Regenerative Skills

As we’ve explored in recent episodes of the Regenerative Skills Podcast, there’s an unfortunate disconnect between academic institutions, independent research, and real farms. We all know there are endless opportunities for new learnings and scientific studies that could benefit farmers, especially in traditional and regenerative enterprises which have often been overlooked.

Yet frequently we see universities and other institutions struggling to accommodate the realities and needs of these types of farms, and similarly, these profiles of farms struggling to adapt to the needs of the institutions. In this panel episode we’ll talk to farmers and researchers who’ve overcome some of these hurdles in unique ways to advance the learnings that stand to benefit all involved.

Together we’ll explore the challenges and opportunities for collaboration as well as the stories that offer insights and inspiration for future cooperation. In this panel episode we’ll talk to farmers and researchers who’ve overcome some of these hurdles in unique ways to advance the learnings that stand to benefit all involved. Together we’ll explore the challenges and opportunities for collaboration as well as the stories that offer insights and inspiration for future cooperation.

Today we're going to pause our deep-dive episodes to launch a new series supporting a regenerative agriculture master’s program being developed with European universities, starting with regenerative water management . Interviewed by Marina Bartoletti, Oliver Goshey explains macro vs. small water cycles, emphasizing how vegetation drives local cooling, evapotranspiration, and rain formation via biological nuclei like bacteria and fungal spores, and how devegetation can disrupt precipitation patterns and intensify drought, wildfire, and flood extremes. The episode links Iberian Peninsula heatwaves, shifting rainfall, and desertification to land management, and outlines farm-level responses: boosting soil organic matter and infiltration, reducing runoff and erosion, using shade and windbreaks, improving water quality, and considering nitrogen fertilizer impacts on plant drought stress. It introduces Climate Farmers’ free Water Management Guidebook and previews upcoming case studies and a watershed-scale restoration blueprint.

Farm viability depends on much more than what happens in the field. While we often focus on production and farm management, many of the biggest challenges farmers face are shaped by what happens.

After harvest: processing, packaging, distribution, and access to markets. As processing facilities and post-production industries become increasingly consolidated, primary producers are left with fewer options for where and how to sell their products.

Not long ago, much of this work happened on farms or through small-scale enterprises in nearby towns. These local processing systems allowed farmers to capture more value, reach customers more directly, strengthen rural economies, and create meaningful employment close to home.

In today’s panel, we’ll speak with farmers and small-scale processors who are keeping these local industries alive while finding new ways to make them viable in an era of mass production and industrial consolidation.

Together, we’ll explore practical opportunities for adding value to raw farm products, the real challenges of setting up micro-processing operations, and the lessons learned from people already doing it.

We’ll also look at how farmers can start their own processing enterprises or collaborate with others in their community to transform their products, diversify income, and rebuild more resilient local food economies.

After the biodiversity panel from the last episode, I got to thinking about how protecting biodiversity is so often reduced to the life forms that humans value. The ones we find beautiful, friendly, or otherwise useful to us directly. Cuddly mammals, majestic birds, colorful butterflies and flowers, etc. 

 

In many ways though, these living beings are only able to survive and thrive if the critters that we dislike are abundant in the same spaces. Many flowers are pollinated by bugs most would find annoying. A lot of cuddly mammals feed on weed species or our own crops. Eagles and owls need an abundance of rodents and reptiles if their populations are to grow. Many invasive exotic species are working tirelessly to restore damaged and imbalanced ecosystems. 

 

It’s kinda like trying to lose body fat in just one area of your body. You can’t just pick the parts that are desirable to you and expect the whole interconnected system to accept that. Collectively we need to embrace the restoration and stewardship, especially of the lower trophic levels of the food web that support all the higher levels above. 

 

In the last panel we touched a little on the tolerance and adaptation required to share space with predators and birds that threaten livestock and crops, recognizing their role despite the challenges that come from having them around. 

 

Today I’ll be revisiting some of my favorite interviews from previous seasons in which we talked about three specific categories of overlooked and undervalued wildlife. 

 

My hope is that we can welcome these into a broader conversation about biodiversity, and maybe even convince you to work to promote greater diversity and open pollination of your crops and livestock, the full range of insects, and even rethink your management of invasive species in your land or on your farm.

This month we’re tackling the challenges and benefits of wildlife in all its forms. Wildlife and wild spaces are often spoken about as if they're at odds with the goals of farms. We often talk about battling weeds, deterring predators, and eliminating competition from undomesticated forms of life. It doesn't need to be this way though, and as farmers build beneficial relationships between all forms of life around them they're finding incredible benefits to the farm as well. In this panel we'll speak to farmers who've made care for the wild a part of their management practices. They'll share what they do to make their land more welcoming to all the life around them and how the health and productivity has responded as a result.