Transcript
Brett: Well, well, well, who do we have here?
Plant People: That was a soft start. That's impressive.
Brett: Yeah, well, I was gonna let Lexus take it in, but you know, she's she's playing shy today, playing coy.
Plant People: She comes in loud and proud. She is.
Alexis: I might scream into people's ears and it's just a whole thing.
Plant People: Like a cicada. Yeah.
Brett: Yeah.
Alexis: i was i was letting you try it out.
Brett: Thank you, it feels great. We'll let the listeners decide. Um, yeah, here we are. And, and I, it feels like the last time we podcasted, it was spring and now it is fully summer.
Brett: Uh, it's, there's a steam bath.
Alexis: but
Plant People: it It happened quick. It happened quick, did it not?
Brett: Yes.
Alexis: It's steamy.
Brett: Steamy.
Alexis: It's the...
Brett: I feel like I'm, I'm glowing even more than usual.
Alexis: it's the
Plant People: Glistening even.
Alexis: You're like the temperature has not been.
Plant People: What is the movie Twilight? You would have this gold-flecked glow about you in sunlight.
Brett: Yeah. Say it out loud.
Alexis: and he's wearing his glow screen today.
Plant People: I don't know what that is, but it sounds cool.
Brett: Hmm.
Alexis: thank
Brett: Well, we, I did have, actually, this is no joke. um So I just, I do happen to work not to be totally ah gendered here, but I do happen to work with like four young women. And I've taken advantage of that by having them give me some tips on, on sun care, sun care products that I was unaware of.
Plant People: Solid, solid.
Trevor Terry: Okay.
Brett: a One of which is called glow screen from a company called super goop.
Plant People: I don't know what that is.
Brett: Not, you know, if they want to sponsor the pod, they can, I just don't know that there's a lot of overlap in audience necessarily.
Plant People: Super goop.
Alexis: Farmers, skincare, sunscreen, personally, I feel like it's a big market, but...
Plant People: I bet you as has it has plant-based ingredients.
Brett: Yeah.
Plant People: We can work with this.
Brett: Well, yeah, so so it's a it's a sunscreen that gives you a little bit of an iridescent glow. i'm not wearing any now because I'm not really spending much time outside today. That might be a faux pas for the skincare people.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Brett: But, but we're joined by a guest today, Trevor Terry, you want to say hi, Trevor?
Trevor Terry: Yeah, I'm Trevor Terry here with Supergoop. um I am here to to to get you all on board.
Alexis: Spider monkey. Fresh.
Trevor Terry: I want you glistening like Edward Cullen. and
Plant People: yes yes twilight reference i'm here for it
Brett: Oh.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: spider monkey
Brett: Trevor coming in hard for Team Edward.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, no, i'm ah I'm Trevor Terry. I'm here with ah Kentucky Horticulture Council. I'm the executive director as of November of 2024. Yeah. Yeah.
Brett: Cool. Well, we'll we'll get into we'll get into into a little bit of how you arrived there.
Alexis: bre
Brett: I do have a question.
Trevor Terry: yeah
Brett: I'm curious. So that we did you know it is the steam bath summer Kentucky weather now. And do you have do you all have a a signature or a particular drink of summer that like it's warm now?
Brett: I've kind of transitioned. Some people go from hot coffee to iced coffee. Some people maybe are into the bubblies. That's been a huge thing over the last you know decade or so.
Plant People: Fizzy stuff.
Brett: But do you all have, and bonus points if it features a horticulture product of some sort, but you know it doesn't have to.
Plant People: o Ooh, I've got an OG one. Mine's about as basic as you can get. and that's a half and half drink that is half lemonade and half tea.
Plant People: You can garnish it with whatever embellishments of liquid you want to add to that, but half lemonade, half tea. So kind of, what is that called? An Arnold Palmer sort of thing.
Alexis: Arnold Palmer.
Brett: Arnie Palmy, yeah.
Plant People: And it has a horticulture ingredient in it because we do have native tea plants in the U S. So there you go, Brett.
Trevor Terry: okay
Brett: There you go.
Plant People: Yeah.
Brett: Shout out to native tea plants.
Alexis: Golf.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: What about you, Trevor?
Trevor Terry: Oh, okay. So
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: I just had a kombucha the other day when we went to locals and I think it was a berry... Berry kombucha from a local place. I've got the, it's probably in my recycling if you want me to dig it out, but ah definitely I'm definitely into odd, ah specifically probiotic drinks in the summertime.
Brett: like the peroxide bottle style.
Plant People: Yes.
Alexis: Love it. I love it.
Plant People: Good deal.
Trevor Terry: Love that. ah We are having a little bit of a ah ah surprise birthday party for a family member later this this weekend. And it is martini themed.
Trevor Terry: So I don't know if I'm going to like get into a martini phase because of that. But we're making, ah you know, like a French martini with like Chambord. And I know we grow raspberries in Kentucky. So I'm going to qualify that as a horticultural ingredient.
Plant People: Ooh, nice tie-in.
Alexis: ah love it
Brett: Yeah.
Plant People: Martinez can go so many different ways. I mean, that's, that's kind of an OG too. That's a, that's a good one.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, great for breakfast too.
Plant People: Yeah. um and Whatever works, whatever works.
Trevor Terry: yeah
Plant People: There you go.
Brett: Yeah.
Plant People: In the big cup.
Brett: Fill up the Stanley and go.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. yeah
Plant People: Brett, I know since you were the question asker, what, what sort of concoction did you have on your mind today?
Brett: well
Brett: Well, I would say, i mean, that I kind of switch over from, I don't switch over. I still drink coffee, but I also drink, mix in some cold chilled mate, yerba mate, which I've been i' drinking for a while.
Plant People: Coffee is all year round.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: But also like as far as the summer, summer drink, we're still a little early for it, is we'll do a, take a watermelon and cube it up.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: freeze it put it in a blender with lemon or lime juice and it turns into like a very thin daiquiri kind of consistency so unbelievably refreshing and delicious and yeah
Plant People: Hmm.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: yeah
Plant People: I'm not going to lie. thought you were going full, full college scale, like dump stuff in a bathtub route, but you didn't, you didn't, you went classy.
Brett: cut a plug in the watermelon yeah when you said half and half i i imagine you saying half lemonade and half half and half
Alexis: Yeah, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yep.
Alexis: Cut the top off, blend it
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yep.
Plant People: I,
Plant People: yes. havent Half and half. Well, but I do love coffee ah year round.
Brett: Mmm, just gotta let it curdle.
Plant People: So yes.
Trevor Terry: ye Yeah.
Alexis: up. Let it go.
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis: who
Brett: What about you, Alexis?
Plant People: Oh man.
Alexis: No, I drink everything all year round. Mm-mm.
Brett: You don't have a transition?
Plant People: There's no seasonality.
Brett: Yeah, I don't have a ah hard transition period. Like like some people, you know, it's like, ooh, time for the first.
Plant People: No, I guess I don't.
Alexis: no
Plant People: I don't either. Yeah. ah How about for you guys?
Alexis: Yeah, no, I drink margaritas all year round.
Plant People: ah yeah All year round.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: You have a margarita machine at your house, so I mean...
Plant People: but If it's cold outside, it's fine. So you guys don't switch between like hot drinks and cold drinks at all?
Alexis: i need
Plant People: Like, I don't guess I do.
Alexis: No, I used to, but I don't anymore.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Alexis: um Like I've got like hot tea right now and there's, I could do an iced tea, but I don't know. I just, I don't do that anymore for some reason. I'm just like all the time. Margaritas?
Trevor Terry: It sounds like another sponsorship of opportunity. You know what I mean? You in super goop and and, uh, and yeah, Margaritaville.
Alexis: margaritas
Trevor Terry: Um,
Alexis: Tequila has an agricultural product in it, so... No.
Plant People: It does. It does.
Brett: We'll contact with jimmy but the Jimmy Buffett estate to see what we need to do as far as getting set up.
Alexis: ah
Plant People: Very agricultural.
Brett: Yeah, this I'm just taking this completely derailed, but if you have you ever come across the the concept of the Ayurvedic doshas?
Plant People: I don't think so.
