Dirt to Dollars
Agriculture, farming, and rural issues in central Kentucky.
Dirt to Dollars
Episode 43 - Precision Conservation Management Director Greg Goodwin
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Thanks to this week's guest Greg Goodwin, Director of Precision Conservation Management.
Also thanks to this week's episode sponsor Masterson Farms!
And thanks to our studio sponsor Biotech Innovations. Learn more about them at www.biotechinnovationsag.com.
Welcome to Dirt to Dollars, where we cover everything from the dirt on your land to the dollars in your hand.
SPEAKER_01We're talking all things agriculture and central can take, from the field to the farm office.
SPEAKER_03Join your hosts, Daniel Carpenter, Matt Adams, and Mark Thomas as we dig into current ag news, practices, and more. And now, coming to you from the biotech innovation studios, here's Dirt to Dollars. Now let's get innovative. Welcome back to another week of Dirt to Dollars. I'm your host, Matt Adams, here with co-host Daniel Carpenter. Say hello, Daniel. Hey, what's going on, Matt? Thank you for thank you for the introduction. And the one who doesn't introduce his co-host is co-host, they're just there, I guess. They're just there in the background talking. Some famous comments.
SPEAKER_01So excited to get to my tie-in for you not being here that I've got to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_03That was first thing I noticed, I was like, man, so you know what?
SPEAKER_01While we're calling people out, Matt, I think you owe, and they're not our sponsor this week, but you owe the social media gal over at Southern States an apology.
SPEAKER_03Why was that?
SPEAKER_01Because you said Jonathan's the one that did all the videoing. And Katie was quick to correct you that she took the video on the of the vector running through the field. So let's let's apologize, man.
SPEAKER_03So was it her phone laying between the cornrows?
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_03Man, that's that is for the brand right there.
SPEAKER_01Well, who who is our sponsor this week? Oh, Arlo, again, over at Masterson Farms. Uh took care of skin this week. And uh I hope you guys continue to listen because that boy's gonna need some college money someday.
SPEAKER_03I think the college dreams are long gone.
SPEAKER_01He's it may be. But I did hear I did hear maybe some pumpkins are going in the ground again soon, and there might be a might be a few pumpkins out there on the wagon to I thought I heard they weren't.
SPEAKER_03I thought he was planting like two rows. Oh, but I I don't think that's enough for the wagon to come out.
SPEAKER_01Well, maybe not, but you never know. Maybe they have a good crop.
SPEAKER_03I think he had done the uh economic returns on that and they weren't too good. So uh yeah, hopefully uh hopefully Arlo's like his daddy and can figure out how to do pretty much anything for a buck and he doesn't have to go to college.
SPEAKER_01I'd say he probably can, but speaking of economic returns, we've got a guest this week to talk to us about uh PCM. So, Daniel, you want to lead us off into that?
SPEAKER_02So I get the pleasure of introducing our special guest today uh for this week's episode, all the way from Illinois. We crossed state lines uh to bring in our guest this week, but happy to have Mr. Greg Goodwin, uh, who is our director for precision conservation management, PCM. Greg, thanks for joining us this week.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, my pleasure. My pleasure. Happy to be here.
SPEAKER_02Why don't you uh take a minute and just tell us a little bit about yourself, a little bit about your background?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Yeah. So um studied at uh University of Illinois is is is where I studied. I studied agricultural engineering, um, did a master's and bachelor's and master's in that. Um master's project was really looking at uh nutrient loss reduction through bioreactors. Um so uh between that and then um going to University or uh US Geological Survey, uh Illinois Water Science Center, and then um environmental consulting for about 10 years. I've kind of been studying and involved in in agricultural water quality and nutrient loss mitigation for you know about 20 years or so at this point. Um, and then about four years ago was approached about uh taking this position as director of PCM with Illinois Corn Growers uh after working on some projects with them through my previous consulting job. And uh yeah, now been the director for about four and a half years at this point. Um and yeah, just kind of holistically speaking, have have really kind of been in various aspects of agricultural data collection, kind of specifically related to you know, mitigating the environmental impacts of agriculture. And that's kind of just evolved from again looking at kind of nutrient loss and then uh working with ag pesticide companies in that environmental consulting stint. Um, you know, yeah, how how we mitigate and prevent chemicals from entering the environment from agriculture. And then that kind of bridge back into some nutrient loss work with uh Illinois corn growers and some work with Kentucky corn growers and Missouri corn growers as well. Um, and then ultimately uh led back to this position uh at PCM and yeah, now working more on the um sustainability side of things and and you know, really trying to help farmers understand um the economics of infield management decisions and you know, helping them kind of have a holistic look at that from uh economics and the sustainability benchmarking perspective. Um but that kind of gives you an idea of yeah, my background.
