Kent Boucher 0:02
Are we are we started? Right.

Kent Boucher 0:06
definitely more like my dad. Really?

Nicolas Lirio 0:08
Yeah. Okay. All right. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 0:11
I am.

Nicolas Lirio 0:12
I I believe ya. I don't know I know your parents decently well, but I don't know like you know, their little quirks that they do enough to know, you know.

Kent Boucher 0:19
Yeah, a lot of my phrases and what I find funny, how it's funny to me, the way I the way I conduct myself, a lot of that comes from my dad. But then I spent so much time with Carol that like that got sprinkled in there on top of it. So yeah. Whenever I'm doing something miserable I do that.

Nicolas Lirio 0:38
Do you do the like I do that all the time?

Nicolas Lirio 0:46
Yeah. You know, so I was telling my counselor the other day, was like months ago. I was like, sometimes I wake up, you know, and I'm like gently caressing my arm. And he's like, Yeah, that's usually sign that you don't get enough comfort in your life and you're hiding from people. I was like, and so I started telling No, I started telling my friends that in a

Kent Boucher 1:03
Yeah. I think it's time to go.

Riley Rozendaal 1:09
Yeah, we got a little H R thing. I'm sitting my dick on here. He's talking about not getting enough attention.

Nicolas Lirio 1:17
No, I just started asking a bunch of my guy friends and they're like, I I'd do that. Like I w I'd do that with my sleep. Anyway. Interesting.

Kent Boucher 1:24
What's the matter with you people?

Riley Rozendaal 1:26
Discrediting it.

Nicolas Lirio 1:28
The point is it's a deep it's a deep coping mechanism. And I find myself doing it with a when Yeah, or if I'm tinkering if I'm tinkering with a vehicle or something, I will

Kent Boucher 1:39
Riley and I had to survive a lot of terrible on was that Thursday? Yeah when we had to fix the chain on the all crop. that was that was unbelievably terrible. Like just and you can it's not that it's like necessarily hard to access, it's just very hard to work on. Yeah. It like injured me that like like trying to fix that chain. It nearly like like my my Elbow was hyperextending to like bend it into position to you get that like that little bee sting feeling in your elbow like you're you're about to dislocate it, you know? I did

Nicolas Lirio 2:18
Never had that. it's not like a regular feeling. Terrible.

Riley Rozendaal 2:21
Well, you know, I can tell when Kent's having a fun day fighting equipment because he'll come in and his voice is different. He's kinda like, Hey Riley, what are you doing? And it's like, Okay, all right, something something is wrong. We're about to wade into some sort of we need eight hands on this thing.

Nicolas Lirio 2:39
Hey Riley, are you busy for the next two and a half hours?

Kent Boucher 2:42
Yeah, it that was so horrible. That was definitely and Riley when he hears that tone of my voice, it's Yep, I'll be there in just a minute. To his credit, he never

Riley Rozendaal 2:46
Yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 2:51
Yeah, yeah. You gotta bring you gotta bring some kind of jolly or something to that because you're trying to balance out the other side.

Nicolas Lirio 3:00
You guys turned it around. You guys turn it around, you finish the rattlesning master.

Kent Boucher 3:04
Yeah, we did. Judd Judd was a big help with that. And another like just random problem. The cross auger on the all crop has there's these retracting fingers. They have a name, I don't remember what they are. But they basically help pr pr like pull and shove the material that's as it's coming into the throat of the combine, into the the head, the pickup head. They they shove it up the throat.

Nicolas Lirio 3:06
Happy with the rattlesnake master this year.

Kent Boucher 3:34
And so that someday I'll find out why these doors are there. I know I will. there's a way I think it's so you can adjust those the depth that those fingers move in and out of that cross auger. And that door, that access door, came it detached, like all the bolts fell out or something. And it went through the combine, a plate of metal, and just stopped that cylinder in its tracks. And so so Judd was incredibly handy with not only retrieving the door out of the cylinder, but he re fashioned it back into he bent it back into a usable piece of metal and we used some brand new self tappers to hold her down. And we got through the harvest. But like what a random problem. You know what I mean? It's just like I get it if you forgot to grease that bearing and the bearing goes out. Or you turn the corner too sharp or you're going too fast and it's rattling the the machine apart or whatever. Like I get all that. It's when a little door after seventy years of use decides to leave

Nicolas Lirio 4:49
Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. We figured it out.

Kent Boucher 5:01
Been the year, yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 5:02
When I was a kid it was it was fun to run the combine because you're like, yeah, I'm running this big machine and we're doing this cool thing and the older you get and the more you run a combine, yeah, the more you get those those flashes. You know, you hear a squeak here and you hear a pop here and you start having flashbacks to that time that everything rapidly disassembled.

Kent Boucher 5:24
Yeah, the combines are interesting because they spend so much of their life not running. Yeah. You know what I mean? They're just it's a short window of time and they get used hard for that short window of time and then it's Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 5:37
Well, you know it it didn't a lot of

Kent Boucher 5:41
We should treat combines like we do bees. Send them down south there over the winter.

Nicolas Lirio 5:48
It's interesting 'cause l you know, large construction companies or dirt work companies, they will do a lot of their math. Like one of their main metrics is like this giant machine that I paid for, how much are we using it? Yeah. Right? So if you're a one man show and you've got six big pieces of machinery, you're not gonna physically be able to use them enough. You won't have the hours. But like somehow with combines we just like even though they cost just as much as those other giant machines, we only use them for three weeks out of the year. And then we're like, Yeah, somehow this ROIs. But I think yeah, I've I've actually been thinking about that quite a bit. It's like how could we use combines like how can we use our equipment more

Kent Boucher 6:27
We have to start driving him to work. Yeah. Don't forget to turn the threshold on every Thursday. Ever Threshing Thursday. Going down the road with the Shaker shooches, belching mouse turds out all over the road.

