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| So what I've seen with long term no-till is reducing and even almost eliminating bad yield areas of a field. Sure, the treeline and wildlife still reduce, but the level of fertility and/or soil type aren't as big as influencers on yield as they used to be when more conventional tillage was used.
Yields become more consistent across the whole field regardless of soil types or soil test with no till imo. Not to say there isn't any variability, or an excessively dry growing season won't show differences across a variable field, just that the low and high yield areas of a field are much closer in range than they used to be, and in most "normal" years are not very significant or noticeable.
Was kinda funny when I was pulling out CRP trees to get it ready for a return to cropping, had a good friend who wanted to help, and he commented on how good the soil on the tree roots looked. He was right, it looked black, with great texture, but some of the good look was moisture from just recently being exposed. I said, well, let's look at it again in a week after it's dried out and has been oxidized by the sun for a while now that it's exposed on the surface. Sure enough, turned from looking like deep prairie soil to white chalk in about a week just like I thought it might. Btw, he found out real quick the constant up and down off the tractor pulling trees wasn't for him, lol, but it was great help for a while having 2 of us going at the same time.
I think no-till greatly reduces that oxidation so that lighter dirt can act more like richer soil in normal conditions. Oxidation obviously isn't all bad, as it can help in releasing nutrients while also warming the soil, which is why I think strip till ahead of corn is a pretty good compromise to try and get some of the benefits from both systems.
I think newer genetics, like aqua varieties of corn that help plants get thru drought periods have reduced the no till advantages during dry years compared to the advantages I saw during the 1980's with no till, and a farmer now doesn't necessarily need to go all the way to no till to get similar benefits during drought stress type years.
Edited by WIJDW 1/26/2026 10:44
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Priming the pump when converting CRP to crops