Brett: Yeah, dosha.
Alexis: no
Brett: it's So so it's it's sort of like ah essential elements of the self and of the like, it's it's it's it's not like the zodiac, but it's kind of like the zodiac, but it's like your but it's more about your body and mind connection.
Trevor Terry: Hmm.
Brett: And there's certain people who kind of have like more of a fire dosha. There's people who have more of a water dosha or whatever. And so there's things that you're supposed to eat or drink to help to kind of counterbalance yourself.
Alexis: It's like um exactly exactly i was like, that's where I'm going with this.
Trevor Terry: Oh.
Brett: And so for me, hot drinks is like the vibe and it pretty much year round.
Plant People: o
Brett: Like I, it, I have a tendency to kind of laying, I don't, I don't have the fire in me. I would, yeah, got to add the fire, bring the fire, spicy hot drink.
Trevor Terry: got to add the thought of it.
Plant People: I'm getting real avatar vibes from this. Are like you water energy or earth energy?
Trevor Terry: but I was going to say, and I didn't want to say it. Yeah.
Brett: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: So what is your nation?
Brett: A very, I had had a whole arrow removed from red.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. yeah
Brett: Yeah.
Plant People: Or the one that goes up.
Brett: Then Lexington has really strong,
Alexis: Are you, are you an heir more of an air person?
Plant People: an airbender?
Brett: Yeah, Lexington has really strong code violations against having buffaloes in your backyard. So I had to just change it up.
Trevor Terry: Yep. Yeah.
Alexis: Absurd.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Brett: But yeah.
Plant People: they're very lightweight. They just kind of float around.
Alexis: What about lemurs? Where are we on lemurs in Lexington?
Plant People: Madagascar.
Brett: But that's fine.
Trevor Terry: yeah
Alexis: yeah
Plant People: yeah
Brett: that That's allowed.
Plant People: We're just wondering. We're just wondering.
Brett: Yeah, so we don't we don't have a strong... you know, crystal clear plan, because we know that Trevor is such a cool guy, and at least two out of the three of us are pretty cool. And I'll let you let the viewers decide what the listeners decide on that.
Brett: But Trevor, you mentioned you you're the the director of the the horticulture council now.
Alexis: It's
Brett: And but you were coming before this, you were coming from a different or a different and involvement in the horticultural world.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: or Is that right?
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah. So I started my journey in horticulture kind of, ah I guess, the most Kentucky way possible. I met some guys at the Derby ah back in, I think it was 2014.
Trevor Terry: um And they were ah all Israeli and they were talking about this concept of growing vegetables indoors. I had just graduated up in Boston and I was coming back to Kentucky just to visit at the time.
Trevor Terry: I was still trying to make it up there in the city. And I got fascinated by the concept. So um post, you know, post hangover the following days, I reached out to these guys because I got their ah their contact.
Alexis: you hes
Trevor Terry: And I said, hey, that was incredibly interesting. Where can I learn more? i'm I'm fascinated by this concept. I did not study horticulture. My degree is in the humanities. They're on the wall, whatever that means.
Trevor Terry: ah And, and I'd like to learn more. And they said, I tell you what, why don't you come along with me to a meeting? So I was like, sure. Yeah. So jumped in the car, went over, i think it was to the estate of some famous writer in Kentucky that they were asking for investment for a high-tech greenhouse.
Trevor Terry: and And odd meeting, they brought a ah ah PowerPoint printed off in nine pages, which, you know, just presentation was on point.
Alexis: Solid. That's extension right there.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. I think it was still in a black and white printer too. So like all the colors, you know, just kind of gray skinned.
Plant People: Even better. Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: Beautiful, right? ah and And through the course of that presentation, I kind of found out that that the way they had sold this to me, this idea of you know the future of horticulture, ah when they had a few drinks in them was different from when it was in a business meeting.
Trevor Terry: And it did not exactly come across in the same way.
Alexis: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: I think they kind of missed the point of that story, which is which is growing more food locally, which is doing it in a manner that's more sustainable in the long term for a lot of different reasons and and just genuinely pretty cool from a nerdy tech point of view.
Trevor Terry: um So I asked them if there was anything I could do to help them to tell that story a little bit better. Do they have a website, for instance? do they ah Could I work on this pitch deck with them? And they said, no, absolutely not. you know They were in a little bit of a a mood afterward um when that investment didn't come through. So they said, no, absolutely not. This is all proprietary information.
Trevor Terry: And we're the ones in the world who are doing it.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: Turns out ah I'm not great at taking no for an answer. So I went ahead and taught myself how to make a website. and made them one and based on all the information that I was able to find.
Trevor Terry: ah And they didn't respond to me for like two weeks. if they were They were pretty quiet and I thought maybe it was just a shot in the dark, but they got back in touch and said, hey, we actually really like what you did.
Trevor Terry: um We'd like you to make some changes though. We can't pay you anything, but do you want to join our team as like a shadow to the to the sales team? And was like, yeah. For sure.
Trevor Terry: So at the time I was I was also working for my family. we we go way back in Brethet County in eastern Kentucky, got about 1500 acres there. Some of that includes some ah coal mine land and a few gas wells, gas and oil wells.
Trevor Terry: So on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, I was going down to Brethet County to pump the wells and maintain those engines and do all the work involved in, you know,
Alexis: you
Trevor Terry: pulling oil from the earth uh and then on the off days i was putting on a suit and i was going around kentucky looking for somebody to invest in one of these projects and uh after about a year of that really interesting dichotomy we finally found an investor in uh lincoln county in stanford kentucky and we finally had a piece of land and that's when we got started and i got so you know they started paying me so was the first employee um course, everything was history from there. Eight years later, ah that's an 11-acre project under roof. you know We went from a soybean field to the first high-wire, high-tech vegetable facility in Kentucky, which is a great point of pride, growing grape and cherry tomatoes.
Trevor Terry: I'll probably get more into all the wonderful people that made that possible, including my my friend and mentor, Shabin. ah But after about eight years there, it was time, i think, for me to figure out where I was going to go next, take that knowledge that i gained over those eight years.
Trevor Terry: And I was lucky to get involved with the the kingdom of the Netherlands, of all places. um I ended up as they needed a local liaison for some of the consortium work that they were trying to do here in ecosystem development.
Alexis: Thank
Trevor Terry: And that's how I ah became a ah What was it? Economic policy officer for the Netherlands consulate general in Chicago, focused on controlled environment agriculture.
Alexis: you.
Trevor Terry: The Ministerie van Barthelandszaak is the ah official title, foreign affairs. um
Brett: Well, now I feel bad that I didn't didn't salute when we came on the policy officer on deck.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah.
Alexis: should be
Trevor Terry: It's it's actually ah funny story. actually share a birthday with the king of the Netherlands. They still have a king and a queen and everything like that. And ah his birthday is also April 27th. So there's actually a national holiday called King's Day.
Trevor Terry: And it is essentially that entire country gets together for a giant party. And I like to think that maybe, you know, if if some things were to happen, i'm not saying any kind of threat or anything, but maybe I'd be like, you know, next in line for the king.
Alexis: I mean, we already have the date figured out. Like, might as well.
Trevor Terry: It's already holiday.
Plant People: the birthday celebrations, the calendar be the same.
Brett: there's lot of logistics they wouldn't have to change.
Trevor Terry: know You don't have to change it.
Alexis: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, let's not overcomplicate anything.
Plant People: i mean, run with that.
Trevor Terry: You don't have to change any of that other stuff. Think about the things.
Plant People: Yeah. Lots of money saved. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: I in aliens you know ah I speak a bit to the Netherlands. You know. So, you know, I'm in.
Brett: Yeah. Well, it's so that you could do least do the press tours, you know, and just be like, kind of give that that regal indifference that you don't want to, you know, give short answers.
Trevor Terry: and
Alexis: Nailed it.
Brett: That's works perfect.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. That's my vibe. You get it
Brett: Yeah.
Brett: So you you you came from from that world and then you you stepped into this Kentucky Horticulture Council role. And so I will say, think your story about the the pitch with and without cocktails is a very strong, ah recommend very strongly recommends a kind of mad men culture of alcohol in the workplace, maybe.