Nicolas Lirio 6:30
Gar R.

Riley Rozendaal 6:33
man.

Nicolas Lirio 6:41
Goodness dude. Dude, but the the roadsides in Iowa right now, I I think it's because of the rain cycle are f thick, big blue India right now. Thicker than I've ever seen

Kent Boucher 6:52
All right, how much time have you spent envisioning reaching the edge of the stripper head over?

Nicolas Lirio 6:57
No I'm like, well if we went for miles, we would literally have enough seed for all of the Midwest for for Big Blue and Indian for years. You know what I mean? Like there's a way

Kent Boucher 7:10
You know how I knew how to ask you that question?

Nicolas Lirio 7:15
Dude it's but i I literally think like yeah that bank's probably too steep. We'd have to somehow get around that one. All right, Riley, are you you more

Kent Boucher 7:25
had rear wheel assist you probably wouldn't get too stuck.

Nicolas Lirio 7:29
I've literally been like, could we do a poll type call out of those areas? Like, could we get around the signs? Yeah. Yeah, I've thought about it a lot. Riley, you I'm gonna send this to your mom and dad. You more like your mom or your dad?

Riley Rozendaal 7:42
probably somewhere in the middle. I picked up mannerisms from both. I was always told I looked more like my dad. And the older I get the

Kent Boucher 7:50
I've never seen your dad. I've seen your dad's house many times and I've had wired him. He stores all of his equipment under a roof.

Riley Rozendaal 8:03
Make my parents make an appearance. No, I I would say somewhere in between. I I think I got I would say I got the best best of both of them but

Nicolas Lirio 8:11
I want everyone to l listening to know that Riley is useless at putting his vote into an argument. He will never be like, Yeah, Kent's probably right on this. Every time he's like, Well, you know, you're both kinda right in a way. He is never gonna put

Riley Rozendaal 8:26
It's like

Kent Boucher 8:28
I think he told me he's voted twice in every election.

Riley Rozendaal 8:31
Yeah no. Why why have a definitive opinion where I could just pick one of yours, you know? But it seems to work out well for me.

Nicolas Lirio 8:37
Yeah. Goodness. That's funny. I guess before we start to keep the trend going, I am a lot like my I have my mom's motivations and my dad's fears, if that makes sense. So like on the Enneagram

Riley Rozendaal 8:58
No, no, no, no.

Nicolas Lirio 9:00
Like my manner isn't they're so much like my dad. You know, if you if you my and I didn't I didn't like grow up around him. So you'd be like, What the heck? You know, nature's real. and then but in terms of like what drives me, like what like I'm just the same as my mom. You know what I mean? And when we're in social settings and she's embarrassing me and I'm like, yeah, she's exactly me. You know, so can't embarrass me more than I do.

Kent Boucher 9:26
Yeah. yeah. If you have a daughter someday, do you hope she marries someone like you?

Kent Boucher 9:35
Or does that scare you too much?

Nicolas Lirio 9:36
No, I think so. I I think I'd treat my wife pretty well, you know.

Kent Boucher 9:41
Yeah, I wasn't just talking about that. I was talking about like personality mannerisms, all that stuff

Nicolas Lirio 9:45
Like would I wan would I wanna be around someone like me w at like Thanksgiving and stuff? No, no. I really like attention and and so if he comes in and he also really wants attention, I'm kinda like well it's just Yeah.

Kent Boucher 9:51
I

Riley Rozendaal 9:59
Thanksgiving handle two Nicholas.

Kent Boucher 10:01
No question. Man, that is a question.

Nicolas Lirio 10:03
You guys should see our our Thanksgiving with our with my mom's side of the family. It is a riot. We we're the kind of family that you to to start talking you just start talking a little louder than the person that's called talking. It's there's a lot going on. Alright, we should get started.

Riley Rozendaal 10:15
yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 10:26
Coffee time Wednesdays with the Prairie Farm podcast. Can't hit us with the jingle. Dee doo.

Kent Boucher 10:31
Tree

Nicolas Lirio 10:39
Wanna tell you a little story about my wife and I. Several years ago, we found out that our insurance company was literally spending millions of dollars lobbying against conservation in our state and our federal level. And when we found this out, we said, uh-uh. And we decided right then we are gonna get a new insurance company. And that brought us to McKay Insurance. Now, if you know me, you know that I'm pretty thorough when I make some of these decisions. And I looked for through a bunch of different agencies and they seemed great. But McKay Insurance stood out because of the people that I met there. They were wonderful. One of their agents actually went through the whole rigmarole to set us up with insurance that she and the agency didn't get a cut of. They just wanted to make sure that we were insured. Whether you're needing life insurance, health insurance, car, home, and auto, reach out to McKay Insurance. They will get you taken care of. If you are tired of your insurance company lobbying against you, go to McKayNsagency.com. Welcome back to the Prairie Farm Podcast, Coffee Time Wednesday. I'm your favorite host, Nicholas Lirio, with your favorite co-host, Ken Boucher. Doppel. Big Bears fan over here. big Big Bears boy. I don't know. I'm trying to do a little cannot believe that you guys are doing so well on your third string quarterback. Crazy.

Kent Boucher 12:00
Yeah. Me neither.

Nicolas Lirio 12:03
And co-host to the co host, Riley Rosendah.

Riley Rozendaal 12:07
Howdy howdy, I'm surprised you didn't give me one more co-host on there. Still still holding a grudge.

Nicolas Lirio 12:11
I do hold grudges. All right. but I love you forever for cleaning the wild bergamot. So I wait while Kent is harvesting, 'cause usually we've had cycles where we harvest and then we clean. Well, what's happened over I don't know, maybe the last seven years is we would fall behind by maybe a species per year, because by the time you get to April, you gotta start jumping back in the field, but you're just kind of barely behind on cleaning. Well, that stacks up six or seven years. And Riley had what? You had

Kent Boucher 12:16
And we didn't have to

Nicolas Lirio 12:39
Six species to catch up on. Yeah. And he wa we didn't even hire him to seed clean. He just said, I'm gonna do this. And by golly, you're getting pretty good at it.

