- Happy New Year. It's been so cold over the entire country this week here on Vashon Island where I live, windchill got well below zero, and some of the southern states had windchill of like negative 40 and negative 60 degrees Fahrenheit. That's ridiculous when it gets this cold, my old house is miserable. The poor insulation here just lets the cold right through, and I have to bundle up and keep moving until the weather changes.
Several parts of the country are without power, too cold and no electricity. Makes life dangerous and unbearable. The parts of my island that have no power have put their freezer foods outside in the icy cold to stay fresh. Some folks are grilling their defrosting expensive meat and seafood so they can enjoy eating them before losing them, in case the weather warms before the electricity comes back. Some folks are even leaving town to stay with relatives.
And believe it or not, this is the theme of today's shaping fire episode. Just like humans get miserable and crappy weather, so does the microbe life in your cannabis soil. Too much water, too little water. Not enough sunshine. Too much sunshine. Too little carbon. Too much carbon, too hot, too cold, frozen. Yikes. I imagine the microbes also putting all their little foods out in the front yard and having the neighborhood over for a big freezing barbecue.
Yeah, that's right. Get ready for a lot of anthropomorphizing of microbes today, 'cause microbes are people too. If you wanna learn about cannabis health cultivation and technique efficiently and with good cheer, I encourage you to subscribe to our newsletter. We'll send you new podcast episodes as they come out, delivered right to your inbox, along with commentary on a couple of the most important news items from the week, and videos too.
Don't rely on social media to let you know when a new episode is published. Sign up for the updates to make sure you don't miss an episode. You are listening to Shaping Fire. And I'm your host, Shang Los. Welcome to episode 112. My guest today is Michael Delegue.
Michael Delegue earned his master's from Colorado State University's horticultural department in 2020, where he researched different facets of plant microbe interactions, including nematode, biocontrol methods, microbial legacies, resulting from replanting fields, and even the caterpillar gut microbiome. Now serving as the Director of microbiology at Impella Biosciences.
His research surrounds the overlap between biological and biochemical agricultural inputs targeted towards both crop and soil health properties. Cannabis sativa is one of their model organisms for agricultural research, and one of Michael's projects is to examine the functional bacterial species recruited by cannabis sativa in the rhizosphere during the first set. Today we will discuss biostimulants and plant growth regulators and how to approach them as regenerative cannabis cultivators.
In the second set, we will discuss the care intending of micro life in the rhizosphere. And during the third set, we will choose companion plants for soil diversity. And finish the episode with an indictment of the 24 hour light strategy. Welcome to Shaping Fire, Michael. - Hi, Chenko. Thank you so much for having me. I'm very grateful to be here. Awesome. - Really glad that you made time for us. So let's get right into it.
You know, um, cannabis farmers are always looking for like a leg up, uh, something winning to add to their recipe. And, um, a lot of us look for different things that could be determined to be bio stimulants. And then a subsection of those people are, are people mostly who follow this show, who are, uh, regeneratively minded farmers. So, so they're, they're, they're looking for natural biostimulants versus synthetic ones.
Let's start out the show by talking about what biostimulants are generally, and then we'll start to tease apart the synthetic ones from natural ones. So, so that's my first question for you. Um, what are bio stimulants and, um, and what are the kind of kinds of attributes that we look for them to impart on our cannabis plants?
- Absolutely. Yeah. Um, so I mean, I like to think of biostimulants as a really large umbrella term with several different kind of facets of, of products or inputs that people can use or they can take advantage of that might be in a natural system. Um, but I guess in essence, you know, they're, they're very much performance enhancers for plant growth and metabolism is how I kind of define biostimulants.
- So, so when, so when we say performance, um, um, are we talking about specifically like the, the, um, the gathering of nutrition, the processing of nutrition, uh, improved photosynthesis, essentially all of the plants, um, biological systems get, get kind of like tweaked up the, the governors turned up on all of them, so they're running either more efficiently or faster, is that's the idea. - Yeah, I think that's a really good way to put it.
And, you know, different parts of biostimulants will, uh, uh, upregulate different parts of the plant metabolism or, or growth, uh, rates and things like that.
Um, but yeah, I think, uh, the, uh, primarily I look at these as, you know, biological products, things like microorganisms and, and biochemicals, um, things that are usually plant derived or discovered in nature and then used, uh, um, to upregulate the plant metabolism, whether that's with hormones or, um, amino acids, fulvic acids, things like that. - I like this term up-regulate. Um, uh, I've heard it before, but I don't use it regularly.
And, um, I like it both for the biology conversation, but it also sounds like a great, um, euphemism for getting high. Like, like, oh man, I need to go up-regulate . - That's awesome. . Uh, I like that a lot. - So, so let, let's, let's tease apart now the synthetic and the, and the natural biostimulants because we're, we're mostly gonna be talking about, um, natural biostimulants today.
Um, so WW when I discuss bio natural biostimulants with other regenerative growers, we're usually talking about, um, you know, this or that plant that we are going to, you know, do a, a a a tea of or an extract of or a or a or a, you know, a top dress of something like that because we want, uh, some, uh, naturally occurring biochemical that's in the plant. We want that to seep into our biosphere.
And then when at the conventions, when I talk with the synthetic bio stimulant sales guys, their products have always got these like multisyllabic names that, that, um, sound very scientific. And sometimes they've, you know, they've also been named at some marketing name, and so they have got a, a, a real different vibe to them.
Um, perhaps they're perhaps the natural ones and the synthetic ones are both trying to do the same things, but I'm, I'm guessing they have got different attributes that, that you can share with us.
- Yeah, absolutely. So I, I would think like, um, a lot of times when I, when I think about synthetic biostimulants, whether that's something that is, you know, uh, discovered through a natural process, and then, you know, one compound is isolated, it really seems a lot to me, like the pharmaceutical industry, we find one active ingredient, we purify it, you know, it shows in a lab and on the bench that this is effective at whatever we're trying to, uh, alleviate.
Um, and then all of the, uh, you know, medicine is built off of that compound.
Um, and that's kind of how I look at like the synthetic aspect of that, where potentially there's a, there's a chance of missing some other minor chemicals or, you know, metabolites that might be from a natural product extract, um, that would be missed, uh, when things are just synthesized in a lab versus, uh, extractive through a natural process like making it a compost tea or, or breaking down other, um, forms of, of organic inputs like, uh, fish waste
or even, you know, corn waste, things like that. - Hearing you describe it, it actually reminds me a lot of how we talk about the entourage effect and the difference between isolates and whole plant. It sounds a lot like the synthetic, um, the synthetic bio stimulants are often like isolates. They are an isolated biochemical that we're gonna apply the plant one way or another, versus the compost tea kind of flavor.
That's more like taking a whole plant medicine because we're getting all these, these random, uh, plant constituents that, um, that we may not have even researched yet, but we know that as a symphony, they, they interact really well with the human body. Um, what do you think about that? - Yeah, I would agree with that. I think it's really similar to how people talk about the entourage effect of, of cannabis and, you know, terpenoids and things like that.
Um, the same thing goes for, you know, whether these, these compounds, whether a synthetic or natural bio stimulant is, is directly influencing the plant. There's a, there's a good chance it is, it's also really helping out like the soil microbiome most likely. Uh, things like, you know, the upregulation of the can be a factor of, uh, an increased rate of, you know, soil respiration or soil organic matter, or just general beneficial soil ecological components.
Um, you know, things like amino acids, uh, the things, or one of the, um, smaller terms underneath the larger bio stimulant umbrella can become building blocks for protein synthesis in both plants and microbes. Um, so by providing that source that might be, you know, deficient in the soil or, um, you know, out competed by other microbes, if a, a grower can add that in there, um, whether that's helping the plant directly or the soil ecology, the whole system has benefited at least,
um, from what we've seen. Mm-Hmm, . - Mm-Hmm, . So, um, you know, I, I rec I do recognize that I've got a certain amount of prejudice against synthetic biostimulants simply because they are synthetic. And I know that, um, that is often unfair of me just to, um, discount things because they're synthetic.
Um, you know, outside of the fact that just on its face, I prefer organic gardening and organic food and organic seeds because I like to, um, you know, have my garden be as close to nature as possible. Um, is there really any, you know, a priori reason to discount or not include synthetic bio stimulants?
And, and what, what I'm gonna compare it to is, you know, we often talk about, you know, bought bottled salt fertilizers on this show about how they kind of force feed nutrition to cannabis plants. And by doing that, um, you know, you might get a robust plant, but you're also getting a plant that is out of balance and over the long term is more susceptible to plants and can have all sorts of other problems because you're, you're forcing it right now.
Um, is there, is, are there any mechanisms like that with synthetic bio stimulants that are a reason to reject them because of how they function instead of just me being prejudiced because they are not organic? - No, I, I understand where you're coming from with the, um, the synthetic prejudice and I, I kind of adapt similar principles, like in my own gardening and, and things like that.
Um, I guess I wanna ask you a question about, uh, what might be considered, I guess, synthetic to take a step back here. Um, I'm familiar with a process, uh, for an amino acid product that is, um, taking waste from the fishing industry. So lots of shrimp shells and, and crab shells and things like that. And then they're put into a reactor. A couple enzymes are added to break down the, the fish waste or the, you know, the crustacean waste.
Um, and then the end product is both, uh, you know, amino acids and, and chitin and other things like that. Um, so that is, you know, synthetically, uh, the breakdown process is synthetically increased with these enzymes in the reaction. Um, but if you were to kind of slowly compost, you know, shrimp and crab shells and, and things like that in your soil, you might have a similar, uh, endpoint product or, you know, beneficial effect of the soil system.
