Cows and Effect

Paul Allison and Michael Blanche
  • 3.0 (1)
  • NATURAL SCIENCES
  • UPDATED MONTHLY

Welcome to this occasionally mildly interesting farming podcast (it's a science podcast), hosted by award winning podcaster Michael Blanche (200m swimming badge 1978) and not-yet-not-a-real-doctor Paul Allison. We talk about recent research into soil, pasture, cows and sheep. People say that it's the podcast they didn't know they wanted or needed, and they definitely didn't ask for it. It's sometimes a bit sweary (not the big one). It's fine. Cows and effect sounds like cause and effect. It's a play on words. That's funny stuff. Warning: Following legal advice the listener should be aware that the views and information shared in this podcast do not constitute professional advice or even unprofessional guidance. For God's sake consult someone who knows what they are talking about before making any changes to your farm management practices. Logo image created in https://BioRender.com

Episodes

  1. 12/25/2025

    Episode 7. Folk dancing, pocket meat and the Malmo shipyards.

    This festive episode comes out on 25th December 2025, so Happy blooming Christmas listener. If you're anything like me, the morning so far will have been; 1. Put the turkey in the oven around 06.00 hrs; 2. Check round the stock, 3. Get back to the house in time for a late morning snifter, 4. Check how the turkey is doing, 4. Turn the oven on, 5. Explain that Chistmas dinner is running late.  There's some robust swearing in this one listener, including the big swear at around nineteen minutes in. Sorry about that. We know a lot of people don't like the big one, but think it's canonically justified in this case. We'll try to avoid it in the future. The original recording included my favourite ever Christmas joke, but Michael cut it out and burned the tape. I thought it was funny, but he explained that being funny isn't always enough to avoid being taken off air. We have exchanged Christmas presents. I don't understand why I received a £50 voucher for therapy, but Michael says that me not understanding that there is a problem is "just another symptom". Micheal has only very recently realised why he received a dictionary with the word "canonically" underlined.  As promised, this month we're in Denmark and looking at Nitrogen transfers from legumes into grasses and herbs. Which legumes are good at fixing? Which are good at transfering Nitrogen to neighbouring plants? Which non legumes are good at acquiring the Nitrogen? Only one way to find out the answers listener. Actually, there is another way. If you just read the paper, you don't have to listen to the chaos and the big swear. Here it is.  Pirhofer-Walzl, K., Rasmussen, J., Høgh-Jensen, H., Eriksen, J., Søegaard, K. and Rasmussen, J., 2012. Nitrogen transfer from forage legumes to nine neighbouring plants in a multi-species grassland. Plant and soil, 350(1), pp.71-84. Nitrogen transfer from forage legumes to nine neighbouring plants in a multi-species grassland | Plant and Soil Unfortunately, once again, it's behind a paywall. Sorry about that. I only realised at the last minute. Karin has very very kindly messaged us to say that if you want a copy of the full paper, she will send you one. You will need to email her on pirhofer@weltacker-berlin.de to request a copy. Our expertise in internet stalking of scientists revealed that this is where Karin works now. It's Weltacker Berlin and they all look like they are having fun. Weltacker Berlin | Weltacker . Weltacker is a global agroecology demonstration and education organisation (the Berlin site was the first). They are not for profit (which definitely aligns them with our sort of farming). Check it out. Welcome to 2000m2 .  For the real nerds, who like an old reference. Fred EB, Baldwin IL, McCoy E (1932) Root nodule bacteria and leguminous plants. University of Wisconsin, Studies in Science. ‎Root nodule bacteria and leguminous plants - UWDC - UW-Madison Libraries And our old mate Frank, FRANK, B. 1889. Ueber die Pilzsymbiose der Leguminosen. Ber. Deut. Bot. Gesell., 7: 332-346, 1889. Ber-Deutschen-Bot-Ges_7_0332-0346.pdf And proving that scientists absolutely love citing themselves, the earlier work with just three species; Høgh-Jensen, H., 2006. The nitrogen transfer between plants: an important but difficult flux to quantify. Plant and Soil, 282(1), pp.1-5. The Nitrogen Transfer Between Plants: An Important but Difficult Flux to Quantify | Plant and Soil Sheep / halal statistics. England and Wales slaughter statistics 25-02-14 Slaughter Sector Survey 2024 (REVISED) UK sheep slaughter numbers Lamb market outlook | AHDB Scottish sheep numbers RESAS Agricultural Statistics Hub Northern Ireland sheep numbers Slaughtering of cattle and sheep since 2001 | Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs

    1h 45m

  2. 11/27/2025

    Episode 6. Free honey, a faraway look and a copious flow of mucus.