Riley Rozendaal 12:47
We're we're hanging in there. Yeah. I'm I'm glad to be caught up. That's that's what I will say.

Nicolas Lirio 12:52
Okay. You miss it a little.

Kent Boucher 12:54
I sea cleaning, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, taking away my joy.

Nicolas Lirio 12:58
Yeah, that's

Riley Rozendaal 12:59
You're casually just just

Kent Boucher 13:00
That's all I have to say.

Nicolas Lirio 13:06
Man, if you guys know someone in Illinois or Missouri that we just absolutely have to interview, give us a holler.

Kent Boucher 13:13
I was thinking more like prairies of Hawaii, maybe.

Nicolas Lirio 13:17
I've been to Hawaii. It's beautiful. I don't not a lot of prairie.

Riley Rozendaal 13:21
Hawaii in January. Sounds pretty nice though.

Nicolas Lirio 13:25
yeah. I went in February and what's interesting with Hawaii, it's not like hot. You know, like you go to Miami, it's like, it's so beautiful here, but it's like hot. It Hawaii's like eighty degrees all day. And the water water's warm. It's just been? man. You need a raise.

Kent Boucher 13:37
Yeah, sounds like a nice place.

Kent Boucher 13:43
It's the one tropical place I have any interest in in visiting. It's I have zero interest in visiting other than like I could I could if I had the right people with me and the right creature comforts, I could I could enjoy a like Amazonian

Nicolas Lirio 14:01
What about like in Costa Rica?

Kent Boucher 14:03
I don't know. Just doesn't for whatever reason it just doesn't doesn't I think it's the heat and humidity is really the interesting. And it it's like if there's some really significant history. Not like, my state's awesome because in you know, eighteen forty one this guy did this and that's awesome. It's like okay, yeah, for if you live there. I'm talking like the world would be different if it wasn't for this kind of history. You know what mean? That's then I could be I could be interesting going there. And as far as why goes, you know, like I wouldn't say like a super dedicated life goal I have is to hit all fifty states, but it is definitely like it interests me, you know.

Nicolas Lirio 14:45
Does Iowa have that? The like the world would be different.

Kent Boucher 14:50
I don't think so. I can't think of anything.

Riley Rozendaal 14:54
Practice.

Nicolas Lirio 14:56
yeah, yeah, that's true. Carter or Palmer or

Kent Boucher 14:59
but that's not the d that's not where chiropractic was invented, was it? It's just one of the most

Nicolas Lirio 15:06
I know. I think that guy invented chiropractic. I think that's like

Kent Boucher 15:10
I know we I know we have a a podcast listener who knows. So you know who you are if you're tuning in right now, reach out to

Nicolas Lirio 15:19
I I where was George Washington Carver? Wasn't didn't he do some

Kent Boucher 15:26
he was down in the south where he was doing his peanut research. But maybe he went to Iowa State.

Riley Rozendaal 15:31
He went to Iowa State. I'm pretty sure he did.

Nicolas Lirio 15:33
Simpson College in Iowa. Really? and then transferred to Iowa State.

Kent Boucher 15:35
Really? is a way under flexed, you know what I mean?

Nicolas Lirio 15:40
What the heck? Simpson college, what you guys need to it's like how Harvard claims Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, even though they both dropped out like right away.

Kent Boucher 15:44
The game, man.

Kent Boucher 15:53
Through their nose here in the in the recruiting office.

Nicolas Lirio 15:56
We're relevant. man. Well, everyone, you saw the titles. National Cover Crop Survey came out. And Conservation Techno Technology Information Center and the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Center did the survey with the American Seed Trade Association. 600 farmers, 46 states, 113 questions. and it was fielded and In March and April of 2026. So 2026 cover crops are not included by any sort in this survey. and it was a pretty it's pretty in-depth, pretty interesting survey. So in mostly the Midwest is what we're talking about. The vast majority of people that took it were in first Missouri, then Illinois, then Iowa, then Minnesota. And that covered like over half of them of the people who actually took the survey. We are Over a five year period, we grew by five to six percent, or we grew our cover crops 33%, which comes down to about five to six percent per year. so it's obviously not a fad. In Iowa specifically, pardon me, we're doing, I believe the number is four million, just over four million acres, which is no small feat. but there was a in twenty twenty five a study done by Society and Natural Resources saying that many farmers abandon the practice after one year. and so there's more information, we'll get to it. But I'm curious what you guys think about as like anecdotally and just the evidence saying, okay, it is growing, but the Nutrient Reduction Act says we need to be at just shy of thirteen million acres and we're at four million acres growing. We need to literally triple and we're growing at five to six percent per year. You know what I mean?

Kent Boucher 17:52
Yeah. We both looked at each other like who's gonna open the can of worms first?

Kent Boucher 18:00
I would anecdotally I would say well, first of all, that is encouraging that there's growth, right? Yeah. I also read a book in college, called How to Lie with Statistics. And I think just a straight up number like that can be deceiving. And in the way that I have seen it be deceiving is I don't see a lot of it done well. I do see some that where the cover crop is is like a work of art, you know, and it's you can tell like that's making a difference. But a lot of it, you know, it it you maybe get a little green on the field and then it's terminated before it's really doing much meaningful retention of soil. pulling in and sequestering much carbon. I mean it's doing some, right? There's a live root there and the plants do plant things, but how much more it'd be if it was, you know, ten inches taller by time of termination. Yeah. so I don't I don't see a lot of it done well. And I think that's what you see when that's that little stat there of a lot of people are quitting after one year of trying. And Now there there could be other reasons for that. it could be the cost, you know. Now I don't know how much on average a farmer is ends up paying out of their pocket for cover crop at the end of the year or if it actually ends up I d I don't know. I don't know how that what the cost share we'll get it. Yeah. So maybe that's part of it is finances and finances coupled with something that they perceive to not be working.

