We still have neighbors here that summerfallow half their farms every year and still seem to have enough money to have the big equipment, ten vehicles per person, and travel all the time. I'd say it'll be around for awhile yet.

 

Around here, Dad and I call it "recreational tillage"!

That's not to say we are zero-til, because we definitely aren't. Fall harrow behind the combines to spread straw. Then chisel plow puts down fert. Then straight into seeding in the spring. (Some fields will get a harrow pass to dry them up enough in the spring, but not all.)

There are very few conventional till farms "here" and very few zero-til farms "here", but a very high percentage doing fall fert banding. There are more that have tried zero-til and gone back to a more min til practice around here than there are currently zero-til. Our cold, wet spring clay soils really respond to a bit of blackening and airing out.

Andrew

 

Hello Madcow
Is this another one of those threads where the no till/zero till gurus are going to try & educate us poor, dumb, backwoods, hicks about how to farm????????????????????????????????????????? :sFun_DeadHorse:

To ALL the GURUS: Put your $ where your mouth is!!!! Bring your equipment to my part of the world & show me how it's done!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:imgres:
Cold & wet & more rain here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Looks like the second year in a row that I don't get a chance to put some soybeans in.:38: I guess that I'll be putting the corn planter back into the shed, after spending the last few day$ getting it ready too.:38:

(RANT OVER)

 

Hello Madcow
Is this another one of those threads where the no till/zero till gurus are going to try & educate us poor, dumb, backwoods, hicks about how to farm?????????????????????????????????????????: :sFun_DeadHorse: (Suppose to be the "Beating The Dead Horse" here????)

To ALL the GURUS: Put your $ where your mouth is!!!! Bring your equipment to my part of the world & show me how it's done!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:imgres:
Cold & wet & more rain here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Looks like the second year in a row that I don't get a chance to put some soybeans in.:38: I guess that I'll be putting the corn planter back into the shed, after spending the last few day$ getting it ready too.:38:

(RANT OVER)

I agree! What works in one area, doesn't work in another!

I'd venture to guess that the majority of Manitoba is using some type of tillage/fall fert to prep the ground (dry it out, warm it up, etc). And then running 10" or less row spacing in order to get weed competition.

Too bad that some of the SK drill manufacturers don't offer less than 10" spacing. (And the ones that do offer 10" will try everything they can think of to convince you that 12"+ is the only way to go!)

Andrew

P.S. I fixed your dead horse in my quote - put some spaces on each side of it

 

I think with cover crops and such we may see some improvement in these areas of extreme wet, my father in law is in the pot holes and deals with extreme wet, last year he cover cropped peas and radishes and is already seeing a huge improvement, the ground seems to manage its moisture better all on its own, wehave a lot to learn but I believe there is merit to this

 

I was actually thinking of spreading on radishes with valmar after our winterwheat will be harvested in fall, problem is I want to do some ditching after harvest in that field.

 

I was recently watching a slide show where guys planted radishes in the fall with their planters and in the spring used it as their strip till seeding directly where the radishes were, I found it very interesting and am thinking I may try that

 

I tried some radish's the other year, seeded sept. 1 and it was a wonderful fall. by the time winter came they didn't amount to anything.


hairy vetch was tiny in the fall but it survived winter and came back strong, seeded into it and then killed it off. lots of N there.




10 years ago in our area you couldn't pay someone to reduce tillage. most then where still on moldboard plows. 5 years ago everyone chisel plowed and a couple guys were trying some no till. this year a several more guys are trying it and a couple are full no till/strip till/rotational tillage.
the easy thing for us is that you can no till beans into corn stalks easy. but there are some guys that still do full tillage for beans for no yield gain and delayed planting.


in our area I think in 10 years full tillage on every acre for every crop will be the thing of the past.


the guys that don't want to change are going to almost be forced to change simply by the pocket book.

 

how long would the radishes to grow to be of any use, if i can seed them august 1st and what about loads of straw we are good at growing lots of straw that's for sure.
i'd like to try striptill for our corn but our acres are too small to invest towards it.

 

Yes it will be different in every corner of the world. But in many places where the top soil is still quite young and has some depth to it, tillage will remain active until the top soil is in such condition that it requires conservation.

In my area, temps are very mild as a norm, and we have a lot of trouble with insects and ground rodents that laws limit our abilities to control. Some tillage still has to take place to incorporate some of the legal pesticides to deal with the insects, and deeper tillage is required when rodents get out of control.