Um, so I guess, how do you feel about that kind of process? Is that what you call that more synthetic kind of towing the line between the two of them? Or just is that purely synthetic 'cause you know, lab equipment and bioreactors are involved? - Yeah, it's an interesting question to kind of tease the definition. Um, uh, definitely at, at from the top, I'll say the word synthetic is a messy term.
'cause it, it's, it's kind of like a, it's, it's, it's a bucket i of ideas that are different to pretty much everybody who hears the word. And it is best applied on a, on a case by case basis based on what you are, you know, based on this little example though, um, it sounds like that is a, um, a, a non, - It's tricky, right? - Yeah, it is tricky. It sounds like it's a natural process, right? It, it sounds like you're, you're just processing by adding other natural processes.
So it's, you've got, you've got natural, natural naturally occurring product A and you're a adding naturally occurring products B and C and, you know, you put them together and it causes the breakdown to happen into a, you know, a usable nutrition faster.
Um, you know, if we were to, if we were to go long on this and make it the, the, you know, the, the brunt of the show, I would probably have to ask a bunch of questions about what are the natures of the inputs and, and where that line might be drawn between, um, you know, adding, adding inputs that, that, um, either inhibit natural reactions or create non-natural reactions to get whatever you're trying to, you know, produce, produce.
But, but, um, that's a slippery slope right there, of course, right? - . Absolutely. Yeah. Um, and yeah, I think, I mean, you know, the processes would, would, uh, you know, uh, theoretically occur in nature just a little bit longer time for those enzymes to unlock some of the, the polymers like things in, you know, the exoskeletons of crustaceans.
Um, but yeah, we are synthetically or, you know, in this type of process development, uh, somebody would be synthetically upregulating or increasing the rate of decomp to make these things, um, you know, in a more plant usable form. That way the plants and the soil microbes have to expend less energy, um, on breaking down things, and they can just be, you know, slurped up and used, uh, efficiently. Um, so yeah, I think it kind of tells the line between synthetic and natural.
But one thing that is, is kind of cool in processes such as these, um, I know there's similar ones for corn and soy, uh, based biostimulants. Um, they do put, uh, a use and end use product to things that might be considered waste material prior to, um, these types of reactions. Mm-Hmm. - And I guess we just wanna make sure that that waste material is handled in a responsible way, if, if we're gonna produce it at all.
- Absolutely. And, you know, when it is not waste material, when it's, you know, host material for a, a crustacean farmer or a, a corn or so farmer, we wanna make sure that, uh, those plants or, or animals are being treated and, uh, you know, uh, the management practices of cultivating those are also not gonna influence the inputs that we wanna feed our plants later. Mm-Hmm, . Mm-Hmm, - .
So, um, so let's talk a little bit about, um, some of the, the natural biostimulants that come up, uh, the most often in, uh, cannabis cultivation. I'm thinking, uh, humic and phobic acids, seaweed extracts, uh, different types of microbial innoculants and then amino acids, which you've already mentioned. Um, are these all, are, are these different types of natural biostimulants working on, um, different, um, uh, biological systems of the cannabis plant?
Or are they all essentially acting on the same system, but in different ways? - Yeah, they would definitely, um, act on, you know, the same system as a whole, the plant, the soil, the microbes and whatnot. But every, every part, everything you just mentioned has a slightly different, uh, effect on the biome from what I understand. Um, you know, helix and FXs can be great sources of organic matter for both the plant and the soil microbes to use as inputs.
Uh, whereas things like seaweed extracts often contain plant hormones like cytokine and content and, um, um, I think some phosphorus or potassium as well. Um, so we get a little bit of plant nutrition from there, as well as some, you know, plant hormones, uh, applied outside of the plant body rather than being produced within it. Um, microbial innoculants, I think these guys, uh, really depends on your soil and the history of that, that system or your indoor cultivation system.
Um, but those were primarily, you know, uh, if they're administered in a drench, be, uh, benefiting the root systems of the plants as well as the neighboring microbes that might already be there. And then we have, you know, foliar spray microbial inoculants too that help, um, outcompete things that might be negative to plant performances like molds and stuff like that.
Um, so yeah, it, it really is a whole system of, of, uh, effects, you know, different, different building blocks, uh, from the bio stimulant world will help different areas of the plant, as you mentioned. And, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's a fun big umbrella term because there's so much going on underneath the, the umbrella that is biostimulants Mm-Hmm.
- , it's also sounds like it's a very fine line between biostimulants and nutrition, um, because some of the, you know, some of the positive attributes that you mentioned from seaweed extracts are different, um, you know, nutritive, um, substances. Is, is there a line, is there a scientific line between nutrition and biostimulants, or, or do they kind of like see into each other?
A lot of times - I think the line is maybe dotted as opposed to, uh, you know, less of a gradient, less of a firm line, um, where that, where a lot of bios, stimulant compounds can have some form of MPK or even micronutrients in there. Um, but then when we look at plant nutrition, those are products with NPK is almost the biggest number on the label besides the product name for the most part.
Um, so that's kind of how I see the separation between, you know, nutritional inputs versus bio stimulant based inputs. But it is kind of a gray area or a gradient where you have some trickling effects of, of the, um, you know, amino acid type biostimulants having some, some form of NP or K in them as well. Yeah. At - Using that definition, it, uh, biostimulants becomes really, really close to, um, like, like trace nutrients and trace minerals.
It's like, oh, if, if you're not talking about NPK and you're just talking about everything else, you're, you're talking about, you know, biostimulants, um, including things that we don't get in, in, you know, kind of targeted generic fertilizers that we add because we wanna round out the ri the rhizosphere with, with, um, essential micros.
- Yeah, absolutely. And, um, one other thing to mention too is, is, you know, whether or not, uh, well, another, another reason I guess that the, the line between nutrition and bio stimulation is maybe a little bit more blurry at this point in science, uh, is because things like, um, certain bacteria have enzymes to unlock, uh, unavailable forms of phosphorus such as calcium phosphate, so unavailable for plant uptake.
Um, so, you know, there's no nutrition in in that type of bacterial product, but it can help unlock nutrition that might already be in your soil. Uh, things like Michal products too, I think from what I've seen, um, also sometimes have a, a phosphorous content as well.
So, um, you know, somebody might apply a Michle product for the first time and see a really great, uh, you know, flowering boost in their cannabis plants, and it's hard to attribute that to the michie being present or the, the increased amount of phosphorus being also available for the plant or, or probably both. - Yeah. I wish that when we try a whole bunch of new things at the same time and we get good results, we could just straight up ask the plant which one caused it, my friend.
- That would be amazing. And yeah, I wanna, I wanna talk to the soil microbiome as well. I'm looking forward to those developments maybe with ai . - There we go. So, uh, before we move on from Biostimulants, um, let's, uh, let's bring this conversation and make it like real, um, real rubber hits the road.
So for, for the cultivators who are listening, um, who are like, okay, I understand the difference between the synthetic and the biostimulants as much as we can get to definitionally, I like the idea of offering natural biostimulants to my plants. Um, what are some that you recommend from the natural world that regenerative farmers can, um, use at home that will have, you know, reliably good effects?
You know, some of the, some of the stuff is so obscure and its impact is so small that you can have a debate about whether some of these did anything at all in particular, but, but what are a couple like tried and true naturally occurring bio stimulants that, um, that our listeners can, um, you know, explore for, for pretty assured benefit?
- Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of it really depends on where your plants are gonna be going if it's going into a hydroponic or controlled environmental system, um, versus a soil system, um, you know, plays a role. But I am biased to the, the soil microbes and the root adhering microbes or the plant growth promoting microbe. - So, so are we here at shaping fire? So ?
- Yeah, absolutely. Uh, so yeah, I mean, from what, from what I've seen in both research and at home cultivation, uh, the sooner microbes get introduced to a plant root, um, I like to think about it as a really good protective and enhancing form. Uh, one of my favorite analogies here is think of that, that radical, that that firstly emerged plant root from your seed or your clone, um, being like an empty seat at a table with, you know, let's say a hundred seats.
Um, the, the plant is gonna be exuding root ex exits all over that table and, um, through the roots. And those are basically like adding different types of food sources to the, the table here.
Um, the sooner that those seats of the table can be colonized with plant benefiting or soil ecology benefiting, or even just free living, uh, microorganisms, um, maybe not colonized, but present and taking up space and competing for resources, the more likely, um, the cultivator, uh, would be, you know, not seeing things like plant disease.
Um, the, if the seeds can be full filled with things like plant benefiting microorganisms, um, whether they're from a compost system, living soil, uh, indigenous microorganism, cultivating, uh, or even a biological inoculate you can buy off on a shelf, I think that is probably the best way to really prime young or new plants for, uh, you know, a successful harvest cycle.
Um, filling those seats up with the table, uh, allowing those resources to be used by things that are maybe symbiotic or mutualist with the plants to, you know, the benefit is, is a feedback loop. Um, whereas a pathogen might only, you know, consume a root exit until it can get in high enough numbers to penetrate the plant cell and then become pathogenic.
Uh, the less seats at that table that are for things like fusarium or phytopthora or pythium, um, the less likely, uh, you know, that plant is gonna have a negative effect. - I really like that seats at a table, uh, um, example that I can really envision that. And so, so your first answer is to, you know, add a bunch of, uh, you know, of, of indigenous microbes, um, so that the seats of the table can get filled with, um, with, uh, probiotic folks before anything pathogenic shows up.
And, um, you know, uh, and there's a, you know, there's a, there's a, there's a range of ways that we talk about on this show to add microbes and, and, and you're like, just, you know, add them, add them right away as soon as, as soon as the plant starts. Um, for the second one, is there something that might be more nutrition based instead of like, having good neighbors based like microbes that you would also recommend as a, um, naturally occurring bios stimulant?
