- [Narrator] Clean Genes Farm specializes in growing salad greens 365 days a year.

And here on this family farm, efficiency is a must.

Annette Shrader sees that firsthand in the seeding, the transplanting and weed control.

Tammy Allgood sets out to explore the benefits of no-till agriculture for both the farmer and the land.

Hutchinson farms has been at the forefront of this environmentally responsible production technique for three generations.

Let's get to it.

(uplifting music) This is where farm and family flourish.

- More than 90% of the farms in the United States are classified as small, and most are family-owned and operated.

We're visiting one such farm today in McEwen, Tennessee, Clean Genes Farm specializes in salad greens year round.

Let's get to it.

This is where it all begins.

Tell us.

- So as I like to say that I tried to be as efficient as I possibly can.

And some of these tools that we use on this small farm are the most efficient tools that the market has provided.

And one of them is a gravity seeder.

And with the gravity seeder I'm allowed now to seed a 200 cell lettuce tray in seconds.

So I will show you that process.

First, I fill it with a potting mixture, peat moss, vermiculite, just your standard potting mixture.

And then I've made this fancy dibbler with some of you electricians might see with some wire nuts, and it's got 200 wire nuts, perfectly aligned for our 200 cell tray.

- Wow.

Your breakfast tray has been turned into a seeder.

- And now the holes have been dibbled.

Today I'm gonna show you some head lettuce.

So besides our salad mixture, we also do head lettuce, romaine and green star, a nice summer crisp also, great for growing in the heat of the summer.

- And you're calling this gravity seeder.

- Yes, it is.

- Okay.

- There's a thousand seeds on that.

There's 200 holes aligned and we're just gonna shake.

These are pelleted seeds.

And they're about the size of BBs.

- Reminds me of a child's game.

- Yeah.

It is.

- That is really intriguing.

- So we just shake the gravity seeder until all the pelleted lettuce is in a hole.

And I just go directly over our already pre-dibbled holes in our tray and open it up.

- And you just slid that tray over and they fell in.

- Before I had the seeder, what used to take me three hours, now it takes me about 15 minutes to do about 16 trays.

I would water this in deeply, and then put it into our germination chamber that is set for 68 to 71 degrees temperature.

And in a day and a half, the soil has been up to temperature and I'll take them out and I'll put them under a light.

- So these are the lettuces that you're working with now.

You would take these and transplant these directly into the ground.

- Correct.

- And you're please with what percentage of germination?

- I love a hundred as anybody would, but 75 to a hundred is good.

- It is like May.

Jason, It's wonderful to be in this greenhouse with all of these stages of lettuce.

Give me your edge on the market of how you're trying to grow this lettuce.

- So growing lettuce in humid, Tennessee weather is definitely, there's some tricks.

It's all about varieties and limiting the amount of sun that comes in.

And most times farmers are considered solar harvesters.

- Yes.

- We're trying to limit that through the fact that lettuce is a colder climate crop.

And so I utilize shade cloth to limit the sun.

I utilize the weed suppression mats to keep the soil cooler and suppress the weeds.

We use our irrigation systems to cool down in a very hot summer.

So five minute mist, twice a day.

And then we have drip lines running through the cloth also where we transplant to keep them watered.

And we do that once a week, really, really deep watering.

And from there, having transplants - What percent of blockage of the sun do you want from your shade cloth?

- So we use 50%, but we're trying to figure out is 30% better or is 50% better.

But right now everything is 50%.

So this is called landscape fabric and we use a four foot by 100 foot piece of landscape fabric for our rows of lettuce.

- And so these are very rhythmic holes.

You do that with a certain machine?

- I have divide a wood jig that has about 50 holes in it, and I burn the holes.

So I just continually follow the pattern.

And that's my thing.

Normally in larger agriculture, they have machines that would make the dibbles and then two people or one person would be on the back of that piece of equipment behind a tractor putting in the transplants.

- Necessity created this.

- Yes.

Necessity and some hybrid information I found.

- Right.

Okay.

So you don't direct seed any of your lettuce?