Alexis: This is
Brett: You can understand why Don Draper was
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah, that's that's also the vibe.
Brett: Yeah, it was functioning. Maybe some other we could leave some other parts around you know gender relations in the past, but the the booze cocktail lunch vibe, you know that I think that might might smooth some things.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, spending money on horses. I mean, that that is definitely my my other reason for moving back to Kentucky besides, you know, family and this awesome opportunity to work with Kentucky Fresh Harvest. And, ah you know, the fact that I met my wife here, I just really like horses and and ah wasting my money on ah losing bets. So that's the only part that I really like.
Alexis: Catch him at the racetrack, folks.
Brett: you'll fit right in.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: you you fit You fit right in with that.
Alexis: Yeah.
Brett: And so it was kind of a, wow.
Trevor Terry: Actually, this month is 10 years I've been back, which is crazy.
Brett: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: Cause you, you kind of, we've we've talked, talked before about the, the, the several different places that you spent time and lived.
Plant People: I,
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Brett: But as far as the horticulture council, um I would love for you to, to, you know, pretend I'm too mint juleps deep, and Maybe three and pitch me on the horticulture council. you know, tell me why, why I should care what I should be into. I'm i'm curious to hear, to hear that, to hear that.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. Yeah. Um, so horticulture council, we are a 501 C five nonprofit association of associations in horticulture in Kentucky.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: So it it was a little bit confusing for me when i when I first heard about it, but our members are actual member associations that cover the whole gamut from apples to zinnias, from carrots to daikon, whatever it is.
Trevor Terry: we anything that What did I say the other day? ah If it grows, we... we It's it under the sun, everything under the sun. That's what it was.
Plant People: Ooh, nice.
Trevor Terry: It was a very happy moment, not one of these like need a little bit more coffee kind of moments. But yeah, Kentucky Horticulture Council has existed since 1991.
Alexis: You
Plant People: Those are the best.
Trevor Terry: ah The initial kind of impetus for it was there were a few groups, the Vegetable Growers Association, the Kentucky State Horticultural Society, a few others that all realized that you know we're supporting fruit growers or we're supporting veggie growers or we're talking to ornamental growers.
Trevor Terry: And they they realized that they needed kind of a unified voice. And so the mission of this organization is to elevate and advance horticulture in Kentucky. Do that in a lot, a lot of ways.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: And the Horticulture Council is a lot of things to a lot of people. A lot of that, I think, is is due in large large part to the really hard work of my predecessor, ah Cindy Finneseth, who's now at UK with you guys. You already know her.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: She was in the role for six, six and a half years, I think, and took things from ah an organization that had had very little leadership and very, you know, a direction and kind of a historical trajectory of what they were doing, but in really professionalizing it and bringing in a lot of additional grant funds and expanding our our overall scope.
Trevor Terry: So I'm very fortunate to ah to be in the role ah during a really interesting time, I think, for horticulture, but also ah to to support growers through some of that stuff with my other experience. So I will never, I i don't think I will ever live up to ah Cindy told me she wears a six and a half shoe. And because everybody's telling me big shoes to fill, big shoes to fill. Like I heard that probably a thousand times when I started.
Trevor Terry: and And they are very big shoes to fill. um I wear ah not a six and a half, but, you know, they feel a lot bigger than that.
Alexis: and
Plant People: I know you guys cover a tremendous amount of ground. You said, I mean, I'm familiar with you guys and and some of the things that you guys do as far as direct work with, like audits, you know, on vegetable operations, all the way up to some of the work that you guys do with like making sure that elected officials understand, you know, the state of things in Kentucky, but you guys cover a tremendous amount of ground.
Plant People: With that being said, i'm I mean, what is ah an average day if there is such a thing for you to look like at the, at the Hort Council? I mean, what do you do with your time? And I'm afraid that's a question beyond the scope of this conversation probably, but kind of what the day look like for you?
Trevor Terry: It's... it's It is very rarely the same. I think I was telling Haley, wife, about it the other day.
Plant People: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: And just the the hardest part about it is that no no two days are alike.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: Yesterday, for instance, ah Dakota on my team and I went up to conduct a water test for a grower up in northern Kentucky. um We drove up in my Camry, which is another whole topic of conversation. being The horticulture guy with the Camry is ah not a great look.
Trevor Terry: um And also not super functional, ah but went out on the farm, got three samples from three different locations out there um and brought those back to the KSU lab in Frankfurt to get those analyzed for that grower.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: I got back to the office for about an hour in which I tried to wrap up a full proposal for the the specialty crop block grant coming up next week. And then I headed back out to South Farm ah for the ah the blueberry field day put on by Brent, Arnold Lewis and and Dakota there for for blueberries in Kentucky, which I don't know if you know this.
Trevor Terry: The most complex thing in the world. ah Blueberries are finicky as they get.
Alexis: Yeah.
Plant People: ah Yes, yes.
Trevor Terry: This is from Daniel Becker. um It is a eight page ah diatribe on the overview of blueberry production and raised mulch beds. And it is.
Plant People: And that's probably just dealing with pH, not actually anything else.
Alexis: yeah
Trevor Terry: That's exactly the
Plant People: yeah It may be eight pages on just that. Yeah, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. Yeah. So being a tomato guy coming from that side of it.
Brett: Meanwhile, if you you drop a blackberry, you've got a patch.
Trevor Terry: yeah Exactly. Exactly. Like that is some complex stuff, but yeah, that was one day. um got you know, left the house at seven 30, got home at seven 30.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: ah So it's, it's what I think you guys get an extension. No two days are exactly like um a lot of the days, unfortunately I am doing what I'm doing today, which is talking to people that I just, you know, really don't have a lot of patience for. I'm kidding. that No, it's that was,
Alexis: I was like, wait, wait, what
Plant People: He said people that he has a lot of love for. Okay. Let me clarify.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah, that's what I meant.
Alexis: what?
Brett: yeah yeah
Plant People: Yes.
Trevor Terry: That's what
Alexis: He said, unfortunately, and I was like, wait, who?
Plant People: Well, I thought that you would probably wear the the field hat as well as the administrative hat.
Trevor Terry: I meant.
Plant People: Was that some administrative stuff you were dealing with today? Probably.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, that was a lot of budgeting.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: So there's a lot of spreadsheets.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: and And I think I may have been a little bit too eager about the spreadsheets in my job interview because I can really hear the truth.
Plant People: Yeah.
Plant People: You just excited Brett Wolf a lot.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah.
Plant People: You said spreadsheet. Yeah. Look at his mouth.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: He's like, his face is glowing right now.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: Well, that's how I fell in love with horticulture. I mean, what what excited me the most about it, i mean, yes, all of the biology that goes into it is is incredible. The idea that we're directing a biological entity looking for some production out of it, that's like the oldest...
Trevor Terry: thing that humans do as a civilization. It's wicked cool. ah Where I found a lot of love for it was that our customers at the greenhouse really didn't have a good frame of reference for, you know, we're we're not working on like these 12 week or or, you know, six month long contracts with these big buyers.
Trevor Terry: We are working on like generally a week to week, two weeks ahead kind of basis.
Plant People: Oh, wow.
Trevor Terry: So even you know as ah as a farm that was just getting off the ground and starting to get that customer base, we didn't have a lot of those really secure contracts for that timeframe. But I needed to know what our yield was going to be based on all the information available. Now, Shabin, Dr. Saha at Kentucky Fresh Harvest, formerly of UK,
Trevor Terry: He has it wonderfully in his head. ah But those days where he's not available or he's got to pick up the kids or whatever else, I need answers pretty quick. So the way that I kind of got around that was developed a model for tomato yield prediction in the greenhouse ah that was accurate within about 10%.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: So on the weeks where we had 14,000 pounds coming out of the greenhouse of grape tomatoes, we could definitely say within about 1,400 pounds, this was kind of what we were going to have. So it allowed us to develop better customer relationships, credibility with those buyers to ah to say, hey, here's what I think we're going to have. And we're pretty close to that.
Trevor Terry: Right. um But it also allowed us to plan for payroll, for inputs, for energy costs, you know, the lighting and the the natural gas in the greenhouse, all those sorts of things.
