Marissa Busch

busch_farm@outlook.com

My name is Marissa Busch; and my husband, Duane, and I, along with our 7 kids, farm around 1,000 acres of non-GMO corn, barley, oats, and hay, outside of Milaca, MN.  We run a no-till operation, and no longer use synthetic fertilizers or sprays.  We use a living cover crop/mulch system to keep nutrient cycling going and the microbes active, which also acts as weed suppression.  After many frustrations of applying synthetic soil amendments, only to have our plant tissue tests repeatedly show that these amendments are not being taken up by the plants, and then for the following years soil tests to recommend applying the same rates of the same amendments, we decided we need to do some studying as to why the plant isn’t taking up these amendments.  Our studying lead us on a journey as to how a root truly works, and answered many questions, including why all the non-plant available nutrients are not only a waste of money, but destroying our soils.   We were able to adopt a whole new approach to how we run and manage our farm.  We now make a living aerobic compost to extract and grow all the aerobic microbes needed in the soil, that years of tillage, sprays, and salt-based fertilizers destroyed.  We apply compost extracts to the soil, and compost teas to our foliar feeding and seed treatment.  We make our own fish hydrolysate, and apply humic acids we extract from aerobic compost.  I use a microscope to run all our tests on the farm to monitor soil biology, the biology in the compost teas and extracts, and am able to run studies and tests to track the changes we are making in the soil.

We also run a cow/calf operation, raise hogs, pastured meat chickens, and have egg laying chickens, and have adopted nutrient dense feed programs which result in healthier animals and meat.

We are currently in the transition to organic phase in our farm.   However, I always tell people, the organic certification is simply a label we are obtaining to market our grain.  In essence, we are going deeper than organic with our operation.

Our journey involves lots of continual learning from wonderful people who continue to help us along the way, and I hope to be able to help others in their journey.