- Yeah, so I think my, my bias is really gonna show with this answer, , but, um, uh, you know, I talked about the probiotics, right? I also think that prebiotics are just as important, especially in, in soilless systems or, or, you know, uh, near sterile systems, right? Hydroponics and things like that. Um, plants evolve roots with their relationships with microbes.
Uh, Dr. White and all of his research surrounding Oph Fiji has really been, uh, a beneficial disruption in, in agricultural research. Yeah. And I think that, uh, a lot of growers have tried really hard to maintain a sterile system, which, you know, your plants don't want sterile systems. They're often, you know, exuding, uh, cakes and cookies, sugars and carbon into the, the surrounding soils to try to get microbes to colonize there.
So, uh, a long way to answer your question, I think like prebiotics, things like organic materials, humic, fulvic acids, um, we know what those can do to benefit the plant and, and how they are benefiting the soil microbiome and how that's benefiting the plant is still being kind of flushed out. Um, but I do think that, uh, your plants are gonna benefit from these compounds that you're applying, whether or not they're for the plant or the bacteria.
And, uh, usually the application rates from things, whether you're whipping up a compost tea or doing like a, a plant extract or purchasing something, um, there's enough to go around for both the plants and the microbes. - Fantastic. I love that. When, when we keep on coming back to, you know, grab plants that are already in your yard and let them, um, decay in water, you know, spin that for 36 hours and then pour that back on your plants.
I love that cycle, bringing back, um, you know, what's already in your yard, the plants, the grass clippings, the forest duff, whatever it is, incubate it for a little bit to make those microbes super abundant and then just pour it back on your plants. - Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, that, and it's, it's always, you know, a fun term is like kind of bio prospecting being out. Ooh, I like that.
In, in soil, uh, in the woods, in the forest, or anywhere that, you know, it's okay to kind of, I'm gonna use the word sample from, um, I know you guys have talked about indigenous microorganisms here. Um, but yeah, like the, the ability to kind of collect some microbial diversity, um, from maybe a forest or, uh, somebody with a better historical soil health practice than maybe the plot you inherited, um, is also a great way to, you know, add that microbial diversity.
Um, if you, you know, we have these like notions of, of plant micro symbiosis, uh, in science where, you know, we wanna look at a really happy cannabis plant and then collect some soil microbes from its roots and then take that home and apply it to our cannabis plants. So they do well too. Um, but there's a lot of functional redundancy in the, the rhizosphere microbiome world, whether that's a palm tree or a cannabis plant or some grass.
Um, so you might even be able to get some type of beneficial microbial function from sampling something like grass, uh, and applying it to your, to your home grow, or, you know, making a compost tea out of it, or a soil slurry. - Right on. So, uh, so dear listener, if you're very interested in, in moving, uh, these microbes around, um, sit tight, 'cause we're gonna be coming back to this topic again with set two or in set two.
So Michael, um, I wanna move us on past biostimulants now, uh, to what I consider one of their cousins that I know less about, which is, uh, plant growth regulators. And, you know, I, I first got turned on to, uh, plant growth regulators kind of as a, as a slur, as a dis when I would come across like really rock hard, um, indoor Rockwell buds, and that, that, you know, I, I would squeeze them.
And as a, you know, as a, as a lifelong outdoor grower, when you squeeze my flowers, there's, there's some give to them. Whereas these were like, like literally rocks. And I was all like, what, what kind of cannabis is this? Right? And people are like, you know, because I tend to hang out with, you know, organicy farmers, they'd say something like, ah, it's those PGRs that they use, you know, and I'm like, I don't know what those are, but, but I, I certainly don't want any part of that.
And, and over time I realized it's true that synthetic PGRs and, and what they have a tendency to do to the plant are not something that I'm normally going for.
But then I started to realize, um, while, while studying the soil food web, that there are actually naturally occurring, um, biochemicals in plants that, um, you know, that we can wild craft that also are pro, um, plant growth regulators so that maybe you can get, you know, harder flowers that have got a, a market attraction and an aesthetic attraction in ways that don't also, um, you know, injure the plant and make it, you know, need to be grown in a sterile environment instead of the yard.
So, so, so I'm gonna ask you, number one, would you, would you, would you explain for us what plant growth regulators are and, um, where we may find them in, uh, the natural world? - Yeah. Um, so the way I kind of, uh, understand plant growth regulators would be just kind of, um, hormones, uh, the, the plant hormones, things like ox oxygens, giin, cytokinin, and, uh, you know, natural sources of those things like seaweed is a really, um, common input used for cytokinin, uh, PGRs.
Um, I think, um, like we talked about a little bit earlier, uh, you know, when you do the wildcrafting, you do the natural pro, uh, process and, and take your plant inputs or get materials and do the extraction yourself, you are likely getting things that might be missed, uh, as opposed to one, an oxen is purified in a lab and dried out into a powder and then, you know, mailed to you in a tube to dip your plant roots in before rooting them .
Um, yeah, I mean, I, the way I kind of see 'em would just be plant hormones, uh, whether they're natural or synthetic. I think they can be helpful for growers and, you know, helpful for making, uh, deadlines and yield improvements and quality improvements and things like that.
Um, but, uh, yeah, I, I still kind of am in the school of thought of, you know, these, these natural processes like breaking down, uh, organic inputs, um, would, we're, we're probably missing something when we're applying just to pure compound, but, uh, further, you know, science needs to prove that .
- So, so if we're talking about ge, you know, getting these oxen and cytokines and giin and, and, and putting them on, and they we're getting 'em from plants, it sounds awful lot like we're talking about biostimulants again, and, and, and, and perhaps there is an argument to be made that plant growth regulators and natural bio stimulants are all in the bucket of plants that have got chemicals, hormones, and nutrition that are also used by the cannabis plant that we just wanna wild craft,
or what's that term you used, bio prospect, um, you know, on our properties. And, and then just allow them to either degrade in their basic form or incubate them with, you know, oxygen and then apply them to our plants. It, it sounds like it's the same system just using different vocabulary. - Yeah, I would agree with you on that. I do think, like, you know, the PGR term fits, fits nicely underneath the umbrella term that is biostimulants in my world, um, and maybe the world.
Uh, but yeah, you know, you think about, um, how these compounds, um, ma mainly, you know, the, the plant is naturally producing these things when it meets roots. There's ox oxygens being produced inside the plant, um, to, to signal those mar stem cells to turn into roots.
Um, but having, you know, furthered science, uh, in agriculture, we as growers can, can use these things to get effects that we want to, I know, um, in a lot of the ornamental crop industry things like, uh, anti gis are sprayed on, you know, flowers to keep them like tight and, uh, you know, not too lagy or stretched out from the pot. That way they make a nice compact, bushy, you know, ponta or a zinnia or something like that.
Um, so yeah, it, it's interesting to think about the use of PG in products that are gonna be consumed by people rather than just enjoyed by, uh, like aesthetically like flowers and, and things like that. Um, and I think, um, I need to do more reading on, on, you know, the, the, the, uh, the consumption of things that might be residual on flower if the plant wasn't able to use all them and, and, or even just surfactants to get them to spread as well.
- So when I have talked with other regenerative farmers about the naturally occurring pgs that they use, I only have ever gotten one response either. Either the farmers don't think of them in that way, and so they're just using degraded plant, you know, compost teas or, or spun aerated teas. So they'll, they'll either say nothing, they don't, they don't use one intentionally or they will say banana peels. And so, so, um, are, is there any, oh, this is kind of a nice pun.
Is there any low hanging fruit that you recommend where, where we can go for, um, the, the hormones that have the effect on the cannabis plant that we're looking for? So we don't have to go to synthetics, for example, if we want tighter flowers and a more compact overall plant. Uh, do we wanna go to a banana peel or are there things that we may have access to that you think might be, um, you know, better for us to go after?
- Yeah, I think ultimately, I don't have any sort of materials off the top of my head on, on things like anti gires. I know seaweed is a good one for cytokine in. Um, I think people have used, uh, you know, honeys for, for ox oxygens, whether that's, I'm not sure if that's actually a root increaser or if it's just a good antimicrobial for, uh, you know, pathogens that might infect the plant before it can root.
Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I, I'm a huge composter, um, and I'm a big fan of verma compost as well. Yeah. Um, so I think, you know, doing that stuff in the backyard when space allows, uh, there's indoor systems that are really great too. I have a, a friend that did like a three bucket stack system where the worms were in the, the bottom, the new food waste went in the top, and when they ran out of food, they would kind of dig up and kind of make it a closed loop system.
So there are ways to kind of get those organic materials broken down depending on, um, the space you might have. Um, yeah, I, you know, I, the other kind of school of thought too is when I was a lot younger, I, I was always told, you know, dig a hole, six or seven feet underground, bury a couple dead fish there, and that's where we'll plant our cannabis plants the following spring, right in the fall.
Uh, and it's been cool to kind of enter more of the sciencey realm of this kind of stuff and seeing like, oh, well, yeah, the fish breaks down into a, a ammonium or some form of an H four or three, um, and the emulsions and, you know, they, they provide nutrition from those breakdown products.
Um, so I just, just, one thing that I love about the cannabis science industry is, or just cannabis science in general, is kind of seeing, um, you know, old school of thought growers with these really wise practices that we are just now starting to understand, uh, and can be measured scientifically with, with, you know, how does a fish break down in the soil and what types of plant inputs does it turn into?
- Yeah. All, all of this old school, um, cultivation magic, you know, eventually science catches up with it and it's like, oh yeah, I guess, I guess, you know, the old hippies were right in what they were doing here. Absolutely. It's like, yeah, yeah. Uh, everything old is new again, so Right on. Well, uh, let's, let's wrap up this first set here. Um, we're gonna take a short break and be right back. You are listening to Shaping Fire, and my guest today is microbiologist Michael Delegue.
