280. Pushing the Plant: Propagation, Protocols, and Grower Collaboration w/ Rachel Warner

In this episode of CropTalk, we sit down with Rachael Warner, head grower at Planteva, a vertical propagation company in Canada delivering clean, pest-free starts for leafy greens and strawberries. Rachael holds a master's in plant science with a controlled environment focus and has worked across small, medium, and large-scale facilities before taking on the role of building Planteva's production protocols from the ground up. We walk through what protocol development actually looks like when your job is to push a plant as hard as possible without breaking it, and how running a plant past its delivery window by just 24 hours can take you right to the edge of tip burn. We cover the clean start problem the industry has with strawberries, what it means to give growers a genuine stamp of approval on plant health, and why that responsibility sits entirely with the propagator when something goes wrong. We get into grower-to-grower collaboration as a collective protection mechanism, why word of mouth is still the most reliable filter for evaluating new technology, and what happens to an industry where operators keep reinventing the same wheel in isolation. Rachael also shares her take on where high-tech propagation fits into the broader CEA supply chain and where she sees the model going as the push for local production accelerates.