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southern MN | Nice pics, always enjoy your stuff.
So, organic notill. I've been scratching my head, you and others have been mentioning that for a couple years now. The pictures look great!
How is the weed control achieved?
I remember back years ago dad was close to organic, but it was because he was too cheap to buy a sprayer or hire chemicals applied. I won't say his deal was a good organic program but just saying I recall working on ground that didnt get herbicides......
Perennials were horrible. I just don't understand how you control Canadian thistles and others in organic notill?
Giant ragweed in heavy soils was terrible, as were sow (milk, soft annual?) thistles. Grasses - pigeon grasses they were called back then - come up like a sod... I understand rye suppresses some sprouting, but we grew rye back then too, it wasn't a perfect suppression. Less than perfect on these high seed producing weeds and you still get a huge patch of weed seeds to deal with for years.
Are these test fields hand weeded, or what is the weed control program? If you start with clean ground and really stay on top of it things can go along for a while and look pretty good.
But some year something breaks out, rain keeps one from weeding, and a seed bank shows itself.
What does control the weeds in a notill organic operation? You can't use herbicides, and you can't use a cultivator, technically a hoe is tillage but I'd give a pass on that.
What does keep the weeds at bay? Farming is about putting out the fires that break out, with herbicides and tillage both off the table, how does organic notill deal with the weed outbreaks?
Paul
Edited by paul the original 7/18/2016 10:01
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WIU Organic Research Farm pics