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I am your host Shose, and my guest today is microbiologist Michael Delegue. So during the first set, we talked all about, um, bio stimulants and where to find them in nature, as well as, um, the idea of plant growth regulators.
And we kept on coming back to this idea that, um, what we wanna do to help, um, our cannabis plants the most is to help the rhizosphere to make sure that the nutrition and variety of microbes are incredibly varied, um, our our indigenous, so that they survive in our local natural environment, and that we can bio prospect them all over our own property and near us, uh, by just going to other plants that we already have locally.
And, um, not only does that save us money, but we know that these plants that are already surviving locally are already covered in, um, indigenous microorganisms. So saves us money and is exactly the tool for the job to help you have your best grow ever. So here in set two, we're gonna talk about the care and tending of the microbe community that's in your rhizosphere, right?
So these are, these are, um, all of the residents of the rhizosphere, the root zone, um, that make up the, the, the, the soil food web that is within the soil. As we all know, the, the soil food web also is above the soil, and it also takes place in water. But specifically we're talking about this, this neighborhood of the roots of the cannabis plant.
So when I was listening to Michael Delegue on, um, our friend Layton Morrison's show, um, um, uh, he and I, I guess I'm talking to the audience, Michael, and to you kind of third person. You, you were talking on Layton's show, um, about your, um, uh, uh, love of, of bi biochar, which we're big fans of on the show as well. And, and, um, and, and I really liked how you kind of anthropomorphized, uh, the microbes.
'cause you were talking about how, um, uh, how biochar has got all these like, you know, ridges and places to live and, and they've got these, um, these, these environments that the, the microbes can set up housing and, and, and where their nutrition grows and, and how it just kind of makes like for this perfect neighborhood. And, and I always like to think about my pots that way too, or, or, you know, the soil that, that I wanna make a good neighborhood for my plants to grow a bit as well.
So, so, so you, you and I clearly enjoy anthropomorphizing microbes, which, which I can support. Um, let's go ahead and start just kind of generally with this idea of, of creating neighborhoods that have got the kinds of attributes in the soil that, um, that these neighborhoods can build on. What is the nature of soil structure that makes good rhizosphere?
- I think a good balance of, um, sand, silt and clay obviously is, is a great way to, you know, that definition of soil makes a good structure for the microbes to colonize. But I think a really important thing that is often overlooked, uh, would be things that, uh, we call max MAC, uh, microbially forms of accessible carbon or microbe accessible carbon.
Um, your plants are, you know, constantly depositing these things into the soil through root ex exits, uh, as well as, you know, any organic matter, um, and different types of breakdown processes in soil or other systems, um, can provide these forms of max, uh, carbon sources, food sources for the microbes to be in there. Um, you know, biochar being carbon based is a really great form of this.
Other things like fulls and, um, um, different like, you know, cellulose breakdown products are another great way to kind of feed microbes in the soil. - So, um, so I is the primary, uh, i i is the primary, I'll say the first, not the only, but is the primary attribute of creating a good neighborhood, making sure that there's lots of these max rounds. So there's there always high quality carbon for them to eat that, like at the top of the list.
- I would, I would put that at the top of the list just because, uh, if you apply something like a biological to a, a near sterile system, I'll, I'll never call it hydroponic system sterile, um, just because there's microbes everywhere. Microbial ubiquity. Mm-Hmm. . Um, but we do have, you know, the, the notion of, uh, a lot of that stuff can be wasted if there's not food sources to, to feed the microbes. You know, you hear about with your gut and gut health prebiotics with probiotics.
Um, that's, you know, feeding also the things that might be resident to your system, whether or not they're applied, uh, from a bottle or from, uh, indigenous microorganism hunting. Mm-hmm, - . So, so what are, um, sources of these macs that we can wildcraft and, and how do we, how do we process them into it?
I mean, you know, the biochar, um, you know, we can use as a soil amendment and some people like to crush it up and, and, um, and, you know, top dress it into their water so it slowly works their way in. But give us, give us some more idea of how to think about these Macs and, and where we can bio prospect them into our cultivation. - Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I think, um, I'm going to do a callback to biostimulants, right?
There's lots of Maxs, uh, in different tiers of bios, stimulant products or, or, uh, things that you can get or procure naturally with wildcrafting. Um, and essentially, you know, the, uh, the plant is also feeding your microbes. So as long as your plants are health, uh, maintained optimal health and nutrition, there is gonna be some source of, of max in the system from the root exodus too. Um, but you will, you know, plants also can re-uptake root ex exits.
Uh, so there is a degree of plant microbe competition for these food sources. Um, but going back to that kind of old, uh, wisdom cultivation, uh, you know, thinking, um, people that I hear a lot of people have really strong opinions about applying molasses, uh, as a, as a input and during flour. Um, and I've always kind of understood that as we're feeding the soil microbes rather than we're, you know, giving sugar to help increase flour synthesis or something like that.
- Yeah. Yeah. We've, we've talked on this show many times how, you know, the adding of molasses into the pot. Um, what you're doing is throwing your, your, um, your pot out of balance. What you wanna do is, if you're gonna use the molasses, is feed the, feed the microbes in your, in your aerated compost brewer, let them eat the molasses there and incubate them. So now you have a whole bunch of them. And then put that compost tea that's not hot anymore into your, your rhizosphere.
Is, is that the, are those the steps that you're referring to? Yeah, - Yeah. I think that that is probably the best practice to do it. Um, for those who, you know, aren't able to kind of have the lead time to brew cup a compost tea and, and feed it sugar and whatnot, I think, um, just a very diluted form, an irrigation solution can also kind of benefit those, those microbes that might be in your roots.
- Right on. I wanna push you a little bit on specificity because you said that there are, um, you know, various plants that we can wildcraft where we can get the max from. Um, just for examples to get us started, because we, we all know that we can like, you know, Google it or ask GPT or something, but from you, will you give us three mac rich plants that we might be able to wildcraft just so you know, people who just want to jump on it, know what, where to start?
- Y you know, I think, um, I'm always gonna go back to compost and those breakdown processes. Um, I, I would, when I say, you know, you ask for specific plants, I don't know that I have any of those off the top of my list, but, um, I, I think, you know, carbon and nitrogen sources, uh, essentially, um, can help increase available max, uh, whether, whether or not they are being added to your system or the nutrients, you know, the compost pile or something like that provided.
Um, but in terms of kind of going out and, and foraging up a bunch of plants and making a tea out of that, I, uh, I would have to do some more - Research. Right on, you know, your, your hesitation kind of like suddenly re-con contextualized everything for me is, is it potentially the answer to the question I asked that, um, these Macs are in everything because carbon is a building block. So, so long as I'm starting with a, a local healthy thriving plant, it's gonna have max in it.
So just use whatever I have a lot of around me and use a variety of plants that are around me. And then if I wanna up it, we'll then go ahead and do some online research and find out the types of plants that are more rich in max. But it, it, I'm starting to get the idea, since we keep on coming back to compost, that the max are everywhere and, and so just use whatever you have. - Yeah. Yeah, I would agree with that. Thank you.
Um, and another kind of way to put it, you know, or another, I guess using whatever you have should, should be used with caution a little bit as, as a lot of people know, you know, if you look for, uh, broken down, dried out plant material, um, you wanna make sure that didn't come from anything diseased.
Uh, obviously, you know, you'd want that to be fully broken down and in a composting system or a, a heat breakdown type of format, uh, before you add something that might be, you know, degraded a, you know, a leaf loss due to xanthomonas bacteria in the leaf or something like that. Right. We don't wanna reintroduce that to our system, but, um, you know, plant health is very important too when you're, when you're kind of wildcrafting - Right. On - All that to say.
- Alright, so, so when we're talking about the care tending of microbes, obviously we want to include a lot of these Macs so that there, there's a, a varied buffet all through the rhizosphere, um, for, for, um, uh, for all the varieties of, of, of residents to eat.
So, so let's go, um, so long as you think we've covered that well enough, let's go beyond the nutrition for the microbes eating the carbon, and let's talk about some of the other, um, attributes of soil structure that might also be, um, um, beneficial to, to the rhizosphere.
And, and again, I might be over anthropomorphizing here, but in my notes I put like shelter reproduction space, you know, you know, um, uh, non-carbon nutrition, like, like the idea of shelter may not actually exist in soil in the rhizosphere, but, but it seems like it should exist there because you have got more, more predator residents in the biosphere and more passive residents in the biosphere. And, and, you know, normally life forms need to take shelter when they reproduce.
And so, you know, I I'm very willing to be very wrong on this, right? But, but is it, tell us a little bit about how the community interacts and if there are attributes of our soil and amendments that, that potentially provide more of this shelter and reproduction space and non-carbon nutrition.
- Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I think, uh, uh, the best place for plants to over winter, um, in terms of seasonal changes would be in the roots and in the, in the kind of skeletonized plant bodies that are no longer actively growing. Um, that's a great place for microbes to over winter and be ready to, uh, be introduced to your plants when you're planting them in the springtime. And then I just do wanna circle back a little bit on the max stuff and say one more thing.
Sure. Um, I wanna go back to, uh, I wanna quote Dr. Elaine Ham from the soil food web and say, you know, what do microbes love, uh, sugars, right? And that's why the cakes and cookies that are the root exodus are really kind of, you know, being deposited by the plants in theory to, to colonize or recruit microbes to the, to the root zone. Um, the other thing that I wanted to mention was going back to that, that big open table analogy with empty seats.