I try as best I can to reduce my tillage needs. I have had some great success, and some very expensive failures. But I keep trying. Equipment is a limitation for many areas yet. Not enough manufacturers left with enough diversity to build eq for more soil and climates types. In the UK and western Europe, they have many dozens of manufacturers each offering different advantages that work better in areas than others.

Also rotations can be limited in some areas. For example, I can not grow canola. It is the law. Years ago, a group of people got together and lobbied to protect certain seeds from pollen contamination. They got it passed and certain crops can not be grown inside that boundary. Thing is, I am at the outside edge of the boundary, so I cant get any of the seed contracts, nor can I grow canola.

But,............I can grow, at least for now, the coveted tillage radish for seed as a rotation.

 

Yes it will be different in every corner of the world. But in many places where the top soil is still quite young and has some depth to it, tillage will remain active until the top soil is in such condition that it requires conservation.

When I see what wind and water erosion does to long term tilled fields I wonder how anybody can justify it. How much is a cm of A horizon worth? An inch? 6 inches? 2 feet? The color changes as subsoil is mixed with topsoil and subsoil is mixed with parent material. It is not something anyone notices on a year to year progression but compare tilled soils separated by 40 years and you can really see differences.

There is a grad student at NDSU studying the horizon thicknesses at sample sites used in the early soil surveys and going back to the same sites now and measuring the differences. I had some preliminary data here somewhere. I'll have to try find that.

People do what they have to do to get the crop in. My hope is that we can find alternate cropping systems that more perfectly fit specific locations. Shift the focus from short term "mining" to long term productivity and efficiency. For example perennial grain cash crops for cold wet soils.

 

Went to no till in 1993 after our dad died in 91 and had to have a second oil patch job.. The year he passed away we had a total 23 inches of rain and much of it was in the fourm of terrancial down pours.. We were 50/50 then and had ruts over four feet deep in many quarters losing precious top soil to your lower neighbours.. But also received some from our higher neighbours fields as well..We cultivated the dirt black and had close to 8 passes on our summer fallow each year after to control weeds

We had a severe hail storm in July 93 that wrote crops off, but we had a few fields that came back from growing a crop, then had to grow a second and did low 20bu/ac yeilds that were over 50 percent of our normal yeilds

From that year on I had decided to seed everything and Was the only guy to do so in our area, told many times it could not work and some were very strong minded about that, but I had a good oil patch job to rely on, and the farm was somewhat a exsperment

Had purchased a new low disturbance drill, and started to put on 70 lbs of actual n on stubble and rotate crops like peas and canola that were also new to our area..and had some wrecks on learning the ins and outs.. My fields were often discussed at the coffie shop..We also have had a few wrecks were moisture has been short and been written off before July.. But then finding out that the summer fallow was not much better in yeilds... And again been told i was just lucky..

But now with over twenty years of no till.. My cultivator is still never been touched with a few trees growing threw the middle, swathers all sold and becoming distant memories of what we use to do..

Our ground is some of the dryer land of the parie provinces and chem fallow was a big part of conserving the moisture when it first came out

But as of lately we are down to only a few old timers left that are sticking to there 50/50 rotation and two of them have swaped there rented land over to continuos no till as well.. We have went From all acres being 50/50 in early 90s to less than 10 percent now... The years of changing cultivator shovels twice a season are over..

As for yeilds, we can still have wrecks like could happen this year, but with average moisture we are growing stronger yeilds by a margin over our 50/50 days and doing it on all acres.. And on good moisture years are almost doubling our numbers

No till is a big change over its predecessor and like some have mentioned that it does not work with their climate.. But for us the cultivator or discor was more our enemy than protector.. But back then is all we had to use to control weeds

Biggest benefits of no till is moisture conservation for us and a one pass operation sure cuts back on exspenses, and much less rocks in the fall to pick, our fields are not eroding and soak in the heavy down pours with ease.. Our standing water holes have disappeared and overall a much healthier happier field.. The 50/50 was also alkaline best Freind..

what I have found..

 

We have been no till for quite a few years as well but we are starting to feel that some sort of tillage is going to be needed. There's to much trash causing cold ground in spring and ruts from previous wet years that need to be smoothed out. Now it's the driest it's been here since probably 02 and yes the trash probably has saved some moisture but crop also did not germinate in lots of areas from cold soil. Now those heavy trash areas have dried out as well. We have been dragging a vertical tillage unit around for 2 falls now but it's not quite adequate. Compound the issue with a low disturbance disk drill and it s not pretty. Tillage will work for some but not for others.

