EC MN - Hour North of 'The Cities' | Brian,
Very good observations and comparisons, but your post seemed to be pertaining to 'nature' and how things could mimic a forest or other similar ecosystem. I will vouch for enhanced soil structure in one-pass seeding, and its low cost, but definitely not its profit potential in cooler/damper climates.
If I HAD to blow money away, I would probably try many things that seem impractical today, to see if it MIGHT get me more profit (i.e. interseeded cover crops), but unfortunately I don't have that privelege. One wrong move in today's ag and you'll need a string of right moves to get back to where you need to be.
Some extracted quotes from your post:
"We are seeing that if we don't mess with mother nature we are rewarded with healthier crops."
We get paid for our production, not if we can make Momma Nature happy. What universities have done research on this matter, and how do they go about rating a healthy crop? I have usually heard from most universities to 'bury residue' to reduce the chance for disease pressure, which one is correct?
"I know this is getting too long, but, I want to finish by pointing out how this can all come together so that everyone wins. The more closely you can farm in a way that doesn't fool with mother nature, the better your crops will be, the more profit you will make and the more healthy our environment will be."
If I didn't 'fool' with Mother Nature, then I probably wouldn't have suitable soils to plant into and wouldn't get to plant corn until Mid to late May, and I might get my beans in by the 4th of July. So instead of being able to grow a 95 day corn and a 1.5 bean, I now get to grow an 85 day corn and maybe an 0.8 bean on the high end. If the crop was direct seeded, probably wouldn't see it come out of the ground until a week later than something tilled. Not unusual to have a killing frost in Mid-September, so my late planted crops didn't quite get to maturity and now I get to buy extra propane to dry my high moisture (immature), low yielding (unable to incorporate fertilizers if direct seeding, so lost all of my N when it didn't rain the Urea into the soil), low test weight corn, and I should probably find out how do deal with my green soybeans that the frost nipped, and assign some propane gallons to the beans to dry as well.
So, if we don't fool with Mother Nature, why does she not return the favor? If I would have spent some fuel on spring tillage, I could have upped my production, spent less on propane, and put more moeny in my pocket at the end of the day instead of breaking my piggy bank to pay the excessive LP bills.
I understand that in an ideal world, we wouldn't have to disturb soil and use exfessive amounts of fuel in the spring and fall, but too bad we live in a REAL world.
The answer is not to deep rip everything down to 24", but it also isn't to only direct seed and plant cover crops in the summer. It won't be the same for a farmer in SC Pennsylvania as it would in Central Minnesota, or even into the Dryland Great Plains, or any given location across the 'I' states.
Trying to show the other side of the coin, but still willing to peek at the flip-side to see how some things can be utilized in our area.
Lance |
The no till debate - A different perspective