- No.

- It's all transplanted.

- Yeah.

It's all transplanted.

So the transplants we'll be dealing with today are around two and a half to three weeks old.

- Okay.

Now this first section, evidently, it's definitely been just transplanted, right?

- Yeah.

So I transplanted actually this morning.

I started and in each line is 200 transplants.

So in a perfect germination, tray is 200 transplants.

- Because this one over here is two weeks old?

- Yeah.

That's been transplanted.

It's actually now going five weeks, but transplanted about a week and a half ago.

- Okay.

So from seed to market is how many days?

- Well, as the package says 55, but we definitely are in that range.

- Okay.

- From seed to package.

- I see definite varieties over here.

What are you choosing to produce in the summer?

- Our favorite is summer crisp.

And we definitely like stuff that's slow bolting, that can stay crisp.

We definitely have been experimenting with different varieties and we find stuff that we like and some stuff we don't because from seed to process, in the bagging and getting ready for direct market, there's a lot of other steps that could damage a lot of that.

So we try to mitigate that as much as possible.

- So it's your goal to have lettuce 365 days a year, - Yeah.

- 52 weeks, right?

- Yeah.

We try to have a base for a salad for our customers, our salad snobs.

- We are about to step up from seed tapes to planting tapes.

Now this is quite interesting.

So you seeded this just like you did the other things, only there in that tape.

- So this is the paper pot system.

So on a small scale that we have, we have to utilize the space as best as possible.

So I'm using a lot of transplants.

The transplanting obviously allows me to grow it in the nursery, - Exactly.

- Use the germination chamber so I know I can control the percentage of the watering, and then utilizing systems with my transplants from my lettuce or the paper pot, which the paper pot I've done everything from mixed kales to this is bunching onions, to beets, to carrots.

Everything's got their own tricks.

- Yeah.

But you see, when you kind of hear, it's ready to go, if you've seeded that seed in here, you got to wait three, four weeks to see, "Did I get a good germination?"

- Yeah.

- Right here, you're good to go.

- Yeah.

We're good to go.

So now in four weeks to five weeks, well, depending, we'll have bunching onions ready for market.

- Wow.

Well, let's talk about health benefits for what's so beautiful on this table.

- Yeah.

So these are all microgreens and we use a couple of different ones.

We have radish over there.

That's nice purple and green trays.

For people that are unaware, radish has more vitamin C than oranges or strawberries.

- I just read that.

- So the actual green tastes like the bulb of the red.

- Yes.

They actually tastes like the root of the radish.

This is our mild mix.

It's a cabbage, kale, broccoli.

And as you can see, we're waiting for the true leaf to emerge before harvest, which this tray will be ready to harvest in about a day.

So we have a nice cabbage broccoli, cabbage kale mixture right here which we call our mild mix and tastes just like broccoli, cabbage, kale.

And one of the great things, besides being very nutritious, you can add it into salad sandwiches, smoothies, green greatness.

- Oh.

It's just so wonderful on that good Turkey sandwich.

Well, as of today, we're standing on different grounds than what you started with say, six years ago?

- So when we originally bought this place, nothing was farmed.

And up to three years ago, three and a half, when we first put our first plants into the ground, but there's been a lot getting there.

So previously when I had my career and we decided we're going to start farming, I put down lots of tarps, silage tarps, plastic, and you use the sun to solarize and kill all the Bermuda grass and any other pre-emerge weeds that were there.

- Perennial.

- Yeah.

The perennial weeds and the grasses.

Once we took off the tarps, we then went and got soil samples.

And I use a pretty good agronomist, well known from Vermont.

And I was told with disheartening information that good luck on your soil, it's not going to grow anything.

From there, I'm one that doesn't give up too easily.

So lots of compost, lots of reading lots of different books on prebiotics, probiotic, the mycology of the soil.

And I was like, "Well, I'm going to create something I can and utilize all the microbes that I possibly can do on the farm itself."

So this bed was spinach previously.