Trevor Terry: um It allowed us to plan on a lot better timeframe. that's kind of the spreadsheet that i fell in love with now i work with a lot more you know um reconciling budgets with 13 different federal grants yeah
Plant People: budget numbers and stuff.
Plant People: Yeah. Oh, with grants. Wow. That's a whole different prediction model. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: that's a whole different one yeah
Plant People: Wow. Yeah. Wow.
Brett: Yeah, with with new levels of uncertainty, new new variables to consider.
Alexis: Thank you.
Brett: as you... as you you mentioned that, know, obviously the spreadsheet is a point of joy or falling in love with horticulture. So, so is it, is there anything particular about this? We have a whole episode about the the reasons that we are interested in the joys that we get from horticulture.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: I know you do a little bit of, a little bit of gardening, a little bit of growing around your, you know, for, for what can, do you have any, any thoughts about like your
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: joy of interacting with these plants, this old, very old human connection to the photos and our photosynthetic friends.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, besides the nerdy part, which which does excite me a lot, you know timing irrigation you know around around specific plant needs and and fertilizer and and trying to trying to predict my own yield at home, that's super fun.
Trevor Terry: But who made me fall in love with it really?
Alexis: yeah
Trevor Terry: like My dad and his seven brothers and sisters were all, ah grew up on the farm in Bretton County. my My dad's dad purchased it for, I think, $5,500.
Trevor Terry: This was about 750 acres. um And that's where they all lived and worked to survive, basically. you know Growing tobacco, raising hogs. ah They did some sorghum. they did They did all sorts of stuff. Dad told me that occasionally they did eat squirrel, ah which is very on brand for my dad.
Plant People: yeah
Trevor Terry: if You knew him. ah But but yeah, the they wanted I think that generation wanted us to get as far away from horticulture and agriculture as possible um because it was a hard existence in that generation.
Trevor Terry: And it's it is crazy to me that that. A generation later, we're talking about ai and predictive models for for, you know, yield. And at the same time, I grew up with like my uncle Paul, who passed you know, giving the first tomato from the garden to the youngest kid in the family and having that first like white bread and mayonnaise and salted tomato sandwich of the year and having that honor as being the youngest person, right?
Alexis: that that's it
Plant People: Rite of passage. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: um I think the other person who really made me fall in love with it besides, you know, my my family on that side is ah is my wife. So Haley, when I met her, I was working for the greenhouse, but I had an apartment in Midway. I didn't have any like garden space or anything, but ah When we met, she had this little, you know, I don't know, 10 by 20 garden and she was growing some things.
Trevor Terry: And I was like, hey, ah what if you pruned your tomatoes like this? Or what if you trellis them with this Florida weave thing that I've seen? And she's just like, I don't know. That's weird. Why would I do that?
Trevor Terry: And we tried it
Alexis: if
Trevor Terry: And we started to just like fall in love with each other through that aspect of of our relationship, kind of like caring for the same thing, arguing about it, which was fun too.
Trevor Terry: and And that's grown like into, into you know, we're, I think we're both consumers and producers of of food in a really like passionate way. So if it's our tomatoes, I want them to be perfect.
Trevor Terry: She owns a bakery in Lexington. It's Gigi's Cupcakes on Richmond Road.
Plant People: Oh, I know that place.
Trevor Terry: And so it's right at Starbucks. you can You can go and tell her you know me and she'll either give you one or throw one at you depending on the day.
Alexis: Very delicious.
Trevor Terry: um
Plant People: Fair enough.
Trevor Terry: and And yeah, so so the opportunity to kind of use some of those ingredients that we get from local farms like blackberries or or apples or strawberries or things like that um in in deliver those to people in a really unique way is really interesting to me too.
Trevor Terry: um Yeah, I'm a nerd for all of it. ah just I I don't have a lot of like, there's there's not a lot about growing tomatoes specifically that I'm not just fascinated by.
Trevor Terry: I have a couple of little starts that I'm trying to start some new guys right here.
Alexis: um
Trevor Terry: I will, like I refuse. Haley hates it because anytime there's a volunteer in the garden, she wants to take it out and like make it more efficient space and not have all the, you know, possibility of disease and things like that.
Trevor Terry: And I save all of them and I hide them around the yard.
Plant People: like
Trevor Terry: ah So they're just kind of.
Plant People: It's like, I wonder what this guy's going to be. Yeah, what's it going to be?
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: It's like a mystery wrapped in an enigma.
Trevor Terry: It is.
Plant People: It's what's this tomato going to be?
Trevor Terry: It is.
Plant People: Yeah, potential.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, exactly.
Plant People: but you
Brett: volunteer volunteer management.
Plant People: you ah You mentioned Brethet County.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: We do that some that in extension too. That was just stupid.
Plant People: Yeah, sorry, Brett. I was going to just say, I bet you I've been to some of those places in Brethet County.
Brett: Don't give it an
Plant People: You mentioned like your past and oil drilling. My father used to drill a lot of wells in that area, Clay Hole and Frozen Creek and Altro and
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: and i'll
Trevor Terry: We were right next to Frozen. Yep, exactly.
Alexis: you
Plant People: Oh, really? ah But, um, yeah, I, I spent a lot of, uh, uh, time there just riding the sputter rigs, uh, just old gas fired rigs that ran off natural gas all day long, just but watching that hammer drill go up and down.
Trevor Terry: Yep.
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Plant People: But, uh, What caught my attention about that is, yeah and yeah the Horticulture Council is right in the middle of this, is that the change in horticulture over, you know, going from like subsistence, and Brett and I and Alexis have had this conversation before, going from like subsistence-type farming that was pretty prevalent in that area,
Plant People: And now we're talking about AI and what is Kentucky, the say second biggest state in kind of controlled environment, agriculture, horticulture. i mean, it's kind of incredible.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: I mean, when you mentioned that, there's this picture immediately popped in my head of those old hillsides, you in Jackson and surrounding areas and places like I grew up in Johnson County outside of Paintsville.
Alexis: Hmm.
Plant People: But now we're.
Trevor Terry: OK.
Plant People: talking about all of this space under glass and it kind of, that's kind of what the horticulture council is right in the middle of it. And it really with like infrastructure development and and all the work that you guys do. It's so cool to me.
Plant People: And the, and the, the, the, the breath and the width that you guys cover is just pretty incredible. It's pretty awesome.
Trevor Terry: yeah it's pretty wild, man. Like walking into one of those greenhouses, you know, 60 acre structure, first of all, it's just hard to write.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Plant People: Yeah, it's mind blowing. Yeah.
Alexis: the
Trevor Terry: Right. But then, then you walk in and you're in this, this environment that is developed, you know, with every intention of providing exactly what that plant needs. And that's kind of the, the formulaic piece of it. I think that's the through line to the spreadsheets and the AI is like,
Trevor Terry: you know if i If I adjust the temperature or or i'm I'm controlling the the lighting or i'm I'm putting on the shade cloths or opening up the vents, like none of that is an accident. It's all intentional.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: And that's that's what's fascinating to me about the greenhouse stuff. the you know With Kentucky Fresh and eventually, of course, App Harvest as well, a few of the other big players like 80 Acres, like
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: we have so much space that's under protection. um I did a a little bit of a when I was still with the Dutch, I did like a kind of an analysis of the USDA census numbers. Because I was lot of conversations with people and Globally, I think people saw what happened with App Harvest as sort of a like a blip. right They were like, okay, here's this this company this tech company that raised a ton of money and they built all these greenhouses and here they go, they fail.
Trevor Terry: um A lot of people said, I told you so. a lot of people said that that, of course, that was going to happen. I think it had a lot to do with the management of the business and a lot...
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: less to do with the actual viability of the production system, because we know from around the world that those things work in that kind of study of the of where the country is at as far as a greenhouse or protected horticulture goes.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: um the the increase from 2017 to 2022 in Kentucky, it went from like 1.4 million square feet to 6.6 million square feet, which is already huge. It's like a 342% increase over that timeframe in protected vegetables under glass or other protection.