Um, uh, another kind of enhancement of this theory is, is like, uh, if that table's being catered and, and there is only, you know, slabs of meat being put on that table, only, only, uh, you know, carnivore type people are gonna be sitting down there to consume that stuff, right?
So we also wanna provide a lot of diverse inputs of, of max, whether that is, uh, different types of compost tea or sugar sugars like molasses or, you know, just com, uh, broken down leaves and pine straw and stuff like that. Um, but the important thing is by providing a lot of different forms of microbial accessible carbon, we're feeding, uh, lots of different functional microbes in the soil, right?
So if, if there's, um, if that table's being catered with vegetables, meat, and a little bit of both, we're gonna have omnivores, vegetarians, vegans, and, and carnivores all sitting at that table. Uh, the same applies in my, in my head at least to the plant roots, right? So if the, the tomato root is only exiting the, the same compounds, tomato plants exude, then only a few types of microbes or functional microbes are gonna be able to use those food sources.
Um, so the grower can kind of apply different forms of max molasses, compost, stuff like that, or even companion planting, um, to provide a lot of different food sources because, uh, the general thinking in microbiome sciences health is very closely associated with high diversity in a microbiome.
- Alright, so with my next question, I'm gonna set up a little, um, a little example first about EM one, and, you know, a lot of folks like to use em one and, um, the idea is like, okay, you can buy em one, which is a, a blend of microbes and you can add it to your plants and your plants will love it.
And if you want to expand the bottle so your, your, your bottle lasts longer, there's, uh, usually instructions on the back of how you can do a, um, a, a simple aerated tea so that you can expand what's in your bottle. But, but eventually, if you just keep on brewing it and brewing it, um, the, the microbes that are differently com aggressive and competitive, the balance that is in the actual em one balance that they recommend, it'll eventually get out of balance.
And so you have to go and, you know, get a new bottle of em one and, and start over with the the actual balanced product. Um, so, so using that as the example, um, if we are grabbing, uh, lots of different plants that are local to our area that are thriving and we are, um, either degrading them or extracting them into some sort of extract or aerated compost tea, is there any, um, awareness we should have about the balance of those microbes and nutrition that we're actually putting into the pot?
If, if, if, if we do want to have our, um, rhizosphere life to be in balance and we influence that balance by what we're adding from our compost pile as a tea, do we need to be worried about throwing off the balance of the residents of the, of the rhizosphere because we are feeding out of balanced, uh, teas? - Uh, yeah, actually that is, that is a major concern. And, um, it's cool that, that a product like that has those types of instructions for kind of increase, you know, bang for your buck.
Um, but yes, I think, uh, my best advice, and this is maybe my opinion, but based on some science, um, would be when you're making those types of products, try to use them up, um, you know, do, do your research and say you, you've found a lot of sources to say 48 hours is the ideal incubation or aeration time for a compost t try to use that up, uh, pretty, pretty quickly, uh, after it's ready to go.
Um, and I think that is based on the thinking that, um, all types of microbes, whether there's one thing in a bottle or a thousand things from a sample of compost have different, uh, growth and metabolism rates. So, um, when things are grown together, uh, the term is like co cultured.
Um, the faster growers are always gonna be able to have that add advantage towards the other members of that, you know, biome, um, because they're just, uh, genetically advantaged to eat faster and divide faster and break down faster. Right. So you can see things like, um, if you let a compost t sit for two weeks, uh, maybe if it's aerated, um, as opposed to one week, I bet that that microbiome completely shifts Yeah. Just based on the ability for those faster growers to become dominant.
And I think, you know, the diversity was probably the highest within the first 72 hours of brewing a compost tea. And that starts to probably taper off just based on the way microbial microbe ecology kind of works in that system. Um, there's only so much food around, right? And, uh, if the fastest eaters are, you know, kind of throwing their elbows at the other ones and and eating it faster, they're gonna become dominant.
And maybe those aren't the plant growth promoting microbes that you're in search for. Maybe they're just really good at eating those Macs. Mm-Hmm. , - I like that idea that, that as you're, as you're brewing it for 36 to 48 hours and you're, and you're pulling it out of the bucket, right?
Then you have got so many aerated microbes and they've all just been getting all the aeration and nutrition that they could possibly want, which just means like everybody is fed and thriving and at the starting line, and that's when we want to give it to our plants. But the longer we get away from that starting line and let that compost tea sit for one day, two day, they're all, they're all already racing and competing and beating each other up and eating each other.
And so by day, you know, three or four, you, you're fully at survival of the fittest at that point, and you're not providing a nice, even balanced array of nutrition and microbiology. You're actually providing them something imbalanced that's going to have some sort of effect on your, um, on your soil environment. Does that sound about right? - Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, and the way to say that is in microbiome sciences we use a term called alpha diversity.
Um, so if I have a basket of fruit and there's 10 pieces of fruit in there and nine of them are apples and one of them's an orange, I have really low alpha diversity. But if I have 10 pieces of fruit in a basket and one's an apple, one's a grape, one's a banana, blueberry, everything is a different thing. Um, the parts of a hole are all different. That is really high alpha diversity.
So the longer something like a compost tea might sit, um, it's likely that you'd be lowering your alpha diversity where those fast growers or good eaters are gonna become dominant. Um, - Right on. That's, that is super interesting. And because I wanna look this up after the show. Are you saying alpha A-L-P-H-A? - That is correct, yes. - Alright, cool. That's a very interesting idea. That is new to me - And on compost teas as well.
Um, I, I collaborated on something when I was in school, uh, where a colleague was making verma compost tea from worm castings and finished compost. Um, and this person was able to, uh, grow it up. I think they did a 48 hour aeration. Um, and then they boiled half of it and then they applied the other half untreated. And they actually found that, I think it was a basil host or a tomato host, um, those plants benefited more from the boiled compost tea.
Um, so this is not me suggesting that everybody should be boiling their compost tea, but maybe on their aeration time they were able to, you know, increase the populations of things that might not directly benefit plants and actually compete for plants for those beneficial parts that get released when we make a compost tea. Um, so it was kind of interesting to think about, you know, boiling or trying to get the microbes out of a compost tea.
The ones that can't survive boiling, uh, actually made the plants do better. Um, presumably from a reduced, uh, amount of microbe competition for the same things the plant wants that kind of get released from the aeration process in compost tea. - Wow. Man. Boiling compost. You just kind of blew my mind there. Um, I'm gonna have to think a lot about that.
But, but what I think about it immediately is that if, if, if we've talked constantly throughout this episode so far about, um, the biodiversity of the teas and, you know, of the carbons and of the plant sources that we continually pour into our plants, that if I'm gonna make aerated compost teas and I'm also gonna do cold extracted, uh, teas, like I don't see any reason why, uh, having a big pot of boiled plants that I then let cool and then apply to the plants.
'cause I'm gonna get a whole DA whole different, um, cast of characters in that. And all I'm doing is increasing my diversity by using all three different types of teas. - I would agree with that. Yeah, definitely.
You know, the, the, the non boiled compost tea in the study I'm referring to is, is kind of a balance of both probiotic or just bacterial members and prebiotics, whereas likely after it was boiled, you know, it wasn't measured chemically, but that was probably just more, uh, I, I'm gonna use the term prebiotic, but just, uh, kind of those, the metabolites that are released from the compost tea brewing process, um, ready for the, the plant to slurp right up rather than kind
of have to share with the microbes. - Right on. Alright, so, um, before we move on to our next topic, I wanna hit something one more time because, um, you know, um, I've heard you kind of allude to the fact that one of the good things that biochar does in the soil structure is to, you know, not only provide, um, you know, the carbon for food, but also, um, it's like a unique housing structure, if you will. 'cause 'cause it's got all these nooks and crevices.
Um, is, is there anything, and the answer may be no, but I'm gonna try to squeeze you on this anyway, is, is there anything else that we should consider adding as an amendment to our soil that is less about nutrition and having it break down to provide, you know, foods, which is what most of the stuff we do, um, is for, but instead is something that we are gonna amend the soil because it actually provides, um, a physical mechanism that is good for the microbe life?
- Yeah. Uh, I for that, I think, you know, the, the biochar are a really good approach to that. And I think I'll always recommend if people aren't already doing this to get a starting soil test before you start applying your innoculants or, or inputs to that as well.
Um, but I think in terms of kind of like housing the microbes or giving them like a, a nice place to live, um, you know, again, I'm biased towards the soil systems as opposed to like a hydroponic system, but when we think about no-till, um, not only is that really kind of maintaining, uh, soil, you know, carbon that's stored from those plants, um, but that's also keeping those, those houses for the microbes dormant in the plant roots ready to be, uh,
you know, introduced to the fresh roots that would be kind of germinating in the same soils. So, like my, me personally, um, I have one of my experimental, you know, garden beds in my backyard that I, I've never tilled it for and I'll plant seeds or directly transplant things there. And it seems to be, um, you know, speculative that those plants get a little bit of a boost, uh, because the, you know, i, I do apply heavy compost and things like that.
There's a lot of factors we're not considering. But I think a big thing is, you know, those microbes have overwintering structures and they were evolved with the plant to survive through these, these, uh, you know, cold temperatures and hot temperatures. Um, so yeah, I think, uh, people should maybe experiment more with no-till or, you know, companion planting and things along those lines. - Yeah, that certainly makes sense.
Uh, regarding our experience with no-till every year the soil just gets more mature and it lasts better through the winter and the, the, the, the following years plants or thriving, it's always hard as that first year when people are using like, you know, immature bagged soil without a lot of mycelium and, you know, they get kind of mediocre plants. Um, and then, and then the longer they go, no-till the more, you know, beefy the plants get.
- Yeah, yeah. It's like a, a a bettering, you know, I think there's probably a limit to it year three, year four or something like that. Mm-Hmm. Everybody's system's different, but yeah, the more, the more organic material and different types of plant materials and, you know, their root exits, stuff like that, you can get in that system.