Nicolas Lirio 19:47
Yeah.

Kent Boucher 19:56
or maybe they're kinda stumped on how to make it go better. You know, like not necessarily because they can't figure it out, but it's like, well, I just don't have the equipment or access to the equipment to make this go better. I know it would need to do be this, this, and this, but I don't know who to call. And I know everyone t tells me to call this one guy, but he's always so busy getting to everybody else that, you know, I kind of miss the window for the timing for me by the time he's available. Th there's I'm sure there's many hang ups for it. But I just don't see a lot of it that's being done super effectively.

Riley Rozendaal 20:33
I think I think we're still in the early phases of covers. I mean there's there's good covers being done. but the real unlock for covers is the savvy operators who can utilize grazing collars on unfenced farms with corn stubble residue and a good cover. there's a lot of feed value in there in the in the corn stalks and the stubble. There's a lot of feed value in the cover crop.

Nicolas Lirio 21:04
What's the best w what are some of the best cover crops for for grazing?

Riley Rozendaal 21:10
I that's that's actually kind of a blind spot for me. I've never I've never grazed covers. I've only grazed residue. but anything vegetative, any of the ryes, you know, are pretty vegetative. I've seen guys graze them with decent success. but I think the biggest obstacle right now is small producers don't want to buy equipment and I don't blame them, you know. Buy separate equipment for it. Diesel prices, it's another pass in both application and in termination. which in a if we're telling guys do no till and they're doing one pass to plant and one pass to spra or you know, two passes to spray, whatever, you're you're adding a significant amount of burden on the on the diesel side of things, you know, if if they're gonna do a whole nother pass or two related to cover crop. Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 22:07
I I wonder, you know, when people get their harvest in and they go, Okay, it's time to do cover crop this year and they realize we already are in the negative. Yeah, we can't afford to do it this year if they

Kent Boucher 22:16
Diesel is two X, yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 22:19
Guys if guys can get creative on how they're putting in covers or if they're doing like light tillage but they can work in covers with it at the same time, you know, then then it makes more sense. But doing a whole dedicated pass with high diesel duc to covers will be I'll be curious to see what the actual turnout is this year.

Nicolas Lirio 22:40
Yeah, right now it not diesel, gasoline. It is costing me eight dollars to get here and eight dollars to get back from work every day. Kinda interesting. so let's talk about money then. the biggest group of respondents pays between twelve and twenty dollars an acre for seed. and the next biggest group says they pay over thirty dollars.

Kent Boucher 23:06
It's out of pocket or is that before That's before Cosh?

Nicolas Lirio 23:10
Yep, and we'll get to the cost share here. So we're we're gonna I'll add this up. the all in average cost, this did not feel real to me. This felt like poor producing, was sixty dollars an acre. And I guess maybe if you have really expensive equipment, but I like so

Kent Boucher 23:28
They're saying that's the that's the total cost when applying to plant an acre of cover crop maths out to sixty bucks an acre.

Nicolas Lirio 23:36
My friend does it for fifteen dollars an acre via drone and I know for the fact, because I've sold it many times, is that seed is usually fifteen to twenty bucks an acre. So it seems like that number is like twice.

Riley Rozendaal 23:50
How they're figuring it in.

Nicolas Lirio 23:52
And if you buy old equipment, you know, and you have no equipment payment and you're willing to do the extra pass, I feel like it's under thirty. But I don't know.

Kent Boucher 24:01
Is is that is this a self reported number for a cost share?

Nicolas Lirio 24:06
interesting. I don't yeah, I don't know. That's a that's a really good point. Is like people yeah, right now

Kent Boucher 24:11
I I don't wanna cast any stones, but Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 24:16
I I really don't know. The that is so interesting. Like like when they sent out the survey, did it say like how much are you paying? Or did it say what did you tell the FSA? You know what I mean? I that is that is a great point.

Riley Rozendaal 24:32
And I wonder how they're accounting for it regionally, you know. Some some places are gonna have higher prices on covers than others and Yeah. You know, do they just take an aggregate of all that or

Nicolas Lirio 24:43
Farmers with ten years plus reported an average of seven bushel corn better, but under ten years the difference was negligible. which is exactly what Ruth McCabe said. and then soybeans showed a two percent bump just right away and it just it didn't get much better. It was two percent but which I mean two percent on a third of your farm is nothing to scoff at. You know what I mean? That's that's that's twenty dollars an acre, you know, or so. the payoff seems to come on a delay, which you know would kind of go back to the people who quit after a year or two. this is where most of the money pays back. And right now we're just talking about far if it was privatized, not government cost sharing. people who run cattle on it reporting fifty to seventy five dollars an acre in added value. I think this is probably the place that as a culture we should lean into the heaviest, is running cattle out there and and while the sun can harvest the while the plant can harvest the sun, then we've got cattle that can actually harvest the plant instead of not uselessly but feeling like the government's just footing this bill to have plants out there. And I do believe in giving fields rest, but

Riley Rozendaal 26:09
And being being residue won't offer much of anything. I you know, y you won't there's no reason to run, but with a cover crop you've got something out there to Yeah. at least offer some value.

Nicolas Lirio 26:22
Sixty eight percent. Now this was nationwide. This was not Iowa, which Ruth McCabe said, Iowa, Illinois, it is a lot harder. Northern Missouri, it is a lot harder. I doubt that this number would make sense as much. Sixty eight percent of the people who put in cover crop reported no incentive payments from nonprofits or government agencies. Over half. Did it because it made sense for them. Either they cared conservation or ROI, they understood it, or they realize my land will be worth more in forty years than everyone else around me. I know, and it sixty eight percent. I don't know now here's what I don't know. Is that sixty eight percent of the acres or is it sixty eight percent of the people doing it? They did not share that in the

Kent Boucher 26:53
That's great.