Plant People: yeah
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: but But what I knew from working with those folks and and kind of paying attention to that that greenhouse industry through my Dutch job was that that the app harvest facilities alone were 7.1 million square feet.
Trevor Terry: So clearly something was not adding up. um I went into the county level data to take a look and kind of verify what was going on. It turned out that none of those facilities were listed.
Trevor Terry: So when I'm in these conversations talking about, you know, foreign policy as it relates to agriculture at at the embassy in the Netherlands, like,
Plant People: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: and And they're saying that maybe that's just a blip or or that's just the app harvest facilities or or that's, you know, we can write that off. The fact of the matter is that none of that was listed.
Alexis: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: All of that growth came from small medium sized operators, right?
Alexis: yeah
Trevor Terry: and And so when we when we look at that growth alone, 6.6 million square feet, and then we add in the 7.1 million square feet from ab harvest, we get to about 13.8 million square feet for Kentucky. That's protected vegetables under glass or other protection. I think it's table number 37 in the USDA census.
Trevor Terry: So... I'm a nerd for that stuff. I think that's, that's impressive, but where does that put us in the nation um prior to that addition or that, that correction, I guess, um,
Trevor Terry: we'd be in fifth place. I think it was you know behind Ohio or something like that.
Plant People: Yeah, it's
Trevor Terry: But with that additional acreage actually counted correctly, ah it puts us in second place behind California in the entire country, which is just a crazy step, right? um Now, California has 38 million square feet.
Plant People: yeah it's a big leap between number two and number one, yeah.
Alexis: You jump, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah. But all that said, 13.8 for a ah state like Kentucky to go from 1.4 to 13.8, 932% increase is crazy.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: so um i'm very much I'm very much a proponent of that because number one, I see it as, as an opportunity to ah bring more people, more food locally.
Trevor Terry: I see it as an opportunity to, um to get the next generation of folks more interested in horticulture, whether that's in ornamental or in vegetable production. um I also see it as, as another thing for Kentucky to hang its hat on as like, Hey, you know, sows, cows, and plows have been the story about Kentucky,
Trevor Terry: agriculture forever. But here, horticulture is actually creating opportunity as well. And it's the same thing with the cut flowers, right?
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: um I might not have these as memorized, but I believe that that in the 2022 census, 220 growers listed growing on acres.
Trevor Terry: the market value in ah in twenty seventeen i think was fifty thousand dollars like in cash receipt listed in that census
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: it's now up to two point two million in that in that time frame which is insane so you got yeah it's it's over 20 growers growing on a little less than an acre or or even less than an acre and there's we know there's some that are not counted as well if the usda census is not perfect but
Plant People: little bit of a growth area. Yeah. Yeah. Crazy.
Plant People: me
Trevor Terry: There's another thing with tremendous growth in Kentucky that is on the smaller scale, but has an opportunity to explode, I think, over the next time frame that they'll make that report. So I'm just maybe I'm too much of a nerd for those numbers, but I think it tells helps to reshape the story around Kentucky horticulture away from like, well, tobacco left and what's next.
Alexis: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: And you deal with this a lot into like, here's opportunity.
Alexis: yeah
Trevor Terry: Here's this this like natural resource we have in both the land and in our people. And they're doing some amazing things with ah with very little land and very little, ah you know.
Alexis: Yeah. because and Kentucky doesn't always tell its story as as well as it should.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: And so organizations like Court Council, you know Kentucky Proud, other places like that help, I think, to tell those stories of all the good things that are happening so that there can be you know investments when it makes sense from other places um you know to just build that build that industry in like a sustainable way.
Trevor Terry: yeah
Alexis: Yeah. Because nobody's like asking for it to be completely everything under glass, you know what I mean? Like it's not going to be like the next vertical farm, central hydroponic, what, I don't know, makeup, AI run greenhouse, i don't know.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: It's not going to be just one thing.
Alexis: But yeah.
Plant People: We've talked about diversification for how many years, and it was an interesting and an interesting point you just made, Trevor, when you said we're always looking, wondering what the big thing is. Well, the scary thing is, what if the big thing is already edged into the picture, and the scary thing is we may not see it until it's passed us by with another state or the market's been captured someplace else.
Alexis: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: There it
Plant People: But I think that's the trick of framing, and that's why groups like the Horticulture Council is so important to me you need to have people looking at things like that to make sure that the the picture and the frame that the picture is in is truly representative of what's going on out there in Kentucky and there's a lot going on in Kentucky and it's pretty exciting as far as horticulture goes and agriculture.
Trevor Terry: is. There's a lot to be excited about and there's a lot to be nervous about. I mean, if I'm being completely honest, you know, i I took this job knowing that there would be a lot of opportunity and also a lot of challenge.
Plant People: the
Trevor Terry: um And I think the growers are seeing that too. you know ah Brett, Alexis, and I have had some some really good discussions with growers about some of the economic uncertainties that are that are facing us right now from tariffs and from you know just general inflation affecting you know what inputs they can get at what prices.
Trevor Terry: And ah you hear you hear the full gamut of of folks that are working you know with three truckloads, for instance, of of a substrate versus one pallet.
Trevor Terry: Right.
Alexis: Right.
Trevor Terry: And all of those folks are experiencing those same issues just on different scales.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: um And.
Alexis: right
Trevor Terry: So so that's that's one of the challenges I think right now. The other is, of course, federal funding right now is a huge uncertainty. And as ah as a grant-funded organization with 13 of those federal grants right now, I can tell you that I did not sleep well from January 28th when the OMB memo was put out until like basically today.
Trevor Terry: And I'm sure it's going to be tough to sleep tonight. it's it's And that's affecting a lot of different organizations, right? That's affecting universities.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: That's affecting our our member associations. That's affecting... ah you know, individual farmers who are, are taking advantage of federal programs. Like we had the LFPA and the LFSS, the local food for schools. um When that that went away, that was a big hit for a lot of horticultural producers.
Plant People: Yeah. um
Trevor Terry: Right. um I am encouraged right now that we've got a, a lot of advocates at both KOAP and at KDA, like the commissioner shell, um you know, you're,
Trevor Terry: even even our our friends at Kentucky Farm Bureau have all been very much listening to those issues right now. And I think that as things kind of play out on the federal level, we've got a lot of great advocates here who are who are trying to take those things into account.
Alexis: Oh, that.
Trevor Terry: Now, is is everything perfect? Am I still going to sleep well about you know this, that, or the other funding opportunity? It's going to be tough, but um I am still optimistic that that some of that that grower support is going to continue through through the challenging time when we kind of need it a lot, right?
Trevor Terry: You guys heard about how strawberries are doing right now, for instance?
Plant People: As far as from
Trevor Terry: um
Alexis: oh that like the root system or the disease issue.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: The neopest, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Neopestalopcheopsis, yeah.
Plant People: ah I think it's going to change the industry some. I believe it's making some larger growers. I know we have some in my county, Bourbon County. I mean, it's making them reassess the supply chain and how they get plants or do they grow their own plants.
Plant People: So I think that's generating, you know, some churn in that industry. ah It's going to make some changes definitely on how things come from,
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Plant People: you know, the sp supply chain there just to overall, i think it's going it's making some changes right now. Currently we're, you know, considerations are being made already for next year and changes are happening. So, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Exactly.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: and And I know for cut flower growers, it's a similar thing, you know, like sourcing those bulbs from overseas. A lot of that strawberry plant material comes from Canada.
Plant People: Yes.
Trevor Terry: um It's a lot of the substrates, fertilizers, um plastic materials, whether that's for a greenhouse or just pots.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: A lot of that stuff comes from a global supply chain. So that that additional uncertainty I'm not saying i know a lot of growers that make a perfect budget for what they're going to spend the next year.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: But if you bump 10% to 30% 50% on top of those line items, I can tell you from my own experience, that's, it's going to hurt. It's going to hurt.
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis: Yeah. Yeah.
Plant People: And do you guys ah work with, if oh, sorry, Brett, were you going say something?