SPEAKER_02So some of that, some of that work um in your environmental consulting was some work in Kentucky. Was that like back was probably 10 or 15 years ago?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I would say that that started probably around 2016, 2017. And then, you know, the core of that was was up until yeah, probably um really around COVID. And then um, you know, I think started to phase out a little bit after that. And that's uh yeah, 2022 was when I started at Illinois Corn, and then some others carried that on at the at the uh consulting firm I used to be at. But um yeah, doing a lot of edge of field type monitoring on various farms, various farming practices in Kentucky, trying to help understand, yeah, how various best management practices are are mitigating um nutrient loss and and surface sediment loss and things like that. Um, and but really trying to get capture, help Kentucky corn and Kentucky soy capture a good data snapshot from a um really the gamut of various farming practices that are deployed in Kentucky uh from a grow crop production standpoint, um, and really just help use that to train models and then extrapolate that a little bit a little bit more with that modeling exercise to uh help you know just farmers understand what what true losses do look like and and have a data set that could be used in their uh support, frankly, for um entering conversations with with you know the state or regulators, so to speak, that um yeah, farmers need to be well represented when they have those conversations.
SPEAKER_03So you started to get into it a little bit there, but uh just explain to us real quick kind of what PCM is and what their purpose is, and maybe a little bit about how they got started and uh and how they're organized there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so the program got launched by Illinois Corn Growers Association through a regional conservation partnership program grant from USDA and RCS back in 2016. And that was sort of the official start and launch of PCM, but it was really um in response to the Illinois Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy. And uh at that time, Kentucky had signed on as a uh partner and support, um supported the program, and actually we launched a region in Kentucky at that same time, and that predates my involvement. That was that was all done through some of the other fine folks at at Illinois Corn, namely Dr. Laura Gentry, who was the initial director and and um got the program off the ground and then has sort of grown in in terms of the data analysis aspect of her role. Um, but yeah, the the program again was really spons uh spawned as a result of trying to help farmers meet that nutrient loss reduction goal, you know, through sort of voluntary um pathways, so to speak. So, you know, trying to avoid further regulation, further mandates uh around what practices are deployed or how much nitrogen or timing of fertilization, uh, things like that. And so Illinois Corn designed it, you know, to sort of help address what I'd say farmers tend to think, or what we believe farmers think are the biggest barriers to adoption of different practices, which is really the economic component. Um, how's this going to affect our bottom line? I think farmers are generally, you know, happy to do things when when ends meet, um, but also have to understand, you know, the labor components and all the various factors. And and so the way PCM is designed is um really to try to hit on all those different threads. And yeah, we can, I'm sure, dive into um you know some of those various aspects. And I do know that you you both are participants in PCM, so we'd yeah, I'd be you know happy to talk about you know feedback and and your guys' experience in the program as well. Um but I guess maybe to just tag on to that from that initial launch, we've now sort of grown and and we're now in nine different regions. We operate the program on sort of a regional basis through a role we call the conservation specialist. And for those who may not know, Daniel is one of the conservation specialists and and is home in Kentucky and serves what we call the bourbon region for the program. Um, but we kind of had this understanding or expectation that each specialist is going to work with about 80 to 100 farmers and and help facilitate the benchmarking side of what we do. So collecting on-farm data on a field-by-field basis, on a pass-by-pass basis, and using that to benchmark various farming approaches. Um, and pair that with the average economic cost of all those different passes, and then use that to show how, on average, you know, taking data collection all the way through yield, you know, how different farming approaches shake out, economically speaking. We also pass all that data through a couple different environmental models, and that allows us to pull in the metrics or outputs from those models and do the same thing from an environmental impact standpoint and help compare various water quality like nutrient loss components, sediment loss, um, greenhouse gas emissions, things of that nature, uh, and just give farmers kind of this holistic picture of what's going on on their farm uh and and how they compare against others regionally.
