U.S. Senate Passes Farm Bill, House Vote Uncertain

Throw Away the Plow: Why Experts Say Strip Tilling Is Better

Strip-till isn't a one-size fits-all concept. For starters, there's a considerable amount of patience and persistence that comes with taking the time to build strips, manage residue and precisely place seed.

Valley® Irrigation, the leader in precision irrigation, will be featured on FOX Business News in an upcoming segment of The Green Room titled "Industry Leaders Pioneering the Future of Sustainable Agriculture." The segment, hosted by former NBC News correspondent John Holden, will air on April 20, 2013, at 5:30 PM (ET).

In April, Mitas celebrates 12 months of farm tire manufacturing at its Charles City facility, which currently employs 188 locals in Iowa. Today, Mitas held its board of directors meeting at the facility and launched three new tire sizes in the SFT and AC85 ranges available in North America starting in April.

Sit around a table for just a little while with Joey Hanson, and it becomes evident that running short on personal energy isn’t a problem for the Elk Point, S.D., producer. His eyes dance with enthusiasm and his voice burns with excitement as he talks about farming.

A bill to fund the federal government for the remaining six months of fiscal year 2013 is now awaiting the president’s signature. The House of Representatives passed the government funding bill recently by a vote of 318-109. Senate passage occurred with a 73-26 vote.

Strip-till certainly isn’t a secret or new concept. For more than 20 years, Charlie Hammer and his wife Nancy Kavazanjian, have been strip-tilling corn on their nearly 1,900 acres near Beaver Dam, Wis.

Although reducing tillage intensity can provide conservation benefits and cost savings, adoption of no-till and minimum till practices for corn production has been limited in some areas, particularly in the northern Corn Belt. In this environment, a shorter growing season and cold, poorly drained soils can lead to delayed planting, low and uneven emergence and lower yields for reduced versus conventional tillage. Strip-till has been proposed as an alternative minimum tillage system for areas and soils that are not well suited for no-till management.

When fourth-generation farmer Lance Saathoff climbs into the cab of his 510-horsepower John Deere tractor, he's in a control center that's guided by distant satellites to fraction-of-an-inch precision and programmed for exact application of every last seed, every bit of fertilizer.