In this episode of 'In Living Cover,' presented by the Regenerative Alberta Living Lab, host Kim Cornish talks with Alan Hall, who grew up on a mixed farm near Barrhead and has spent more than 50 years working alongside Alberta farmers, starting as a district agriculturalist in 1973 and later serving as executive director of the Agricultural Research and Extension Council of Alberta. Alan shares the story of founding the Pembina Forage Association and its rotational grazing steer pasture in the 1970s, and walks through how zero tillage went from a few farmers experimenting in the late 1970s to most of Alberta's crop acres, with the RT Linkages team helping farmers, researchers and companies work together. The conversation covers how the round baler opened the door to bale grazing, how ideas move from farm to farm, how producer-led research funding evolved from the industry development funds to RDAR, and why Alan sees systems thinking and closer ties between crop and livestock farms as the way forward.

00:00 Introduction to Alan Hall

01:57 Growing Up on a Mixed Farm near Barrhead

03:35 Studying Agriculture at the University of Alberta

05:50 Starting Out as a District Agriculturalist

07:06 Lending to Beginning Farmers

10:34 Founding the Pembina Forage Association

17:24 Why Each Generation Has to Learn It Again

19:11 Learning Online Versus Learning from People

22:32 How No-Till Took Hold in Western Canada

31:43 Profitability and the Cost of Land

33:34 The Round Baler and the Road to Bale Grazing

37:20 High-Moisture Barley and How Ideas Spread

41:42 Canola, Glyphosate and Reduced Tillage

44:57 Regional Director and Public Lands

48:48 The Plant Industry Division and the Ag Research Institute

51:50 Producer-Led Research Funding: From the Development Funds to RDAR

58:34 Funding Systems, Not Silos

1:02:25 Why Applied Research Associations Matter

1:04:38 What Farmers Asked For: Optimizing Inputs and Soil Health

1:09:52 Monocropping and the Loss of Cattle on Crop Farms

1:14:23 Crop and Livestock Partnerships

1:18:38 Wrap-Up