please visit: https://news.mgcafe.uky.edu/article/researchers-believe-fragipan-breakthrough-horizon To read about Dave Fischer's annual ryegrass system at Fischer Farms, please visit: https://www.agproud.com/articles/46700-beef-on-rye-at-fischer-farms Learn more about AEA: https://www.advancingecoag.com About John Kempf John Kempf is the founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA). A top expert in biological and regenerative farming, John founded AEA in 2006 to help fellow farmers by providing the education, tools, and strategies that will have a global effect on the food supply and those who grow it. Through intense study and the knowledge gleaned from many industry leaders, John is building a comprehensive systems-based approach to plant nutrition – a system solidly based on the sciences of plant physiology, mineral nutrition, and soil microbiology. Support For This Show & Helping You Grow Since 2006, AEA has been on a mission to help growers become more resilient, efficient, and profitable with regenerative agriculture. AEA works directly with growers to apply its unique line of liquid mineral crop nutrition products and biological inoculants. Informed by cutting-edge plant and soil data-gathering techniques, AEA's science-based programs empower farm operations to meet the crop quality markers that matter the most. AEA has created real and lasting change on millions of acres with its products and data-driven services by working hand-in-hand with growers to produce healthier soil, stronger crops, and higher profits. Beyond working on the ground with growers, AEA leads in regenerative agriculture media and education, producing and distributing the popular and highly-regarded Regenerative Agriculture Podcast, inspiring webinars, and other educational content that serve as go-to resources for growers worldwide. Learn more about AEA's regenerative programs and products: https://www.advancingecoag.com

Jeff Kleypas is Distribution Manager and Senior Agronomist at Advancing Eco Agriculture, based in South Texas. He began his career 20 years ago as a crop consultant walking South Texas vegetable fields that were sprayed weekly with insecticides and fungicides. He started working with biologicals in 2009 and joined AEA four years ago. He also runs a 1.5-acre market farm at home, where he tests new tools himself. Jeff works with row crop growers and dealers across the Midwest and South, many of them now in year three or four of a full AEA program. This season he helped calibrate the CropTix sap sensor on cotton and corn and ran live demos at Midwest grower events. He uses FieldLark and other AI tools to turn sap, soil, and imagery data into faster recommendations. In this episode, John and Jeff discuss: A 3,000-acre Illinois corn farm that saw 5% of the tar spot with Pinion compared to its conventional fungicide check. How cutting P and K too hard led to tip back in Illinois corn. How the Croptix sensor returns full sap results in minutes. A grower with a 58-bushel soybean break-even who is averaging over 80, with some spots near 100. Pinion results from Jeff's own cut flowers, including a full month without disease. Why AI should make farmers better at seeing patterns in data, not replace them. Why sugars give a much bigger response at much lower rates in biologically active soils. A biological in-furrow program that beat a 2x2 of 40 units of nitrogen by 25 bushels. Additional Resources To learn more about FieldLark, please visit: https://fieldlark.ai To learn more about Pinion, please visit: https://advancingecoag.com/product/pinion/ To learn more about Croptix, please visit: https://www.croptix.ag/ To listen to Jeff's earlier podcast short, please visit: https://advancingecoag.com/podcast/podcast-short-10-breaking-away-from-traditional-agronomy-with-jeff-kleypas/ Learn more about AEA's regenerative programs and products: https://www.advancingecoag.com About John Kempf John Kempf is the founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA). A top expert in biological and regenerative farming, John founded AEA in 2006 to help fellow farmers by providing the education, tools, and strategies that will have a global effect on the food supply and those who grow it. Through intense study and the knowledge gleaned from many industry leaders, John is building a comprehensive systems-based approach to plant nutrition – a system solidly based on the sciences of plant physiology, mineral nutrition, and soil microbiology. Support For This Show & Helping You Grow Since 2006, AEA has been on a mission to help growers become more resilient, efficient, and profitable with regenerative agriculture. AEA works directly with growers to apply its unique line of liquid mineral crop nutrition products and biological inoculants. Informed by cutting-edge plant and soil data-gathering techniques, AEA's science-based programs empower farm operations to meet the crop quality markers that matter the most. AEA has created real and lasting change on millions of acres with its products and data-driven services by working hand-in-hand with growers to produce healthier soil, stronger crops, and higher profits. Beyond working on the ground with growers, AEA leads in regenerative agriculture media and education, producing and distributing the popular and highly-regarded Regenerative Agriculture Podcast, inspiring webinars, and other educational content that serve as go-to resources for growers worldwide. Learn more about AEA's regenerative programs and products: https://www.advancingecoag.com