SPEAKER_01I guess you could even take that data from regionally and and compare across your multi-states. And and how much variance is there? I guess I shouldn't use variance, but how much difference is there in in like our farming operations here in central Kentucky versus you know central Illinois? You know, we like to think we're nothing like up there, but there may you all may have pulled in some similarities or some major differences over time.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a that's a great point. And and that is absolutely um something that I think we're gonna get better at doing once some of the regions are spawned or have been spawned up a longer time in some of the other states where we work. We have sort of the longest running data set in Illinois, just since that's where it started and kind of grew out from there. Um, but I'd say that's absolutely one of the things that we can do and do to some degree. There hasn't necessarily been a strong focus on state-by-state comparison at this point in time, but um but yeah, you're absolutely right. We're pulling in, you know, not only the you know, the field management data, we're pulling in, you know, the some of the geospatial layers as well. So soil types, soil productivity level, um, you know, general weather data, things like that, all the stuff in the background that's needed to run those environmental models, you know, slope, uh, you know, all those kind of things to be able to do those comparisons and help folks understand, yeah, what things look like holistically. Like I said, we haven't really done a lot of state-by-state comparison at this point, but um, yeah, I'd say that's something we may look at in the future. Um, you know, something good to mention as well is um we're a very multi-stakeholder kind of funded and and um you know, as far as who we look at, what who we partner with and what they're interested in. Um, you know, if folks are interested in things like that, that's definitely stuff we can we can do and we can um take a closer look at. It's really, it's really just trying to figure out yeah, what what means most to our partners. But that said, farmers first and foremost are at the front of who we who we support, who we're here to um satisfy, and and who we're looking for feedback from in order to make different decisions.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and that was some you mentioned that our data gets uh compared amongst kind of like soil productivity profiles and soil types. Uh that was something I didn't realize until Daniel came down and did uh his first little end-of-the-year review thing back over the winter. And uh we were we call those wraps. I went over that with you. You don't call it the end of the year review thing. That's not the technical term.
SPEAKER_02Resource analysis assessment plan. I think I said that right.
SPEAKER_03Uh but yeah, I didn't realize that that was how that was done. And when we were looking at some of those comparatives, I it's kind of like, man, I that's pretty good because I I farm some uh a lot of kind of marginal ground, what you'd call marginal ground here. And I thought, man, maybe I'm kind of hanging with the big boys, and then Daniel busted my bubble and said, no, that's that's compared with uh like productivity.
SPEAKER_00So that's exactly right. Yeah, we try to normalize by some of those factors in order to keep kind of apples to apples. Um, you know, again, not that we can't figure out how to help draw those other comparisons if folks are interested in seeing it, um, and maybe have different soil types across their farm and and can kind of look at it that way, because that should all be included in the report. But um, yeah, generally speaking, yeah, trying to sort of level set for a lot of those comparisons for that apples to apples perspective.
SPEAKER_03Um I guess one question I'd have for you and Daniel, you can maybe uh chime in on this a little bit too. Um what are kind of some some of the most common goals that farmers come to you all uh looking for assistance with or things that they're wanting to look at or maybe wanting to experiment with that they need your all's advice and guidance on?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I'd say I've got a I've got a intro here, but Daniel, I would definitely turn this over to you for all your first hand comments. Um I you know, I think I look at kind of our service as a bit of a three-legged stool. You know, we offer the financial and sustainability benchmarking incentive programs, you know, most of the areas we operate in. We've got some supply chain partnerships with uh, you know, folks who are buying buying the corn or buying the soy off of the farms we're working with and are passing incentives along to incent conservation adoption of various kinds, mostly cover crops, tillage reduction, and nitrogen management. Um, but then also that agronom agronomic support. You know, we not all of our staffs are CCAs, but Daniel is, and and we have a few others that are. Um, and I think it really goes a long way when when folks like Daniel can coach farmers through any kind of change that they're looking to make. Um but I don't know, I feel like we get when we survey farmers, it's not any necessarily any one singular thing that stands out from our sort of broad service that's the clear winner. I mean, I think farmers always like getting paid for things that they're doing.