Brett: So
Brett: Oh, I was I was gonna take us in a different direction. So you go ahead
Plant People: No, I was just going to add one thing to that. So, and you guys are out here. It sounds like the Hort Council helps communicate this stuff to different stakeholder groups. Is that the case or yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Plant People: Telling the story.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. so that's part of the mission. I think that it's going to become an even bigger part of our mission or our, our, you know, our charge that, that is our original charge, right. To act as that unified unified voice for horticulture. So we've got currently 12 member associations that are, that are part of the Kentucky horticulture council. Like I mentioned, vegetable growers, hort society, uh, uh, all these different groups that represent their own kind of segment of horticulture.
Trevor Terry: And, uh, right now, I think more than ever, they do have a unified voice. Um, at least in my experience, you know, the guys who are our turf and landscape guys are talking about the same issues in workforce development, in, in rising costs for, for their operations in, uh, in uncertainty around the future that our vegetable growers are and our vegetable growers from the open field guys to the greenhouse guys, to the, the really small scale, just getting into like a direct to consumer market.
Alexis: Amen.
Trevor Terry: um everybody's kind of talking about the same concerns right now. So although although it is a challenging time, I do see a lot of unity in how people are approaching the times.
Trevor Terry: And that gives me a lot of hope because when those people get talking, exactly, exactly.
Plant People: ah We're all in it together kind of thing. Yeah.
Brett: I think sometimes sometimes organizationally we we get come to get known for one or two things and there's a lot more going on. So for instance, with our group, people know about the the farmer's market and auction price reports and maybe aren't familiar with some of the other things.
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Brett: And so I was curious, you know we've talked a little bit now about the the controlled environment stuff. We've talked about the unified voices for the for the growers. um I think you know one thing that I would love for people to to know and understand a little bit more is that there's actually, in addition to just being a member and being able to come together and have conversations, youll you all also do provide services they that that growers can and fat can and should, in fact, get involved or or approach you all about different support angles.
Alexis: Thank you.
Brett: And that's something...
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: you know, that's something that keeps me awake at night is trying to think about how we can tell people more about how the horticulture council folks can, you know, just get in front of more growers or realize, oh, this is a thing that that the hortic council does. So what are some of those things?
Trevor Terry: Yeah. So, I mean, we're a statewide organization with, ah as of April now, five people on staff. ah ah Used to be just just four. And it's it's crazy um the the amount of ground that is covered by my wonderful staff. So I'll kind of frame that discussion. I think I've got a big you know slide where I can go through all the details about what the different programs are. But i want to frame that discussion in our people ah around our people and like their levels of expertise. So we have, of course, when Cindy left that later left a great hole that I will, of course, never completely fill the vacuum of.
Trevor Terry: ah But but, you know, between Dakota, Bethany, Danny and Ali,
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: I've just got some great people with some great experience. Our um our oldest team member ah who is ah is just one of my, like kind of the light that I call when I'm in one of my darkest modes is Bethany.
Trevor Terry: Bethany Cog. She has done, i think for five years, five and a half years at Hort Council, she has been like the go-to. She does everything from farm visits to working with farmers markets to up upscale their their businesses and to to better communicate with growers to working directly with, farm share operations lately to, get them more used to digital tools and kind of future proofing those organizations and, and that could particular business model. Um, she is, ah she might kill me for saying this, but she is kind of the, the, uh, the breath of fresh air when everybody else is feeling a little bit down. Uh, she will, she will bring it in and she, she won't agree with me about that, but you know how it goes.
Trevor Terry: Um, Of course, Danny ah on our team, Danny Zwischenberger, she is a kind of all around expert. She spent a lot of time in horticulture professionally prior to joining ah Kentucky Horticulture Council, but she's still curious about everything.
Trevor Terry: ah She's managing two particular projects. One is on that CEA, the protected ag ecosystem development in Eastern Kentucky, and another is a completely different shot at workforce development.
Trevor Terry: So she's managing a project from the Department of Labor where we're, it's called Kentucky Green Works.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: We're trying to upskill and get certifications and registered apprenticeship programs outlined for the nursery landscape, aboric culture and protected ag industries in Kentucky. ah So she's she's one of those people that can take a really, really complex thing and boil it down and communicate it in a way that just makes sense for people.
Trevor Terry: um And I'm very much proud of her and all of her hard work, even before I came on ah Dakota is is like, I think you all know Dakota, right? um i'm I'm trying to think of the best way to describe him.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: He's the hardest working person that I know. I thought that was Sydney, but it turns out it was Dakota. um you
Alexis: Aw.
Trevor Terry: He's our grower outreach coordinator and and he does everything under the sun. So he's our resident water expert. He's our resident risk management expert. He is our resident produce safety expert.
Trevor Terry: And he works with a lot of other partners, but he is the guy who's like, I was i was talking to him just yesterday about, you know, shifting some of his time from one project to another. And his his main concern was not like, you know, about him personally and how he was going to be spending his time.
Trevor Terry: But really, he was like, okay, but right now, I'm the guy out there, boots on the ground, traveling to growers.
Alexis: Thank
Trevor Terry: And if I am stuck behind a desk doing this project, then who's going to be out there every day talking to these people. And genuinely, I respect that. You know, I had one idea because I'm looking at spreadsheets and I'm trying to make decisions based on that, but he's thinking about the human connection. And that's why he's the best grower outreach coordinator, bar none that I've ever, you know, had the pleasure working with.
Trevor Terry: And then Allie is our newest team member. Allie is, she comes from Legacy Dairy. You've probably had their milk before. It's by the way, the chocolate milk is fantastic.
Trevor Terry: ah So free plug for Allie and Legacy Dairy. But she joined our team in April as our program and operations manager. So she is kind of like our... She's my boss, essentially.
Trevor Terry: She keeps me on track when I'm thinking about, oh, we could do this project or we should be focusing on this. She's like, hey, but remember, we need to focus on this, this, this. So she is my, she's my rock.
Alexis: Thank you.
Trevor Terry: And since she doesn't come from a horticulture background, it's really exciting because as she's discovering stuff, I'm also discovering stuff. And so is the rest of the team. So you know how it is when you talk to people who are less familiar with yeah everything from gardening to commercial horticulture.
Trevor Terry: and that light goes off for them and they start to see how these businesses work, like she's already in love with it. I will say that her first like kind of horticulture council era ah plant that she bought was a cactus.
Trevor Terry: um and And that kind of reflects...
Alexis: They all do.
Trevor Terry: I don't get it, man. Dakota loves cactuses too. um they're They're all over the place, but between all those people and hopefully with a little bit of help from me and our partner organizations like you guys at CCD and UK extension, and we we, I think, deliver on a lot of value.
Trevor Terry: And then like I said earlier, it's it's ah it means a lot of things to a lot of people. So some of that core programming, and I'll shut up when you want me to about all this stuff, but
Alexis: Oh, we love this.
Trevor Terry: So beyond all those grant funded projects, we have so our our core like foundational funding comes from the Ag Development Board. And and that's that's the really the the key stuff of what we do. um Through that funding, we're able to offer a gap cost share program where we will pay for up to 75% of a gap good agricultural practices audit ah third party from for growers.
Trevor Terry: We have expended that entire amount already this year, which I'm very excited about. And because that always helps me to go back and say, hey, look at the engagement with this program.
Alexis: People use this. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah. and i'm I'm really excited about that because what that means is I think currently we have 74, 75 GAP certified operations in Kentucky. And, you know, if we can get that to 100 over the next couple of years, I'll be thrilled.
Plant People: Uh-huh.
Trevor Terry: Right. um That just helps lower that barrier entry for growers and to help existing growers who are currently, ah you know, adopting those practices and getting that certification, usually to go to a specific customer, um we're we're kind of helping them, you know, grease the wheels to get to that next point.
Alexis: Yeah.
Alexis: yeah
Plant People: youhow
Trevor Terry: And it's a real hook for us, too, because when we are going in to talk about produce safety or we're going in to talk about marketing or we're going in to talk about, ah you know, technical assistance for for production systems, it it really helps to have something like, hey, and you know what, we could probably do this.
