Ep. 262 Getting Fired by DOGE as a USDA Employee with Tabitha Panas

Jun 13

Tabitha Panas was one of thousands of USDA employees fired on Valentine’s Day with no warning. The reason was “performance”, but we know first hand that Tabitha gets incredible results at her job. So what’s going on? Why did DOGE fire her and others. We get into her side of the story to start the podcast. We also discuss the future of conservation and the people who are entering the industry. We spend a long time at the end of the episode doing a mental exercise on what would happen to the ecology if all humans left Iowa right now.

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00;00;00;04 - 00;00;03;12
Unknown
welcome to the Prairie Farm podcast.
00;00;03;14 - 00;00;06;23
Unknown
Tabitha
00;00;06;25 - 00;00;29;16
Unknown
You're your, title right now is something that is kind of always been true, right? At least professionally, for you. And by the way, you gave us one of the best piece of advice that I've passed on countless times is the first time we recorded with you. Yeah. On how do people find their thing right. Like, how do they how do they find their calling?
00;00;29;18 - 00;00;55;26
Unknown
And, you said don't tell people, to chase their dreams. Yeah. Or. Yeah. Or do what they love. That's how you don't tell people to do what they love. Tell them to find a problem that they are passionate about. Helping find a solution to. And so your title reflects that now and on this podcast, you are a lush Hills prairie conservationist.
00;00;55;29 - 00;01;15;11
Unknown
And that has played out in different iterations. You were just telling me about kind of your first job, which was what was the title of that organization that year. So one of my first jobs right out of college was with the conservation Corps of Iowa. I was a field field crew member, so we traveled in a small crew of kids up and down the Lost Hills.
00;01;15;11 - 00;01;39;06
Unknown
They gave us a lot of, like a crash course on fire training, chainsaw training, chemical application. We got a chemical applicator license, and then we just had a number of different project hosts that we got to work with, and it was just so awesome. I mean, being outside all day, every day, rain, snow, heat, whatever it was cutting down cedar trees, prescribed fire cutting, invasive species, spraying.
00;01;39;06 - 00;01;58;11
Unknown
It's like hard, tough, dirty work. And so that's why I said that was one of my most favorite and my most hated jobs at the same time. Like it was just so impactful. And I feel like, yeah, it just it was amazing. So. Yeah. Yeah. So you had that and then you went from that to Pheasants Forever, right?
00;01;58;14 - 00;02;20;20
Unknown
Yeah. I was, Pheasants Forever farm bill biologist for almost five years, in here in western Iowa, started out in Denison and then moved here to Council Bluffs and did it here in the lot. Sells for a couple of years to working with private landowners, and helping them get connected to resources that could improve conservation on their farm or their land, improve wildlife habitat, water quality, all that.
00;02;20;20 - 00;02;55;16
Unknown
So that was also awesome. Yeah. And then most recently, you were with the NRCs, right? Yeah. So, yeah, since July of 2024, I was with the Natural Resources Conservation Service, as a natural resources specialist, kind of redundant there, but I liked it, and similar kind of role to the Pheasants Forever position. You know, I was working with private landowners to address resource concerns on their farm, helping them with technical and financial assistance where we can, you know, people might have problems or want to make improvements.
00;02;55;16 - 00;03;13;19
Unknown
It's all voluntary conservation that we do. So we'll go out and do a farm visit and see what we can do, to solve their problems. You know, some people have some massive erosion concerns. Some people want to add diversity to their farm and, work through some of our programs to, you know, add some plant diversity out there.
00;03;13;22 - 00;03;42;12
Unknown
So just different things like that. So could you just walk us through you don't have to give your opinion on anything, but just walk us through the events of your job and people around you, you know, jobs starting February 1st this year. Yeah. Yeah. So starting this spring, you know, with the changing administration, there's obviously been a lot of change in, the objective of USDA and the administration.
00;03;42;12 - 00;04;10;19
Unknown
So, it was February 14th. I received, an email first thing when I got in in the morning, that had been sent the evening before. Just letting me know that, I mean, since I was, less than a year with the organization, you're in a probationary period. So due to my probationary status, I had not performed, you know, I guess up to standards.
00;04;10;21 - 00;04;36;28
Unknown
And they were standard for being there more than a year. That was the standard. Pretty much. I know. So, you know, I was obviously devastated to get that news. There was, some inkling that that might be happening, but we we weren't sure. And being that I worked for USDA, I thought that would maybe be more safe than some other, departments, but and, you know, no, like, runway.
00;04;37;05 - 00;05;01;00
Unknown
No, like, hey, you've got two weeks to finish your projects. So it was basically like, yeah, my supervisor had to meet with me that day, turn in all my equipment. And that was the last day. And it was very confusing because, I mean, that letter was, I mean, it didn't give information about benefits. It was just very basic, like, you are done.
00;05;01;00 - 00;05;18;10
Unknown
Thank you. Wow. There. Were there any benefits? Like. So I did end up finding out after emailing HR, waiting around a week, trying to figure things out. I mean, I rushed to try to get a prescription I needed right away because it's like $500 without insurance. And, so I wasn't able to get it. And I'm like, well, let's just hold off here.
00;05;18;10 - 00;05;45;12
Unknown
And, it ended up that I did have 30 days on my insurance, so that was good. So, you know, fast forward a little bit. Come March, there was a Supreme Court order that, reversed those terminations essentially. So stating that federal probationary employees that were terminated based on performance needed to be reinstated. Based on what what was there, based based on.
00;05;45;19 - 00;06;06;18
Unknown
I guess I'd have to look back at it. And I'm just kind of quoting from my mind here. I might not be 100% correct on this, but it was just essentially based on the fact that, you know, these are not I think they were trying to say that, like, these weren't based on performance. They were more of a mass layoff style, termination.
00;06;06;18 - 00;06;26;00
Unknown
And so they needed to go through other means to achieve those layoffs, I guess. I it's been a while since I've read it. Yeah. But, yeah. So then I was super excited to be reinstated to my position. You know, I had already actually accepted another position with the U.S Post Office. I was going to go be a mail carrier.
00;06;26;00 - 00;06;39;28
Unknown
I'm like, you know, I love to be outside, I love walking, I'm going to do this. I'm going to see what this is like. And so I was like, I had already signed and accepted and done everything to be a mail carrier and was ready to do that, and then I get reinstated. So then I'm just kind of waiting.
00;06;40;01 - 00;06;55;01
Unknown
And I didn't want to tell the post office too soon, because what if I don't like by the time, you know, they're like, you're reinstated here in like three weeks. And so it's like, well, I want to get in my desk and make sure I really, before I tell the post office. So I was kind of in this limbo of like, what should I do?
00;06;55;04 - 00;07;16;03
Unknown
I decided I wanted I definitely wanted to return. In the end, they had me, well, I mean, if I could return today, I would. It's just such important work, like the things that we're doing. The educational piece with landowners, it is just an amazingly rewarding job, honestly. And it's so desperately needed in the state of Iowa.
00;07;16;03 - 00;07;42;04
Unknown
You know, we need more conservation funding, not less. We need, people to have incentives to notice. We need people to have incentives to implement cover crops, implement diversity on their farms. You know, we essentially have half of our topsoil left in our 160 year farming history, modern farming history. So we it was estimated that I can't remember, I think about 2 to 3ft of topsoil.
00;07;42;08 - 00;08;04;08
Unknown
We're now down to like 16, 18in of topsoil on average in the state of Iowa. And topsoil equals the ability to produce food. So we are dwindling away at our ability to produce food. It's being washed downstream. It's we've had a lot of drought. We've had a lot of wind events lately. Just last week, it was like the sky was a brown cloud around here, you know?
00;08;04;14 - 00;08;27;01
Unknown
And who knows where that soil was from? I mean, it could have been from way south. It could have been from right here. Well, we had that from Oklahoma earlier in the spring. Yeah. And I mean, Illinois last week had a dust storm. I like a true yeah, true dust or. Yes. Yeah. There was I think I, I want to say like a 70 car pileup in Kansas earlier this spring too, because of a big dust storm.
00;08;27;04 - 00;09;01;12
Unknown
Yeah. And a few people lost their lives. Two. Very. So I was out in, the Sandhills region, in early April. In this spring, I got a friend out there who, grew up on a ranch, and we go out there and and Chet Hunt in the spring, and it's a ton of fun. You love seeing the prairie plants out there and just that difference in ecosystem and and truly an ecosystem that's definitely changed from its original, you know, players and, and members, but still largely intact.
00;09;01;12 - 00;09;24;01
Unknown
You know, the Ponderosa pine has really moved in. And, there's a few other tree species that, are native to America, but like, really haven't been a part of that ecosystem for very long that have really settled in there. I think there's way more cottonwoods now than there were historically. I think that might have been. The other one that he was telling me about was beautiful place.
00;09;24;01 - 00;09;52;05
Unknown
I love going out there. And, his family is just so generous. And, so I was sitting down to dinner with his, we're actually eating some, Nebraska elk burgers. He, he, seeing elk, he sent me a gripping grin a couple of years ago with his bull. He he, shot. And, seeing someone hold up a gripping grin with an elk in a soybean field.