SPEAKER_03So that's definitely more one of the more popular ones.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for sure. But for instance, when we survey about like farmer feedback to that rap report, it's not like any particular section there is this as clear heads and toes winner above several of the others. There are a couple that are more just information-based, generally speaking, than like specific analysis of their farm. But all the sections that do focus on that specific analysis, I think from what I've seen in survey results over the last few years here, it's all you know, each section speaks to some subset of farmers, which makes us feel good, I think, about the the holistic nature of what we're providing back. Um, but I didn't I don't want to take away from any of Daniel's comments about what he hears firsthand.
SPEAKER_02Well, well, I guess some things that I've I've heard would be um that they don't really know what to expect, right? So it's kind of a very new program uh for the area and a unique way of looking at things. Um, so it really wasn't until after people had gone through a year, you know, they um a few of them were surprised it didn't take very long to gather data from them. You know, it's it seems daunting when we talk about we're gonna go by over every pass across the field and however many fields you want to put in the program. But really, um, other than Matt, because we had computer problems at Matt. So Matt, just don't even talk about that. I forgot about that. But um and that was also the first one that I did. But um, I mean, hour to an hour and a half, we can get a lot of data from our farmers, um, especially if they have their maps and are really easy to uh to grab uh format, whether that be through like opcenter or agfinity um or any of that software. Um, but uh so that that was one thing that I think was was it was easy and farmers didn't really anticipate. But then that that data analysis, just going through that with them and um seeing, you know, the the most popular topic this year I feel like was nitrogen because it it it's it's so expensive this year. Um there was a lot of interest in those numbers and watching those over time. Um hopefully nitrogen prices come down, but we all know they're probably not going to come down very fast. Um, and that could be a useful tool for farmers to use um in the coming years to help identify those inefficient fields that they may be over applying nitrogen on. Um, and maybe they're looking to just make some cuts and save some money and some fields, and it would be very, it's very helpful for that, I believe. Um, and then yeah, I mean there's interest in in cover crops, um, and and it's been interesting to see uh how farmers um react to that. Uh and and I know one thing that came up this year, and of course it is one year of data, so it's nothing that we're gonna like publish and and and and hang from the from the uh rooftops or anything, but uh we did see a lot of uh response to soybean acres this year that uh with the cover crop before soybean uh had higher yields and higher returns. And a lot of times what we think about, especially here in Kentucky with our slopes, is how important the cover crops are after soybeans before corn to save the soil from washing away. Um it was just kind of an interesting thing to just see the response from farmers on that. So it's I really think it's one of those things that's you know, until you've been in the program, it's hard, you know, to understand exactly what it is that we do. We can sit here and talk for an hour on it and not even cover everything that we offer. But um, I feel like after people have have been in the program, they really start to see things that catch their interest. And it may not be all of it, but there's bits and pieces there that seem to catch everyone. And um, you know, of the uh 30-something farmers I had this first year, they they all are going to re-enroll. So I think that's a good sign, too. And they all are not getting paid either, right? There's some of them that are not getting incentives that are still in the program, so they do see some value there, and um and I think there was a you know, it's all enough to spark their interest to continue in it and see where it goes from here.
