|
Eastern Iowa | No-till can work virtually anywhere, particularly today with the ability to control where wheel tracks are, etc, in reducing compaction risk.
That said, we utilize a hybrid system, no-tilling two years out of three, and using minimum till procedures to maintain 80+ % ground cover in year three, primarily due to a DNR requirement to incorporate our manure.
In a push for higher yields, farmers are going to do whatever they can to get soils warmed up and dry, and a crop up out of the ground as quickly as possible. But when factoring in fuel, time, and equipment expense it may not add any to their bottom line. Coffee shop talk always center on what a field yields, not what it nets. I think a lot of the increased tillage of recent years has more to do with residue management than anything else. These stalks just don't decay in six months under any conditions. | |
|
Tell me why we need to till