00;09;52;05 - 00;10;09;03
Unknown
It's kind of a it's like, it's a weird paradigm. It's funny to think through, but, we're sitting there eating some of these Nebraska elk. He's talking with his dad, who's lived on the land his entire life. Guy in his 60s, grew up on a ranch out there and is now working on a different ranch.
00;10;09;03 - 00;10;49;10
Unknown
To this day, that's all his career has been. And, you know, a guy who's who probably I would say is, is a lot of his politics probably aren't the same as most people concerned about the environment of, I'll put it that way. But he said to me, he said, you know, I really feel that, based on what I see going on, especially in and and Sandhills, I don't really know historically how the dustbowl affected that region of the country, but definitely parts of southwest Nebraska were were a part of that.
00;10;49;15 - 00;11;08;19
Unknown
Oh, yeah. But he was talking more into Kansas, which he's got. I think he might have some family down there, I think. I think he has a son that lives down there, too. He's like just seeing how a lot of the shelter belt plantings that were established to get us out of the dustbowl by the USDA, where I think.
00;11;08;19 - 00;11;29;24
Unknown
Isn't that what created the NRCs? Didn't the NRC has come out of the dustbowl, I think I think that, yeah, you're correct. It was in a response to the dust Bowl. Yeah. He's like I think we're we're like headed to that. Yeah. Again because we're committing a lot of the same mistakes that. Yeah that we did then.
00;11;29;27 - 00;11;51;27
Unknown
And it was just really interesting hearing that perspective from a guy who has lived so close to the land for so long and who, who isn't, you know, it's easy to see, you know, politically when someone starts and we got this problem coming and we can expect this because that's that's their echo chamber there. And he doesn't live in that echo chamber.
00;11;51;29 - 00;12;13;00
Unknown
He just looking at his own two eyes and with a whole lot of experience. Yeah. And I think that these, I'm calling it a duster that we had last week because I think the people who survived him on the, in the, in the Dust Bowl in no man's land. Yeah. I'll keep preaching it. Everyone needs to read or listen to the book.
00;12;13;00 - 00;12;33;00
Unknown
The worst hard time. You just do. However bad you think the Dust Bowl was, it was worse. Yeah. And that book will put it into perspective for you. We had a true duster last week's sweep through, Illinois. But even here, you know, driving home from work, I got footage of it, you know, dust everywhere. It looks like it's raining, but it's dust.
00;12;33;03 - 00;12;55;18
Unknown
Yeah. And, it's, I was driving home at 530, and it's laid out till 830, so. Yeah. And it was already. I was driving with my headlights on. Yeah, yeah. And these are a little bit more, intermittent weather events. You know, it takes some high winds. It takes weeks of no rain. And then we, we have these dustbowl like effects.
00;12;55;22 - 00;13;21;19
Unknown
But even in a good year, even when we're, you know, have a lot of moisture and we're not seeing this symptom occur, you know, we're losing an average of a dime width of soil every year on farms, you know, wind and water erosion. So even in a year when we're not seeing the dust bowl, that's what's so kind of insidious about these things is it's like you don't see it, you don't see it happening so slowly, and it's happening over a long period of time.
00;13;21;19 - 00;13;43;22
Unknown
So unless you're listening to people who study this stuff are tuned into this stuff, you know, who's going to walk across the ground. If you walked outside tomorrow and your front door step with a was a dime with lower, would you ever know, you know. And so it's like these things are just happening year by year. But you stack up stacks of times over that for decades.
00;13;43;22 - 00;14;06;19
Unknown
Yeah. And we're really starting to see these effects, you know, I mean, I talked to a farmer in Carroll County, Iowa, and he said that his I think grandpa, grandfather, was around in dustbowl times and they had, fence at the bottom of this hill and they had so much soil erosion. Washing off of their hillsides that they had to build another.
00;14;06;21 - 00;14;23;20
Unknown
That fence got completely washed over where, you know, it was completely underground now. And they had to build. Wow. They had to build another fence on top of that fence. And that one got washed over. They had three stacks of fences at the bottom of a hill, because that's how much soil is moving downhill. It's burying our fences.
00;14;23;22 - 00;14;42;05
Unknown
So, and it takes a strong experience. I remember another thing you said at the very, in our first podcast with you was that if we always ask that question. Right, if you could change one thing about the world and you're like, I wish everyone would just, like, be in a prairie for a little bit. My dad, we caught you often on the podcast.
00;14;42;10 - 00;15;11;03
Unknown
We did? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You for, for, I don't know, for your age. I guess you are, a lot of wisdom. A lot of wisdom. Yeah, size of wisdom. But the like. Dad, he he quote the very beginning roots of his conservation journey. Like, there was a whole thing with a pheasant. But way before that, there was him at, like, 11 years old, getting stuck in a tractor at the bottom of a hill because all the, all the soil had eroded to the bottom of that hill in a waterway.
00;15;11;10 - 00;15;26;22
Unknown
And now it was, you know, a few inches it was he calls it slick. It's not, you know, and he couldn't get out of it. And that ingrained in his brain, I don't know if it was because his, you know, grandpa yelled at him for because he got it stuck or whatever. It was like something ingrained in his brain, this is a problem.
00;15;26;22 - 00;15;47;11
Unknown
Our soil leaving and I well, yeah, he just. Carol is such a, mechanical mind, you know, like, he's just very like, he understand that he can look at things, just know how they work. And he's like, wow. All the, you know, as a kid, all this dirt isn't from here. It's from up there. And that means that up there doesn't have any of this anymore.
00;15;47;11 - 00;16;08;00
Unknown
Yeah, that's not. And that, in Carol's words, that's not good. That's not good. Yeah. So what brought us Cedar back the other day at Native Cedar? The vast majority of people that use them treat them really well. But this specific individual did not. And what did he say? He took one look at it and what he said.
00;16;08;02 - 00;16;33;25
Unknown
Carol just looks at it goes. That's terrible. Like they had so abused David. You know, it's like whether it was just like there was just like a simple mechanical concept. Yeah. And, yeah, that was. Oh, man. Oh, it's so funny. So. So let's go back. You you said no to, actually, I think being a post, a mail carrier would be really cool for, like, a while.
00;16;33;25 - 00;16;52;28
Unknown
All right? I'm too extroverted here. I was a mail carrier for a short time. He was. He got a little frostbite, didn't he? Got frost bit. Slipped on the ice one time. He got bit by a dog. Oh, yeah. The whole day he was. Yeah. Yeah. So, so so you you chose going back to the USDA. When was that?
00;16;52;28 - 00;17;23;27
Unknown
And then what happened? So that was sometime around March. Late March. And, you know, so I get reinstated. I'm super excited to be back. My coworkers are super excited to have me back. I start jumping back into projects right away. Not only maybe a week later, in the news is now, you know, the Supreme Court has kind of reversed that order that reinstated me and said that federal agencies no longer have to reinstate people.
00;17;23;29 - 00;17;45;27
Unknown
And so we were reading about different federal employees who were told they were going to be reinstated and then weren't. I already was fully reinstated. So am I safe now? We just weren't sure. So it was essentially like probationary employees seem to be on the chopping block again. Like they could just turn around. And now now you can fire probationary employees in this way.
00;17;45;29 - 00;18;06;25
Unknown
So they had already offered the deferred resignation program once before in the spring. And I was like, no, I will not take that. You know, essentially it's saying that you will be able to get paid through September 30th, you'll be on administrative leave, and you, will have that time, I guess, to find a new job, see your way out.
00;18;06;28 - 00;18;34;13
Unknown
You know, as, as they're attempting to make government more efficient and save dollars. So that's kind of the the thought process behind that resignation program. So I originally never took that. But after being fired, rehired and then potentially being fired again with talks of reduction in force happening later on, you know, even if I make it through to July and get out of my probationary period, you know, there still are future reductions in force, looming.
00;18;34;17 - 00;18;59;21
Unknown
So I chose to take the resignation program, you know, fire me once. Shame on you. Fire me twice like, you know, like I can't be fooled and fired again on this, I blame. Yeah. And so I took the resignation. And so now I'm in the process of just looking for other employment. I've applied for a few pretty exciting opportunities, but I'm also just kind of taking time to, like, step back, do some writing.
00;18;59;21 - 00;19;14;09
Unknown
I feel like writing really helps, you know, make pros and cons less about things in a world where you can really do anything, like how do you make the most impact? It's like, where do you start? What do you, you could do a lot of different things. What do you what are you finding? Where do you feel like you make the most impact?
00;19;14;12 - 00;19;35;05
Unknown
Well, you know, right now I kind of am focusing on, like, career things. So, you know, I've kind of dabbled in doing other, fields altogether, you know, like, maybe now I don't want to work in conservation. I want to like, for example, my dad's a home appraiser. He makes good money. He he works all the time, but he doesn't have to.
00;19;35;12 - 00;19;53;23
Unknown
I know I could be a home appraiser and work, like, part time. And then I would have all my other time to do these awesome volunteer opportunities that, you know, in a, in a perfect world, they'd be paid opportunities. But, you know, like my work through the Iowa Prairie Network, my work I just recently became a board member of the Lost Preservation Society as well.