Riley Rozendaal 27:05
I would assume it's sixty eight percent of the acres. So I just don't see the grab on locally to yeah back that up. But

Nicolas Lirio 27:07
I hope so.

Nicolas Lirio 27:14
Well now obviously so I dolls has a program where they are doing where they give twenty five dollars the first year, but then they give fifteen dollars every year after that. And then like practical farmers of Iowa PFI, they through a grant from Pepsi, I believe, are giving quite a bit of money. Actually, I have the number here. If you're listening to this podcast, that's because you or someone you love Really cares about conservation, water quality, or systemic changes in agriculture. And I want to tell you about a company that does all three at the same time: Iowa Cover Crop. Now, Iowa Cover Crop, we've had a long-standing relationship with them and it has been amazing. Way before they sponsored the podcast, we have connected with them and bought a lot of cover crop seed, and they have bought a bunch of native seed from us. And let me just say they are wonderful people. They're family-owned, community-oriented, and they run. A heck of a business. So they've always taken care of us. Now they don't just serve Iowa. They send seed to Iowa and every state touching Iowa. And they don't just do cover crop. They do forage mixes, waterway mixes, any kind of small grain or food plot mixes that you could hope for. Basically, if it's not corn and beans, they've probably got you covered. I highly recommend this company. If you are looking for cover crop on your land, whether you've been doing it for a long time or you're just wanting to dabble, we applaud you and we recommend you reach out to IowaCovercrop.com. It is they gave ten million dollars in cost share for nine hundred thousand acres, which is a lot. That that's like what twelve bucks an acre. So that's not nothing. And then insurance companies, let's see, Iowa crop insurance discounts five dollars an acre for the farmers who are willing to do cover crop on their land. So that can add up. I mean it adds up to forty dollars the first year and twenty five to thirty dollars and but you know heavily subsidized and again as farmers we shouldn't want to be heavily subsidized because that helps our bank balance in the near term but we lose power and autonomy in the long term and that's not farmers aren't farming because they you know report to someone else they

Nicolas Lirio 29:36
lot of them are farming 'cause they like the self reliance and they're hard working and they wanna take part of that fruit.

Kent Boucher 29:42
Well and what's interesting about subsidizing those practices is one of the one of the selling points. If you were a cover crop salesman, one of your selling points is, this makes your ground more valuable in the end. Right. There's back end there's back end gain and it's it's a I'm not saying I'm against having incentives for to participate in a program, but let's let's take the incentives that we benefit from here at Hoxie, which would be equip or CRP. That doesn't really monetarily make an acre of ground more valuable to the farmer because it's in most cases, some cases maybe yes, right? Where it's like ground that could easily be cropped, but instead they have it in prairie, which I'm not against. I don't think I don't think prairies should only exist in ravines. I think I think that that leaves out members of our biotic community that that need prairie in all contexts in which it once existed. But my point is you're not when you when you put prairie down on a acre of ground that always loses you money. So in other words, it shouldn't be farmed, never should have been farmed, and shouldn't be farmed in the future, you're not really getting like you're not

Nicolas Lirio 30:59
Yeah.

Kent Boucher 31:08
This isn't a building thing that's becoming more valuable over time, right? Yeah. Whereas if you're putting if you're putting cover crops down on pancake flat ground, or maybe ground that's not pancake flat, but but is good row crop worthy ground, right? You technically are being paid twice, right? You're getting the incentive cost up front, but it's going towards something that's increasing in value because your soil's getting better. over the years that you're participating, right? And and whereas in any other business sense, where are you getting and it's not that they don't exist, but I mean in most contexts we're not okay with somebody getting like let's say if we wanted to build a new shed, like a b a big shed, right? That is going to pay off in the end for us to have because all the maintenance it saves us on on equipment, if we go to sell this land and we have a nice shed here, the land is worth more, that kind of thing, right? If we were to say, No, no, no, we need to be paid to build our shed up front, you know, it's like it's kind of an interesting concept.

Nicolas Lirio 32:21
I I the way that I Yeah, absolutely. I I I double dip. The way that I see it is that if we're like subsidies are best used to remove barriers, not for ongoing bank balances. It's it's just not better. So for instance right now

Kent Boucher 32:23
You get to capitalize on value twice.

Kent Boucher 32:40
So like a one time upfront payment type thing.

Nicolas Lirio 32:42
Hey, we'll help you buy the piece of equipment. We'll give you a one like the government will float a one percent loan for this piece of equipment so that it's you know, y that kind of stuff I think makes a lot more sense. Or what's the what's the the small the small business owning like deal right now where the government will will basically give you a very low interest and it's supposed to help To buy a business and it's supposed to help the boomers hand down their business. That makes sense because it's a one time the purchase of the business is a one time thing. If your business fails, past that, government's not taking responsibility. They're not gonna dip you know, dip out more cash for you. And so I think it makes sense if like, hey, we're we're gonna do some incentives on some equipment or we're gonna do some incentives on on something. But and I I want to incentivize people to do cover crop. I just don't think the ongoing like

Riley Rozendaal 33:34
It makes sense to incentivize an on ramp. Yeah. But not not to create a system where consistently where you know, and if we build if we build the system where cover crops are easy to get, the prices come down, the equipment's out there, there's on ramps, as a practice it becomes common. it will just become part of the norm without needing

Nicolas Lirio 33:38
Yeah. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 33:42
Every year you get a cost share.

Nicolas Lirio 34:00
I y

Riley Rozendaal 34:01
A consistent program to constantly hold it up.

