The Power of Networks: Making Regeneration Work Across Farms

In the early days of the Regenerative Alberta Living Lab (RA-LL), we set out with an ambitious goal: to support producers not only with science and innovation, but also with connection. During our initial engagement sessions, producers across the province shared their needs — they weren’t just asking for better research or funding, but for community. They wanted to meet others who were experimenting with similar regenerative approaches, facing the same challenges, and trying to innovate their way forward.

One of those voices was Harold Perry who farms with his brother Chris at Perry Family Farms, a regenerative pioneer growing potatoes — a crop not traditionally associated with low-till or soil-building practices. Harold has spent years exploring how to make potato production more regenerative, pushing the boundaries on what’s possible with a high-disturbance crop. What he told us early on was simple but powerful:

“I’d really like to be better connected with more producers who are trying the same types of things I am.”

This wasn’t just about sharing ideas — it was about removing the isolation that so many innovators face.

From a Wish to a Working Network

One of RA-LL’s founding goals was exactly this: to connect producers who were working on similar problems, to surface grassroots innovations, and to drive adoption by lowering barriers through peer learning and shared experience. This network isn’t just about conversations — it’s about supporting innovation with research and replicated data. That’s why it’s so exciting to now have high-resolution soil maps for each core producer’s entire property. These maps allow producers to track and share the outcomes of their regenerative practices in a grounded, scientific way — linking observational learning with measurable change. And just as importantly, scientists are engaged in co-developing this data with producers, ensuring that both research and practice evolve together in a feedback loop of mutual insight.

This vision recently came full circle.

At the Peace Region Living Lab's Below Ground event, we met Brent Kobbert, a farmer with extensive experience in intercropping. Brent shared an important learning: while intercropping often leads to “over-yielding” — more bushels per acre than a monocrop — his profits were wiped out by the cost of seed separation at commercial seed cleaning facilities. For Brent, the bottleneck wasn’t the agronomy — it was the post-harvest logistics.

Fast forward a few months, and we were visiting Perry Farms again. Harold had planted a fava bean–oat intercrop, but winter discussions revealed concern: the seed separation last year had been complex and expensive, and his team was unsure they could justify doing it again. Intercropping might be off the table.

Instead of letting that stop him, Harold reached out through the Living Lab network — specifically to Kimberly Cornish— asking if anyone else had solved this problem.

The network responded.

Peer-to-Peer Problem Solving

Harold was quickly connected with:

• Brent Kobbert, who uses a rotary separator, a more affordable option than commercial color sorters.

• Will Groenenveld, another intercrop producer with on-farm separating solutions.

• Ward Middleton, who offered this detailed feedback:

  
  

“We have separated oats and peas, and also intercropped faba beans and barley. A slotted rotary screen seems best to separate the cereal from the pulse. It’s easy to get the whole beans out, but fragments smaller than half a bean — chips — may match the oats in size and density, and can be hard to remove. If the oats are for feed, this isn’t an issue. But if they’re for milling, a color sorter may be needed for purity.”

This practical advice allowed Harold to confidently move forward with intercropping this year — a decision grounded in shared learning and collaborative problem-solving. In this case, the Living Lab network delivered exactly what it promised: actionable knowledge, faster decision-making, and cost-saving solutions, not just across one lab but through collaboration between two Living Labs.

From Vision to Reality

This kind of impact is exactly what Harold hoped for when he first voiced the need for stronger connections among regenerative producers. And it's what the RA-LL set out to build — a living, breathing system of knowledge exchange.

This isn’t just a blog about solving a technical issue. It’s a story about how networks — when made real — can transform challenges into opportunities, and make regeneration not just possible, but profitable and scalable.

The network is working. Producers are connecting. Barriers are falling. And regenerative agriculture is growing — together.