Wendy Mariko Johnson farms in Floyd County, Iowa, near Charles City. She grew up on an Iowa farm, left at 18 in the 1990s for an 18-year career in the Los Angeles fashion industry, and returned in 2010 with her husband Johnny Rafkin. Having watched farms close across Iowa in the 1980s, she came back determined to follow the three things that carried her parents through that era: diversification, low cost of production, and little to no debt. Today Wendy runs two businesses from the same land. Jóia Food & Fiber Farm carries 160 ewes, 25 cows and their calves, plus hogs, chickens, and ducks across roughly 130 certified organic acres, alongside 15 acres of Kernza and more than 6,000 trees planted over the past decade. Jóia Sleep turns the farm's wool into comforters, mattress toppers, and pillows. She also co-manages Center View Farms, her family's thousand-acre commodity operation, and serves as vice president of the Perennial Promise Growers Cooperative, co-founder of 99 Counties, and chair of Iowa's USDA Farm Service Agency state committee. Her current question is how to take what she has proven on 130 acres and extend it across a thousand. In this episode, John and Wendy discuss: What carried her parents through the 1980s farm crisis, and why it still applies How direct marketing made her a price maker instead of a price taker Why the thousand-acre corn and soybean farm is becoming obsolete How Kernza thrived through a 10-inch drought year and a 12-inch rain month Why she hires custom operators instead of owning machinery What it would take to treat agrarian labor like the skilled trades Whether the next generation wants land ownership or just land access Why she would rather be paid on practice and nutrition than on yield Four years of silvopasture planted over field tile Additional Resources To listen to the podcast episode featuring Austin Unruh on integrating trees into working pastures, please visit: https://advancingecoag.com/podcast/episode-97-integrating-trees-into-working-pastures-with-austin-unruh/ To learn more about Jóia Food & Fiber Farm, please visit: https://www.joiafoodfarm.com/ To learn more about Jóia Sleep, please visit: https://www.joiasleep.com/ To learn more about 99 Counties, please visit: https://99counties.com/ To learn more about the Perennial Promise Growers' Cooperative, please visit: https://perennialpromise.com/ Learn more about AEA's regenerative programs and products: https://www.advancingecoag.com About John Kempf John Kempf is the founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA). A top expert in biological and regenerative farming, John founded AEA in 2006 to help fellow farmers by providing the education, tools, and strategies that will have a global effect on the food supply and those who grow it. Through intense study and the knowledge gleaned from many industry leaders, John is building a comprehensive systems-based approach to plant nutrition – a system solidly based on the sciences of plant physiology, mineral nutrition, and soil microbiology. Support For This Show & Helping You Grow Since 2006, AEA has been on a mission to help growers become more resilient, efficient, and profitable with regenerative agriculture. AEA works directly with growers to apply its unique line of liquid mineral crop nutrition products and biological inoculants. Informed by cutting-edge plant and soil data-gathering techniques, AEA's science-based programs empower farm operations to meet the crop quality markers that matter the most. AEA has created real and lasting change on millions of acres with its products and data-driven services by working hand-in-hand with growers to produce healthier soil, stronger crops, and higher profits. Beyond working on the ground with growers, AEA leads in regenerative agriculture media and education, producing and distributing the popular and highly-regarded Regenerative Agriculture Podcast, inspiring webinars, and other educational content that serve as go-to

In this Podcast Extra, Brody Benton of Six B and John Kempf, founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture, dig into why plants are shutting down weeks before black layer, what top dieback is actually telling you, and how nitrogen form, leaf temperature, and trace minerals decide whether a crop finishes strong or hollows out from the inside. John explains why the fungi behind stalk rot and crown rot — fusarium, rhizoctonia, pythium — are saprophytes that navigate by electrical charge, and why they only attack cells the plant has already given up on. Brody brings the 2026 weather data: 43 nights above 68°F in Polk County, Iowa (vs. a 28–29 night average), 35+ in York County, Nebraska, and record dew points that opened the door for tar spot. Put those together and you get a plant burning protein for energy, converting rubisco and PEP carboxylase back to ammonium, robbing amino skeletons out of the leaves, and dismantling its own photosynthetic engine during grain fill. From there the conversation goes well past stalk rot: front-loaded nitrogen and electrolyte overload, chloride and sodium from manure histories, herbicide and fungicide effects on fungal-to-bacterial ratios, the depletion of microbially active carbon under corn-on-corn and corn-soybean rotations, molybdenum and nitrate assimilation in soybeans, EDTA chelates that pull one nutrient out while adding another, plant sap pH targets, and how humic substances turned a manure pit into liquid gold. Additional Resources If you farm in the midwest and would like to get in touch with Brody, please reach out to him via email, [email protected]