SPEAKER_01And and one thing we talked about, Daniel, too, when when we first sat down and looked at this is it's like any good program. You get in, you get out what you put in. And if if your data uh and your information that you're giving Daniel is garbage, you're gonna get garbage out of the data that he brings back. Um as farmers, we tend to to end up, you know, data overload. We've got uh planning maps, we've got uh tool test, we've got yield maps, we've got spray passes, we've got all this stuff. And uh one, we probably don't have time. I know I don't have time to sit down and break that down uh piece by piece and see what we've done in the field. For me, that's where PCM has come in. They can kind of uh use their metrics they've used over the years and and kind of pull all that in and i it's like hitting the easy button, I guess, uh for the farmer to look at our data, see what we're doing, see if something stands out, and we can step back and say, oh, we did this different on that field, or that different. Um, or or cover crops and um rates that you put out or or a mix of species or or whatever. So there's a lot of things that that you guys are looking at that we wouldn't look at normally.
SPEAKER_02So and there's some farmers that are doing everything uh great. I mean like they might there may not be much they can really fine-tune at this point to be much better, but they're offering, you know, they're they're helping other farmers to give them something to strive for as well. And then, you know, maybe even some producers that are are not doing cover crops, that are working some ground, that are maybe not applying nitrogen in the most efficient way. We want them too, because that that just gives us more data to to make some really good comparisons about um well, I won't say worst practices, but I guess I just said it, but but you know, maybe practices that aren't aren't the best and and then best practices, right? So that that just kind of gives you a whole uh just really good data set to to look at and see where we all stand.
SPEAKER_03So you mentioned uh Daniel, the nitrogen rate thing. That was something uh you know, when I joined and and started last year, we were already no-till. We were already cover crop on a fairly large scale over acres, virtually everything, uh, and had been for several years. So we kind of had that part covered, and uh but the nitrogen rate thing was something that I really wasn't expecting until we started sitting down and looking at some of this and looking at some of these comparisons at the end of the year. Uh but that's something that I think is really valuable, especially with nitrogen prices being so volatile like they have been the last few years. Uh you know, we have we all have here in Kentucky, we have AGR1, or you have whatever extension uh data and research that's been done that everybody's seen that graph with the curve and the rate of diminishing returns once you get over a certain amount, but that really doesn't bring in each year's economic data of and being able to to use some of the tools you all have and and compare nitrogen rates and uh you know it's been a common practice for a lot of farms in Kentucky, we're just gonna throw out 200 units of nitrogen in front of a corn crop, no matter where it's at, what it is, and uh we've always tried to be a little more conservative than that on what we're doing, and I didn't think nitrogen was really ever one of our limiting factors, and I still don't think it is, and still think we can probably cut it back a little more, but uh that's been one thing that I really wasn't expecting that has benefited us through this program, and I think we'll continue to do so over the next few years.
SPEAKER_01I I agree wholeheartedly with that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, uh to me, I I would say that's one of the things that I feel like we've seen as you know, our ability to demonstrate that diminishing return on additional nitrogen, and the same thing from a tillage perspective. And that may be almost a thing too that's even more unique than the being able to demonstrate that diminishing return on nitrogen. Because you, like you mentioned, there's a couple other sources out there in Illinois. We have the maximum return to nitrogen tool and rate that's uh you know, got trials that go on every single year to determine that in different parts of the state of Illinois and soil types in the state. Um, but what I don't necessarily see in different types of extension outreach is that benchmarking around tillage, tillage, you know, all the way from no-till to very heavy tillage and pretty much everything in between. And you know, we sort of work pretty hard to be able to benchmark all the different tillage tools out there in some facet and uh you know, show how many passes a farmer's making with each and show that diminishing return for both corn soy and wheat. Um yeah, I I think all those different facets that you can anytime you can demonstrate where there's that diminishing return to additional input is is hopefully going to be very valuable to a farmer. And um, you know, the reality too, I guess, is a sort of follow-on comment to that, and would be curious what you guys feel like you see in your own operations. Um, but we definitely don't cover anything up, you know, when it demonstrates that, you know, a little bit of tillage is more profitable than no till, or a little bit of extra nitrogen is paying for itself. You know, those are economical models, they're not environmental models, so to speak. Um and we don't try to cover that up because we want, I guess, farmers to go in eyes wide open, and then that also helps us sort of make the case for anybody that's doling out incentives to be like, look, here's here's the reality that the farmers facing on this decision. It's like there might be all the right environmental reasons to back off on one of these things, but this is the real economic gap that they've got to address for their own operation and what makes the most business sense for them. So if you're asking them to make this change, here's what here's what it's gonna cost them. What what are you willing to do here? So um, yeah, I'd say that's something that we've we always look at, and and where we really do appreciate all the farmers that participate and allow us to bring that transparency, even those that are maybe already doing all the right things, so to speak, you know, from an environmental standpoint, um, their willingness to participate and help share that information is super valuable to help all farmers understand those differences.
