Thirty-year-old Wade Yingling and his father, Bruce, run a corn-soybean rotation on several different, highly erodible soil types across 2,300 acres in Mt. Sterling, Ill. 

Looking to save their soil and get more bang for the buck with inputs, Wade convinced Bruce to give strip-till a shot 5 years ago.

While most of the Yinglings’ acres are under a simple 50-50 corn-soybean rotation, they grow continuous corn on about 300 acres, which presents a different set of challenges.

“The biggest challenge is sizing residue and making sure it breaks down through the fall,” Yingling says. “We run the Accelerator through it in the fall before running the strip-till anhydrous bar. We also have Yetter Stalk Devastators on our corn head, which helps big time with residue management.

“The last two years, we’ve done spring strip-till on some of those corn-on-corn acres, and then coming back with the freshener makes it a breeze. But as long as we can get through it with the shank machine in the fall, we haven’t had too many troubles with strip-till corn-on-corn.

“If it gets a little damp or the sun goes down, it can get a little tricky at times, but it’s not too big of a deal,” he adds.  

The Yinglings have seen multiple benefits since implementing their fall strip-till/spring strip freshener system, especially on some of their most challenging soils.

“We had the best corn we’ve ever raised on our marginal ground last year,” Yingling says. “It probably wasn’t all because of strip-till but being able to band nutrients and be more efficient with nutrient uptake was a big deal, even more so on our lighter soils that aren’t as fertile or don’t have great water holding capacity. The less we work our soil, the more tilth it has, and it doesn’t get nearly as hard or crust over.”

To learn more about the Yingling’s farm and what they’re learning from strip-till, read Noah Newman’s article “Father-Son Duo Keeps it Simple with Strip-Till” featured in the Summer 2026 issue of Strip-Till Farmer.