Re: No Till discussion

Posted by fixerupper on November 24, 2016 at 16:55:52 from (100.42.83.79):

In Reply to: No Till discussion posted by Dave from central MN on November 22, 2016 at 12:39:57:

I have been 100 percent no till beans into corn stalks for the past two years but I played with it for several years prior. The jury is still out but so far my yields have matched the neighbor's yields in tilled soil. Hybrid selection and planting dates and fertility can have an affect though so my comparisons with the neighbors aren't apples to apples.

The one difference I see in no-tilling compared to planting into tilled ground is in no till you have to get off that tractor more often to check out the job the planter is doing. You are adjusting depth more often and messing with the row cleaner depth more often if you want to do a good consistent job of seed placement. My row cleaners are the kind that have the pin going through holes for depth adjustment so I have to sit down on my butt and hold the row cleaner up while I am messing with the pin. This arrangement will be changed this winter!! I have a neighbor who has tried no-till off and on without good results with his stand but he is the kind of guy who is more interested in getting more acres planted per day then anyone else. Someone with that mentality will never be a good no-tiller. Another thing that can affect your stand with no-till is traffic in your field. If you are baling stalks and hauling manure, even in the fall, you will have more trouble getting consistent planting depth the next spring. You want as many stalks standing up as you can get. Stalks flattened and laying horizontal by wheel traffic are harder for the trash whippers to push aside.

My planter is a plain old Deere 7200 vac wing fold with shark tooth row cleaners but nothing else is changed on the planter so far. Next year it will have heavier adjustable down pressure springs for a little better penetration and depth control. I am not going with the fancy air bags though I do have the monitor to control them if I choose to go that route. Bags are too expensive for my acres in my opinion. One problem I did have was the row cleaners lifting the units, affecting the planting depth so I couldn't have the row cleaners down as far as I wanted them to be. Next year will be different in that aspect.

Last spring my beans did not grow as fast as the neighbor's beans that were planted in blacker tilled soil because they were in cooler soil. I was seriously thinking about giving up no-till for awhile back in June but in July they took off and made up for lost time, giving me a little more confidence in trying it again.

The type of row cleaner you use might depend on the type of soil on your farm. The Shark Tooth row cleaners on my planter came off the planter of a farmer who did not like them. He has heavier soil and I think these cleaners lifted the planter more than straight finger cleaners. Also, shark tooth cleaners tend to mud up more in wet spots.

So, if you are the kind of person who doesn't mind fussing with details no-till might work for you. The money I am spending setting up my planter for better no-till performance is less than the cost of working the ground two or three times prior to planting and once the planter is setup, maintenance expense is all that's needed. Like I said before I'm not completely confident in no-tilling yet but I'm not ready to give up.

My neighbor across the fence no-tilled corn into corn stubble last spring and did a very good job. His seed placement was very good. He has a newer Kinze planter with more down pressure and he is just plain good at setting a planter. I don't know if A MInnesota farmer would want to try no-tilling corn into corn stalks though. Minnesota is a farther north and has cooler soil in the spring.

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