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NC Kansas | Cornstalks comments remind of a story I heard where an operation was tying no-till for the first time and had some side by side fields. After a rain the tilled ground was mucky and sloppy and they were making ruts and the no-tilled ground was firm and they were able to travel. A positive mindset toward no-till would make you think...hmm good soil structure will allow me to travel in wetter conditions. Their negative mindset was that the no-till ground "obviously" didn't hold near as much moisture as the tilled ground...therefor no-till was bad for water infiltration...therefore no-till was bad.
Now I'm in Kansas where warming the soil is not a problem, and we need to catch every drop or rain that falls. You are in a vastly different area/climate. I will speak to this, some of the nicest planting conditions we will have for corn is planting into wheat stubble, that had a cover crop that was grazed in the fall by our cow herd. I think your concerns are valid on will the ground dry out with all that residue...but also the cover crop will use some moisture up. | |
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Water infiltration notill vs chisel plowed?
