Published 11:30 am Wednesday, October 25, 2023
Jumping into a farmer’s tractor is one way Rich Bupp tries to make the transition to regenerative agriculture easier.
Farmers employing regenerative agriculture concentrate on improving soil health through crop rotations and less tillage.
“Because I have a background in no-till, farmers starting to incorporate it will hire me to run the no-till planter so I can set it up and adjust it so it is performing in those conditions,” he said.
Soil health and remediation, water management and mechanical systems are Bupp’s specialties.
Through his EarthKnowSys nonprofit, he helps clients design and carry out soil, water and other natural resource analysis projects.
Bupp also runs Advanced Farm Services, a custom farming business.
The company serves as a platform from which he can offer consulting and the use of specialized equipment. A mobile grain-drying system and a tractor attachment that uses electrical current to kill weeds are examples.
Advanced Farm “provides some of the operations infrastructure to be able to apply those concepts on the farm by using mechanical ingenuity and innovation, and customized systems, specifically to implement soil health practices,” he said.
EarthKnowSys and Advanced Farm “are separate, but they do overlap or interconnect at certain places,” Bupp said. Both reflect his overall approach to agriculture “as an environmental system that is a combination of soil, water and air.”
Understanding how they work together can make soil-health fundamentals achievable and farms more sustainable and profitable, he said.
Bupp recently worked with a Kentucky client to optimize corn for the distillation market. The portable grain dryer was used, among other systems and processes.
“Agriculture is a wide-open door to innovation,” he said. “A lot of what we do, we do really well. And yet there is still room to do even better.”
The Kentucky ground had not been tilled in about a decade, said Bupp, whose family’s Pennsylvania farm went no-till some 30 years ago to help combat erosion.
In southern Kansas, where he was reached by phone in late September, he said, “I have not seen a single piece of tillage equipment moving. I see combines harvesting corn and soybeans, and no-till planters planting winter grain.”
Bupp is based in southern Idaho, where he sees an opportunity for increased adoption of no-till and other practices that can benefit soil and reduce sedimentation.
He aims to roll out the Agriculture Ecosystem Academy next spring. He is seeking funding partners for the academy, which would send a mobile training unit to farms. Farmers would train for three to four years and ultimately become academy ambassadors.
“We will be working with them to apply soil health principles and to improve their return on investment,” Bupp said.
He has been working with farmers to reduce tillage and keep soil covered with crop residue so they can ultimately irrigate less and lose less moisture to evapotranspiration. Solutions vary by crops and rotations.
Incorporating cover crops is another emphasis. One goal is to reduce or eliminate the use of synthetic fertilizer and ultimately boost return on investment.
Another recent theme is “increased awareness of long-term farm management,” Bupp said.
“Probably the biggest message now is the increased cost of doing business in agriculture,” he said. “Anything we can do to reduce fuel, fertilizer, chemicals and labor ends up being an increase in return on investment.”
Rich Bupp Age: 51 Occupations: Executive director and resource systems professional, EarthKnowSys Inc.; owner, Advanced Farm Services; president, Magic Valley Land Trust. Education: Bachelor’s degree, agricultural systems management, Penn State; graduate studies in historical geography, Idaho State University; associate’s degrees in environmental science and water resources management, College of Southern Idaho. Residence: Twin Falls, Idaho. Family: Wife, no children. Hobbies: Whitewater kayaking, bird watching, hiking, model railroading, private aviation. Website: https://earthknowsys.org/
Age: 51
Occupations: Executive director and resource systems professional, EarthKnowSys Inc.; owner, Advanced Farm Services; president, Magic Valley Land Trust.
Education: Bachelor’s degree, agricultural systems management, Penn State; graduate studies in historical geography, Idaho State University; associate’s degrees in environmental science and water resources management, College of Southern Idaho.
Residence: Twin Falls, Idaho.
Family: Wife, no children.
Hobbies: Whitewater kayaking, bird watching, hiking, model railroading, private aviation.
Website: https://earthknowsys.org/