Nicolas Lirio 34:04
You could do it pretty easily if you just said like, Hey, we're not gonna pay your we're not gonna pay your insurance premiums unless you implement XYZ practices. You don't get government you don't get government subsidies unless you're willing to do unless you're willing to farm your farm in a way that helps the populace. But again, that like insurance subsidies is another form of ongoing payments. I don't I'm not a huge fan of that. I don't I'm not saying I have all the answers to fix it. I just it's just not the way you want to build markets. And if we want to say, hey, we're gonna vote with our dollars at the grocery store, well, if the government decides what's gets grown on the farm, your dollar at the grocery store does not matter at all. The government's gonna say, well we're gonna grow more corn, we're gonna figure we'll we'll find a place to get you to have it, right? And they'll have their meetings behind closed doors with Cargill or whatever. Be like, hey, we got a lot of extra corn. Can we figure out how to move this? Or you know, or we go beg another country and we have to like be adversarial with another country just so they would buy a little bit of our soybeans. And like, that's so stupid. You know? So and I so I'm here, I'm I agree with the substance. I think equip does it pretty well. Where it's like, Hey, we're gonna give you like putting in a pond is very expensive. So we'll help you pay for that. But not like we're not gonna keep paying you because you have a pond. but they help with that initial barrier.

Riley Rozendaal 35:24
It's an investment in a better future. Yeah. You know, like an on ramp for cover crop would be, you know, it's not a here, we're gonna create the market or we're gonna determine exactly what the market does or doesn't want on a consistent basis.

Kent Boucher 35:40
Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 35:40
And we kind of got into this, but I want to hear what you guys think. Zach Smith said this on his podcast on the podcast with us that totally is gone. So sad. But I want to give him credit for it. he and maybe someone else came up with it. But he was the first time I ever heard he said, Look, we w right now we have a third as much cover crop in Iowa as we're supposed to have. If we were paying as a state fifteen to twenty five dollars per acre. for all the cover crop that we need to have in order to actually affect the water quality, which according to the the nutrient reduction strategy in Iowa is 60% of road crop acres. So you're talking somewhere about 13 million acres, skive or take a million acres. depending on where they're where those which acres are getting placed on. so at let's say there's public money that goes for to 25 million, you know, or or $25 for 10 million of those acres. $250 million per year. Okay, let's keep that $250 million per year. The farm defaucet, the big farm defaucet thing. The Iowa just signed in, Kim Reynolds and the, you know, Mike Neg's been prancing around everywhere. He signed, they signed it in June. It is $319 million per year.

Kent Boucher 37:07
Singing around everywhere.

Riley Rozendaal 37:08
Interesting way to describe it, Alpha.

Nicolas Lirio 37:10
You're not getting all the emails. I get an email from the USDA ever

Kent Boucher 37:14
I'm not I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just saying your phrasing was kinda funny. Well that's kinda what's pr prancing around.

Nicolas Lirio 37:21
Because they you know, they're like, Wow, look at this big shiny thing. Three hundred and nineteen million and I'm I'm glad that it's there, but three hundred and nineteen million dollars over twelve years, which is twenty seven million a year, which what was the other number? Two hundred and fifty million per year. So we're at ten percent. and Zach's point was not like, Iowa government isn't dishing out. We need to they're not voting on it, they need to give out more money. His thing was like, Iowa literally can't afford. Yeah. We we don't have that money to to give. We're Where are we gonna scrape together two hundred and fifty million dollars per year?

Kent Boucher 37:53
Well, I think doesn't our budget currently run at like a one billion dollar deficit or something like that?

Nicolas Lirio 38:00
It was a lot yeah, nine hundred nine hundred million dollar deficit in twenty twenty five, if I remember correctly. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 38:05
So I mean now you gotta come up with another quarter of that. Yeah. You know not happening.

Nicolas Lirio 38:11
Yeah, and like if I mean the tax on the biggest corporations in our state, Vermeer, Pellicorp, Athene, Casey's, like all of those together are coming up to that. You know what I mean? It's like where are you gonna get that money?

Kent Boucher 38:24
And the argument for all this is it's in the public's interest, right? The reason the public pays for something is because it's in the public's best interest to pay for it. And that already happens with equip money and with things like CRP, right? And and subsidized crop insurance. It is in the nation's best interest, our legislators have determined. For like right now my in laws are visiting from New Hampshire. So They're

Nicolas Lirio 38:55
Is that why you came in early today and are planning on staying late now?

Kent Boucher 38:59
We had a great time. We were up in my my favorite place in in driftless Iowa this this last weekend. Caught a giant brown truck.

Nicolas Lirio 39:07
You know how I know you were having a good time up there? He didn't call me.

Kent Boucher 39:11
Yeah, I was I

Riley Rozendaal 39:12
No reels, no call.

Nicolas Lirio 39:14
I've been on vacations before where I got quite a few phone calls, but this was not one of them.

Kent Boucher 39:18
was not one of them. And and it was raining back here, so I didn't have to feel guilty. Yeah. but but they're they're here from New Hampshire and I've explained to them how they pay for our corn here in in Iowa as as taxpayers that live in New Hampshire. And I think they you know it's not like they're they are they are like aware people. You know what I mean? So but it's just like Here they see it in the living flesh, right? And right, right. And so the idea might be, well, if Iowa can't pay for all that cover crop is in their federal program, it's like, you know, you already have people solving our problems here for us that live many states away. And yeah, there is some like food security is probably what it boils down to for like crop insurance subsidies.

Nicolas Lirio 39:50
I'll have that thought.

Kent Boucher 40:15
So like, yeah, you can see, you know, a a thread of logic in there, right? But at some point it's like cover crops are really benefiting Iowa mostly. Yes, the whole watershed, we know the dead zone of the Gulf and all that affects really everybody, right? But I mean like how how much do you have to yeah bring in outside money to to solve something? And and I just don't think we're gonna be able to to Zach's point, subsidize our way to to That two hundred and fifty million at home. Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 40:48
Yeah, I I think the only place the only pocketbook big enough to solve this problem in Iowa is families at the grocery store. I I I think that yeah, we just we just want our cake and eat it too. And if if we gave up some Oreos and fruit roll ups and you know a few other things and maybe ate a few less calories

Kent Boucher 41:13
Yeah, but how does that translate so much to cover crops though specifically?