    Hello listener. How's things? You'll be relieved to know that this episode is much shorter than the last one and really delivers on the science. Yes, that's right; back by popular demand, this is the second episode of Lab Rat Jazz Club and, this time, we hear about the work of the brilliant Professor Smith (he's the best, Paul loves him).  The main paper;   Smith, M.L., 2014. Xxxxx xxx xxxxx xxxx index by xxxx location. PeerJ, 2, p.e338. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.338 Find Professor Smith's other work here;  https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?view_op=list_works&hl=en&hl=en&user=lREVIHgAAAAJ The Berkley paper on pain thresholds; women (not girls) vs men (cited 1,673 times!). This could be behind a paywall, but there's at least an abstract.  Berkley, K.J., 1997. Sex differences in pain. Behavioral and brain sciences, 20(3), pp.371-380. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X97221485 The career of our other hero; Justin Schmidt.   Starr, C.K., Jacobson, R.S. and Overal, W.L., 2024. Justin Schmidt's originality. Journal of Hymenoptera Research, 97, pp.297-306. https://jhr.pensoft.net/article/121387/

    1h 7m

  3. 10/29/2025

    Episode 5. Chain drives, mushroom tea and a professional.

    Edith Piaf - Non, Je ne regrette rien Where to begin listener? Well, you could begin about 45 minutes into this unfeasibly long episode, because that's how long it takes to get to this fascinating research paper and it's 45 minutes of your life you will never get back. Salomon, M.J., Demarmels, R., Watts-Williams, S.J., McLaughlin, M.J., Kafle, A., Ketelsen, C., Soupir, A., Bücking, H., Cavagnaro, T.R. and van der Heijden, M.G., 2022. Global evaluation of commercial arbuscular mycorrhizal inoculants under greenhouse and field conditions. Applied Soil Ecology, 169, p.104225. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0929139321003486 Apologies listener, you will only find the abstract and some section snippets, because the full paper is behind a paywall. Michael just tried to make me feel better by saying, "Surely no-one actually reads them, do they?" This is the review paper that sets off all the nonsense in the first 45 minutes; the one with the peloton. It's got an abstract.  Genre, A., Lanfranco, L., Perotto, S. and Bonfante, P., 2020. Unique and common traits in mycorrhizal symbioses. Nature Reviews Microbiology, 18(11), pp.649-660. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-020-0402-3 Another bloody paywall, but you can read the abstract and here is the peloton picture.  https://share.google/images/droIULxU1yL85Lrgl We promise that we will definitely do more science next time with data, graphs, tables and statistics. Well, not exactly next time. Next time (Ep. 6.) is Ep. 2. of Lab Rat Jazz Club. But, definitely the one after that. Episode 7. will be just science with no funny business. Promise. Three punch lines; in one joke; brilliant.

    1h 45m

  4. 09/24/2025

    Episode 4. A fun guy, a great judge of character and a very interesting three years drawing moss.

    Do you like your agricultural scientific research sumarised in easily digestible form or described at length in mind numbing detail? Oh, OK, nevermind; how about this then? Have you ever asked yourself what happens to arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal mediated phosphate supply when stressed plants stop supplying sugar-like carbon molecules to the fungi? No? Seriously? Nevertheless, buckle up and welcome to the School of Biology at Leeds University, West Yorkshire. Eee by gum, ey up, etc. Michael makes a couragous attempt at humour, based on the marvelous premise that AMF (the phosphate supplying fungi) sounds a bit like EMF (the 90s band), but Paul doesn't understand what's happening and it falls a bit flat. We alienate another potential sponsor and the cats continue to carry the show. Links The main paper; Charters, M.D., Sait, S.M. and Field, K.J., 2020. Aphid herbivory drives asymmetry in carbon for nutrient exchange between plants and an arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus. Current Biology, 30(10), pp.1801-1808. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(20)30294-3 Great judge of character, Professor Katie Field on The Infinite Monkey Cage, with Professor Brian Cox and popular fungus botherer Dr Merlin Sheldrake (not kidding). https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0fwww6q EMF doing their thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfCLt0kTd5E&list=RDsfCLt0kTd5E&start_radio=1  The Swiss work on how AMF protects maize against pathogenic fungi. Lutz, S., Bodenhausen, N., Hess, J., Valzano-Held, A., Waelchli, J., Deslandes-Hérold, G., Schlaeppi, K. and van der Heijden, M.G., 2023. Soil microbiome indicators can predict crop growth response to large-scale inoculation with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. Nature Microbiology, 8(12), pp.2277-2289. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-023-01520-w  The British Society of Soil Science webinar with Dr Anne Bhogal and Professor Richard Bardgett; see proper scientists putting themselves out there and talking to normal people. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RggdJPe6nio  Don't tell Professor Bardgett (eminent respected academic, titan in his field, behemoth, etc), but Paul thinks that the evidence that biodiversity (species richness) causes agroecosystem productivity is weak, because he's been thinking about it for almost a year now.   The paper about soil and bacteria and fungi and that sort of thing. Howe, J.A., McDonald, M.D., Burke, J., Robertson, I., Coker, H., Gentry, T.J. and Lewis, K.L., 2024. Influence of fertilizer and manure inputs on soil health: A review. Soil Security, 16, p.100155. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667006224000297  The it's-a-network paper that shows unstressed plants transfering extra Carbon to AMF, which makes up for neighbouring stressed plants being a bit crap. Durant, E., Hoysted, G.A., Howard, N., Sait, S.M., Childs, D.Z., Johnson, D. and Field, K.J., 2023. Herbivore-driven disruption of arbuscular mycorrhizal carbon-for-nutrient exchange is ameliorated by neighboring plants. Current Biology, 33(12), pp.2566-2573. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(20)30294-3