And one of the things like we kind of pride ourselves on is once the beds are formed, I'm using a tiller, then we don't till anymore.

We don't say we're completely no-till, cause we do disturb the soil.

We use broad forks to aerate, to bring oxygen a little bit oxygens everywhere, nitrogen in the air, and we can then slowly build up the soil just using the natural elements.

So we aerate, we then use heavy compost, let the organic material from the previous secession go down and let the germs and microorganism start eating that and creating more organic biology.

Normally, we just do quick-growing, short-rooted products, lettuce for instance, but I'm having tomatoes actually looking beautiful in the soil that I was told a couple of years ago that we weren't gonna grow.

- Absolutely.

So I feel good on that, patting myself.

Tomorrow this could be gone but I like it.

- This didn't happen overnight.

- No.

- It took you several years to build up all of the microorganisms in your soil.

- So for us, we're always putting in prebiotics, probiotics, compost teas, lots of compost.

And now that we've incorporated, we have chickens on the farm.

We're using chickens to break down wood chips and biochar, and just other things for the regenerative sources that we are linking to put in to our soil.

- So you don't use any synthetic fertilizers?

- No.

No synthetic, no petrochemicals.

I'm going to quote this as I heard a great sayings like, "Don't ask if we spray, ask what we spray."

And everybody sprays, we have neem oil, we spray probiotics, we spray prebiotics, compost teas, there's stuff we spray, but we're all spraying everything that is going to build up this soil ecology as best as we possibly can, but there's always going to be a bug somewhere.

- Okay.

Well, obviously you've done the right things at the right time and I think I'm gonna have a little conversation with Sarah.

- Excellent.

- Because she's going to fill us in on some of the things you are growing right now.

- Excellent.

- Sarah, I'm excited to hear about your plans for what you're growing in here summer or fall.

Tell me about what the flowers you've planted and your vegetables.

- Yeah.

So I started to cut flower garden last year, just trial and error to see what would stick.

And so zinnias did fantastic, sunflowers, snapdragons and then there's celosia was a great one for me, gomphrena.

- I love those.

- And this year I decided to try some new things like the violas, cause they're edible too.

- Right.

- And those could go great on salads.

- Of course, over here, I can't help but say these must be white potatoes.

- Yes they are.

Yeah.

So this is our first year growing potatoes as well.

And we kind of did something different.

We wanted to suppress the weeds and I've never grown potatoes in the landscape fabric.

So we held them with straw because I saw it on YouTube.

- Yeah.

- And we'll see if it works, but it's kind of a trial for us.

- Oh and you know but they do need to be able to grow down so the barn type situation is what they look for for better growing.

Well, I see you have basil?

- Yep.

- And dill?

- Yes.

- And over here, green beans.

- Exactly.

Yep.

I like looking at these beans blooming right here, Sarah.

I'll see that purple bloom.

And I recognize that as being a blue light.

Tell me about your concept.

This is a two-person operation.

- It is.

- No outsiders, just you and Jason.

And give me your concept of this farm and how about the name?

- The name?

So the name came in the planning process.

And a little backstory, Jason and I had been on a health journey for about nine or 10 years and just tried different real food diets, like we did some juicing and raw foods.

So anyways, along the way, I read a book called Dirty Genes by Dr. Ben Lynch.

In the book, he discusses how the food that we eat, the air that we breathe, the water that we drink can all kind of are very telling in how the expression of our genes will be.

So if we're eating clean food, it can help promote the clean expression of our genes.

But if we're in a really toxic environment with a lot of processed foods or just not clean water, - Exactly.

it can promote the dirty expression of our genes.

For our family, for our community, we wanted to grow the cleanest food possible.

- Okay.

Now you play an important role here.

Not only are you the mother, homeschooler of three beautiful children, but you're the partner beside Jason.

So give me a little rundown of how you see this farm.

- Well, it's a lot of work, a lot of labor, a lot of planning for sure.

We have to plan when the seeds are planted, plan when we're gonna transplant, plan when we're gonna harvest, wash, and pack, and all of that.

