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S.E. Iowa | Just a little comment on a field being lower on one side than the other. I have a farm bought 36 years ago on my side of the fence it is at least a foot to 3 feet higher my side than the nieghbors. Was that way then and maybe even more so now. The thing is my side has been mow board plowed, minimum tilled. no tilled, been a hay field corn ground with soybean rotation, there side has been seeded down to pasture and had cows on it for 40 years. The reason mine is in better condition has nothing to do with tillage types but rather the method, and the fact that sometime in the late 50s or early sixties the farm was parallel terraced and contour farmed. Both parallel terraces and contour planting have been pretty much ignore in the last 20 years as equipment has gotten bigger and speed of planting and harvest have taken on more importance than conserving the land. The thing about soil is that it it both alive and fluid, and as such there is not now or ever been a single way to work with it. It takes a combination of practices and that might mean turning it black every once in a while | |
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Why didnt I go away from notill sooner?