SPEAKER_01And looking here to 2026 data, something I've kind of been watching that that could be very interesting this winter when you all put data together is uh our early planted soybeans. You know, guys that started in late March uh you know through the the 15th of April or so. If you'd have done a a light vertical tillage pass, you might not have got hit by a frost very hard. It might not have had a replant or a cover crop or bare ground. It'd be interesting to see um if there's a way to uh uh to split out uh what got replanted and what didn't, and see if there was any, you know, would a uh you know, would a ten dollar you know vertical tillage pass have have paid to uh save that those soybeans, or would a a cover crop have saved it, you know, at a at a certain rate. So those things would be interested to see just here on on what we're seeing and have seen in 2026 so far.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. That's an excellent comment. And you know, that uh I'll speak to what I think we're seeing in Illinois, not even necessarily specific to the 26 crop, but um you know, I think for a long time there's sort of been this conventional wisdom that like no-till soybeans was an easy button. Um, but I think on average, at least in Illinois and some of the higher productivity soils, we're actually seeing where a little bit of tillage ahead of soy up to you know two light passes, you know, especially thinking about following a uh, you know, highly productive corn year where there's a ton of residue to be dealt with and figuring out how to get that incorporated and broken down a little bit, those tillage passes are actually paying for themselves with a couple extra bushels of soybeans that do cover, like you say, the cost of a generally light tillage pass to do some of that residue incorporation. Um, and something else fascinating with that, and I would say one facet of why it's more beneficial to stay in the program and really be able to look and discern about these trends over the long haul is you know, in any given year, you're gonna get a weather condition that may not reoccur for another five or even 10 years, right? And it may just take that one year of a really stark difference to help show that something like cover crops is truly paying for itself in the long run, but you may not see that four out of five years or six out of 10 years, you know. But that one year, couple of years and 10 years that it does those circumstances come along. To use your example, you know, the the frost on early season soy, like generally speaking, I think we've seen a trend where early season soy is absolutely paying for itself. Um, I've even uh seen some recent information coming out of a soybean association that suggests there should be an automatic um CI benefit of by just by planning date related to soy. But in in your case, that's you know, it maybe gotten dinged in your area by um that early frost or late frost, maybe rather is a better way to say that. But um all that to say, yeah, I think those circumstances just don't over don't occur every year. And so the way we're sort of setting ourselves up and and where I think we do add a lot of benefit to farmers is like the longer you participate, the more you're gonna be able to see um the benefits of various practices shake out. And that's where I think we'll also be able to, again, take this information to the folks that make the rules, so to speak, and and help them understand things a little better and and from a perspective they may not have had, you know, given they don't tend to collect data this way.