And so my role is I do a lot of the labor with Jason.

He's the planner.

He plans everything.

And I love physical work.

So I'm out here in the fields, working with the kids, and I do the customer service.

So I'm social media.

And then I get to do the fun things too.

I get to get creative with flowers and other things that would go great on salads.

- So we put a T-E-R in there.

He's the plan and you're the plan-TER.

- Exactly.

Yes.

- Exactly So these are head lettuce.

- Yes.

This crop right here will be harvested.

Today is Monday.

So these three beds that we are looking at right now will be harvested for Wednesday's salad mix.

- And when you harvest it, you cut it.

- I cut it.

Yep.

Four rows cut completely to about two inches off the mat.

- Okay.

Well now then Sarah, you've got a part in that process too, don't you?

- Yes.

So I help in the pack house, but also with our online farmer's market.

I just share with people that the online market is open for ordering.

And so we do our home deliveries.

People can place their orders online and we deliver to their doorstep.

Or if they're outside of our delivery zone, then they can do a farm pickup.

- It's obvious you've got an edge on a market that's not used so I wish you much success with this.

And it's obvious that when the sun goes down at eight o'clock, are you ready for going to bed or do you still have work to do?

- Lot's of work, it never stops, it never stops.

It seems like as we are talking about using tools and techniques to simplify the processes, we're still refining.

And I think we're always going to be refining.

- Of course.

- And it's just tweaking and getting all our systems in place so we can spend more time with our family.

And that's the main goal.

That's when people are like, "What's your farms main goal?"

To be sustainable, be family-orientated.

- Exactly.

- And you are achieving that and I'll tell you, this was not what I thought I was going to find at the end of this country road.

And what a blessing it has been to share time with you and your family here today.

- [Jason] Thank you.

- [Sarah] Thank you.

(country music) - Innovation keeps all industries moving forward and conservation in agriculture has been quite dramatic.

As a result, today no-till is a big deal.

Here to educate us on that subject is Will Hutchinson from Hutchinson farms in Murfreesboro.

Hello friend.

- Hey there.

- Glad to have you here.

Will, start by telling us about your farm because it truly is a family farm, right?

- It very much is.

So our operation, great-grandfather moved to Murfreesboro in 1932.

And from there, my grandfather farmed, my dad farmed, and now my sister and I are farming as well.

Over the years, we've done everything from dairy, to hogs, to hay, to watermelons and peaches.

And now, currently today, were pretty strictly a no-till corn, soybean, wheat operation.

And we also still raise some commercial hay.

- That's great.

So talk to us about no-till, Will, because it seems so counterintuitive to what we think about happening on a farm during planting season.

What is it?

- Yeah.

So no-till is kind of just like it sounds, we do not disturb the soil.

A lot of people still think about farming as to go turn the soil and work it and disc it and get it looking a lot like you would have a garden.

That's not at all what we do anymore.

We've discovered that minimal disturbance has a lot of benefits.

We really liked that minimal disturbance.

We can retain moisture better.

We are a lot less susceptible to erosion that way.

We've modified equipment to a point.

To do all of that, turn in the soil and ground preparation and all that disturbance is a significant cost on fuel, and time and equipment.

- Right.

So this way we've eliminated a lot of those costs.

Some of the modifications that we've done to this planter to help it work in these conditions better in a no-till environment.

This is a disc opener here and it has small serrations and that helps to slice the residue a little bit better and reached the proper depth.

Also these are gauge wheels and that is what sets the depth of the seed.

And if you'll notice these rows are exactly 30 inches apart.

And when we plant corn at a common 32,000 population, every seed will be placed at 2 inches deep, 30 inches apart, at exactly seven and a half inches apart as well.

And that'll equate to 32,000 seed per acre.

Coming on back here.

You'll notice these closing wheels are spiked and they're also swept back, that way when they leave the soil, they will release any residue and not wrap.

coming on back here.

You'll notice these stainless steel hoses precisely place one third of our nitrogen for this crop right there at the seed in front of us.

So that it's readily available for the seed and supplying these hoses, there's this tank on the back of the planter.