Trevor Terry: Another one of those is our on-farm water management grant program. that's another cost share where uh we can uh for for growers who submit projects uh that are approved we can cover up to 50 of a project cost up to twenty thousand dollars so that that has some really specific stuff so don't don't make me quote every single best management practice from nrcs that we cover uh because it's ah it's a list right but um but
Alexis: you
Trevor Terry: that That is another program where we can say to a grower, hey, you're using this water source and it might be, you know, your agricultural water might be actually introducing risk into the supply chain for specific pathogens.
Trevor Terry: And if you were to just do drip tape, right? Or if you were to just use it, like drill a well or have a cistern or or do some raining catchment, right? Like those those sorts of things that come naturally from trying to improve your production system also improve your food safety.
Trevor Terry: It's one of those things where we can kind of turn that on its head and say, hey, we're elevating these growers by helping them get to that next stage.
Plant People: It's a gateway indicator to me when people ask about gap audits and water systems, things like that, especially gap audits. It's a, it's sort of a gateway sort of waterfall moment where you know that that producer is usually leveling up as far as production or clientele.
Trevor Terry: Exactly. Exactly.
Plant People: And it's pretty exciting time when I hear that because usually that's the motivator, right? They, and you guys provide that important service to help remove that friction for them to move up, level up production or marketing, whatnot. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: And that's all thanks to Ag Development Board and and that funding that has been just, like i said, foundational to everything else we do. um The other big part of that service, you know, we we do the NAP surveys and we do the the research grant program, which I'm particularly excited about all the time as a nerd for horticulture. Yeah.
Trevor Terry: So so we we have ah a small pool of funds every year that we get to allocate for specific projects at Kentucky universities to advance horticultural research in the state. So it's like a baby version of SCBG.
Trevor Terry: You know, it's not a baby amount of money, but it is like a a step in that direction. for a lot of people. And it it kind of fills a gap that those larger grant programs do not. So in some cases, we are, we're funding research fellows. And in other cases, we're funding specific ah horticultural research projects for ah specialists at UK or KSU, or at we've had Moorhead, Murray State, Berea, UPike, all over the place for different researchers doing those those smaller projects. And
Trevor Terry: That one particularly excites me, like I said, because I'm a nerd, but I think there's the most opportunity to fill a gap right now with that.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: And then like the other huge portion of that spreadsheet that I'm always working on is ah is our support for for extension across the state. So um we have ah either fully or partially funded 11 extension associates at the University of Kentucky, everything from ah the protected ag folks to to the the fruits and everything like that. And I think people don't really have an idea about what an extension associate is because I was going ask you guys, like kind of how do you view that?
Trevor Terry: And where does that fit into the puzzle for you guys of in your own experience? um um I'm curious.
Plant People: Oh, man. ah It provides critical support and very specialized area. I mean, as a field agent, it's so important to me because I've worked with different folks in those positions over time.
Plant People: And the thing about all the horticulture that we're talking about today is it tends to be kind of advanced. It's advanced systems when you talk about or can be advanced, everything from drip to protected ag, but they provide that kind of expertise on the field facing side. Now I know there's other components to it, but just from a selfish point of view, that field help, you know, really supplements what's there or what may, or there may be a gap in what's available, you know, at the university and other places. But that's why it's been kind of very helpful to me and local growers in the past with my experiences as a field facing person.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. What about you guys?
Alexis: Yeah, I would say like seeing it from, you know, being in the county to now being on campus, it it is a little bit dependent on like kind of what they're specializing in. um But, you know, I think that they are a way to expand the, expand that specialty, right? Because we only have one specialist and they are pulled in a lot of directions between teaching and extension and research. And i think that the, um, the EAs, the extension associates,
Alexis: are able to really drive home the extension mission. And so they're able to take, you know, that area they're specializing in, even if they're not, you know, an expert, right, they have direct communication with the, you know, the specialist who is and they can get with them more quickly. and they can really be, i think, the face of that program area and stretch that, um stretch that out and also deliver back you know, it's a two-way street. they They help deliver back, hey, I was over at this farm with this agent. The agent was saying they're seeing a lot of problem with, you know, Plum Curculio.
Alexis: Can, you know, you let the specialist know, or can we do some more research, or can we do an on-farm, you know, whatever, and so just kind of helping with with that and a little bit more technical assistance that way, so I think they just really expand the program, um,
Alexis: that they're in and are a good space for the university and for the agent too, you know so the agent knows that they've got help.
Plant People: It's kind of just another strand in the rope for me.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Alexis: Yeah.
Plant People: It just is part of the fabric, and we need all the support we can get on a lot of these advanced production techniques and operations. So it's just a good supplement in a lot of cases. But I know they, you know, ah just as Alexa said, it depends. But yeah, sure.
Alexis: Brett's been an EA though, so.
Plant People: Go for it.
Trevor Terry: yeah
Brett: What's that?
Alexis: You didn't you start out and as an EA?
Brett: I did, i did, yes.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Brett: Yeah. So in case anyone doesn't know we're talking about, these are campus-based staff positions that support extension at a statewide level, usually, sometimes a regional level. I honestly think that a blend of faculty and staff work is going to be more and more of the future of extension.
Brett: Of course, our county-based programming is to me the the ah crown jewel of the of the whole system.
Alexis: the heart. who
Brett: but And we have a very unique uniquely strong system in that regard and in the state of Kentucky. And i I think honestly, the collaborative funding and support that the Hort Council has given to UK for the last 20 years, I think we might look back on it and say, wow, that was actually extremely forward thinking or indicative of where things were going to as far as collaborative understandings of
Trevor Terry: Right.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Brett: value and identifying priorities and funding. um I think more and more as the core funds get cut or eb as the federal and other funding opportunities for for extension and for universities start to to shift and become maybe more unpredictable,
Brett: I think we have a lot to lot that we owe to the Hort Council and to the Ag Development Board and the way that they have thought through that stuff and the people who have figured out what that looks like across time.
Alexis: No.
Brett: And now you're you're part of that ah that legacy, and that which is really, really cool. i think i do I do think we've led the way in that regard.
Trevor Terry: And it is figuring it out, right?
Trevor Terry: I'd agree. I don't think that folks in Kentucky have a great understanding of like how extension programs work elsewhere, but associates aren't present everywhere, right?
Alexis: yeah
Trevor Terry: Sometimes it is just a specialist in a state that's covering the entire state, which is crazy. And I'm really glad that...
Alexis: And they don't have county agents. So like it's pretty much just the specialists.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, so I mean, as far as the land grant mission goes, like having... you know, many hands make light work. ah and And I think we're always improving that too. You know, i in my time, I'm hoping that we can really center on what value we deliver to growers and getting more of those those ah that feedback in a direct way. like How can we better serve those growers and what what are the issues that they're they're facing and how do they view the assistance that they're getting? Just to try to focus on that continuous improvement model.
Trevor Terry: That was the plug for Toyota and my father-in-law, just to add in there. Yeah, no, I think...
Brett: It's good to know that Supergoop practices lean production systems and continuous improvement.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. Yeah.
Brett: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: We're trying, we're trying. I guess, I guess the other piece about Hort Council, just to, just to round that, that discussion out, because we are so many things to so many people or, or is just to bring it back to those, whether it's a funded position at one of our land grant universities or it's folks directly on our staff, or it's our volunteer board members that put in a lot of extra time to make sure that when I'm going crazy, I don't go completely crazy.
Alexis: Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: Um, you know, it's it's all those people that make it work and it's, and it really does come down. i think it's important. One thing i I just want to make sure we cover is like, because I've been thinking about it a lot is is sort of paying it forward and maybe like mentorship of people.
Trevor Terry: I mentioned, I know Ray, you know, should have been pretty well from back in the day, right?
Plant People: Yeah, yeah. ah Go back a ways, yeah.
Trevor Terry: Yeah. I, like when I started there KFH, there was, I had very little direction about what I was supposed to be doing. I had zero knowledge of horticulture.
Trevor Terry: And I was working with this group from Israel, which was you know a lot of time differences and a lot of language barriers and things like that. um But we were out like kind of meeting with different agents in different counties, trying to figure out who was growing what where.
Trevor Terry: And ah went down to Whitley County and somebody ah from from the judge executive's office, I think, had invited Shaban down from UK. And he was, ah I mean, if you know Shaban, he's got a particular vibe of skepticism and he doesn't he does not suffer bullshit very often.