00;19;53;28 - 00;20;19;22
Unknown
Yeah. Actually, that might still kind of be in the works at this moment. I don't know if they've officially voted me on yet, but I, I very likely will be. So, you know, I have a lot of different, like, projects that I'm working on, and I think it would be great to, you know, maybe not be so drained with all of the conservation stuff I do all day at work and then just have my free time to pursue this.
00;20;19;22 - 00;20;42;21
Unknown
So. Yeah. Yeah. Time is time is a there's a gift for sure. And, and so it's good to see that you've been able to, you know, make the most out of it. But obviously we, we, we felt for you when, when you know. Yeah. Kent was like man if you're trying to be more efficient, like, it's an oversight to fire Tabitha, you know, it was like it was like, yeah, what are we doing it?
00;20;42;22 - 00;21;02;24
Unknown
Well, that was such the, you know, all the talk behind it, you know, the. Well, we need to get back to a meritocracy and, like, look, if you're if you want to get rid of a, you know, all the, the corporate garbage that happens or not corporate, it's red tape. Red tape. There's a there's a bureaucracy.
00;21;02;29 - 00;21;26;05
Unknown
Bureaucracy. That's the that's the main one. You want to get rid of the bureaucracy of something and, and people having, you know, privileges that they haven't earned. That was not the way to do it. Yeah. You it just acts, it's just it's just continues the, the bureaucratic process in my opinion. Yeah. So in my personal opinion, it has not been very thoughtful.
00;21;26;07 - 00;21;41;19
Unknown
I again, personal opinion think there is a lot of bureaucracy. There is a lot of red tape. There is a lot of ways that we could slim things down so we don't have to have 45 people look at something and take all this many years time and this and then it goes bounces around here, to there, to this place.
00;21;41;19 - 00;22;01;26
Unknown
You know, we have a lot of paperwork. We have a lot of processes. We have, a lot of things that could totally be streamlined. And in my opinion, I don't think it was a very, you know, thoughtful way of going about that. We'll see what happens. I know that, we were pretty understaffed at the Natural Resources Conservation Service in Iowa as a whole.
00;22;01;26 - 00;22;31;00
Unknown
Was pretty understaffed. Stop prior. To these cuts being made. So they're definitely bare bones now. And potentially they'll be hiring again when we have a new fiscal year. So nothing that I have signed or anything, you know, taking that resignation for this time, you know, I'm resigning from my current position at this time, but I'm not taking off anything, taking anything off the table for the future, you know?
00;22;31;06 - 00;22;57;09
Unknown
So that was one thing that was really important to me. When making that decision is I could work here again in the future, when things are more stable and, Yeah, yeah. I'm curious. Like, on boots, on the ground level rewinding eight months, what you were doing in the office? What? How how were you helping conservation?
00;22;57;11 - 00;23;18;19
Unknown
I know a big part is educating landowners and the NRCs when we work with them, that that's just. Which is super, super, super important part. But, like, what were you doing that you you went home at night and you're like, I made a difference today. Yeah. So I mean, kind of just an average day is we I mean, any day could look so different.
00;23;18;22 - 00;23;40;02
Unknown
There are a number of different federal programs that we work with. So like the Conservation reserve program was one that I worked with. I love that program. That's like the bread and butter program for pheasant habitat in Iowa for prairie constructions in Iowa. The conservation reserve program is huge. It's administered by the farm Service Agency. But the Natural Resources Conservation Service provides technical assistance.
00;23;40;06 - 00;24;01;21
Unknown
So I loved going out in the spring like right now, one thing that, folks within NRCs might be doing would be helping people with planting. Right. Like, so how do I plant this? Where do I get a drill? What seed do I plant? What am I doing? You know, somebody who's enrolled in the program? It might be having someone who planted last fall and it's starting to come up already.
00;24;01;21 - 00;24;14;28
Unknown
And this is one of my favorite things to do, is go out when people are like, I think I need to spray this. This is a failed seeding. No, it's a prairie reconstruction. There's going to be a lot of annual weeds. What you need to do right now is mow and point out all the little baby plants that are coming and be like, here, look at this little seedling.
00;24;14;28 - 00;24;30;27
Unknown
Look at this little partridge pea. Look at this. This looks like it might be side oats, but grasses are hard to tell, you know? So you know that all that, all sorts of stuff. So that is super fun, you know, making sure that people aren't completely killing a stand and wasting tons of their money that they put into this.
00;24;30;27 - 00;24;56;05
Unknown
You know, you also taught us that if it's an unidentified flower, just say, oh, I think it's an aster. Right. So, yeah, they're around forever. Like a bunch of them are already up, and there's only a million asters here. Might be in the aster family because, like, even I think stuff. Oh, okay. Like cousin, you know. So you and I don't want to kind of sound like an expert.
00;24;56;11 - 00;25;26;16
Unknown
And you got a good site. That's grandma. It just has no idea. I don't think it's ever even seen its grandma in real life. Yeah, right. What they spend about, what do you think? Maybe four weeks every summer. Oh, yeah. Other native grasses. It is so hard to keep our cities grow up here. I've been. I'm like, we just need to move it to a field in the middle of nowhere, like a field on an island, you know, and Lake Superior would still seed it.
00;25;26;22 - 00;25;54;28
Unknown
Oh, yeah. No. Speaking of which type of that. You want a job digging out a little from three hours away? Yeah. Oh, provide the shovel. Yeah, yeah. Sounds like a pretty good deal. Yeah, man. So. Well, I think I think where the importance is to especially there's an outsized importance in Iowa. I didn't I didn't I, I obviously knew we were very low on public acres in Iowa compared to other states.
00;25;55;00 - 00;26;17;00
Unknown
But we were doing a coffee time episode yesterday and I was doing some reading on it, and they had a chart on there that was about, the ratio of, of public land to private land in Iowa ranks 50th or I guess, tied for 49th with, I think, Delaware maybe. Yeah, some tiny Rhode Island, I think Rhode Island.
00;26;17;02 - 00;26;46;27
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. Might be running a little. So almost entirely privately owned. And so when you think about that, the, the decisions being made, the, the environmentally minded decisions that are being made are being made by a lot of people, instead of where you go out to, Nevada, who has more? They have the highest ratio of, of public land to private land.
00;26;46;29 - 00;27;21;25
Unknown
You know, that's just a handful of people then making an outsized decision, which our elected officials, you know, or at least appointed by a by or hired by elected offices, I guess. Yeah. So having the NRCs here to, to, help these people make decisions who let's be honest, for a lot of them, it's pretty far down on their list of decisions that they have to make every day because they're yeah, they're running a business on that farm.
00;27;21;27 - 00;27;42;13
Unknown
And yes, this is a part of it, but there's like ten other things on that list that dominate their day. And so having somebody who can go and say, yeah, you know, let me let me assist you with this critically important. Definitely. And I mean it's free consultation as well. You know we're completely free resource. But you're right.
00;27;42;18 - 00;28;03;06
Unknown
The conservation and land decisions across the state of Iowa are by the vast majority just being made by our fellow Iowans, our farmers, our landowners. You know, I think it's around 3% of the state that's public. So 97% of the land, is privately owned. And, I mean, it was an honor to be able to work on all those farms every day.
00;28;03;06 - 00;28;25;17
Unknown
I got to see places that, you know, aren't open to the public. People don't get to come here like, you know, just walk across this place and see it. So it's pretty amazing. But you're right, those those decisions can get far down on the line. But I think a lot of Iowans really do care about. Yeah, not only, I mean, and a lot of the things we did there, not just for the greater like, feel good.
00;28;25;20 - 00;28;48;27
Unknown
They're not just like plant a tree and feel goods. They're like, these are extremely important to maintaining your profitability this year and profitability in the future. Yes. Right. So it's hard to measure those things, but they do have those things in mind. So what is the when you recommend a conservation practice to a farmer? What is the largest?
00;28;48;29 - 00;29;18;15
Unknown
What is the most common given reason for why they won't be able to, in their words or can't or aren't going to or you know what I mean? Yeah, along with such and such practice. Yeah, I think a lot of times people might be nervous about, first off, the financial implications. You know, it's hard to trust anybody who's going to tell you like, this is going to help save you money on your farm, you know, so I think people are concerned with the financial impacts of it.
00;29;18;18 - 00;29;47;03
Unknown
However, I mean, like through the Conservation Reserve program, we're not in a sign up right now, but, like, when we were in sign ups, you know, they're paying 90% of the cost share upfront, 10% in year five, and then you're getting an annual payment every year. Like, that's money that you can safely rely on, you know, and we can target that to your acres that are not yielding very well, those high, dry, knobby hilltops that have the soil washed off of them or, you know, a low area that's so soggy you don't even harvest it sometimes.
00;29;47;05 - 00;30;09;25
Unknown
Yeah. So, you know, those are kind of easy. But then after you get past that, like, you know, I am a business owner, I need to make decisions for my business. So my family and my business can survive this year and survive in the years to come. Then after you get past that initial worry, I think the next biggest thing is just fear of change.
00;30;09;29 - 00;30;28;03
Unknown
We've always done this this way. It's hard to change. And that's I mean, that's true for a lot of farmers, but it's true for a lot of people in the population in general. And I'm the same way, you know, I will do something the same dumb way forever because that's how I've been doing it. You know, it's like, I know it works this way.
