An ocean has formed in Washington state – a sea of orange marigolds near Simplot’s Othello facility. The pretty flowers have a pretty important mission: improve soil health for the company and its growers.
Simplot Grower Solutions (SGS) Senior Digital Sales Advisor Patrick Williams is both an agronomist and an ag enthusiast. When a company partnership to create pollinator habitat in southern Idaho wrapped up, he saw an opportunity to build on learnings from it in a different way, in central Washington where he lives and works.
This new “Marigold Edition” project started as a personal one for Williams. The idea sprouted from gardening with his grandmothers when he was a kid. The women would plant marigolds to keep bugs away, which made a lasting impression on Williams to the point, he says, “I have always planted marigolds in my garden as part of my personal integrated pest management strategy.”
Based on the success he witnessed in his home garden Williams had been considering a larger scale company marigold trial for a couple years. Through research he learned that marigolds can control two specific nematodes that affect potato, onion and other crops in the Pacific Northwest. A nematode is a parasitic worm that impacts crops by transmitting disease via soil.
He decided last spring that it was the year to make the Marigold Project happen. “There’s evidence from studies dating back to the 40s saying that marigolds are able to control nematodes,” he pointed out. “I had never seen anybody grow marigolds at a commercial scale for anything other than seed production, and so I thought, ‘Well, let’s try a little bit and see what happens.’”
A cluster of marigolds.
In the spirit of One Simplot, Williams partnered on the project with Senior Agronomy Sales Enablement Advisor Shane Hansen and Troy Meacham, agronomy raw development manager for Global Food’s Moses Lake facility. Together, the three launched the project to dig deeper into whether orange flowers could keep plants green.
In 2023 Williams worked with SGS customer Kerrick Bauman at L & L Farms in Connell, Washington, to plant four varieties of greenhouse transplanted marigolds on half an acre at that farm.
When the flowers went into the ground, soil analysis showed 160 to 190 nematodes per 250 cubic centimeters (about a cup) of dirt. After a month, the number had dropped to 18 to 36 nematodes, and after two months the number was down to zero to two – and only one of the four marigold varieties had two nematodes.
Although he had reason to believe the trial would be successful, Williams was pretty much floored by just how good the results were, stating plainly, “We essentially achieved 100 percent control with the marigolds.”
And nematode control wasn’t the only benefit from the marigold plot. “The pollinators we saw within those marigolds was absolutely mind-blowing,” Williams recalled. Pollinators are critical to crops because they help move pollen, which is necessary to fertilize many plants so they can produce fruits, seeds, and young plants.
A hoverfly buzzes a marigold. This pollinator evolved to look like a bee to deter predators.
“There was a huge diversity, including honeybees and native pollinators like bumblebees, butterflies, moths … big hummingbird sized moths and you’d see 100 of them out there at a time pollinating the marigolds.”
“And so we created this habitat where we are effectively controlling a pest in the soil for next year’s crop, while at the same time creating a pollinator habitat,” Williams added.
This year the Marigold Project partnered with SGS customer the Warden Hutterian Brethren, who is also a grower for Simplot’s Global Food business. This year’s project direct-seeded 130 acres of marigolds on the heels of pea harvest: 65 acres each on the south half of two pivot fields, not far from the SGS Othello facility.
Rows of marigolds bring multiple benefits.
Soil health, improved crop yields and sustainable agriculture practices are all key components of the Marigold Project. And there’s one more important element in the pipeline, said Williams. “This year, my main objectives have been not only the nematode control, not only the pollinator benefit, but how do we work this into a normal farm rotation?” Stay tuned for the answer to that question.
As the saying goes, “Everything old is new again.” Simplot has been around for nearly 100 years, and we have learned over that time that there are many ways to create a sustainable future for the world, its people and our business. This visionary approach also allows us to see that innovation may materialize from putting a new spin on an old practice.
“This is going back decades … centuries maybe, to learn from the past to prepare for the future,” Williams said, summarizing the Marigold Project. “It’s a multi-benefit, win-win situation.”