This has been a difficult spring in Illinois and other areas. I think maybe more trying for folks in IL because they are just not used to still be planting corn (for the first time) at the end of May!

I delivered a 6 row mounted strip till unit near Dixon IL on Friday. This is an area of very good heavy soils and good yields. This was corn on corn. The customer is just making strips this spring, not applying fertilizer. We were on an older Case tractor as you can see.

This is an area of particular interest because in these heavy black soils there are some folks who feel that strip till just will not work in cornstalks. And this ground is REALLY wet especially underneath. 

As time was limiting I did not take a lot of pictures but did take a few and some video with my still camera. We made a couple passes to try to find the best settings for this condition.

Here is 1 mb video which is probably not suited for dial up. It was interesting to see how we could change the strip with a few adjustments.

Here also is one of the few still pictures I took. This is in long term continuous corn ground.

Jim at Dawn

(Dawn Strip Till W ILL C on C Hvy Wet Soil 052209_IMG_0584.JPG)

Dawn Strip Till W ILL C on C Hvy Wet Soil 052209_IMG_0584.JPG (107KB - 124 downloads)