    1h 13m

  5. 08/28/2025

    Episode 3. French cigarettes, the Motown joke and there's someone Scottish that's really annoying me.

    Bored with multi species pastures episodes? Welcome to North America dear listener and a research paper that is definitely not about multi species pastures (although they get a mention in the intro). No spoilers, but it's proper science done by proper scientists. As well as the science, Michael reveals that he is a High Noon guy, Paul admits a life long obsession with Katy Jurado and Black Cat disgraces himself on mike (on microphone, not on Michael).  Links Jim and Stan's paper. Polston, J.E. and Glick, S.D., 2011. *****-******* context preference following ******* conditioning in ****. Behavioral neuroscience, 125(4), p.674. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3144275/ Carbon Calling 2023. Nikki Yoxall (head of research at Pasture for Life and regenerative farmer), Amy Hughes (podcaster and AHDB engagement lead for beef and lamb), Claire Whittle (regenerative consultant and vet) and Sarah Langford (author, lawyer and farmer) talk about their experiences within the agriculture sectors and being in leadership roles. They are brilliant. They say things that need saying and say them with clarity and passion. Boys and men who work in agriculture really need to listen to this. It basically finishes at 49 minutes and 50 seconds; no need for anyone to listen after that. So, just turn it off at that point. That's 49 minutes and 50 seconds. Please. Carbon Calling Panel It's outdoor lambing in the old west. Katy Jurado plays Michael Blanche checking his ewes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFxwq33rVAs&list=RDhFxwq33rVAs&start_radio=1 Katy Jurado gives Grace Kelly an acting class in High Noon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fo_CKWb8eJY And then does the same with Gary Cooper. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6dmg07VBcg

    1h 2m

  6. 07/31/2025

    Episode 2. Farmer jail, the first rule of ecology club and carry on with your dull stuff.

    We're staying in Ireland for Episode 2 and talking about a research paper that looks at four different pasture types (permanent pasture, perennial ryegrass, a six species mixture and a twelve species mixtures) under grazing. They measured yields, nutritive value and how plant species persisted and it's all fascinating stuff (it helps, if you keep telling yourself that). There's more. Paul cries at a boat. Michael reveals his Joel Williams man-crush. And there's four jokes. Here are the links. First things first; a link to a biograph of Fridtof Nansen. There's loads of stuff about him on the interweb, but this one also gets you into The Polar Exploration Museum website (where the boat is). https://frammuseum.no/polar-history/explorers/fridtjof-nansen-1861-1930/ The main paper Shackleton, J., Boland, T.M., Kennedy, J., Grace, C., Beaucarne, G., Kirwan, S.F., Schmidt, O. and Sheridan, H., 2024. Annual and seasonal dry matter production, botanical species composition, and nutritive value of multispecies, permanent pasture, and perennial ryegrass swards managed under grazing. Grass and Forage Science, 79(4), pp.630-650. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/gfs.12691 This is the Dee et al (2023) paper about how diversity (species richness) affects yields in grasslands. It's probably behind a paywall, but essentially they look at previous studies, take confounding factors into account, and integrate the results to get to a conclusion, which is; "Contrary to many prior studies, we estimate that increases in plot-level species richness caused productivity to decline: a 10% increase in richness decreased productivity by 2.4%." Dee, L.E., Ferraro, P.J., Severen, C.N., Kimmel, K.A., Borer, E.T., Byrnes, J.E., Clark, A.T., Hautier, Y., Hector, A., Raynaud, X. and Reich, P.B., 2023. Clarifying the effect of biodiversity on productivity in natural ecosystems with longitudinal data and methods for causal inference. Nature Communications, 14(1), p.2607. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-37194-5 Here's the Raedts and Langworthy plantain paper. It's behind a paywall. Sometimes if you Google the title, you can find a free copy on the interweb somewhere. If not, go to the next one. Raedts, P. and Langworthy, A., 2018. Establishing plantain in spring in existing perennial ryegrass pastures in northern Tasmania. Animal Production Science, 60(1), pp.114-117. https://www.publish.csiro.au/AN/AN18575 This is the open access paper on establishing plantain. Bryant, R.H., Dodd, M.B., Moorhead, A.J., Edwards, P. and Pinxterhuis, I.J., 2019. Effectiveness of strategies used to establish plantain into existing pastures. Journal of New Zealand Grasslands, pp.131-138.  https://www.nzgajournal.org.nz/index.php/JoNZG/article/view/406/63