00;30;28;08 - 00;30;48;06
Unknown
So like, even if I could save time, money, anything, you know, this is just how I know how to do it. You know, I type with two index fingers. Really? No, I wasn't going to say you got to the age of Mavis Beacon. You know, to do that, like Mavis Beacon and stuff, where you had to, like, do the typing games.
00;30;48;09 - 00;31;07;10
Unknown
That was one of the. That was one thing at my at my school that they like that district excelled at teaching us how you were going to type. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. I bet I can type like I mean, I'm not as good now because I don't type every day anymore, but I bet peak Kent typing. I bet I was over 80 words a minute if my mom had.
00;31;07;10 - 00;31;25;17
Unknown
That's pretty good. If my mom had her way, she was our, What do you call that? Curriculum director at my grade school. If she had her way, there would have been no computers in that school. And, we took cursive. We took. We took logic, and then we took cursive. I remember that every day from, like, fifth through eighth grade.
00;31;25;17 - 00;31;40;17
Unknown
You must have learned. Yeah, nothing I didn't learn. I didn't learn a single. But we did end up doing typing. And, you know, you had the little orange covers on your keyboard. You guys did a little cover, you know, where you weren't allowed because you weren't allowed to look at the the keys. I look at those keys all the time, misusing.
00;31;40;20 - 00;32;03;09
Unknown
I see that like I didn't need the orange cover, but I had the covers. We had these things that these hoods that would go over your hands was like, oh, wow, looks like you're sandblasting in there or something. That's so funny. Yeah. Yeah, man. Crazy time you didn't have typing class. I did, but I, I did, but I don't remember the best.
00;32;03;12 - 00;32;19;29
Unknown
That's why you still type with your index. Well, the best I don't really. I'm just joking. I hate to throw my dad under the bus, but he's kind of a hunt and peck guy. 2 or 3 fingers, you know he's not. You don't have fingers on the keyboard. You can really use my dad's to last us to get him to Craigslist or to Gmail.
00;32;20;01 - 00;32;37;21
Unknown
Yeah. Make sure you leave it open on the screen. So I could see it when I get in the office. Yeah. Okay. Gotcha. I think it's good, though, that that you guys had, like, handwriting because handwriting is is degrading. They brought it back. Oh, they Iowa brought it back. They brought cursive back. Good. Yeah. That's I think that's a good thing for kids.
00;32;37;27 - 00;33;10;17
Unknown
Oh yeah. But I mean, by golly, they can press a on that controller and they're quick man. So one of the concerns that has been, mentioned by people who were opposed to those layoffs, which would include myself, especially in the conservation realm. So it wasn't just in our case, it was U.S. Forest Service, I think was the other really big one, National Park Service had some, EPA was another kind of tied in there.
00;33;10;17 - 00;33;33;14
Unknown
But the concern is, are we going to be able to, as a nation, attract people to these positions going forward now that there's this big, moment of uncertainty and you've really done a nice job laying that out, it's like, well, you know, I don't know. I don't know what to expect like a job back, but I don't know that I'm not just going to get the rug pulled on me again.
00;33;33;14 - 00;33;52;18
Unknown
So I better take the sure thing now, which is, yeah, I get paid until September. Yeah. And when you think about kids, we talked about this with Ryan Kurtzman. It's a good, great discussion there because he is working. I had a college that prepares kids to go into, it's Hawkeye Community College, right? Is the name of that?
00;33;52;20 - 00;34;22;22
Unknown
Up in Waterloo, they prepare kids. They have a really strong one of the best in the state, program for, like, natural resource, type of career paths and a big part of that for a while has been you can walk to getting a job within the USDA, work, work in the NRCs, work in an FSA office, maybe, soil and water jobs.
00;34;22;22 - 00;34;46;10
Unknown
And those are a little different because I think those are county supported jobs. Or, you know, going to, Fish and Wildlife Services, which I think they had some cuts as well, maybe be a forester or something like that. Yeah. Do you see that? Do you see that there being a long term negative impact on people wanting to go pursue these jobs, do you think?
00;34;46;13 - 00;35;07;15
Unknown
Yeah, I really am concerned about the field of conservation and young people getting into this field right now, especially, you know, it's it's already a competitive field to get in and it's already. Yeah, you're at a super high paying field either, you know, they pay on field goods. You got to be okay with that. So I think it is really tough.
00;35;07;15 - 00;35;29;15
Unknown
And I think a lot of the avenues that kids use to get into the field are being taken away. For one example, is AmeriCorps in the Conservation Corps. Like that is huge for, you know, getting to meet people, gaining skills. Like I walked in there like knowing hardly anything and just like walked out of there like a hot shot, like, you know what I mean?
00;35;29;15 - 00;35;50;08
Unknown
Like, I knew how to do everything. I felt like, not really. You know, I felt pretty cool, but you, you gained so much just, like, invaluable experience in that program alone. And I think my paychecks were, like, $600 every two weeks, you know what I mean? So it's like, if we can't afford that, if we can afford that, to pay kids to do the stuff that nobody wants to do, that they're gaining a lot of skills.
00;35;50;08 - 00;36;15;08
Unknown
But like, they're doing the hard labor, you know? Yeah. Like that. That's really concerning to me. And I really do think that, you know, there might be a lot of, a lot of just fallout from, from that. I think any organization that's doing conservation in the US right now is concerned. Whether you are federal or not, because there's a lot of federal dollars that trickled to other organizations.
00;36;15;08 - 00;36;40;20
Unknown
There's a lot of partnerships going on. There's a lot of organizations that work on federal lands that maybe aren't federal. So it's it's not it's concerning for for most conservation organizations right now. Yeah. I, I, I wrestle with it, not the overall idea of conservation. Like, obviously I believe in it and I believe in putting resources towards it, for sure.
00;36;40;22 - 00;37;04;03
Unknown
When I have conversations, like even when Ken and I are having conversations like we need to be putting resources to those, you just, kind of be careful. You never, ever. We should never, ever get away from balanced books. For instance, if, public company was being run with the balance sheet of the United States, their C-suite people would be thrown in jail is such.
00;37;04;10 - 00;37;29;13
Unknown
You can't do that. That's it's a terrible way to to run things. That being said. So and we're way off kilter. Something has to be cut. Something has to be cut. And just like nobody wants, a solar farm or wind turbines in their backyard, I don't want one in my backyard. Yeah. Who's going to step up and say, you know, for the sake of everything else, our program will be cut?
00;37;29;18 - 00;37;55;06
Unknown
Yeah. That being said, I don't think we should have cut resources to conservation. I think we already are just way behind in that area. But then my brain goes to what has to be balanced somewhere. So I think we skip over the part of, hey, let's be giving a bunch of, let's make sure we have the appropriate resources to conservation and it's very important that we say.
00;37;55;06 - 00;38;16;27
Unknown
And where are those funds coming from? Because that's what and I do this to what I end up doing is I point out, hey, that's a problem. Look at this problem. And saying, we have more. Make sure we need to put more resources to it, and even saying where the resources would be allotted. That still isn't giving a full solution because we have to be able to pull those resources from somewhere.
00;38;16;27 - 00;38;34;21
Unknown
And it is very important to me and it probably everyone is listening to this podcast, so I don't want to make it too much of an echo chamber, but that we have those resources that come to it. But I think we need to go even further upstream and start saying, hey, we need the funds need to come out of this, or if you're going to cut something, it should be cut out of this.
00;38;34;27 - 00;38;58;03
Unknown
And I need to be willing to sacrifice for that. I need to be willing to say like, hey, I'll put up with worse roads if you'll make sure that there's prairie on our like landscape, I'll wait an extra day for mail. If you're. And I'm not saying those are actual solutions, but that we're going to get the mailman fired is, having a good goods I must do?
00;38;58;05 - 00;39;18;08
Unknown
What would you do if they were like, hey, this guy ran this campaign? All we're going to. So we're going to have to let you go. So sorry. And you see the poster of the campaign, it's me and can. But we got fired. But you know what we're saying? Everybody wants their cake and eat it too. Yeah. And if I'm saying we have to have our resources in conservation, I also have to raise my hand and say, I'll give up.
00;39;18;14 - 00;39;36;19
Unknown
Fill in the blank for it. If you're if we're not willing to do that, then. But I agree, and I think not only should we be paying those kids $600 every two weeks, we should probably be paying them more than that. Yeah. You know, to be doing the hard labor. So I think more resources should go there. But I need to put more thought in is like, what am I willing to give up that cost?
00;39;36;19 - 00;39;53;26
Unknown
Resources. Of the public dollars or my private dollars to make sure that it is insured? And I think that's some soul searching that every single person, not just conservationists, but every single person in the US, has to confront. Yeah. Like what? What nos are we going to give to make sure we can have this big. Yes.
00;39;53;29 - 00;40;11;23
Unknown
So yeah those are much bigger issues and they're like way above me or any pay grade I've ever been at. But I think your pay grade is like $600 every two weeks. So. Right, right. That low that nice low pay grade of $600 every two weeks I'll do I'll, I'll do the bluestem on your farm for that.
00;40;11;26 - 00;40;14;27
Unknown
Yeah.