I sprayed some corn for a neighbour that was seeded into summer fallow the other day. I was quite young in the summer fallow era and do not remember it very well but after seeing the dust and lack of topsoil on the ridges that is not something I will get in line to try

 

Zero till is less and less here in central alberta. I like to go over the land once with spikes in the fall and then harrow and then seed the next spring.

 

I would argue that tillage practices move in a cycle just like the weather throughout most of prairies. In small part of part of central AB we are in you would have had to have looked hard to find a field that was not worked last Fall(forage exception) - that trend been in place over last 5-6 years where it has been quite wet. The way the spring was this yr(dry and windy) we could have been zero till and would have worked fine(although I would still say that heavy harrows needed) - likely will see less fields worked this fall if dry,windy trend continues. I do think the reduced tillage option on the AFSC worksheet captures it best. This is less than 3 tillage passes and would say everybody is in this area falls into that category. Would have been significantly different even 15years ago. The key is how you react or can react to changes in weather pattern. It is much harder for big operators to re-gear/change practices and adopt to the "wet" part of the cycle so as farms have become much bigger that part of the cycle becomes bigger issue.

 

I can buy a few tillage tools for the price of a new air-drill so expenses isn't a reason to switch. I no-till or minimum till due to a lack of labor. My main help is 71 years old and doesn't like to work long hard hours. I would found someone else but that is getting hard to do. With less tillage I can go over more ground with less iron and help.

 

When people say "it's too wet" I think too wet for what? It can easily be too wet for 80ft drills with 900bu carts. I think the bigger problem is it can be too wet for our cropping systems with annuals. Is the pasture ever too cold and wet? We are limited by the annual cropping system.

In notill we emulate the natural system in many ways then complain when it becomes cold and wet. Hay and pasture loves wet. At some point annuals are no longer the "best fit" for the system. In nature we see annual plants primarily in the early stages of ecosystem succession. Generally following disturbance. Annuals do well following disturbance (cultivation). The scab covering the wound so to speak. What covered the prairie under nature's management? Perennials. They are the best fit and make up the bulk of the later succession stages.

There are people working on perennial grain crops. They will not be able to yield like our annual crops that have been selected for yield for several thousand years. So I think we will see a rotation with annuals and perennials to maximize returns. Hay is a nice option as well as long as you have a close buyer or can use it yourself.

 

I really enjoy reading these no-till threads as an education on the practice. I know very little about it because it is simply not practiced around here for miles (southern MB). We are fortunate to farm in a fairly productive part of the prairies, with many very progressive farmers who do and try anything to increase production, but most all come back to conventional tillage.
The goal is to try and get things as black as possible without drying it out or leaving it prone to wind erosion. Because blacker equals, more heat, fewer bugs, fewer weeds which result in MUCH higher yields.
Perennial grasses and forages are grown here. But the trash afterward is typically managed with a lighter, so i can't see it improving the organic matter that much.
I have no doubt no-till is the best fit for your areas. Every area is different.

 

The thing that interests me most about your post, is that southern MB has such a much warmer climate and earlier start than most of the rest of us have. So I am curious when people in areas who are warm and much earlier seeding, state they need to warm the soil, etc.

When the first guy here started no till, everyone else said it could not be done. Too cold, too wet. The only guy who uses tillage, is a neighbor with more money than brains, and he always says "the soil needs air, and it needs to be warmed up and dried out". Well, the rest of us grow as good or better crops as he does, using zero tillage.

We get red river rainfall, with MUCH cooler days, over here, and an early start for us would be the first week in May.

Not saying you are wrong, not at all, just curious how the need for warm soil and blackened soil is so needed in an area blessed with MUCH better climate for growing crops?

 

I am also in southern MB but a little further west. The popular trend define fly cycles around here. 5 years ago 90% was zero/ min till. By min till I mean knife in nh3 in fall. Last couple years had seen a lot of panic tillage in fall.
We have been min till since 93 and zero till since 2009. Despite being nearly the only ones in the neighbourhood not to open up the ground in fall, we were defenatly one of the first out seeding this spring. I think a diverse crop rotation helps. Tap root of alfalfa and hemp to open up subsoil. Late season moisture uptake and dry spring surface of soybean stubble.
I see field tilled black for beans or canola or corn or I don't know why. Every spring we get 1 or 2 crazy windy days and you can pick out these fields from miles away. Giving away topsoil. Not saying this has never happened to me. Harrow canola stubble at wrong time in spring, but I do everything I can to avoid it.
North of me there is rolling land that was burnt and tilled in fall. All the hilltops, of which there are quite a lot, are yellow clay with nothing left to grow a crop. Hardly any wheat growing on them. Really!!!