SPEAKER_03So one thing I will say about uh something that kind of clicked for me when we got into the program and figured out how it was going to work. Um this is very similar looking at kind of different data sets, but very similar to what uh our listeners here in Kentucky will know as Kentucky Farm Business Management, which which looks at uh comparing economic data between farms, but they're not going into the detail of pass by pass. And if you did this pass and your neighbor didn't, who's gonna come out on top, or what did that cost you, or what did that make you? Uh, you know, it's just lumping your chemical costs together and how those related per acre uh with the next guy or with the rest of the group, uh or your fuel cost, or what your average price per bushel was. Uh, but it's not going to that pass by pass to where I can say, okay, if I go cover crops on this farm, it's going to make me X amount of dollars, or it's going to cost me X amount of dollars. Uh, or if I make a fungicide pass, it's going to cost me, or it's going to make me, or uh whatever. It's so really more detailed, but probably more uh because you all, if I understand it right, you kind of level the playing field as far as input cost and you you do an average on on chemical and whatnot. So you don't have that in there, uh, where Kentucky Farm Business Management kind of accounts for that a little bit. So uh really to me, that's I'm a member of that program as well, and use that data. So it's it's kind of nice to be able to throw those together uh and blend those in at the end of the year and and see where you are economically and agronomically as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that that's exactly right. And and um that actually is where we're we're sourcing and by the by their farm business, farm management in in Illinois to get those average costs of a tillage pass, a planter pass, a spray pass, all those different things. Um and yeah, we do that intentionally so that you know we're we're um again trying to create this apples to apples comparison, so to speak. Uh, and we have surveyed farmers to sort of see how well represented they feel by the economics that we do use in our report, since that's not ever going to match exactly, you know, an individual farmer's um information. But on average, I'd say we see that 80 to 85 percent of farmers tell us that they feel pretty well represented, and in the areas that they don't or have some discrepancy with, it's not too hard to do that mental math of like, oh, okay, my you know, cost for fertilizer, cost for um spray is is this much different or seed is this much different, um, and sort of reconcile how that looks in our in our average reports. But um we do get that feedback, and we actually do often take a closer look at our stuff when we hear, you know, oh, that in a certain region this does this is not what we what we think is super accurate. So um, you know, we double check that for us, and and we do. Um, and and you know, have constantly again refining what we do um each and every year by polling our team, polling farmers, so to speak, and and looking at how we can incorporate all that feedback into refining these various aspects of the report to try to get that farmer, every individual farmer, the best representation of their data we can.
SPEAKER_03And I'll vouch for that when uh when Daniel came down and did my rap report at the end of the year. Uh, that was one thing that he did ask me as we sat down and and looked at what those costs were on uh on Euros' side. And he asked if I thought that was close or low or high, and uh just kind of my personal situation. We've worked really hard the last few years of sourcing generics and trying to shop around our chemical prices and and buy from several different places, so we're sure we're getting the best deal. And uh I was coming in a little lower than what uh you all were saying, but that now that you know that, you can keep, like you said, keep that in the back of your mind uh as you're comparing those numbers and kind of do the mental math as you're looking through everything.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yep, that's exactly right. We we want all that feedback. I'd say, I'd say we we take that as as as caring and and and we look at that as just how can we get better, how can we make it more impactful. Um so yeah, we'll we'll take every ounce of that you and any others have.
SPEAKER_02All right. Well, Greg, hey, we really appreciate you joining us this week. Um, Matt and Mark, I will settle up with you all after for bragging on me as your specialist. But uh Greg, thanks so much for joining us and sharing some great info about PCM. And uh sorry I missed the last team meeting, but I'll be there next time, I promise. Uh you have a good excuse. So I'll Diddy though. I was I didn't see the doctor's note, so I can't vouch. That's true. That's true. I'll send you the bills if you want me to. Okay, that's it. But in all serious note, uh thanks for joining us and appreciate your time on uh Dirt's Dollars this week.
SPEAKER_00No, my pleasure. Really appreciate the opportunity and and thank you guys for having me.
SPEAKER_03All right, thanks again to Greg with Precision Conservation Management. Daniel, I don't think there's any chance that we even possibly got you fired or anything this week.
SPEAKER_02No, and uh uh that's that's good. Might even get a raise out of it.
SPEAKER_03I I think you might have scored some brownie points.
SPEAKER_01I I think so too. So we'll we'll send you a bill for that.
SPEAKER_02Some little Debbie points.
SPEAKER_01Ooh.
SPEAKER_02Let's save that for next week. Let's we'll talk about little Debbie's next week.
SPEAKER_03If uh if you missed last week's show, you still got time, go in and comment on our Facebook post or send us an email or a text or something if you have any uh if you have any suggestions for guests or show topics coming up. We got some good ones. We'll uh hold those a little close to the vest until next week. We might try and work some of those in. But uh get yourself entered in a chance for some dirt dollars swag.