00;40;15;00 - 00;40;43;05
Unknown
You know, I hear you got everybody there. Yeah. I mean, that's that's big questions. And I think there's a lot of politics in that. I mean, tax reform would be one thing that folks could work on. And just how our budget is run is a huge, huge endeavor. But it's it's tough because I think a lot of people are learning right now that the government, like I, when I worked for the federal government, we are public servants, you know, we are providing a service to people.
00;40;43;05 - 00;40;59;25
Unknown
So I think a lot of people are learning that like, oh, you know, I didn't know that the government was so involved in my health care, so involved in my yeah, that's true. You know, health and safety every day and conservation on farms and providing food to the grocery to, you know, not even just food assistance for people.
00;40;59;25 - 00;41;17;18
Unknown
But it's like we we really do help a lot with food production and making sure that our lands are healthy, sustainable, productive. I think Rob Sands tag on his Instagram is not a politician, a public servant, which, oh yeah, I kind of like. I know. You got any thoughts on Rob sand you'd be willing to share? Oh yeah.
00;41;17;18 - 00;41;38;14
Unknown
So my personal opinion is that I absolutely love Rob sand. I am rooting for that guy and he really gives me hope. I think he'd be a great candidate for governor in Iowa. And, you know, I, I hope to see him take that, position here in a couple years. Yeah. I don't, I don't know much about who's running against him.
00;41;38;17 - 00;41;53;01
Unknown
But, I've liked what he's had to say on a lot of different things. I, I, I was telling the guy the other day, I was like, yeah, Rob saying blah, blah, blah, and they had no idea. And then the like, oh, the 12 year old they like because he's like so younger guys don't look so young man.
00;41;53;01 - 00;42;16;04
Unknown
Yeah. Nothing wrong with a young politician. Yeah. So the little little stake in the game, if you wanted to break a trend, that might not be a bad one. Yeah. We don't have an aging population. We just have an aging, government. Man. Yeah. I lost my train of thought. Almost. There was, I had a good question.
00;42;16;04 - 00;42;48;00
Unknown
Is sundowning I am. Where are we going of age? Wow. Thanks. No, it was, you know, so much of the work that's being done by our, our government agencies that relate, that pertain to conservation work is incredibly important. CRP is a lot of people. There's a certain way people say that it's our most successful, public conservation work.
00;42;48;00 - 00;43;13;05
Unknown
Is that how people say it? Our most, most successful voluntary conservation programs. Some. There's some there's some qualifiers in there. Yeah. Remember what exactly they are. But, and it's true, we have, there's a 1.7 million acres in Iowa. That could be right. Yep. I think it's about right now. Some of that's Cpf1. Yeah.
00;43;13;06 - 00;43;53;24
Unknown
And old Sepinwall. Yeah, just a small forest. It's bro, it's Brome, it's focused. And, Willow and red canary grass. Still better than corn, I would argue. So some of that is, is cpf1 and, you know, very low diversity plantings. But overall it's it's definitely regain gained us some of our roughly 30 million acres of prairie that we once had, but it seems like and even now CRP has been reopened as of last week for open enrollment.
00;43;53;26 - 00;44;19;07
Unknown
I'll pass it up until June 6th. Okay. But that being said, there's only 1.8 million acres available, nationally, and I doubt they'll fill that because it usually never hits full quota. Right? Yeah. So I think the national cap is somewhere around 26 or 28 million a year. About 27 million. Okay. Yeah. And so there's 1.8 that's available.
00;44;19;09 - 00;44;51;23
Unknown
Okay. Okay. I see what you're saying. And. That would be great to fill that. Yeah. Probably not. You know, usually doesn't happen. Right. Usually commodity prices are real low. Yeah, yeah. And tariff, you know, uncertainties and things like that could definitely influence, but, my point is, as good as that progress is in the, the priceless benefits that we've gotten from it, we're still well short of what truly would be ecologically healthy.
00;44;51;28 - 00;45;24;18
Unknown
Yeah. What is something this kind of goes back to what Nicholas is talking about, where we each have to, like, look at what each one of us is doing on the acres that we can, or maybe eighth of an acre that we can influence, you know. Yeah. What is something that you I mean, I'm sure you've done a lot of thinking on this through time, like things that people could do that would make a a much bigger difference than even what the, the federal government is going to fund to happen.
00;45;24;20 - 00;45;48;11
Unknown
What are some I mean if, if everybody could do, you know, 1 or 2 things that you think would, would make an outsized positive benefit or change. That's a great question because there's a lot of things that people could do. They have, they have a buffet to choose from. Yeah. Pick your poison on which conservation practice you want to do.
00;45;48;13 - 00;46;10;23
Unknown
I wish that we could see farmers in Iowa note telling. You know, I know I don't want to see tilled fields. There is truly no benefit. I mean, like, why do they tell them so? I mean, fields can become what we call hill addicted. So tillage promotes compaction. And when you have long term tillage, you get a lot of compaction.
00;46;10;24 - 00;46;28;12
Unknown
You start paying down. So some fields become tail addicted. And it does take a few years to break that cycle where you build better soil structures. So you're not having to constantly turn over the soil and it's hurting their yield basically. So they don't want to go through the three years that it would take. Yeah, yeah. I mean, there are a number of reasons for tillage.
00;46;28;12 - 00;46;51;21
Unknown
I mean, maybe, you know, we've had some wildfire risk in Iowa. So maybe people are telling their field borders to provide a burn break, you know, in case of a wildfire, not quite a burn break, but something to slow a wildfire down, potentially. You know, there are some sometimes people are trying to close up washouts and that, you know, and, and there's better solution holes.
00;46;51;22 - 00;47;11;11
Unknown
Yeah, there's better solutions until and for some of those areas, you know, we have grass waterways, we have, filter strips, things that can help, you know, plant a perennial cover, get you an annual payment, and then you're not having to go out there with heavy equipment and fill in areas that are washing away your health. You know, if you're washing away your field, that's that's a problem right there.
00;47;11;11 - 00;47;35;25
Unknown
So I mean, no tell would be huge. The next thing I think would be filter strips. You know, in Minnesota they're required. You're in Iowa, they're not required. They I think it's a 20 or 30ft buffer they have to provide on any creek or waterway. I would say all creeks and waterways, in Minnesota. Yeah. And if you guys are wondering how big of a difference I would make, go ahead and check out our episode with Matt Helmers.
00;47;35;28 - 00;48;01;18
Unknown
And he makes it really clear. Yeah. Cool. Yeah, we'll have to do that. So does Minnesota receive some kind of, Doctor Matt Helm or. Sorry, some kind of, financial, cost sharing or anything for that, or is it. It's just it's a stick motivation. I think it's just a requirement. Yeah. I think some people who are already enrolled in filter strips prior to that regulation, and I think maybe a lot of people did enroll in filter strips since I knew it was coming.
00;48;01;18 - 00;48;19;11
Unknown
So some of them are potentially in the conservation reserve program getting a payment for that. Yeah. But they just are a requirement. You know, what would be really interesting is to grandfathered that rule in saying, hey, if you have 15 years or more left on your mortgage, you don't have to do it until you get it. The payments further down.
00;48;19;18 - 00;48;52;08
Unknown
Right. But the reason being is because if you took out that money, let's say someone who bought a farm for $10,000 an acre, basing on how much corner beans they could put in there, you could. I mean, you know that that amount of land could bankrupt. Just keep refinancing though, and never no, no, no. But I mean, I mean basically grandfathered in but then say from now on, if you, if you buy a farm or, you know, something like that, where the reason I'm saying is because what land locks people from, from they really fight against it is because, hey, I bought this farm for a certain price.
00;48;52;08 - 00;49;10;18
Unknown
I owed a certain amount of money. You know, if they didn't show any money on their farm, I guarantee you they'd fight back a lot less on a few acres on the edge versus, like, that could be the margin between, you know, me being able to operate or not operate. And, I think there would be an interesting way to grandfathered that in.
00;49;10;18 - 00;49;33;18
Unknown
I really like the idea of having the filter shifts. Was there a time when the FSA had had a, waterway program that people could enroll in, or that they enforced where you had to have, you know, drainage waterways in your fields? It seems like I've heard some old farmers I've been around potentially a long time ago.
00;49;33;18 - 00;49;53;06
Unknown
Not since I've been around, though. I mean, it just seems like waterways become less and less. I mean, they used to be very common, and it kept in good shape. You guys farmed around them so much you just see it so often. A well waterway is reduced to the scraggly little thing that's just been planted through year after year and harvested through year after year.
00;49;53;06 - 00;50;16;11
Unknown
And eventually it just it's it's mostly gone. Yeah. But I think that would that would really help. Yeah. Soil conservation. Definitely. So no tell what else. The strips and plant of native. I think that'd be the best option to native filter strips are awesome. And just finding some small space to add a little bit of plant diversity.
00;50;16;18 - 00;50;36;00
Unknown
It could be those filter strips. But I mean, especially since we're experiencing a big decline in insect populations. If you don't believe me, drive across the state and see how many times you got to wipe off your windshield anymore. You used to. Not as much as you used to. So finding a small space to increase plant diversity will really help with insect, diversity as well.