You're adding that diversity, which is, you know, really correlated with plant and microbe health - Rotating in amending, you know, no-till soil every, you know, let's say four years. Um, you know, it, that is such a massive improvement. Then the idea of, you know, kind of old school where every year you start with new fresh, clean soil that doesn't have any pathogens in it.
And while yeah, we wanna avoid the pathogens, um, but the, the best way to actually keep pathogens at bay is to have a vigorous soil that's already aged. And I always, I always feel bad for people who are very much set on the new season, new soil tip. 'cause it, it just, it just makes things hard every year instead of year three and four being like easy. - Yeah. To me, the, the, that kind of feels like a scorched earth type of approach.
. Um, and, and I like that you mentioned, you know, the diversity, uh, in what you just said. Um, you know, we've seen, uh, things like fusarium uh, species highly present, you know, 10 to the sixth, 10 to the eighth cells per gram of soil, um, in a, in a plant rhizosphere sample. Um, but it's, you know, very far along into flower maturation and there's no signs or symptoms of the fusarium attacking the plant.
Um, so it's like this, the fusarium is taking one seat at the seat, uh, the table with a hundred seats and the other 99 seats are plant benefiting things or soil benefiting things. So, you know, pathogens can be present without becoming virulent. And it all comes back to soil microbial diversity, you - Know, out competing fusarium is the only potential solution that I see that there is other than just dumping the soil. Um, you know, we, we've talked about fusarium.
I've had fusarium specialists on this, on the, on the, um, program. And, and usually their answer is like, throw the soil away. And I get that. Um, but, um, but it's interesting to realize that as a preventative, since fusarium iss everywhere, it's not like it's not gonna be in your soil. Um, just make sure you keep on, you know, adding microbes, incubating like microbes, adding indigenous microbes and fusarium will never get a good foothold.
- Yeah. I mean, you know, never is a strong word, but I think Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. differently from, you know, adding all the microbes and really intentionally applying, you know, diverse forms of microbes, whether they're from, you know, your wildcrafting or input somebody could buy. I think the other thing is, you know, soil health practices really is where a lot of this soil microbial diversity preservation can start.
Um, so those things like the prebiotics and the organic inputs and companion planting, uh, crop rotation, no-till, uh, soil health, I think maybe even I would put higher on the list than, uh, microbial accessible carbon from the, the previous question , but they're, they're related, right? Yeah. Yeah. - Yeah. Alright, cool.
So the last topic I want to hit, uh, during here, during the set two here is, um, you know, so, so far this, uh, this set we've been talking about the things that we can do to make the living environment for the microbe life and in the rhizosphere as diverse and beneficial as possible. And, and why that's kind of everything, right?
It, it, we keep on coming back to the same answer and it's because the answer is, is kind of the only thing that we need to be doing as regenerative farmers is, is adding, um, adding diversity into the soil and then, and let nature do the rest. So, so that's great.
Um, I also am very attracted to the idea that the plant is also, um, trying to help itself as well by, by putting out, you know, exudates that, that encourage particular microbes or, or, um, or different residents in the rhizosphere where they're kind of curating, uh, who they are attracting to them. And I've heard you talk before about, um, recruitment that, that cannabis plants will recruit bacteria that, that they find beneficial.
And, and I'm unfamiliar with this idea, but it, but just the idea of it is fascinating. So, so I, I don't know the right question to ask you on it, so I'm just gonna kind of hand you the mic and say, will you tell us about how cannabis plants recruit beneficial bacteria itself, kinda like intentionally? - Yeah, absolutely. Thank you.
Um, I think, you know, there's a lot of, uh, literature from the past five or six years that show photo sensitive photo period sensitive plants or plants that, you know, have major changes in development, um, also changed their root exited profiles. So I think it was first, you know, learned about in a arabidopsis wild, wild mustard model, um, a a plant that has a rosette stage and then it bolts and then it makes flowers, and those flowers make seeds.
Um, at each one of those stages, uh, it was seen that the, the root exited profiles change. Um, you know, the early growth and development, there was just a ton of sugar. And later in the, uh, the flowering and maturation, there was a lot of, you know, organic acids and things that are, uh, can be harsh to certain microbes, whereas sugar is like a really broad food source.
So the kind of thinking from the authors of that paper were, um, and I'll get to cannabis too, I promise were about, about, um, you know, the developmental needs of the plant are changing, you know, more nitrogen in the beginning, more phosphorus and potassium later. And, you know, those micronutrients trickled throughout. Um, and we know that the microbes help plants uptake these things.
So, you know, let's wonder if the plant is actually, I'm gonna use the term, uh, intentionally, uh, signaling for different things as it goes on through growth and development. So, I mean, being a cannabis enthusiast, seeing that study, I was like, wow, you know, what's the most popular photo sensitive photo period sensitive plant that we use, you know, happened cannabis, right?
Mm-Hmm. . Um, uh, so it was, I, I'm not sure if root exited work has been done, um, but we've done some work on the, um, the vegetative versus the transition. So, you know, maybe a couple weeks after flour onset after the solstice and the days get short in an outdoor system, um, as well as the harvest, uh, you know, functional microbiome of cannabis.
And we see that, um, regardless of the, you know, specific species of cannabis, uh, or strain, uh, whether it's hemp or cannabis 0.3%, THC producers or higher, um, the same functions, or at least the same bacterial genera are occurring in, in a many different, uh, types of soil environments. Um, we're using like the USDA climatic zones for that, but basically, um, cannabis being as, as nutritionally, uh, needy compared to some other plants.
Um, you know, we, we see, uh, really strong associations with the bacteria, um, based on development. So when we use the term like recruit, it's, it's kind of like the, um, the cannabis plant is sending these signals into the rhizosphere to likely get some type of RSO spheric function by the bacterial or fungal or just anybody in the soil microbiome.
Um, and these needs are pretty standard from, you know, the genus or the, the, the cannabis sativa plants, uh, whether they, they are classified as hamper marijuana, uh, you know, depending on the, the amount of metabolite it produces, right? Um, all that to say is plants really want microbes.
Um, and if we can kind of provide microbes, uh, that the plant can't search for in indoor systems, um, or in really, you know, low alpha diversity, 10 year monoculture corn field soils where there's lots, there's like five different types of microbes I'm exaggerating, um, then we can kind of benefit the plant, uh, in a way that it would in its natural environment in the wild type relatives and the progenitors might have, you know, kind of evolved to do - So.
It sounds like, um, if I'm understanding you correctly, the main point is that over the lifecycle of the plant, the plants, uh, the, the, the dominant bacterias in the rhizosphere changes, and we know the mechanism, or, or at least we're pretty sure that the mechanism of why it changes is because the plant wants different types of bacteria. And so it's putting, the plant is putting out different types of exudates to encourage different types of bacteria.
And so, um, the best thing that we can do is to, um, you know, a, let the plant do its job and then b, do our part by, um, offering, um, varieties of other, um, nutritions and, and probiotic bacterias and such that, that the plant can't produce and it needs to get its environment. So that between the partnership between us and the plant, the roots have just got everything it could possibly desire to express itself most fully. - Yes, that is a perfect distillation. Thank you.
And I think, um, you know, most importantly the, uh, I'm, I'm gonna sound like a broken record, but soil health, right? Yeah. If the soil health is, is maintained, then we are gonna assume, and, you know, we've proven, like the science has proven there's lots of alpha diversity, microbial diversity in a very healthy soil.
Um, so whether or not the microbe that's present during the vegetative growth period, uh, of your cannabis plant's lifecycle is recruited by the plant, um, during that time, if you maintain that soil health, it's likely there will still be those microbes in low enough cell numbers.
And then when the plant changes its root exudation compounds, presumably to attract microbes to, uh, help it meet its nutritional needs based on development, um, then, you know, soil health maintains microbial diversity. Those bugs are hanging around when your plant is flowering and, and in need of those types of, uh, functions. - Hell yeah. That's actually really exciting. , I like that summary a lot.
It's like, uh, it's, it's very rare in, uh, discussing, uh, soil health and, and, you know, soil maximalism, if you will, to actually have, uh, that clear of a recipe for what we need to do this season. Thank God, . So, yeah, right, right on. Well, good. Well, well, thank you for that, Michael. Let's go ahead and take our second, uh, commercial, uh, and be right back. Uh, you're listening to Shaping Fire, and my guest today is microbiologist Michael Delegue.
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You know, during the first set, we talked all about biostimulants and plant growth regulators and what we wanted to do as regenerative cultivators to make sure that we have the healthiest, most biodiverse soil so the plant can do its job of growing in a healthy way that resists pests and gives us awesome yields and terpenes.
During the second set, we talked a bit more about the care intending of micro life specifically, and, and, and not only how we can add, uh, microbes and biodiversity like we were talking in the first set, but also how we can help them thrive and keep them well fed with, uh, carbon.
And here on the third set, um, we're just gonna hit on, um, two more kind of miscellaneous, uh, biodiversity topics, um, that didn't fit in the other two sections, but I think are really important and things that we have talked about, uh, prior on the conver on the, on the program. So the first of the two is, uh, choosing companion plants to encourage biodiversity.
So Michael, we've talked quite a bit today about, uh, plant exudates and how plants push out the ex exudates from the root structure, um, uh, and, and, and attract different, um, um, microbial life and life forms in the rhizosphere, um, that, that it wants to use as, as, uh, different, you know, flavors of tools.