 

Still lots of tillage done in our area, but the tillage passes and tools have changed over the years. The old moldboard plow now just gets used to level out tile line trenches after they settle. The soil in this area is a fine clay-loam and can compact to become very hard. I think for no-till to be successful long term in this area would take a better crop rotation than the corn/soybean flip and use a cover crop (like tillage radish) to help keep the soil loose. We don't currently have a planter or drill that would reliably seed into no-till conditions but have hired someone to no-till in some soybeans on a corn field that didn't get worked the past year (this was a few years back already) it worked ok but he went a little fast and didn't get as good of a stand.


The main goal I have is reducing the amount of tillage done, most of the time its 1 primary pass in the fall and 1 or 2 passes in the spring to level out the soil but would like to try some cover cropping to either get it down to 1 spring pass or none at all and not have to do a primary pass in the fall. One field currently has some winter rye in a big chunk of it that will get cut for baleage in a couple days and then get soybeans planted, should be interesting to see how that ground is.

 

If we were to till again and it were to stop raining we would be dead in the water. Our topsoil would go to Manitoba. If we are too wet a couple low areas wouldn't get seeded. With kids and cows I don't think I'd have the time to till. Perennial crops are a good fit to improve soil structure and moisture holding capacity. I tried some tillage radish last year for compaction and because summer fallow doesn't do much. It seemed to help. I hope my earthworms don't dry out this year.

 

this is my first year of true no till corn and soybeans. after planting now I can see things I need to improve and I can understand why a lot of people try no till but never give it a second chance. the soybeans there is no reason to ever use tillage again. but the corn into corn there is uneven seed depth, uneven emergence, where the row cleaner got down to dirt vs where it rode up on the residue there is 1-2 growth stages difference. more field loss of seeds from increased bug life, some pinch residue in furrow , residue preventing plants from coming up.


corn into soybean residue is hard to tell the difference between that corn and tilled ground. some random spots where the trash whips could have been more aggressive.


its a learning curve. next year maybe I will introduce strip till for the corn on corn or maybe all the corn or just get more aggressive with the trash whips?!!


even with the challenges I am facing and the neighbor hood saying it cant be done for the revenue per acre I don't see going back to full on conventional tillage.

 

Been here for over 100 years, I suspect it will stay as long as permitted. My soil tests say my OM and PH are right where they are supposed to be, no wind erosion, and only water erosion happens when we get cloud bursts and then it doesn't matter, 30 year old CRP will wash ditches.

 

had a couple guys tell me no till wont work here. had the agronomist from pioneer out looking at there test plot on my farm and she said my no till corn looks in the mix of all other local corn. this fall we will see.


but I also run less over all fertility then a lot of guys in our area, I was doing some math in my head. compared to where I was a couple years ago I am applying
50 lbs less urea,
25 lbs less ams,
60 lbs less P
60 lbs less K. that's about 100 dollars and acre in savings, also the saving of 50 dollars and acre for tillage. I guess I can afford to be down 10-20 bu. from MY average, I don't care about the neighbors average.

 

It does no good to apply excess either. In biologically active and healthy soil, many nutrients are held from leeching better and many others are made and kept available to the plants for a longer period of time, reducing the needs for "banking" of nutrients.

In my area, soil tests come back very high in P. But 99% of it is locked up solid and of no value. Yet, in my longer term no-till fields, the tissue samples come back showing sufficient P. Conventional fields, deficient. Why?

 

It also depends on if you are using manure, since ours is dry beef cattle manure it needs to get mixed into the soil somehow or many of the nutrients will wash away. With liquid manure it would be possible to inject it in with some sort of knife or coulter type applicator but the way our operation works its dry. I don't need much P and K either, probably not much S as well but that's because most of our fields have been built up with the manure over several years.

 

sorry didn't mean to repeat myself.


I cut back by going to banding and better timing of application vs broadcasting.


I also cut back since soil test's show we are high and we don't get a crop response to fertilizing on high fertility soils.

 

there is a lot about P and K that we don't know. but we know that its availability from applied and whats in the ground is very low percentage. that is why we went to banding next to row at reduced rates vs broadcasting to get the same yield.

 

I didn't know it untill back than that chloride is a very important, it is very mobil, even more than nitrogen and problems can really show up on sandy hills when wet