00;50;36;00 - 00;50;59;08
Unknown
Specifically, pollinators are really hot topic right now. People are loving to talk about the bees and butterflies. But there's a lot of different insects that, you know, need our help and are important and are providing ecosystem services to us. So finding a small place to do a small pollinator planting, could be around your house, could be a garden, could be, you know, half an acre.
00;50;59;11 - 00;51;25;07
Unknown
Yeah. We need more of those across the state. You know, a lot of our insects don't really travel very far. They stay within a one, two, three mile radius, specifically like bumblebees. Stay within just a few mile radius. So help your local bees. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that's something Nicholas has talked about since our earliest episodes on this podcast, is just how much difference it could make if every urban yard had a little patch.
00;51;25;07 - 00;51;44;15
Unknown
500ft² is not that much. Yeah, it's like 25 by 20. So it's like a room, like a medium sized room in your yard. And you'd have a lot of diversity and, and the first couple of years you'd think, what the heck am I doing? This is so ugly. You know? And, and then year six, you.
00;51;44;19 - 00;52;04;25
Unknown
I'm earlier than that. But year six, you'd be, like, so proud. And your neighbors would be asking what you did with your yard and yada, yada. So if you're looking for any of those Hawks native sitcom, we have specifically designed and added plants to help the conversation with your neighbors, because that's a huge hurdle. I mean, one might be money, but they're like 50 bucks, you know?
00;52;04;25 - 00;52;22;28
Unknown
So yeah, the big thing is like, what are my neighbors going to think? Because it's going to be a lot less labor than, than mowing. And, and you get those in and, who knows, you might have pheasants start hopping around in towns, you know, from plot to plot. That'd be really cool. Yeah. But, you know, if you have a little bit of life, then life shows up.
00;52;22;28 - 00;52;44;09
Unknown
Life is attracted to life. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's so important that we, you know, that we don't just look, the government has a really important role. And I think that and I would love to see the amount of acres they're able to, to supply money for expand even. But as Nicholas talked about, we need to we got some other financial problems.
00;52;44;09 - 00;53;12;10
Unknown
We probably need to work out first before we're able to make that money available. But, it can only get us so far. And a lot of it comes back to each of us making good personal decisions and being proactive. I think another great thing would be if everyone, who had the ability to, could commit to producing one thing that their family consumes, oh, you know, just like a tomato or a goat or anything.
00;53;12;15 - 00;53;42;02
Unknown
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, more than one tomato. Hopefully you don't, but you can't. Single thing, better than nothing. What category of things? You know, like all the halal pinos we're going to eat this year. They're all coming from our windowsill, our our our backyard garden, all the. You know, I think if we could, we could do that, we would see a lot of, noticeable change because all that adds up quickly, just like the dime width of, soil loss every year adds up over time.
00;53;42;04 - 00;54;10;21
Unknown
The fertilizer for his garden. Actually, it was one of the very first episodes we had, it was, bare blood. No, I did oh, yeah, I did actually. Yeah, yeah, that was way away from where I was. Yeah, that's true. I forgot about that. Yeah. But anyways, the, I think that those types of changes where it puts each person back in the driver's seat for, you know, how can I make my situation a little bit better?
00;54;10;24 - 00;54;28;29
Unknown
Who was it that you interviewed as an Angela from Axon Route? Yeah. Homestead. She. It was similar to what you said once. You said you'd have her one step into a prairie. They would. By being in there, they would see. Wow, this is this is life. This is this is something that needs to be here and more of it.
00;54;29;01 - 00;55;01;11
Unknown
She said everyone should have a garden, and they would understand the time that goes into producing those calories. And we wouldn't be so wasteful. Yeah. We would be focusing on things that matter and instead of just living off of cash, we would live off of skill and, and intensive care for something. And you know what I, I would almost guarantee that if you focused one year on growing jalapenos, next year, you'd probably grow peanuts and tomatoes.
00;55;01;12 - 00;55;29;17
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, I think by year there's something in humans about it. It's innate in us. Yeah. We love growing things. We love connecting with the dirt and the land. And then everything's not so left up to these large scale, I guess operations that have so much sway over how things go from a conservation standpoint, and they're leaning more into efficiency than they are sustainable of the land or sustainability of your body.
00;55;29;19 - 00;55;47;29
Unknown
If you want your body to last a long time, it goes a lot better if you produce the stuff that you put into it. I want to talk about your grandma a little bit. Is is your grandma still. She's doing good Lincoln. She's doing great. How old is she? She's got to be 90. She just turned 90.
00;55;48;00 - 00;56;09;27
Unknown
90? No. Is she 91 already? She's already 91. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. She's having 91. I just think about it, you know, time flies. 34. That would have been. That would have been I think at the. Yeah the tail end of the Dust Bowl. And she grew up in a side house right. Yep. Yep. She did tell us a little like oh you have to story on your grandma.
00;56;09;28 - 00;56;28;26
Unknown
Yeah. She's just so awesome and cool. She loved I mean she grew up outside of a small town Dalton Nebraska. It's north of Sydney, Nebraska maybe. Yeah 30 miles. I'm not sure. And so she grew up outside of that town, with her two siblings. And her mom actually passed away of cancer when she was, like, six years old.
00;56;28;28 - 00;56;42;11
Unknown
And so it was just her dad and her three siblings, and but they had a lot of family around, you know, aunts and uncles. She's had a lot of her aunts would help take care of her and stuff. But, I just love talking to her about what life was like back then, you know? I mean, she said they grew everything they needed.
00;56;42;18 - 00;57;02;04
Unknown
They had a garden, they canned vegetables, they had chickens and eggs and pigs and horses and cows. So they had all the meat they needed. They grew wheat, you know, where is commonly grown in western Nebraska. So they had their own wheat. And she said that the only thing, I should ask her how they process some of that wheat and what they were doing with it.
00;57;02;04 - 00;57;18;29
Unknown
But, she said the only thing, they needed to buy from the store was salt and sugar from salt and sugar. And she said a lot of times they would trade. They would go take eggs or take something else to the grocery store, you know, for somebody else to buy. So, I just think that's super cool.
00;57;18;29 - 00;57;35;17
Unknown
You know, I, I, I would love to go back to when you can just, you know, yeah, by just a few things. And you had most everything. You know, I think over time it's just slowly like, oh, now we don't really produce anything for ourselves. So, so there's a people group here in the United States that do that.
00;57;35;20 - 00;57;55;21
Unknown
You would just have to be okay only wearing dresses and hats and, not using a cell phone ever. Yeah. Oh, that'd be hard to do. Doesn't have to be completely black or white here. Yeah. Okay, guys, I got it. I got to tell you this story. So I've been sharing it all over. So two of my good friends grew up on it.
00;57;55;23 - 00;58;15;06
Unknown
They had a grandma just passed away. She's like 95 years old. And there was like over a thousand people at their. At her funeral, Amish people from all over the United States got on a train and rode there. And here's why. Because when this lady was 15, she was the oldest of 13. There were her parents had 13 kids.
00;58;15;06 - 00;58;36;17
Unknown
In 15 years. You're almost zero. Was there on your right? Yeah. And then her mom died. So she was mom. Oh, wow. And then her dad got remarried to a lady with eight kids. And she was still the oldest. And then they had six more kids. So they were, I think 27 of them, if I'm doing my math right.
00;58;36;17 - 00;59;09;02
Unknown
And, and she was basically mom for all 26 younger siblings, or at least a second mom, and then had 12 kids. So she had 26 kids plus 12 kids. And all of those people and their descendants came to this a lot of, funeral. And, but, was, like, beloved, like she was such an amazing woman and had carried herself so well and had loved that large of a family so well.
00;59;09;02 - 00;59;29;00
Unknown
That's why, you know, great grandchild of the people that she had raised honored her to go out. And that's I mean, that is a heck of a legacy, for sure. And, my, my friends talk about growing up Amish, man. They raise a bunch of their stuff, and they got the chin straps to prove it. You know what I mean?
00;59;29;02 - 00;59;48;27
Unknown
Yeah. Well, we've had we've had some interaction with, with, some, some Amish guys and just, like, looks at their hands with admiration. He's like, well, that's what my hands are supposed to look to look like. Are these soft? Actually, my hands are pretty calloused, but still in comparison. They're so soft and, you know. Yeah. Weak.
00;59;48;29 - 01;00;13;08
Unknown
I've seen Amish people lift a barn. Not with stuff, just the people. They just lift the barn and carry it elsewhere, you know? I mean, I had a hard time getting out of my chair last night when I was finishing the movie. I'm getting to the age where I need a few rocks to work it up. That momentum, you know, you're going to need one of those chairs that if you see the electric ones they like, pick you up and set you on your feet.
01;00;13;08 - 01;00;32;16
Unknown
Oh, nice. You're going to need one of those. It's going to get one just for convenience. Here. Your grandma raised it in a mud house. You got a chair like I need a chair that lifts me up. Oh, God. Does she ever talk? About what the prairie was like? I've asked her some times about, like, what the plants were, and she was like, no, I don't know.
01;00;32;16 - 01;00;57;07
Unknown
You know, just weeds, just stuff in the kitchen. So it's like, I think they had a lot more weeds then they definitely didn't have roundup. So weeds were, more of an enemy because they required a lot more hard work to get rid of, you know? So I think, that was tough, but but they weren't able they weren't able to get rid of tens of thousands of acres of vegetation in one swamp, you know what I mean?