And, and, and I understand that like the plants that are planted near our cannabis plants can influence the rhizosphere of our cannabis plant because it is also calling forth different types of nutrition and mycelium, um, to its, uh, root systems as well. And, um, I understand, um, you know, partly what you study is, is, um, how these systems may interact and, and how to choose companion plants that will be a good neighbor for whatever the target plant that, that we're looking to grow in.
In our case, we're talking about cannabis. And so will you kind of, um, talk us through how to think about choosing our companion plants and, and in order to encourage the, the most biodiversity in our soil? - Yeah, absolutely. And I think the reason that this isn't more, you know, widespread or adapted or adopted rather is, is because of the, um, the scalability of this. But I, I would love to see it, you know, on hundreds of acres.
I think, um, two really cool examples that were new to me for kind of companion planting for cannabis would be, um, I had some friends do the three sisters, but replace the corn with the, um, the cannabis plant as opposed to corn. Um, and for those who don't know, the three sisters is corn, beans and squash. The corn serves as a trellis for the beans to grow up.
Um, the beans have a nitrogen fixing symbiotic bacterium called rhizobium that live in their roots, and that nitrogen can get leached outta their roots and be available for both the corn and the squash. And then the squash with their large leaves at the base of the plant, they provide shade, so soil stays kind of cooler temperatures and doesn't get baked from the sun.
Um, so in this case, uh, they replaced the corn with the, the hemp plants and the cannabis plants to serve as that trellis for the, the beans to climb up. Um, and both, you know, the squash and the, excuse me, the hemp was able to benefit from the beans being present due to that rhizobium bacterium being there. Um, and also, you know, certain soil temperatures, if they get too hot, that can actually be detrimental to microbial, um, populations.
So having that cooling effect from the squash leaves, uh, depending on your growing environment, Colorado, we have 320 days of direct sunshine that can help cool it down, um, to keep those soil temperatures, uh, happy for lots of different things to, to keep growing rather than just, uh, you know, the ones that are tolerant to warm soil - Before you move past another. Hold on. Before you move past the three sisters, I have got to ask, are you serious?
We want to have beans climbing up our cannabis plants. Like, that sounds awful. Like, does that work? Do they, I mean, I imagine that the bean plants get all into the flowers and then, and how does that work? - I think it might require a little bit more, um, uh, maintenance from the cultivator than, than most people can do in a production system.
Um, but yeah, so they would kind of climb up and, and on the fan leaves and things along those lines, um, - Do the - Bean bush bean are also very, the - Beans stay closer to the stalk. 'cause like normally the flowers are, are, you know, kind of far away from the stalk. So, so are the, are the beans perha perhaps gonna just like, grow up the center of the plant and not grow out to the flowers? Or will the, would the beans eventually grow out the branch to the flowers?
- The ones I, the ones I saw in the system were, were more so like the, the tips of the bean vines or, you know, yeah, were kind of hanging out in the empty space between fan leaves in the middle parts of the plant. They didn't, might quite make it up to that top cola. Um, and, you know, this is a one one example, right?
So, um, another approach to this though, 'cause I do hear what you're saying with, you know, beans could effectively act like a, a bind, weeded, um, and pull plants down like that. So I think, um, a bush bean or a different type of legume, like a cow p might be a better type of nitrogen fixer to get that, you know, diverse root exed profile, diverse microbiome from the root exodus. Um, and the nitrogen component too from the legume plants. - And so those different type, those bush bean.
And, and the reason why those are better is because you would plant those at the foot of the cannabis plant. And so their rhizosphere is could talk to each other, but the plant is not a climbing bean. And so you'll just have like bean shrubbery at the bottom of your cannabis plant, which is fine. Um, it just won't climb the plant. Is that where, where that goes?
- Yes, absolutely. And so like that RSO sphere becomes representative of at least, you know, two to three different types of plant species with your, what your vining squash, you know, your fruits should be okay. 'cause there'll be far away from the rest of the beans that are kind of pushing at the base.
Um, but if you have all those roots kind of in the same root ball, as long as there's adequate nutrition and organic material, um, that will be like a very healthy, diverse microbiome, uh, as a factor of just having three different hosts.
- Yeah, I like that a lot. And, um, we've talked on the show before too, that people who, uh, who grow in berms that are heavy built up with, uh, compost and, you know, grass clippings and, and other agricultural clippings, um, it's very popular to grow potatoes in that too. So, you know, you've got your potatoes and your beans and your squash kind of trailing off down the, down the line of plants.
Um, I've, I've always loved the idea of, of growing food crops with the cannabis so that you can feed yourself as well as, you know, smoke and save your soul, if you will. - Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. - Um, okay. So now that I've pushed you on that , what other, what other strategies or plans do you have in mind for, um, uh, creating a a, um, diverse, uh, rhizosphere? - Well, this was something that was kind of, um, new to me that I read about.
I didn't get to see this one in, in in action, but it was a, a farm that had been co planting, um, um, a plant with a mushroom. So they were kind of using myceliated, uh, beds of a wine cap mushroom to get, um, both harvest of wine cap fungi, edible mushrooms at the base of the soil and the, uh, the hemp was able to grow, um, and flour at the top. So it was kind of getting, um, both, you know, that fungal microbiome benefit, uh, as well as the, the plant roots there too.
So not directly, you know, plant to plant signaling like we're seeing with like the three sisters we just discussed. Um, but something along the lines of, you know, trying to have, uh, more bang for your buck in terms of square footage for harvesting and things like that. Um, - And the wine cap mushroom is, uh, one of my favorite eating mushrooms. They're absolutely delicious.
I, I tried to do that in my indoor and it didn't work out because the, the humidity for mushrooms seems to be a little higher, um, than we want it to be in an indoor setting. It seems to work well outdoors, um, so long as you've got good plant coverage because, uh, normally we want our plants in direct sunlight, right? Right. But the mushrooms don't wanna be in the direct sunlight.
So you gotta make sure that you're growing plants that are gonna be big enough to, um, create that shadow underneath that allows the, the wine caps to exist. - Yeah. Maintain that humid microclimate underneath the plant canopy that is super ideal for mushrooms, - Ands. Oh, and the squash will help with that too, that you're talking about. - Yeah, - Absolutely. Those, those big leads. Yeah. Alright. Um, do you have any more on that before, uh, before I move on?
- Uh, I think just companion planting is really, really excellent. And I think there is a, um, you know, go back to the literature and, and look out, you know, if you have deer eating your, your hemp marigolds can be deterrents for deer, right? I think there's a different, different plant for a different need. Um, and just always going back to the more diverse roots and host in the, in the soil would, you know, increase your soil health and microbial diversity there.
- So, so I actually was planning on doing, um, big pots of marigolds, uh, next to the plants for the first time this year, um, because we do have a lot of deer pressure and luckily I got some, um, some deer fencing this year, so hopefully that'll help too. But, um, is it, is it as effective that if the, um, the marigolds are, are not in the pot with the candles or in the ground next to it, but like, are beside it that the smell of the marigolds is enough to keep the deer off?
Or will the deer just come over and browse the weeded and, and just ignore the marigold? - I'll be fully honest with you, uh, when I, when I tried to use marigolds as a, a deterrent crop in, in Maryland, I, I watched a deer chew one down before . Uh, so, you know, that's kinda like your - Mileage may vary , - Right?
Yeah. You know, like, uh, kind of like different, different strains of cannabis might have different terpenoid or cannabinoid profiles, different species of marigolds, you know, they have the multicolored ones have different, uh, type of phytochemical profiles or, you know, those volatile organic compounds that smell icky to deer. Um, um, so I, I don't know a variety off the top of my head, but I imagine that, um, you know, it's very species specific.
- Right on. Well, thank you. I, I appreciate your, uh, your honesty in that and you know, if we're really gonna go for it. Um, you know, these bio regions have got different deer, right? So different deer could be, um, accustomed to browsing different types of plants, whereas, whereas Mar Maryland deer don't like, uh, marigolds, but, or, or no, do like Mari or they did Yeah.
- , they do - Like marigolds and, and maybe, you know, my west coast deer, um, are more, um, snooty and they don't want marigolds, you know? Right. Or something like that. So. Alright.
Um, but before we leave the companion planning topic, I just wanted to ask, are there any, um, plants that are, um, obviously, um, um, uh, poor neighbors, um, the, the, the name for it is, is escaping me at the moment, but, but there's, there are often plants that you don't wanna plant near other plants because they, they, they will make, they might poison each other or, or, or, or be toxic to the other person's or the other plant's rhizosphere. Are you aware of any of those?
- Yeah, there is one that's jumping off the top of my head, although I know there's, uh, you know, a lot of examples, um, uh, black walnut, uh, trees for example, you know, not specifically related or cultivated for a, a regular harvest like we're talking about with cannabis or vegetables. Um, but those, those guys, uh, have a, a brute exit it, um, that is under the nature of allelopathy.
Uh, so they are actually able to shoot a compound into the soil that makes it pretty un inhospitable for anything but it's offspring to grow. Um, and to counter that, there's also plants, I think certain trees as well that, you know, don't want its own offspring to, to compete with the, you know, the mom plant, uh, for the resources there.
So they'll, they'll send signals into the soil that make it inhospitable for the plants of the same species to grow, um, to try to, uh, you know, preserve its own nutrients that might be in the soil. - Right on. That's, that's, that's good to say. And, and I'm gonna throw in my two, even though some people like these, um, you know, I always make sure that any, any plants that I consider for a companion plant, um, does not give off floating seeds like dandelions.
I personally really love, uh, pink dandelions and I, and I, and I encourage them in my yard actually 'cause they look really trippy. Um, and so, but, but before they go to seed, um, you know, I've got a different seed crop at a different property, but, but like, I have to make sure, you know, I grab those because I don't want all those like little fuzzy puff balls in my resonance flowers. Right? Right. That is definitely a party fowl.