Plant People: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Oops, sorry. BS very often.
Plant People: Yeah. yeah
Trevor Terry: um And so so he came in and and we we started to to talk about this project. He said, well, have you thought about this? I think this location is a lot better than that one. and he And he just had a lot of understanding and knowledge from his his prior experience at University of Florida, at Purdue and at UK.
Trevor Terry: And ah he came on as the second employee. And I will hold that over his head um forever, I think, ah that I was first and second.
Alexis: As you should.
Alexis: as you should
Plant People: first.
Trevor Terry: Yeah, yeah. But I mean, that's what that that's what you need at the beginning of one of those large you know builds for a greenhouse or any kind of farm. You need a grower, somebody who knows that stuff. And ah and he's still there, ah which is crazy to me too. you know I guess 10 years ago when we met, it was just kind of this idea on a soybean field and here he is running that whole project. And I'm just, I'm immensely proud and and grateful for the time that I got to spend you know eight years going from knowing nothing about that stuff to, you know,
Trevor Terry: where we are today is is it's cool. And i when Shabin's talking about you know pest management practices and teaching me cultural practices around that, as well as the science behind it. and giving me an opportunity to ask all those stupid questions in an environment where where I didn't have to feel embarrassed about not knowing the answer, right?
Trevor Terry: He always put it like, I can give you the paddles, but you gotta to row yourself, right? So he's he's equipping those people down there that are that are still working at KFH and he equipped me with the tools necessary to make my own decisions.
Trevor Terry: and And I'm just immensely grateful for that. And I'm curious like who you guys kind of, mentor was or if they had any good sayings. My favorite is Shaban always says there's no money in growing vegetables. There's only money in selling vegetables.
Trevor Terry: That one I've got tattooed in a number of places.
Plant People: Yeah, I've heard that from more than a few, ah particularly the protected ah ah environment growers. It's something about them that they're they some of them lean ah heavily on the business side rather than the, ooh, a plant, I want to hug it side. They love the plants because it's business units of economy, you know?
Trevor Terry: Yep.
Plant People: Yeah, yeah. yeah
Trevor Terry: Yep.
Alexis: my ah my I feel like i've had many mentors and over my life, but ah one of mine, she said, who's now an extension associate, Sherry Dutton, and she said, plants don't read the book, Alexis. You just have to figure it out.
Alexis: And that has never been more true, and I say it all the time, because they do not read the books, and they do what they want. Mm-hmm.
Trevor Terry: yep
Plant People: It all depends, Alexis.
Alexis: ne
Plant People: It's all very situational. Just like sociology, it all depends.
Alexis: Environmental issues.
Plant People: Nature versus nurture, okay? It works for plants as well.
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Plant People: It does.
Brett: Well, one of my, the people that that really shaped my perspective on this was a former coworker, ah Neil Wilson. He repeated a phrase that somebody else had told.
Brett: And I think, I think it's about having perspective on a lot of things in life, but he said, and, and, you know, some people might push back against this, but there are no horticultural emergencies that we have to have some perspective on.
Trevor Terry: and
Alexis: Yes. yes
Brett: there are things that are really important and there are, there's losing money and there's all kinds of stuff like that. But, uh, you know, if you, if you have health scares or you have other things that happen in your life, sometimes you kind of have like, okay, yeah, let's, let's just rewind back to this is we're growing plants. This is really like, supposed to be a good thing.
Brett: So it's to be not, it's not supposed to just be this primary source of stress or, or cortisol or fight or flight or anything else.
Alexis: yes
Brett: So i don't know if that's inspiring or not, but, um, I've really enjoyed this.
Alexis: I was to say Beller Bloom's version of that is it's only flowers.
Brett: What's that? buts that would
Alexis: And she was a NICU nurse. So like legitimately she goes, it's only flowers.
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: right
Alexis: Everything's dead, but you know what? It's only flowers. Sorry. Go ahead.
Trevor Terry: Mm-hmm.
Alexis: Okay.
Brett: And that's not to say that any of this that any of this isn't absolutely essential and important to our future as a state, to our future as individuals, to the the businesses and organizations in the state.
Alexis: sorry go
Brett: I think that I have been really, I was really impressed with the way that Cindy took the organization by the horns. and i And I've been really impressed with the way that you have too, Trevor.
Brett: And i'm I'm excited for this next conversation.
Trevor Terry: Oh,
Brett: this next chapter of what the Kentucky horticulture horticulture council is going to do and is already doing. And and you all are supporting our CCD 25th anniversary, which we really, really appreciate. We're looking forward to getting together and having some, um, summer ish cocktails and drinks surround somehow focused and integrating, uh, horticulture products.
Brett: That was maybe me fishing for answers earlier about what we should do, but, uh,
Trevor Terry: oh I get it. Yeah.
Alexis: Plug. Okay.
Brett: But yeah, so again, thank you so much for for coming on today and I'll try to do, yeah, of course.
Plant People: It goes full circle.
Trevor Terry: Can I do one more plug?
Alexis: but
Trevor Terry: Okay. All right. So ah currently we're talking about extension associates. Currently there are two positions open at the, at the university of Kentucky and KSU.
Trevor Terry: um This will be the first KHC funded position at KSU. It's on a focus on hydroponics and aquaponics, you know, kind of ah really serving to, to enhance their dare Kentucky project, the largest single grant award in KSU history which is really exciting. um and And of course, KHC is happy to support that, but we're also really happy to to kind of broaden that impact with more positions funded at different folks, universities.
Trevor Terry: ah We also have in ah another position. I think Cindy and Ching Lu just just posted that last week for ah for a protected ag associate in in the horticulture department at UK. And that's super exciting too. We talked a lot about that industry today and how that's growing a lot. We need all the support we can get.
Trevor Terry: So um if you're out there and you got, what, an hour or so into a discussion about plants and administrative and spreadsheets and all that sort of stuff,
Alexis: ah
Trevor Terry: You're going to love it. I'm kidding. Please just skip to the end.
Alexis: You're fit.
Plant People: dedicated
Trevor Terry: Let's go to this part. Apply online.
Alexis: We can put some stuff in the show notes about that too, Trevor.
Trevor Terry: it's you Yeah.
Alexis: Clickable links.
Trevor Terry: Cool.
Alexis: you
Trevor Terry: Yeah.
Brett: Yeah, so we'll link to that.
Trevor Terry: link Link in the description. Like and subscribe. Hit the bell icon.
Brett: There you go. Hit the bell icon.
Trevor Terry: Link in the description. i only get a little bit of a sponsor fee. I'm kidding. I don't get anything.
Brett: Yeah, use promo code Trevor.
Trevor Terry: Just please apply.
Alexis: What's your, um what's the Kentucky Horticulture's Instagram handle if they want to follow for Bethany's fabulous videos?
Trevor Terry: That's really good question. I think it is KY Hort Council and I'm, yeah.
Alexis: We will tag you in... hours So if you are following, pork culture podcast on Instagram, we will tag them and then you can follow and get delicious recipes and seasonal advice and, uh, other.
Brett: it's ah It's actually just, it's just at KY horticulture at KY horticulture.
Alexis: It's a little, it's a green Kentucky.
Brett: Yeah.
Trevor Terry: Thank you, Brett. Would you like a job?
Alexis: You can't have it.
Trevor Terry: Can't have Can't have him.
Alexis: I will fight you.
Brett: was While you're over there on Instagram and you're following KY Horticulture and seeing the great content they put out, feel free to follow us. We are at Hort Culture Podcast on Instagram.
Brett: We also have a brand new email address to hopefully not get emails lost. We've decided to go out into the world of Gmail. And so we have... It's the same as our email address. It's hortculturepodcast at gmail.com.
Brett: You can email us there if you have ideas about what we should cover on the show, if you have questions, if you have comments, if you're having trouble finding a link or anything else. um we really appreciate
Alexis: You want to be a guest.
Brett: If you want to be a guest, you know go ahead and throw that out there. We really hope that as we grow this podcast, you'll grow with us and we will see you next time. Thanks, Trevor.
Trevor Terry: Thank you all.