01;00;57;07 - 01;01;14;26
Unknown
So it was more of a balanced. Yeah, we're fighting against the weeds, but they're coming back every year and and she to. Yeah. And she talked a lot about like going out into the pasture with the horses and loving sitting out in the pasture. And I'm sure it was all native vegetation, you know, and I'm sure a lot of what she was calling weeds was probably native prairie plants, too.
01;01;14;26 - 01;01;31;25
Unknown
Yeah. For sure. But it was so funny. I took her to the drive through a zoo that's in, like, Ashland, Nebraska. Have you ever heard of this? It's like part of the Omaha Zoo. I think it's like a wildlife. Okay. Drive, I have heard. So you drive through and there's elk and there's bison, and they have some bird enclosures, too.
01;01;31;27 - 01;01;54;26
Unknown
With, like, you know, maybe injured birds that are being rehabilitated. And, it was so fun to drive through that with her. She loved it. She said this to me of the pasture as a little girl. Like, she just, like, loved it. And I just think she doesn't get out so much anymore. And yeah, her age obviously, you know, so like going out to that was so fun for her and, and, she was even she was even yelling at the elk trying to get their attention.
01;01;54;26 - 01;02;18;02
Unknown
I have one little video for, like, like, yelling, trying to get their attention. So, so yeah, the she's a different time. Yeah. Does she generally look back at those years as, like, that was a good life? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, she loved it, and she. It's so funny because she's like, as a little girl, you know, the only toys I had were my bike and maybe like a doll.
01;02;18;02 - 01;02;33;12
Unknown
And she was like. But for fun, we just rode our bikes and we played with tadpoles and the horse drops, and we she was like, it sounds terrible, but we loved it. And I'm like, she's like, I know it probably sounds so awful to you. And I'm like, no, grandma, it sounds great. I get it, you know? Yeah.
01;02;33;13 - 01;02;54;22
Unknown
She thinks all young kids today want all the modern conveniences and just want to be on their iPads with their headphones in or something. You know, she's like, I'm not. I'm sure it sounds horrible to you. And I'm like, no, it sounds sounds pretty cool. Yeah. There is something about I, I, I just think it's important to rediscover that, you know, and try and try and, tap into that because I think people do find fulfillment in that.
01;02;54;22 - 01;03;15;15
Unknown
And I think people are worried that they wouldn't. But, but like, I think, Nicholas, you said awake something up in people and I think I think it does. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's where we start really gaining ground outside of CRP or KSP or equip or or whatever. You know, we can we can really gain that ground.
01;03;15;17 - 01;03;37;25
Unknown
Much more efficiently if people realize what they're missing out on. Yeah. What do you think? You're growing a field of wheat or maybe corn? And you can't you can't spray with anything. What natives do you think would have been the worst weeds? Good question. I mean, weed, I mean, probably what big bluestem would have been.
01;03;37;25 - 01;03;54;14
Unknown
Probably a nightmare. Yeah, but, I mean, I bet Partridge pea would have been would have been, because it just. It'll cover an area, you know. Yeah, but does it smother it? Like, what would it smother what's there? It's kind of short, you know? Yeah, but I mean, it's going to take up a lot of moisture. You're going to be.
01;03;54;14 - 01;04;14;03
Unknown
Yeah, a lot. You're going to be seeing it year after year. I don't know, maybe some of our native sunflowers might be too. Oh yeah. Or like cut plant. If you get a wide enough area, cut plant would be nice. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. That is a good thought I once found. And I still have it.
01;04;14;03 - 01;04;48;27
Unknown
Oh, my gosh, it's in a bag at my house. So, when I first started working in Denison, Iowa, I came into the nurse's office there and was looking through just a bunch of old, like, promotional materials, pamphlets, things like that. Handouts. And there was this booklet that was, made or it it was just called, something like weeds in rangeland or managing weeds in your rangeland, you know, and, like, it was pretty depressing because, like 75 and it was probably a pamphlet that had been published in like 1982, 1986 or something.
01;04;49;03 - 01;05;16;25
Unknown
And it was, you know, it's like all faded. The colors are kind of fading, but like all the plants in there were our native plants, you know, and I mean, there's prickly pear cactus. There's all just I mean, it's mostly native plants where I was like, I've never even seen that. I know it's not. I mean, a couple times a year I get a phone call from a much older farmer, and they'll look at our mix and be like, hey, I like this mix, but I don't like these five species stuff.
01;05;16;25 - 01;05;32;28
Unknown
Goldenrod always comes up milk. Come. Milkweed always comes up. Because when I was a kid, I had to hoe those out all the time. And I don't want to see those on my farm. And it's not like that. Usually they kind of understand. It's like a personal, emotional thing. So, like, I don't want to look at that thing.
01;05;32;28 - 01;05;52;03
Unknown
It causes a great anxiety. Oh, my, my, my grandfather, he used to, I think pretty much all summer long, he and his older brother, they would spend on the farm I live on now weeks of the summer. With a sigh, you know, you know, saying yeah, okay, the big got the handle on the that's how you grow strong back, dude.
01;05;52;03 - 01;06;12;18
Unknown
Yeah. Because you're rotating your back. You're not using your arms on those. They would just be cutting weeds, which a lot of those are probably, you know, big bluestem and goldenrod, milkweed. And there's some there's some remnant plants on our farm, you know. So imagine some of those were in there and, and, and there's a lot of prairie species that are very green and don't get that much color.
01;06;12;24 - 01;06;31;24
Unknown
Right. So they're not charismatic. They're not sexy, right? They're flowering spurge. I feel like it's just a it's just a very green. Yeah. What's the what's the one that was in our common, common mountain. Horehound. Horehound. Yeah. Water. American water. Horehound or. Yeah, like that one's like it doesn't. I mean, it's got cute little flowers on it, but it's mostly just like, green.
01;06;31;24 - 01;06;45;22
Unknown
If you looked at, it'd be like a weed, you know? And so I, I can imagine because we save all the ones with tons of color and some in our yard. Yeah, those are easy to promote. Yeah. But the other ones, it's very like you get, let's say you got a prairie and most of it was green most of the time.
01;06;45;22 - 01;07;02;21
Unknown
Well, then it just looks like a patch of weeds to what we're trying to think about. You know, until you get a lot of that color. Right. Separate color. All right. I got a question because we used to ask, what would you change if you could change one thing? But we've asked you that and you gave us an incredible answer.
01;07;02;21 - 01;07;23;12
Unknown
And I don't want you to tarnish your history by saying something else. So two things. I need you to give someone flowers here. It can't be you. And it can't be us. Who would you. Not that you would pick us, but just taking the pressure off. Who would you pick? You have 100 acres to make a pristine prairie, open grassland, prairie.
01;07;23;15 - 01;07;41;20
Unknown
Who would you pick to do it to? They. They design the mix. They'd put it in. They'd manage it afterwards. Oh, you can pick anybody, okay. But they have to be alive. I think they got to be alive. Go on with that. Yeah. Okay. I would try to do it on my own. No, you can't pick. You pick my pick you.
01;07;41;20 - 01;07;59;06
Unknown
Yeah, okay. And I can't pick you guys. Can you pick us? Okay. Oh, gosh. So let me give one moment of thought here. I think I would go with John Judson of Diversity Farm. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that guy's a great pick. Yeah, that's a good. That's a good pick. Yeah. He just just he knows this stuff.
01;07;59;10 - 01;08;12;13
Unknown
Yeah. Like he could make it. He could make it really nice. He just. He and I rely on him a lot anyways. Like if I was going to do it on my own, you know, I'd be talking to him anyways. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like John knows his stuff. He gave me a great compliment. The other day. He.
01;08;12;16 - 01;08;30;17
Unknown
I can't remember why. He was looking at some of our base mixes and he was like, these are good mixes. I like his. And John's pretty even keeled. Right. So that was like amazing. But that is a good, good, good. I was going to say your compliment wasn't for your shirt probably. But no no no no no. Well John and I, we actually share shirts.
01;08;30;17 - 01;08;58;09
Unknown
We both we we I have eight shirts, but that's between the shirts. And I own. He's kind of a minimalist. He claims. Okay, here's the other question. What if all humans got up today and left Iowa right now with the corn plants in the ground, the cows hanging out in some fences, a couple spots of bison. What do you think the landscape would look like over the evolution of the next ten, 20, 50 years?
01;08;58;13 - 01;09;20;19
Unknown
Oh, let's do more time than that. Okay? 10 to 100 years. It'd be like, just, duh. What? What? Creepy. Yeah yeah yeah yeah, yeah, like a like a scary song. I think it's really good now that I know you're doing something like. That was fantastic. Like the, the psycho murder scene. Yeah, yeah, thank you very much.
01;09;20;21 - 01;09;45;03
Unknown
I think it would be a lot of, invasive species for sure. If we stopped today, I mean, there would still be oaks in a hundred years. There'd still be some areas of, like, good quality native timber that has too much shade for invasives to move in. But it'd be hard. It'd be. It'd be hard to tell, you know, we're not going to get fire.
