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Buffalo Houseguest, Purple Warning Corn & the Hot-Spray Beetle | Daily Farm Brief · Farm Tales Unplugged - Daily Farm Brief

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning, Farm Nation, and Hello Truck City.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: This is FarmTale's Unplugged Daily Farm Brief for Wednesday, October 21st.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: Brought to you by World TradeX, empowering farmers.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Rick Portonova.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Today,$8 billion in newly announced FarmAid and an ocean-going ship taking on 5,000 tons of ethanol.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Then a Texas family whose buffalo moved into the house, and a Virginia family that waited nearly a decade for a harvest their dog had to find.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: We'll check the grain markets, meet corn that turns purple to warn of disease, and discover a beetle that fires a near-boiling chemical spray.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: And if you enjoy the show, give us a follow, a like, or a share.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: That would be fantastic.
• 0:51
  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.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: $8 billion in new farm assistance.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: USDA announced the Harvest Fuel Relief Program Monday, October 19th.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: The agency says it will provide one-time payments to help farmers with increased production costs and market disruptions.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: The Farm Service Agency will administer it.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Payments will use a formula based on reported planted acres, production costs, yields, and prices.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: That means the program is designed to cover part of the estimated losses across the crop year.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Rates for major commodity crops are due in November.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Details for other eligible commodities will come later.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: USDA has not announced the application period, so there's a substantial new aid package on the table, but farmers are still waiting for the rates and signup details that will tell them what it means for their operation.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: A ship just took on 5,000 metric tons of ethanol for fuel.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: On Monday, Marsk announced what it calls the world's largest ethanol refueling operation aboard the Mars Califax in Singapore.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Here's why American growers should care.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: In a separate operation last month, Marsk fueled another ship in the United States with American-made corn ethanol.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: And on Monday, engine builder Win GD reported that the ship had successfully traveled from Houston to New York using only ethanol.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Those are actual fueling operations and a completed voyage.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: For agriculture, the opportunity is another customer for ethanol beyond the gas station.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: There's still a long way from individual voyages to regular purchases across a fleet.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: Fuel prices, supplies, and port facilities all matter.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: But American Corn Ethanol has already made it into a working ship's fuel system.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: The question now is how much of that business can grow.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine a 2,500-pound buffalo walking into your house to watch television.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: That was life for Ronnie and Sharon Bridges of Quinlan, Texas, documented in a 2017 Inside Edition feature.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Ronnie had sold his buffalo herd to help cover medical bills, but the couple kept one young calf, Wild Thing.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: Sharon suggested letting him inside.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Eventually, this enormous animal had its own room.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Ronnie said Wild Thing liked watching cartoons.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: The family moved furniture so he could pass through certain rooms.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: And according to Ronnie, the buffalo went outside when he needed the bathroom, then came back in.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's quite a change from looking after a herd out in the pasture.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: But the biggest family moment came when Ronnie and Sharon renewed their wedding vows.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Wild Thing served as the best man.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: They put the rings on his horn.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Ronnie told Inside Edition, the buffalo tossed them into the air.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine planting an orchard and waiting nearly a decade for the first harvest.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's the story behind Virginia Truffles in Rixyville, Virginia.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Pat and John Martin's family planted its first orchard in 2008.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: The prize was Black Paragol Truffles, valuable fungi growing underground around tree roots.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: The first truffle finally appeared in 2018.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: Their daughter, Olivia Taylor, helped develop the farm's harvesting and scientific work.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: The business even built its own laboratory.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: But out amongst the trees, a dog's nose is essential.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: Today, the lead hunting dog is Posey.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: She follows the scent of truffles hidden beneath the soil.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: The people follow her and then carefully uncover the crop.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: The farm's winter harvest runs December through February.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Visitors can join a guided hunt.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And this family has found some substantial prizes.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: In 2021, they harvested a truffle weighing 12 ounces.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Years of tending trees, and then a dog shows you where to dig.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: A quick market check.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Using Monday, October 19th close.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: December corn settled at$4.67 a bushel, down 7.25 cents.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: November soybeans closed at$12.53.5 down seven and three quarter cents.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Those are future prices your local cash bid will also reflect bases.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: And now your high-tech moment.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: What if corn could show you an infection before the usual damage appeared?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: Indiana Company Insignium Egg Tech is working on that.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: It uses a plant's natural purple pigment as an early warning.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: When the engineered plant responds to disease, purple markings appear in its tissue.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: The company has demonstrated the approach in field plots.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Purdue Research Foundation reports that the signal can appear as much as 10 days before the usual visible disease symptoms.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: That timing is the attraction.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: A grower could inspect the flagged area and consider treatment while there's still time to protect the crop.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: Founder Kyle Moore wants the technology delivered through seed companies the farmers already use.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: This is a developing crop trait, and it needs to prove its value across real farming conditions.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't turn every purple leaf in an ordinary cornfield into a disease diagnosis.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: But picture walking a row and finding a visible warning produced by the plant itself.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: The crop becomes part of the scouting system, a warning plague you grow right alongside the grain.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Now for our almanac visit.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: A beetle that can fire near-boiling chemical spray at whatever tries to eat it.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's called a bombardier beetle.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: Inside its body is a tiny chamber where a chemical reaction creates intense heat and pressure.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: That pressure sends an irritating jet out of its rear end toward the attacker and it fires in rapid pulses.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Researchers measured about 500 pulses per second in one species alone.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine something roughly half an inch long carrying a defense system that fast.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Scientists used high-speed X-rays to watch the process inside of living beetles.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: As each burst release pressure, the system can refill and fire again.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: The beetle's body contains specialized structures that withstand the heat and control the reaction.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's a lot of equipment packed into one little insect.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the garden connection.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Bombardier beetles belong to the ground beetle family.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: The old farmer's almanac points out that many ground beetles help gardeners by eating pests.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: So a beetle running across the soil doesn't automatically mean trouble for your plants.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: During fall cleanup, a little leaf cover in a suitable garden border can provide winter shelter for beneficial insects.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Take a closer look before deciding every crawling thing needs to go.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: There may be useful hunters down there and one of nature's most remarkable defenses.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: Today,$8 billion in newly announced farm aid and ethanol finding a place in ocean-going ships.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: We met a Texas family whose buffalo became a house guest, and a Virginia family whose harvest depends on a dog's nose.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: We checked the grain markets, explored corn with its own disease-warning color, and met a beetle with an extraordinary chemical defense.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: And if you'd like more information about any of the topics we've covered, there's a matching blog for every episode we release.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: You'll find it on our website, farmtailsunplugged.com.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: To Farm Nation, have a safe and productive day.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: And to Truck City, keep the shiny side up.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: The future of food starts with the people who grow it and depends on the people who move it.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: And there you have it.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's your FarmTales Unplugged Daily Farm Brief for Wednesday, October 21st.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Brought to you by World TradeX empowering farmers.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Rick Portonova, and I'll see you Thursday morning.