Nicolas Lirio 41:17
Well I think what w it it ideally what we buy at the grocery store should affect what's grown on the land. Yeah. That that's ideal, you know, and and so

Kent Boucher 41:26
So but the idea of cover crops is we're not leaving the corn and bean model. We're making the corn and bean model work better.

Nicolas Lirio 41:32
Yeah, that that's fair. But i you it maybe with beef, you know, maybe with beef. I bet the small beef producers are like the people who are selling quarters and halves are just do I hope they're doing great right now. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 41:46
But but we've we've talked multiple times and no one's building their herd. So it's not like it's not like they're way normally we only sell three, let's sell six this year because 'cause they're not they're not they're not increasing their herd. So well

Riley Rozendaal 41:59
And and there's all this talk about, you know, creating programs to get young people interested in this stuff. But until the market makes sense. Yeah. I mean you look at ground. We're talking about

Kent Boucher 42:16
'Cause the money's there right now, but nobody trusts it. Well

Riley Rozendaal 42:19
Well it i is this is this Charlie Brown football deal? You're you're asking people to put up a lot of money. I mean, to try and either buy ground or to build a relationship, to rent it.

Kent Boucher 42:23
Yeah, yeah.

Kent Boucher 42:34
Or or pay some labor to help with a larger herd.

Riley Rozendaal 42:37
Yeah. And and for what? I mean we've seen cattle futures get slammed when when we decide beef prices get too high before. And so I'm not gonna get all political, but we're

Kent Boucher 42:48
Yeah, hungry for reject. How how did Austin re No, Chinese rejection? Yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 42:54
I I I think what cattle guys are doing right now and rightly so is cashing in on a high market because the market's been junk for a while, you know, and yeah and I don't know why you would try and rebuild a herd into the headwinds we've been seeing, you know, and the the market doesn't stand to get the land market's not going down.

Nicolas Lirio 42:56
China's reject me for

Kent Boucher 42:58
That's like

Riley Rozendaal 43:23
Feeds going up. Right. I think that those guys are gonna take money where they take the wins where they can. Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 43:31
What so I I I I I kind of agree with you, Kent. It is a little off kilter, but Iowans spend five point three six billion dollars at the grocery store, not on food, at the grocery store. and so two hundred and fifty million dollars of that is d five percent. We could go without we could go with five percent less calories, you know, in our state. And and so my point is

Kent Boucher 43:58
So instead of having so it are well.

Nicolas Lirio 44:03
The idea is that if we add that expense to the farmers, they need to sell their product for that whatever percentage more. So can we go to the grocery store and afford to pay more for those groceries? And I know we love complaining about the price of groceries. We can get enough calories. Like if we went back to the 1960s and had cans of beans and and meat and you know, meat being expensive, you know, or a big percentage. The the money is there. We would it we would have to be intentional about how does it actually trickle down. Are we are we paying more for grass fed beef? Are we, I don't know, maybe even buying corn less so people aren't as incentivized to have corn on the ground and maybe they put something else there. But my point being that if we shift how those dollars are spent, they there's enough of those dollars that it it could trickle to the ground. We would just have to be intentional about

Kent Boucher 44:55
See, I I agree with you when it comes to we w we we pay more because we choose a better product. But to me that doesn't go that doesn't line up directly with the cover crop need need because the cover crop need is embedded in the corn and bean model. So what what we're instead asking people to do is to pay more for Oreos and cheez its. Because that's what corn and beans are at the grocery store. And and okay, so we just pay like a you know, like a a a cover crop stamp tax, you know on on corn and corn and bean items because that's what cover crop works with. I think the healthiest model is we just don't grow so much frickin' corn and beans and we have we have something el we have something that is more like real food.

Nicolas Lirio 45:37
interesting.

Kent Boucher 45:54
on the ground or we have I think yes the idea of attaching beef production to that or maybe even if you're willing to go there pork production on

Nicolas Lirio 46:06
Sheep and goats. You get way more calories per acre. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 46:09
And I see that so I guess I don't think that the consumer here, although I think most times the consumer is is the key to all of it, if you're if we're gonna just s stay in a corn and bean yeah extremely dominated landscape, I don't know that the c the consumer can really bail us out there. I d I just I just don't see how it yeah how it really there's a direct

Nicolas Lirio 46:34
Yeah, you might you might be right. Probably best case scenario is the consumer stops

Kent Boucher 46:39
In a way they already are. Right? Yeah. 'Cause they're 'cause they're paying federal income tax that goes to all the cost shares for cover crops already. Yeah. And for the subsidized crop insurance. Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 46:51
I I think I agree with you on that. Like like best case scenario, the consumer at the grocery store stops eating corn products that are bad for you, but then you still end up with lower corn prices so people rip out corn. So it it still just ends up corn. Yeah, yeah. I think

Kent Boucher 47:05
You have prairie instead of cover crops.

Nicolas Lirio 47:08
Yeah, what's what is it, Kernza? Was that the perennial that is like supposed to be able to make it? Yeah. Yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 47:13
Ancient ancient grain or whatever.

Kent Boucher 47:16
Zacquaine talked about Eincorn.

Nicolas Lirio 47:18
Why don't we use perennial like it does it not have as much sugar? Does it not produce as much per acre? I I I

Kent Boucher 47:24
I guess I don't know. Is it easier for John Deere if they have to make five different types of combines or or two types?

Riley Rozendaal 47:25
Clear.

Nicolas Lirio 47:38
How much wear and tear do they get on their planters every year from having to replant every single year? Yeah.

Kent Boucher 47:43
Yeah.

