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Your Tractor—Can You Fix It? Underwater Farming & a $75,000 Doorstop | Daily Farm Brief · Farm Tales Unplugged - Daily Farm Brief

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning, Farm Nation, and hello, Truck City.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: This is FarmTales Unplugged Daily Farm Brief for Monday, October 12th.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Brought to you by World TradeX, empowering farmers.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Rick Portanova.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Today, your tractor quits, the crop is ready, and the rain is coming.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: The last thing you need is a fight over who gets to fix your own machine.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Then we're heading to a farm where you need scuba gear to check the crops, and a Michigan farm where a$75,000 meteorite spent years holding the door open.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: We'll break down Friday's USDA report and what it means for the grain market, plus scientists trying to grow food without sunlight or even artificial light.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: And the old farmer's almanac gets into the strange side of fall, starting with a shrub that fires its own seeds and a frog that freezes to death then reanimates come spring.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: So grab your coffee, fire up whatever you're driving, and let's find out what was happening while you were busy actually working.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Picture this: your crop is ready, rain is coming, and your machine quits.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: You've got somebody who can repair it, but getting access to the parts or software becomes another problem.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: That frustration is behind a new federal inquiry into farm equipment manufacturers and dealers.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: The Federal Trade Commission and USDA are examining complaints about repair barriers, expensive parts, and business arrangements that can limit farmers' choices.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: They want farmers and independent repair shops to describe what's getting in the way.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Here's why that matters.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: The repair bill isn't necessarily the biggest bill.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's the crops sitting outside while you wait.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: You can postpone an appointment.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: You can't ask a field to stay ready until the service truck arrives.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: My feeling, when you buy a machine, you oughta own more than just the payments.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: You oughta have a fair shot at keeping it running.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Now, imagine checking your crops by putting on a scuba tank.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Off the coast of Nali, Italy, an experimental project called Nemo's Garden grows plants inside clear, air-filled domes anchored underwater.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Basil and other herbs grow inside, the fish stay outside.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: The plants aren't drinking seawater, moisture evaporates and condenses inside the domes, producing fresh water for the growing system.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sunlight reaches the structures through the sea and sensors track conditions inside.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: This project has been developing for years.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's experimental farming, not a plan to move the corn belt offshore.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: But the question itself is fascinating.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Could protected spaces underwater offer another way to grow certain crops where land or fresh water is limited?
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: We're accustomed to thinking about what a farm needs overhead.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: These growers are investigating what might be possible beneath the surface.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: All right, here's the market picture.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Friday's USDA supply and demand report gave corn growers more competition.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: More corn.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: USDA raised its national yield estimate to 181.2 bushels an acre, putting production at about 16 billion bushels.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: It also increased the corn expected to remain after the marketing year by 282 million bushels.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: And it cut its projected season average farm price 10 cents to$4.70 a bushel.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's a national forecast, not today's bit at your elevator.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Soybean ending stocks edged higher with the price forecast unchanged.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: Wheat ending stocks also increased.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: The takeaway?
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: USDA raised corn demand, but supplies grew even faster.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: That points to pressure on growers' pricing power and potentially some breathing room for feed buyers.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now for our high-tech moment.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: What happens when scientists ask whether a plant actually needs to see the sun?
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Researchers at UC Riverside and their collaborators have demonstrated a system that uses electricity, water, and carbon dioxide to make acetate, a substance that certain organisms can use as food.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: They've grown algae, yeast, and mushroom-producing fungi on that feedstock in darkness.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: They've also shown that several crop plants can use carbon from acetate.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: The bigger ambition is to develop crops that can grow entirely on that energy source without light reaching their leaves.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's the goal, rather than a proven replacement for conventional farming.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the electricity still has to come from somewhere.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: The scientific work is real.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it can become affordable farming is the harder question.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: Because a remarkable tomato still has to make financial sense to somebody growing it.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Let's revisit You Don't Hear That Every Day.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: A rock that came with a Michigan farm eventually sold for$75,000.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Before that, it was holding a door open.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: David Mazarick acquired the rock when he bought the property in 1988.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: The previous owner told him it was a meteorite, but knowing it came from space and knowing what somebody might pay for it were two different things.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: It really was an iron nickel meteorite weighing 22 pounds.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: He later sold it to Michigan State University Abrams Planetarium for$75,000.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Something that came with the farm, sat around for decades, holding a door open, and did a completely ordinary job, turned out to be an extraordinary rare meteorite.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Let's finish with the old farmer's almanac and two things happening outside that sound made up.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: First, witch hazel.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: The almanac explains a common witch hazel blooms in fall and its ripening seed capsules can burst with an audible pop, throwing seeds several yards.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: So a shrub can be flowering and launching its seeds at the same time.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And here's an even stranger cold weather survival story documented by the National Park Service.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: A wood frog can spend winter partially frozen with no heartbeat and no breathing.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Its body produces large amounts of glucose that help protect its cells while ice forms around them.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: When conditions warm up, the frog thaws out and resumes activity.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: It hasn't died and come back, it has survived a condition that would kill most animals.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: I personally think it died and came back.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think they should rename it the zombie frog.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: Under the leaves, that little frog has a winter strategy more remarkable than anything we're putting in the equipment shed.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot going on out there, even when it looks like everything is shutting down.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Today, we took on the fight to fix your own tractor, visited a farm where checking the crops means strapping on a scuba tank, broke down what the USDA's latest numbers mean for the grain market.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: We looked at scientists trying to grow food without sun, and a Michigan farm where a$75,000 meteorite spent years holding a door open.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Then we stepped into the strange side of fall with witch hazel launching seeds and a frog that comes back from the dead.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: And there you have it.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's your FarmTales Unplugged Daily Farm Brief for Monday, October 12th.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Brought to you by World TradeX Empowering Farmers.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Rick Portonova, and I'll see you Tuesday morning.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: If you could take a moment and share this podcast with someone who might appreciate it, that would be fantastic.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.