Ducks and rice typically go together only on a plate in restaurants, but a rice farmer in Japan has revolutionized the way farmers are thinking about this combination.

Takao Furuno, a Japanese farmer, will talk to faculty and students about his method of farming that uses ducks to control pests and weeds and to fertilize his rice paddies, said Laura Miller, communication specialist for the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture, which is hosting Furuno’s visit.

“Our director read about it in a magazine and was fascinated that you could increase yields without fertilizer input,” she said.

An estimated 10,000 farmers use Furuno’s system in Japan, which he has presented in India, China and Vietnam. Furuno has published some of his innovations in a book titled “The Power of Duck.”

“[Furuno] is really interested in sharing his ideas with other farmers,” Miller said.

Questions during the seminar will be mediated by Michael Bell, associate professor of agricultural sociology, who visited South Korea two years ago and was able to see the farming process in action.

“The ducks pick off the bugs and the weeds and they don’t eat the rice,” he said.

They also fertilize the rice with their droppings, and the ducks are taken out before the rice begins to fruit, he said.

“After you take them out, you have duck dinner,” he said.

The method is hailed as innovative because Furuno took a problem – weeds and pests – and turned it into a solution, Bell said.

“It’s a really wonderful way of maximizing ecological productivity because you are squeezing in two crops where you just had one before,” he said.

U.S. agriculture experts are interested in any ways to adopt the method to Western practices, Bell said.

“This innovation didn’t come from a researcher at a university, but came from a farmer . I think this validates that researchers aren’t the only ones with great ideas,” he said.

“A Conversation with Takao Furuno” will be from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 5 in Room 3140, Agronomy Hall, followed by a seminar presented by Furuno, “One Bird, Ten Thousand Treasures,” at 4 p.m. in Room 2050, Agronomy Hall.