    1h 22m

  7. 06/26/2025

    Episode 1. Five billion, there's no snakes in Ireland and an upside down graph.

    Episode 1 dives into the science with an Irish research paper that looks at the yields of multi species pastures (along with the various different plant species that go into them) at several levels of Nitrogen (including zero). Which grasses work best in different systems? Why bother with Plantain and Chicory? Which plants drive yield?  There's some chat about ewes and Red Clover and there's a smell under the table. Link to the main paper Moloney et al, 2020.  http://archive.sciendo.com/IJAFR/ijafr.2020.59.issue-1/ijafr-2020-0002/ijafr-2020-0002.pdf Links to the other two Moloney papers in the trilogy. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27041764?seq=1 and https://www.jstor.org/stable/27041763 Link to the Egan et al 2025 paper on plantain hoovering up nitrate in the soil. This may be partially behind a paywall, but the key bits are available.  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167880924004948 Link to Mustonen et al 2014 which is the study on the effects of feeding red clover silage to ewes https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S175173111400161X?via%3Dihub Link to the Innovative Farmers trial on ewes and red clover. https://www.innovativefarmers.org/media/l00oqr1t/mating-sheep-on-red-clover-final-report.pdf Link to an early UK study into red clover and ewe fertility; Newton and Betts 1973. Still behind a pay wall, but you can see the abstract without paying.   https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-agricultural-science/article/abs/effects-of-red-clover-trifolium-pratense-var-redhead-white-clover-trifolium-repens-var-s-100-or-perennial-ryegrass-lolium-perenne-var-s-23-on-the-reproductive-performance-of-sheep/DBE300E13E0D8D81BF0B6D00ED9B3E90 Link to a review paper/report not mentioned in the podcast which is Marley et al 2011. This is an IBERS report. https://projectblue.blob.core.windows.net/media/Default/Research%20Papers/Beef%20&%20Lamb/effects_of_legumes_on_ewe_and_cow_fertility_review_-_final_report_20jul11.pdf

    1h 14m

  8. 06/26/2025

    The Prologue; contract work, wild animals and he knows who he is.

    Michael and Paul introduce themselves and explain why the world needs yet another farming podcast (it's a science podcast). There's bits about their farms, the other stuff they do and how science works and, for no obvious reason, a foray into the world of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi.    Here's the link to Frank B. 1885.  https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00572-004-0329-y Link to the original wood wide web paper https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-023-01986-1 and the recent paper that says more research is needed  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-023-01986-1 These two might be behind a pay wall, so here's a link to a recent review of the ecological functioning of mycorrhizal networks that is definately open access. https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2435.70063

    43 min
  • 8 Episodes

About

Welcome to this occasionally mildly interesting farming podcast (it's a science podcast), hosted by award winning podcaster Michael Blanche (200m swimming badge 1978) and not-yet-not-a-real-doctor Paul Allison. We talk about recent research into soil, pasture, cows and sheep. People say that it's the podcast they didn't know they wanted or needed, and they definitely didn't ask for it. It's sometimes a bit sweary (not the big one). It's fine. Cows and effect sounds like cause and effect. It's a play on words. That's funny stuff. Warning: Following legal advice the listener should be aware that the views and information shared in this podcast do not constitute professional advice or even unprofessional guidance. For God's sake consult someone who knows what they are talking about before making any changes to your farm management practices. Logo image created in https://BioRender.com

Information

  • Creator
    Paul Allison and Michael Blanche
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    8
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2025
  • Show Website
    Cows and Effect

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