- So what do we have here?

- This here is a ground that has come straight out of pasture.

So this is not exactly what we would consider cover crops.

However, we're getting a lot of similar benefits here, just not quite to the extent that we would a full-blown cover crop system.

But we can still use our same planting practices and equipment and be successful in this pasture situation as we do in our cover crop.

Okay.

You'll notice that seed is pink and that's just a coating that we put on that seed.

It's a fungicide and insecticide treatment, and it's very local just to that seed and that's to keep any bugs from eating on it while it's getting germinated and getting started growing.

It's just very young and very susceptible to disease.

And that just helps protect that seed as it gets its healthy start.

- When I till up my garden, that's part of the reason I till it up, is to get rid of weeds.

So what do you do for weeds when you don't do that?

- Yeah, exactly.

So mechanical termination needs to be our bread and butter strategy against weed competition.

Early nineties or so, I believe it was, we'd developed crops that were resistant to certain herbicides.

We were able to go out and spray a non-selective herbicide that would control all other weeds except for our specific crop that was planted.

And it was resistant to that application.

That allowed us to take that mechanical termination off the table.

And that just opened the door for no-till to really come full circle.

- Okay.

So Will, talk to me about cover crops, why do we have them?

- So cover crops is kind of a new discovery and a new practice that we're still developing and trying to understand a little better.

But basically cover crops is a crop that we will sow in the fall after harvest and we'll plan a variety of species of covers, anywhere from legumes, to brassicas, grasses, and each one of those species has a different benefit to the following crop.

So a legume naturally produces its own nitrogen.

So with it in the mix, it produces nitrogen to feed the grasses in that same mix.

The grasses are kind of nitrogen scavengers.

So any nitrogen value that might be left over from that crop, we want to take it up in that grass and we want to store it in that plant material.

And the brassicas are known for putting down a really deep taproot and they can be known for trying to create some airspace and bring up nutrients from deep in the soil.

In the spring time, we'll come through and we'll roll those down flat and we'll plant directly into it.

As that plant material breaks down, we get a lot of benefits from that in the following crop.

The first benefit, it's a lot like when you mulch your garden, you put mulch out and that's to keep the weeds down, that's to keep the soil temperature cooler and that's to - Hold moisture?

- Yeah.

Hold moisture.

And when it rains in the spring, we have some pretty heavy downpours in Tennessee in the spring.

And we want to put a layer of armor on top of that soil.

And we want that cover crop residue to absorb the energy of the raindrop falling from the sky and dissipate it as it goes into the soil, real slow and smooth.

And that way the soil has a chance to absorb more of that water and get it deeper into the soil profile before it just runs off.

- So it's kind of like a porous blanket that's down and it's aiding the crop that's coming.

- It is.

- Will, does no-till work for all of the crops that you plant, corn, wheat, soy beans?

- It does.

We can plant in all three crops in a no-till environment, depending on some fertilizer strategies.

We might do a really light tillage called a vertical till pass.

We're only gonna disturb the top two inches or less of soil.

And that's really just to get better stratification of our fertilizer application.

- That makes my heart happy.

And this has got to make the land happy too.

And what about your yields?

Have you seen different yields from no-till versus the traditional way of doing things?

- It certainly takes some adaptation and some years to get all the bugs worked out of the system, but we really had to modify our planting equipment.

Now I'd say our yields are right on par with where we expect them to be.

- How many acres do you farm?

- About 4,000 acres.

- That's a lot of acres.

- Well, it keeps us all busy.

- Yes it does.

And out of trouble as mother would say.

Will thank you for this.

I really appreciate your depth of knowledge on it.

And for those of us who aren't taking our living, farming everyday, it's quite interesting to see how far agriculture has come with row crops.

So thank you for taking the time with us, and we appreciate it.

- [Narrator] For inspiring garden tours, growing tips and garden projects.

Visit our website @volunteergardener.org or on YouTube at the Volunteer Gardener channel.

And like us on Facebook.

(light bouncy music)