Riley Rozendaal 47:44
I don't think that there's been enough investment that way. You know, we've there's a lot of momentum behind where we've gotten to, you know. Yeah.

Kent Boucher 47:53
Well everyone ever everyone's wa the most successful companies win in the margins, right? The it's not the big ideas, it's not the great inventions, it's I can do this for the least amount of cost and the max amount of profit. And the more you have to have a diverse system, there's more margins, right? Yeah. And it's harder to keep your eye on on the ball when you have more balls that you have to keep your eyes on. And and so the

Nicolas Lirio 47:59
Yeah.

Kent Boucher 48:24
it's a top down problem. And and there's not enough collective power to try and and I agree, in most cases it should just be everyone choosing to do the right thing, right? Whether that's as a consumer, I'm gonna choose to make the best food choice that I possibly can with what I've got. whether it's the guy who's growing the crops saying I'm gonna do this because it's the right thing to do. Whether that's using cover crops, whether it's growing a third crop, whether it's whatever, right? Like that is that is the collective power. Everyone choosing to do to love their neighbor and to and to do the best thing, right? Yeah. But that's a lot easier said than done. And history has only proven that it's a lot easier said than done. Yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 49:18
I I totally agree with you and I would even boil it down to biology because I actually do think that you know, if we wanna demonize CEOs or whatever, it I I think that the consumer can still beat them out, but I'm not gonna blame a CEO for me being addicted to sugar. I'm not gonna blame them for you know what I mean. Now I ca I think that there there could be malpractice behind the scenes and I'm gonna blame them for that all day. I'm not but the fact that I go to the grocery store and over and over and over again feed my own addictions, that that part's on me. And and that's real. Like

Kent Boucher 49:58
Well that's our and that's our only way out of it, right? We're not there's there's not gonna ever be right. There's not gonna be a and that's why we have a podcast, right? I don't say this because well let's pack it up and you know, let the world burn. no, it's because I I'm preaching to myself here. I want myself to do better. And the podcast has helped helped me to do better. and I still have a long ways to go. But I hope other people

Nicolas Lirio 50:04
No one's coming to save us.

Kent Boucher 50:27
As they're being made aware of the power that they have, want to be part of the collective solution. And that's and that's that's the only hope to really like solving these problems. We can't incentivize it enough. We can't and it can't always come down to the taxpayer to to make it work. Yeah. By being forcefully have their wages garnished to to make sure somebody else does the right thing. Holds up their end of the deal, right? I

Nicolas Lirio 50:54
Totally agree. Riley, you wanna say something that's somewhat between and Ken and I?

Riley Rozendaal 50:59
I will I will say something that's kinda I I think at at the end of the day for me what it comes down to is we talk a lot about incentivizing, but incentivizing is what's got us gotten us here. You know, we've spent a lot of money to to get to this point where these these are the things we grow and we know how to do it and we're good at it. But until in my mind, until the government steps back a little bit on all this incentivization, we're not gonna see you know, land prices are so high because we know you have insurance options. We know you have a guaranteed market. Because if corn goes down, then we'll get a stimulus payment, you know. Until that changes structurally, I don't, you know, we can we can all vote with our dollar to a degree, but the It's a large force to try and you know, that's a big boat to turn. takes generations really. So I I think the the biggest place we can make a change is in in maybe having a little bit less of that top down, asking for less and trying to take less from the top. in the hopes that that will maybe result in a more resilient food system where we're actually producing We're producing products for a market, not saying I have this product and now I need to make a market. And you have to guarantee a market, otherwise, you know, that's where you get land use where

Kent Boucher 52:37
I grew all the stuff, find a place for it to go.

Riley Rozendaal 52:39
Yeah. Yeah. You know. Nobody nobody grows ten thousand zucchinis at their house and then goes, Wow, I'm gonna grow twenty thousand next year. I don't even know what I'm gonna do with these ten thousand, but I'm gonna grow twenty thousand. Yeah, that's true. That's you don't you just grow a smaller patch.

Kent Boucher 52:54
join multiple churches to get rid of that many zu there's always zucchinis in the lobby at church Yeah during garden season that is another example

Riley Rozendaal 52:57
Yeah yeah.

Nicolas Lirio 53:01
my goodness. Great buckets of tomatoes. And like my wife is like every old lady's favorite person in Knoxville. So that like they go in the coffee shop and they just love her and we get so much food. 'Cause they're just excited to share it. And yeah, we get some great pies every year. It's and pays to have an amazing wine.

Kent Boucher 53:21
Yeah. And I and to be fair, maybe I'm just feeling a little grumpy about incentives today, but i I agree with what Riley's saying. we've we've been doing that all along and we're still only a third of the way to what to critical mass, right? To to make meaningful difference based on the nutrient reduction strategy. And and I don't know that that people are are are are excited about paying more taxes because that's what funds all that. You know. I do I am thankful that companies like private companies step in though and pitch in. I think that's good. That's a good that's a good a way to to give back. I'm sure somebody could write in and be like, that's what you think. This, you know, when you follow the money and there's probably true to that too. But but the the reality is that Nature loves diversity and and until we make steps closer to that, we can expect little to get better.

Nicolas Lirio 54:29
Yeah. Well, everyone, thanks for hanging out. Don't forget, if you're looking for native seed, you can check it out. We've been talking about cover crop. I'm sure I will put the Iowa Cover Crop ad in here, but they really are knowledgeable. We've sat down with them several times, just picked their brain about cover crop. They

Kent Boucher 54:47
And they've helped to make Iowa better. I imagine. In fact, I just drove by a field I believe this weekend where somebody was advertising an Iowa cover crop field like this field uses you know, cover crops from Iowa cover crop.

Nicolas Lirio 54:59
They do a really great job up there. You're probably gonna talk to Josh, but what you should do is go to their website and they have like a dealer map. So it just shows you who who their nearest dealer is. We appreciate you all and we will talk to you again next time.