— Barry Bonner, for John Roulac
A short follow-up to our conversation: what we are working with, what the data shows, and where it could be useful to you.
Ray put us together and I am glad he did. You were direct with me that the microbial category has burned people with overpromises, and that you have landed on biostimulants because they are working for you. I took that seriously, so I will keep this brief and always honest. Since we have just spoken, this is a recap rather than a pitch, here is what we are doing and where I think it could be useful to you.
The microbes are in year two. I am not going to present them as more finished than they are, and after our conversation I have strengthened how we prove them, which is the first thing worth telling you.
You are right that too many products in this category claim organisms that are simply not there when you test the jug. My answer is not to ask you to trust a label, or to trust only my own bench. We run our own genomics analysis on every trial, and after our call I am adding independent third-party testing through Regen Ag Labs, the route you pointed me to. We cover the cost of both.
We put the consortium on a strip next to a control and measure both before planting and after harvest, our own genomics alongside the independent lab, including the available nitrogen going in and the fungal-to-bacterial shift afterwards. Then we let the data decide. If it does not hold up, it does not hold up. That is the only way this category earns back trust, and it is the only way I am willing to build it.
The formulation science behind this is Aster Bio, the firm called in for petrochemical bioremediation of soil and water and part of the Deepwater Horizon response, with thirty-seven years building microbial consortia. Agriculture was never their lane, so I built RAD Microbes around it. We own the agricultural IP and set the direction; they bring the science. It gives us decades of formulation depth on day one, an independent agricultural mission on top, and now both our own genomics and independent third-party verification of the results in the field.
I will give you this as it is, including the flaw. We ran a simple corn trial across two neighbouring North Texas farms, two acres each. The treated plots had no synthetic fertilizer, only residual fertility from the prior season; the control ran its normal NPK at $420 per acre. Yield came back identical, with a visibly healthier rhizosphere on the treated roots. The two farms were neighbours, so I treat it as an early signal, not a proof, which is exactly why the next round runs through both our own genomics and the independent lab.
Our current activity is focused purely on our liquid Bacillus megaterium consortium: five species, with Bacillus megaterium as the main structure, Bacillus licheniformis alongside it, and species drawn from arid environments selected for water retention and heat tolerance. It costs us roughly $5.30 to make the one litre that treats an acre. I am deliberately not building a broad-spectrum, kitchen-sink product, because if you throw everything in at once you cannot attribute a result to an organism. We characterise and prove one block before we add anything to it. What follows is what each does, and the peer-reviewed literature behind the genera.
The value of a defined consortium over a single strain is functional coverage with attribution: phosphorus and root development from B. megaterium, organic-matter turnover from B. licheniformis, and water and heat resilience from the arid-adapted EPS producers, each measurable on its own before the next layer is added.
I heard you on hemp. You gave it twenty years and let it go, and I am not going to argue the cash-crop case with someone who has lived it. Where hemp earns its place in our work is narrower and, I think, more defensible: as a remediation rotation, and as a feedstock for a soil-input product via Panda Biotech’s byproduct dust, with real potential for PFAS removal. Not a fibre fortune, a tool for the soil.
These are our trials to run. What I am asking from you are the introductions you mentioned, not work. Where you open a door, we bring the microbes, run the trial alongside the farmer, and cover the inputs and the analytics, our own genomics analysis and the independent lab you suggested. Here is what I took from the call.
You spoke about two friends carrying cancer. Your friend who has been at it three years, doing the alternative work and meditating but still in real discomfort, does not need a trial, he can come straight into the program. Separate from the microbes, through my telehealth practice I formulate phytocannabinoid preparations for specific conditions rather than off-the-shelf wellness products, working with around eleven phytocannabinoids and their acidic precursors, not CBD alone. For rectal cancer I know exactly which of my formulations applies.
The simplest next step is the one Ray used for us: send a three-way text and I will reach out directly, quietly and properly. Text me your email and I will send some reading first. No expectation attached, and entirely apart from the agricultural work.
[1] Phosphate-solubilising Bacillus megaterium mj1212 regulates endogenous plant carbohydrate and amino-acid contents to promote mustard plant growth. (2014). PMC4186932.
[2] López-Bucio J., Campos-Cuevas J.C., Hernández-Calderón E., et al. Bacillus megaterium rhizobacteria promote growth and alter root-system architecture through an auxin- and ethylene-independent signalling mechanism in Arabidopsis thaliana. Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions 20(2):207–217 (2007). doi:10.1094/MPMI-20-2-0207.
[3] Plant growth-promoting rhizobacterium Bacillus megaterium modulates the expression of antioxidant-related and drought-responsive genes to protect rice (Oryza sativa L.) from drought. Frontiers in Microbiology 15:1430546 (2024). doi:10.3389/fmicb.2024.1430546.
[4] Evaluating the potential of Bacillus licheniformis YZCUO202005 isolated from lichens in maize growth promotion and biocontrol. Heliyon (2023).
[5] Bacillus licheniformis YB06: a rhizosphere genome-wide and plant growth-promoting analysis of a PGPR isolated from Codonopsis pilosula. (2024). PMC11433706.
[6] Exopolysaccharide-producing rhizobacteria and their impact on the growth and drought tolerance of wheat grown under rainfed conditions. PLOS One (2019). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0222302.
[7] Bacterial exopolysaccharides: insight into their role in plant abiotic-stress tolerance. (2022). PMC9706007.
These references support the documented functions of the genera in our consortium; they are not claims specific to our proprietary strains, whose performance we are validating directly in the field through independent and in-house analysis.