SPEAKER_01Good hats and Matt's kind of hats. So we've got we got options.
SPEAKER_03Don't go giving all my good hats away.
SPEAKER_01You might be the only one that wears them anyway. No. So it's it looks like it's gonna get hot this week. Do you think those hats keep you cooler than the Richardson 112s? Definitely. It it doesn't matter because we got hair up there to ventilate. But but I can see that having uh a ventilation tunnel there to get some get some heat in.
SPEAKER_02But yeah, it is it is gonna get hot. Um they're talking like several days in the 90s, mid-90s, upper 90s. Can it this this guy, this this fat guy here does not like that kind of weather.
SPEAKER_03That's not fat kid weather. Um do you think it'll really get that hot? Because it's hard, you know, you watch this, the models or whatever can predict all this heat, but when we're I mean, we're fairly green right now. We've finally gotten some rain uh here in our part of the world, and the corn crops greening up. We've got a lot of green leaf material out there. Doesn't it typically kind of struggle to get those heat values up when you have all that green material? Because what doesn't it it cools the atmosphere and keeps keeps heat from radiating back out of the ground and yes, and and uh but it also I mean it's gonna make it more humid. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Which is gonna make me sweat more, but at the same time it makes the plant sweat, which keeps it cool, right? So yeah, I mean I I don't know. I know we I think we had a text thread going about just concerns about corn because if we talked about this last week, and and we actually were I think we may have uh not guessed it very accurately because I think we may have pushed corn tasseling off another week, but it's it's it's you all did. I wasn't in the right now.
SPEAKER_03I was yelling at the radio when you all said. I bet you were.
SPEAKER_02I was I could hear you now. But uh, but yeah, that that that you know that corn, a lot of tassels went up, and if we get this rain, of course we're recording this on uh on Wednesday the uh uh 24th, and they're talking about some rain this coming weekend. And hopefully we're kind of on the edge of some of that. But especially if we get that rain, I I'm not that concerned about it, but there is some concern, you know, if several days in the 90s of having a negative effect on corn pollination. So we'll, you know, hopefully we got a lot of potential out there. Hopefully it it won't set us back too bad. Maybe it's a short-term thing. I've not seen the longer term forecast on the heat.
SPEAKER_03Well, I mean, we're still we're just now entering El Nino, right? So didn't our central Kentucky weather guy tell us back in the spring that El Nino for our part of the world is usually cool and wet, right?
SPEAKER_01Typically. Depending on where it depending on where the El Nino sets in, but that's what they were predicting. So hopefully we can get through this heat wave, uh, maybe keep the wind speed down uh if we're lucky, and maybe not dry things out as fast.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I get what you're saying. I would I I kind of like a little breeze.
SPEAKER_02If we end up the corn barrier degrees, and my lower back carrier really cares.
SPEAKER_0195 degrees and a 20 mile an hour crosswind. It's it's like corn's like standing in an oven. So that's my thinking. But if you need to spray any liberty, I was gonna say it'd be good time to spray liberty. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03On target only, of course.
SPEAKER_01Yes, not the neighbor ladies where we're gonna be able to do it stay out of the 20 mile an hour wind if you're trying to spray liberty. Yeah. That's right. About all we got this week. All the time we got.
SPEAKER_02We got plenty of stuff to talk about. We got the time we got. We're gonna push a lot of this stuff from our list this week to next week because we got we do have some good things we want to talk about from some of our Facebook comments. So don't forget to to chime in if you can, and or even if you share or chime in on this week's uh episode post and we put it online. Love to hear some feedback and some some good ideas. But just real quick, thanks again to to Masterson Farms, appreciate the support. Probably gonna hear their name for a few weeks now. So uh appreciate that. Go for it. Sure. All right. Yeah, double dinger. But uh thanks again for the support. And uh guys, y'all got anything else? I think it's got us. We'll see you next week. Thanks for listening to dollars. See you next week.