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NC IA | I've got an 8 r 900 with dry. I call it poor mans strip till. I'm 100% no-till, corn-soy rotation. I am using the stock double disc fertilizer openers. Will it get the fert in the ground 4" deep, no, maybe 2 at best but its in the ground and for the most part covered up. I run about 400# of product/acre in corn, and have it set about 3-4" to the side of the seed. I have to keep an eye on the fert opener units, they like to "creep" and a can move over to right in the row. That much fert is way too hot, I try to check placement about every field. Its a slow PITA, really slows down planting but this will be my 7th year of doing this and I am sticking with it because I like the results. I used to just hire coop to spread on top pre-plant. Now I have full control of my fertilizer and if I screw up its on me, but I have seen yields go up, especially the even-ness from one corner of the field to the other. It took out the lows and highs and evened them out while raising my averages. Corn I run the openers but beans I take them off and just drop if from the boxes, basically surface banding. Ive actually never tried leaving the openers on no-tilling beans, but I'm sure it wouldn't work with all the corn stalk trash. Beans don't care about placement as much anyway, and less N in the product to worry about losing. Now handling product, that is the hangup. I've been fortunate to have access to a tender truck most every season. For a few years I used an old grain-o-vator little auger wagon to tender the planter from the truck. Last year I deleted the tender wagon and built a big flexible bucket spout for the tender truck and filled the planter directly from the truck. That worked really well. But either way its a two-person operation filling the planter. Half-mile rows I'm filling every-other round. Its definately not for everybody, and I don't promote or persuade what I do, but it works for me and I like the results in my STO operation. Sorry for the long rambling post but to summarize its fun to take a piece of basically scrap iron (an old rusty cyclo) and raise as good or better crop than the BTOs with the lastest and greatest. | |
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IH Cyclo Planters Questions
