Let’s head out to Moundridge, Kan., now where 2025 Strip-Till Innovator Ray Flickner shows us how his corn’s holding up in dry conditions.

“We have a living root growing throughout the year. We get 3 crops (corn, wheat, soybeans) out of 2 years. Basically, everything has a crop growing with the exception between soybeans and corn. The challenge I’ve had is, I’ve experimented, and I haven’t found the answer, is to what kind of cover crop arrangement should I be using before I plant corn.”  

“If we dig here in the strips, it’s really mellow. We’ve got good moisture and we’re behind on moisture level by about 10-12 inches for the year. We did have an inch of rain about 10 days ago. That strip held the moisture and got a good stand.”  

“The challenge is, trying to make sure the planter stays on the strips. This particular field here was planted with a 24-row John Deere planter, and he did a good job with that one. I’ve got another field where I had one of my neighbors plant with a 16-row, 3-point mount, and you can tell he had a hard time keeping it on guidance with the strips. I had that experience with my 8-row planter. Unless you have a lot of weight on the front end and a lot of tires, it will pull you around pretty good. You’ll end up fighting the strip-till. That is something one has to worry about when you go to strip-tillage, how do you maintain the planter on top of strips.”   

Looking forward to learning more about Ray’s system at the 2025 National Strip-Tillage Conference, which you can sign up for now at StripTillConference.com.

Watch the full version of this episode of Conservation Ag Update.