No Till Farming

BritChaser

BritChaser

Well-known member
No till farming is good for farmers but bad for pheasants. It is highly dependent on herbicide for "clean" weed-free fields when it's planting time. The absence of weeds in harvested fields, especially in wheat stubble, is drastically reducing bird habitat on the high plains. No till equipment is very rugged, enabling farmers to reduce and eliminate formerly unplanted rough spots that were used by pheasants for weather protection, nesting, and loafing. The idea of leaving terraces to waste as suggested by Pheasants Forever has not caught on. If it did, it would lead to many more pheasants, but deprive farmers of acreage.
 
No till is good in Iowa because it leaves corn stalks, corn, and cover from harvest until planting season. Weeds are nuked in tilled or no tilled around here.
 
No Till grain fields in my area of Washington is like Pheasant addict describes. By fall hunting there are green weeds growing in most of the fields. Admittedly the weeds are no means good for winter cover. They need trees and heavy bushes type covers around here to survive---Bob
 
Conventional farming also uses herbicides. Only difference is the fields are sprayed when the crop is 4-6 inches tall.
 
I've been reading alot of books this last year on sustainable agriculture and biological farming. I have come to this conclusion: Most farmers are farming from the top of ground up (meaning very little is done in way of taking care of soils in way of nuttrients, minerals, etc.). I cash rent a lot of acres on my farm and I can already see that the system my operator uses and my responsibilities as landowner and steward of the land are clashing (his system vs. my responsibilities).

I will say this about no-till though. I see alot of top soil blowing into the ditches in southern MN and I do not see it in South Dakota at least on my ground. Very little wind and soil erosion thanks to no-till. Conventional would be bad without adding windbreaks, etc.

Biological farming is vastly different. You put most of your energy into the soil level and below. Assumption is if you have balanced soils them everything else takes care of itself. Pests, weeds, yields can be managed by managing and balancing soils.

Most operators are setup for high speed "macro-farming". I'm seeing the value of going in opposite direction and micro-farming. Possibly even become organic certified.
 
The rate of herbicide application is dang near the same when you do no-till and conventional. No-till leaves a lot more corn and bean seeds on the surface for birds to eat than conventional does if they do fall tillage. I think we want to encourage No-till.
 
I try and have the farmer that rents ours wait and plow in the spring, I duck and goose hunt in my fields in the fall and don't like it when the fields are plowed up. It also makes it easier to run the dogs with the wheeler.
 
UGUIDE, I would like to see what your talking about become the future of farming. More about quality than quantitiy. Farmers and landowners being responsible stewards of the land. I hate driving around in Iowa and seeing the snow blackened by topsoil from disked up fields in the fall. Thousands of tons of topsoil and chemicals from the Midwest flow down the Mississippi River and deposit into area known as the DEAD ZONE.
 
I don't know if you people have seen or heard of this type of farming but I'll try. The farmers here run a 2-1 cycle. They will have 2 years of grain then 1 year of lentils or peas. Then they have one year of Fallow. Some will go 1 year grain then lentils and peas and then Fallow. It varies from farm to farm. I do know when they do some of their field operations, fall and spring they are spraying fertilizer to build up the ground. I do hope this gives some insight to our style of farming.---Bob
 
I have relatives that farm in SC Minnesota and asked them about whether No- Till was a option and they believe with the black soil that we have here, that the ground would not dry fast enough to allow them to till in the spring before planting, or that it would push back the planting date because the ground would dry slower if left untilled.

Anybody have any experience with that? I would think any step they could save in farming would save them money.
 
DennyJ said:
I have relatives that farm in SC Minnesota and asked them about whether No- Till was a option and they believe with the black soil that we have here, that the ground would not dry fast enough to allow them to till in the spring before planting, or that it would push back the planting date because the ground would dry slower if left untilled.

Anybody have any experience with that? I would think any step they could save in farming would save them money.
Click to expand...

It's true that no-till will not work in the heavier soils of MN, IA and even eastern SD. They have to work the ground in fall to allow for soil warmup in spring. A rough fall tillage in corn also allows water to aggregate the soil as it freezes and thaws all winter long. This is good.

Cover crops like lentils are another option to help dry out mosit heavy soils and also fix nutrients like nitrogen back into ground from atmosphere.
 
Last edited:
Crops such as soybeans do well with the no till. So far corn seed companies have not come up with a hybrid that performs well with no till. Corn plants require loosened soil for root development, nutrients and moisture.
 
I have always been of the mindset that the more we leave undisturbed, the better the balance in nature will be. The more we manipulate things the more we need to intervene with chemicals and genetics to try to restore the balance
 
Here in Ohio they do a lot of no til,and we have a lot of heavy clay soils.They plant corn right into last years bean stuble. As long as the soil is dry enough to close up the planting furrow it works very well.They do the opposite with beans into corn stalks. Traveling though Minnesota and Iowa I have seen them harvesting a crop and plowing the fields at the same time. This rich look soil always look like a good candidate for no til to me.:confused:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top