And so any plant that gives off, um, you know, uh, uh, uh, fluffy seeds that are going to be wind, uh, distributed, you wanna be careful of those. And then even though a lot of people like, uh, red clover, I personally caution people from the red clover because the red flower shoots up. And if you don't grow monster plants, if you're growing plants that are only, you know, three feet and not 10 feet, uh, three feet, the clover could totally grow up into and start interacting with your resin.
And, and we don't want that either. So the last question here is, is one that, uh, I talk about sometimes on, um, on shaping fire, but, but mostly it, the, the discussion has, has happened on the Shaping Fire YouTube channel where, um, I posted a, a video with a microbiologist that had, was a, a specialist in in plant microbe interaction, talking about how, um, the 24 hour light strategy is, is bad for cannabis.
And, and I fully believe this to be the case because, um, you know, uh, uh, photo synthetic plants have a, have, uh, evolved processes that happen during the dark cycle. So, so if the plant is naturally growing outdoors, it gets a day cycle, it gets a night cycle. During the night cycle, the photosynthesizing, um, stops and other processes happen. And that's how you keep a strong rambunctious plant.
But we know from experiments, indoor plants, when you're supplementing with light that if you grow the plant at 24 hours, um, it's, it's like giving the plant cocaine or something like where the plants just go, go, go, go. A constantly photosynthesize, constantly process these sugars, go rah rah and, and like, and so it will, it will make your, your, your, your seed germinate faster. It will make the young plant move faster.
It will bring it into be becoming, you know, a ready to flower, teenage plant faster. And then in the flowering, some people find that they reach maturity at the flour faster to such a degree that they can, you know, knock a week off of flowering sometimes. And they're all like, listen, if, if, if, if, if I do that with every cycle my whole year, I can actually squeeze in another cycle a year. And that's real money. And so because of that, the case for a 24 hour light cycle is made.
And I take every opportunity I can to try to teach that the, the dark cycle is necessary for plant health. And, um, you Michael, you know, you're, you're the frontline of this debate as a microbiologist, you know, these cycles intimately and, and you know, what happens in the, you know, what happens in the dark .
And so, so I'm gonna kind of throw myself up, um, hopefully, um, hopefully I'm not wrong in your eyes, but, um, I'd like to hear you speak to this idea of the 24 hour light strategy and, um, and how that, that might impact, uh, the plant. - Yeah, absolutely. I think, um, you know, that's gotta be one of the most, uh, nutritionally expensive types of cultivation practices I would think, um, that could be done.
Uh, I, I wonder what types of, uh, you know, nutrient usage, uh, rates people are going through if they're, uh, doing this practice with 24 hour light cycles. Um, 'cause I would imagine that with 24 hours of daylight without any types of resting period, um, that the plant is gonna be constantly, uh, requiring extremely high concentrations of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium, um, essential processes like the kreb cycle happen, uh, at nighttime.
Um, plants also do these, um, things called like gata where there might be air bubbles in the plant vascular tissue, which can be detrimental. Um, but at nighttime they can push those out. Um, you know, they also close their stem and, uh, don't evaporate the water out of their bodies as as quickly.
So I think primarily the, um, the benefit to get another cycle might be missed by the amount of nutrients somebody might need from trying to maintain the nutritional needs of the cannabis plant, uh, by blasting them with 24 hours of light, right? If you're gonna be, um, you know, basically giving your plants cocaine and keeping them at high energy, high growth, optimal fast growth rates and developments, there's gonna be a lot of energy spent for that.
Um, and in order for them, for them to kind of account for that deficit, there needs to be tons and tons of available nutrient inputs there.
Um, and I, I don't know that one other cycle might be, uh, beneficial enough to, to, to have to add that much more verigation - In, in my experience, the people who are defending the 24 hour light cycle are, are usually people that are using, you know, two part bottled salt fertilizers, and so they're kind of like force feeding the plants, uh, nutrition anyway.
And, uh, you know, it's, it's pretty rare to find a, you know, a bottled nutrients grower who isn't overfeeding anyway, because if some is good, more is better. Right? Right. And so, and so that, that's actually the answer that I get online when discussing this with, with these, these cultivators are at that all, well, if it just makes the plant more hungry for more nutrition, I'll just pour more in. And I'm like, ah, that's not really how it works.
Um, but, um, for folks who aren't familiar with it, you mentioned that the Krebs cycle happens in the dark period. Will you, will you explain what that is? - Well, the, um, the plant starts to respire so it stops using the light, um, or the photons from the sunlight or your LEDs or any types of lighting you have as, um, kind of like the building blocks to metabolism.
Um, and it starts to respir basically it's getting its energy from off-gassing, uh, things that might be in the there as opposed to using the light energy to, um, kind of make more chloroplast and, and things along those lines.
- So when I'm, when I'm talking about, uh, this with folks who, who are very, very, um, into the 24 hour light strategy, um, they come back to me and they're like, they're like, well, you're telling me I can't do this, but I do this all the time and I get plants and I smoke 'em, and I get high and it's great. And, and, and to the best of my scientific knowledge, I say to 'em, I say, yeah, but you're, you're getting a plant that isn't the best plant you could have grown.
Um, if you, if you need fast, cheap styrofoam tasting flour quickly, okay, that, that might be an appropriate strategy to consider. But since most of us are looking for a thriving plant, which, um, you know, also provides high quality terpenes that just like engage us and give us a better high and also creates pest resistance, it seems to me that the 24 hour lifecycle will slowly but surely degrade a cannabis plant throughout its entire lifecycle. What, what are your thoughts about that?
Like, is the, is the, is the, is the life of the cannabis plant so short where over where, over that lifecycle? It doesn't matter if we starve the soil. - I, I kind of am thinking that I, it does matter, you know, uh, the cannabis plant lifecycle is a lot longer to, to maturation and harvest than a lot of other different crops that are kind of following the school of thought.
And I think that, um, you know, speculatively, there's a lot of, uh, things that happen that are beneficial to the plant vascular system during the rest period. Um, pushing those air bubbles out, closing those ada, uh, and things along those lines that I would imagine play a role in the, the synthesis of cannabinoids, terpenoids, and other secondary metabolites.
Um, so I think, yeah, it would be interesting to do a side-by-side with the same kind of cultivar or, or strain of, of cannabis, uh, you know, in a 24 hour cycle versus a an 18 six followed by a 1212. Um, and then the other thing that I wanted to mention, uh, you were talking about kind of the indoor growers and having those, you know, two to one salts readily available and probably slightly over applied.
Um, it, it would be cool to, to get to a point to where we can kind of start to supplement, uh, those conventional salt based fertilizers with more organic things. Um, and maybe even get to the point, uh, and this is from Dr. James White, the Oph Fiji, uh, scientist, um, using those salts that are easily slurped up and, and, you know, immediately used in, in building blocks of the plant body, um, kind of as like corrective uh, treatments.
And you notice the deficiency, you apply a salt, and then you start to kind of balance both your, your salt and your organic base of nutrition inputs. Not only will that benefit the plant, um, but also same thing with the microbes. Um, there's been studies showing the same exact, you know, strain of, of cannabis growing in living soil versus growing in, uh, hydroponics with biologicals. And the terpene and cannabinoid profiles are, you know, statistically different from one another.
And I think a lot of that has to do with, uh, the terroir or the terroir of, of the cannabis plant. Yeah. - Yeah. The idea of supplementing with, uh, with, um, salt on its face I'm prejudice against, but as a citizen scientist, I want to learn more, you know what I mean? - So Yeah, I understand. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. - Yeah. So anyway, well, well thank you for, for, uh, diving into that topic for me.
Um, it, it, it, it's clearly something that I, I am passionate about and I get argued with sometimes . And so anytime I, you know, when I get a microbiologist like you willing to talk to me about it, I always bang that drum. So thank you, . - Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I guess more on the microbe side, I think just like the, the soil temperatures do cool or the roots temp, the root zone rises for temperatures will also cool in the dark.
So kind of factoring in the microbiome, um, that's just allowing more environmental changes to maintain different diversity and things like that, um, with the, the darkness period, because, you know, a grow room will cool off 10 degrees when the lights are off and things like that. - Yeah, right on. Yeah. And I'm sure there's different cycles that need a cooler temperature to happen.
- Yeah. But I'm interested in, in kind of learning more about the effects, uh, in the microbiome, you know, with this 24 hour versus getting that rest period that plants, you know, were evolved to have. - Yeah. So. Awesome. Well, Michael, we are here at the end. Um, thank you so much for sharing your expertise and experience and, and time and good cheer with us.
Um, uh, I've really enjoyed our discussion and, um, you know, it, it, I I, I didn't expect, uh, uh, so much, so many times for us to come back to the answer being diverse microbe ts, but, but really, you know, the, the more I get into regenerative growing and really, uh, growing in a way that's, uh, responds to nature, the more I realized that, um, the farmer's only job is to create, um, rich nutri nutritive, biologically diverse soil. And, and so you're always gonna come back to tea.
So, so thank you very much for being here and for, for, you know, sharing what you know. - Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me, Shang. Go. It, uh, it was a great conversation and I'm really grateful to be able to kind of just, you know, talk about this stuff with somebody else. - Excellent. Yeah, me too. It's, it's nice to find another narrative for this stuff, so thank you. Totally. - Yeah, - Right on.
So, um, if you want to reach out to, uh, Michael or no more what's, he's more of what he's up to, there are two places to do that. Um, you can follow Michael Delegue, that's D-I-L-E-G-G-E on LinkedIn, where he posts what he's up to in his latest research. And also, um, uh, the company where he is a director of microbiology is Implo Biosciences, and you can find out what they're up to at implo I-M-P-E-L-L-O bio.com.
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