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I live in Minnesota where we get lots of snow, real cold, a short growing season, deep heavy clay soils, lots of spring cold rain. For about 40 miles around me, we do as much fall tillage as possible. Just can't get anything to come up in the cold wet spring if we don't. Need the sun to warm & dry the dark ground in the spring, when the frost is 4' deep.... Many other locations are going to notill. If it works in your area, that would be great. See what the neighbors are doing. See what works for them. Ask the local extension office & such, what works in your local area. Hard to say over such long distances. I would look for a renter now for the 60-70 acres, and let them deal with it as they want - some will leave it, some will want it tilled, some will want to get fertilizer down now. Perhaps they will offer a bit less if they have to do the fall work, but I'll bet, if land competition is as heavy there as here, you will get top dollar by getting someone lined up now, and not touch the land yourself. Then you can concentrate on you pasture. Here we would plow it now, field cultivate in spring, fertilize, harrow/pack/some way of smoothing the ground, seed it, and harrow/pack it. Typically corn ground esp is uneven with the washboard rows, you want to work it up hard & smooth it out with several passes of a field cultivator & harrow to make it like a tabletop. You want this done when the ground is fairly dry in spring so it doesn't compact, but you want it quite firm for grass/alfalfa/clover seeds. Lime is not needed where I live, but a pasture in many areas needs lots of lime, I would look into that & get it spread this fall, lime takes a while to activate, sooner is better on that! Will make all the other fertilizers work better. You can also put P & K down now if you need it. N sometimes wanders off if you put it on too early, might want to wait until spring for that. --->Paul
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