01;09;45;05 - 01;10;03;15
Unknown
Way too many burn breaks around here. Every road and thing. Weeds. Yeah. You know, I mean, there's a lot of burn breaks. I think it'd take a really, crazy dry, windy weather event to get a large scale fire. Like what we used to see across the state of Iowa to help promote some of these native species that are so fire adapted.
01;10;03;17 - 01;10;33;06
Unknown
So I think we'd see a lot of invasive species we'd probably start with, like in this area, black locust, honeysuckle tree haven. Mr.. Nature for that. Yeah. Do you think they balance out or do you think it'd be a totally different ecosystem than 1800s? I think I'd probably end up being fairly different ecosystem, for sure. Just because of all the change of land use and changes we've had on the landscape, I think we'd we'd see it turn out a lot differently.
01;10;33;08 - 01;10;50;21
Unknown
You know, I also, I imagine that cattle wouldn't be a small part to play. But the problem is cattle are are bred to be so dumb and like and against instinct that they're, you know, like, it wouldn't be like bison roaming around. It'd be like, oh, so are you assuming that the cattle break free out of these fences?
01;10;50;23 - 01;11;10;13
Unknown
They do. Oh, populations. And then we'd just be overrun with cattle. I mean, a lot of cattle would die in their pens, which is sad, but a bunch of them would get out, you know what I mean? Yeah, we've seen that. Do you think do you think that they'd be successful on their own? Yeah. This is like, do you think that they would like, breed and repopulate and like be be a thriving population?
01;11;10;13 - 01;11;28;13
Unknown
I think they would. Yeah. Yeah. What would be interesting is they do in the West, like when they just dump them out there in Arizona or whatever, they have the wild cows out. They know, but they like them. They like lose them, have wild parties. Yeah. Now they have a wild cattle. So it would be interesting to see would be the predatory response, left, you know.
01;11;28;13 - 01;11;47;29
Unknown
Totally. Yeah, totally. I'm sure we'd get more predators moving in. We'd get worse back for sure. Oh, absolutely. Would be bears would be back. Elk would be back so quick. Yeah. Grizzlies would. Grizzlies I think would move in to just following food abundance. And what would be really interesting to see would be what happens to raccoons and coyotes.
01;11;47;29 - 01;12;21;04
Unknown
Two species that have really and whitetail deer, three species that have that are, you know, kind of almost ecosystem not quite defining. I wouldn't say any of those three are keystone species, you know, like a bison or, a beaver would be. But they're they're kind of like they're major players. And, it'd be interesting to see what happened to the numbers of of those three species in particular that have done so well in the presence of mankind and a totally changed landscape?
01;12;21;04 - 01;12;41;04
Unknown
Yeah, I think it'd be I think it'd be really interesting to see what happened there. It'd be I'd pay money to, if everyone left to, in 220 years to watch Red Rock dam just, like, Blow Out one day, you know what I mean? I think that'd be so fascinating to just too much wear and tear, too much erosion.
01;12;41;10 - 01;13;00;09
Unknown
Which, by the way, you know, the United States, when they're building these things, only thinks 50 years in the future. So Red rocks been around for 50 more than 50 years. And, U.S. Army Corps has had, just a bunch of stuff because they were like, well, I guess we're here now. You know, we're such a young country that 50 years does seem so far in the future.
01;13;00;09 - 01;13;37;00
Unknown
But yeah, it happens real fast. Oh, man, I we're almost 50 guys. I mean, we're like, wow, this 14 years away here pretty quick. I mean, and the scale and how long the earth's been around. Your great grandkids are almost 50, which is like a weird thing, you know? Yeah, I think that's a I think that's a critical part to your question is not just the 100 years, but over the next 20,000 years, what would what would I will look like, you know, there would definitely be, it'd be interesting to see because I think bison herds would end up, eventually, you know, doing pretty well again.
01;13;37;02 - 01;13;58;01
Unknown
And Riley's bison breaking out of his fence. I mean, I mean, what would that do to things like, you know, bush honeysuckle, you know, our and multiple roads and there's a bunch of goats and they'd get out, you know, and I mean, and they'd have something to do with that. Yeah. You know, how would that maybe we would see a lot of invasive plants.
01;13;58;01 - 01;14;22;15
Unknown
I think the invasive plants that would just always stick around would be things like, pig weed and. Yeah. Is lamb's caught. Lamb's quarter might actually be a native, weed. I'm not sure. No idea. No idea. There'd be, like, Pennsylvania smart weed. I think the biggest problem is what's going to happen. I've been thinking of this like we're at Hitchcock and we're looking out the window at, like, the beautiful, like, prairies and timber that's already here.
01;14;22;15 - 01;14;45;24
Unknown
So I've been kind of thinking of, like, what would happen right here, but what would happen to the two thirds of the land that is corn and soybeans? Yeah. You know, there's not a huge seed source to fill that open space. So the seed source would be the closest seed sources are probably from, honey, like, you know what with all that, I think the key here, man, we are just totally talking about a made up thing right now.
01;14;45;25 - 01;15;14;23
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, this is fun. It's fun. I think that the corn and soybeans, especially the soybeans during their growing season, would be. I mean, they would just be such a hard I can imagine allowing. Yeah, cows out into a green, lush soybean field. They're choosing that over the brome every day, you know. And so I kind of wonder if those things would just get annihilated and then, you know, Brome, but then you got bison and elk wallowing and stuff like that, that that's got to create some.
01;15;14;25 - 01;15;32;11
Unknown
So. Well, so you've got a few year ramp up where the, the bison, the elk, the white tailed, the cattle are going to, and the I don't I don't think we can downplay on the goats. I think the goats are getting out. Yeah, but I think they would be pretty easy pickings to for coyotes and. Oh, yeah.
01;15;32;11 - 01;15;50;26
Unknown
Yeah, you're probably right. Well, so so you have a range of all the domestic where, you know, dogs. Yeah. Well that's true, that's true. Those dogs that kill a person and Tama. Oh my gosh years ago. Yeah. It was like they there'd be a ton of pigs we haven't even mentioned yet. We need to get out. Okay. There's our.
01;15;50;26 - 01;16;21;21
Unknown
They wouldn't get out without the open. Yeah. Would they get out. I mean, not before they died, I don't think. Well, natalya's pigs, my mantle's pigs would get. Yeah. No, because they're out. Yeah, they're they're not out of us because they've got enough area there where they could repopulate in there. And until one of the fences got weak, I so here's, here's what I think we're not thinking about is, is the, prey population will explode so quickly because there will be no predators for even just a few years.
01;16;21;27 - 01;16;41;26
Unknown
And then all of a sudden there will be a bunch of wolves here. Yeah. I mean, I think that that's how it bears or disease, you know, wipe out maybe all the, you know, these a lot of these livestock are being treated for disease right now. Very true. Yeah. They're like antibacterial, dependent and stuff like you know, like that.
01;16;41;27 - 01;17;07;16
Unknown
You might just I mean, that's usually how an ecosystem works, right? You have, usually see how, like, island ecology, you know, something arrives, eats itself out of house and home. You know, up to that point, they spiked in their population and, and then a whole new set of things starts growing up in its absence and new predators and, and and, prey species move in.
01;17;07;16 - 01;17;28;00
Unknown
And so without indigenous people and buffalo to protect it for the first little while, like, yeah, I think Iowa's forested. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah I think yeah, that's a great point. I think forest would really expand. And I would probably interesting that would be able to those would be able to compete with corn and, and soybeans too.
01;17;28;00 - 01;17;50;29
Unknown
Yeah man I wouldn't mind movie. We just. Yeah. Yeah. You're welcome everybody. I would love I would love to hear some educated or thoughtful, interpretations to that question. So if you want to send them our way, social at the Prairie farm.com, we'd love to hear them. Tabatha, we had a great time with you today. Thank you for having me.
01;17;50;29 - 01;18;10;17
Unknown
It's always great to talk to you both. Yeah. Is there, is there anything you would like to share? Anything that's been on your mind? Oh, gosh. No. My mind's been in so many different directions. I think I need to listen to other people's minds lately and get a little bit, out of my own, so I. I guess I'm not full of wisdom or advice today.
01;18;10;17 - 01;18;31;01
Unknown
I'm just kind of taking it easy and, you know, in a rebuilding here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like the like the bears. Like the bears. They're in a rebuilding year this year. Yeah. They're already. All right. Well, we really appreciate you and everyone just like Tabitha. I mean, look, we appreciate the work you've done on behalf of conservation.
01;18;31;01 - 01;18;48;00
Unknown
Yes. Thank you. And sorry to go through such a confusing and terrible set of events. Now, not a fun time. That's how life is. Throws you around. You can make a plan and, you know, keep on working on those problems you're passionate about solving. Yeah. Thank you I will. You guys. Do you guys do great work too? So yeah sure.
01;18;48;02 - 01;19;20;09
Unknown
Thank you. Well, everyone, conservation happens one mind at a time.

Hoksey Native Seeds

Ep. 262 Getting Fired by DOGE as a USDA Employee with Tabitha Panas

Podcast Transcript

Ep. 263 (Coffee Time) Urbanization vs Conservation and the Eradication of Fireflies

Ep. 261 Gubernatorial Candidate Rob Sand