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| Possibly because I didn't use glyphosate until a decade after its introduction, I didn't run into resistant weeds on my farm. Maybe always using a full rate, never skimping was a factor. I got better weed control with glyphosate and the soil got very nicely mellow after a few years of notill. The problem I had was it was hard to plant beans after a good corn year. I was using whole farm rotation (almost illegal under the current farm bill when figuring APH). The corn cover definitely protected the soil from heavy rain caused erosion as huge gullies could be found in the fully tilled fields all around the area. Gullies that took a bulldozer to allow getting the combine across the field. In 2008, my last crop year, I ended up planting beans in mid June because the heavy corn stover kept the ground wet and cold until then, and I still had to drive around wet patches. I had burned down mid May and with Prowl H2O applied a week later the weeds were all brown mid June. Mid July I found the lambs quarter up about 4" so sprayed again. I found patches I hadn't planted the first two tries bare and some that I had planted had drowned out. So I planted some short season beans figuring on at least a cover crop. At harvest the BBs were harder than the longer season beans, but probably didn't stay in the combine.
My tenant is strip till and so far in 8 years we've not had any erosion and the bare strips warm up and dry better allowing more timely planting in wet springs. I accept that as a workable compromise. My tenant uses a Soil Warrior for strip till. I think its better than full tillage and his crop yields in recent years have beat my best.
Any tillage takes horsepower, time, and fuel that you aren't suing with notill.
After my soil mellowed in notill, I didn't detect a time where I though any tillage was necessary.
Gerald J. | |
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from No-Till to Till: I want to learn....not defend or attack
