Post by Matt Adler

One farm. Six conversations. All happening at once. All connected. Scott Abney, Joe White, and I were trying to figure out why the hydraulic lines on the USDA NRCS no-till drill would not stay seated in our Case IH tractor. After a few calls and plenty of head scratching, we found the culprit. Someone had swapped the universal hydraulic fittings for older-style John Deere fittings so the drill would fit their tractor, leaving the rest of the world to lose its mind afterward. The best line of the day came from NRCS: “You’re the second person in a week to say they can’t connect the hydraulic lines on a tractor that’s been connected to it in the last year.” Mystery solved. Meanwhile, Dr. Chandan Shilpakar was out in the research plot collecting baseline, pre-graze forage measurements along the separate 100-foot transects. And Scott kept pace with every conversation. One minute he was helping troubleshoot hydraulics. The next he was talking research, reading the landscape, and showing Dr. Chandan some of the slick drone mapping and imagery work he has been figuring out. That is what people do not always see about a working research farm. Mechanics, grazing, forage ecology, remote sensing, data collection, conservation, livestock, and relationships are not separate conversations here. They are parts of the same living system. The correct fittings are on hand. The baseline is documented. The drone work is moving forward. The goats and sheep are ready. And tomorrow, I get to welcome my Ukrainian brothers to Elm Spring Farm. Then came the best call of the day. Erik Fritz reached out about the possibility of collaborating around the amazing work Edapho is figuring out. More data. More science. More connection between what is happening above the ground and below it. A lot of conversations. One mission. It is time to graze. #ElmSpringFarm #BeBold #LandGrantCollaboration #RegenerativeAgriculture #OnFarmResearch #PrecisionAgriculture #VeteransInAgriculture #ServiceToSoil #InItTogether❤️‍🩹

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