Attention to profit was a major consideration in our move to no-till back in the late 1980s. 

We started slow with a 15-foot Great Plains no-till drill. We chose a field with generally uniform soils and did some strip trials no-tilling soybeans. The field cultivator was 30-feet, so we’d make one round with the 15-foot no-till drill and then one pass with the field cultivator. 

At harvest, we found that yields were the same, if not a couple bushels better, in the no-tilled soybeans. It was compelling to see we could get the same results without all the extra labor and equipment. It was just good common sense to make the switch.

We’ve been no-tilling soybeans ever since, but we weren’t as happy with our no-till results in corn due to our dark clay-loam soils. That has led to a progression of experimentation to find the perfect balance between minimal soil disturbance and maximum profit in our conditions. 

Boosting Bottom Line

Profit is our driver. I’m not going to sacrifice a bunch of income just to say I’m a purist with one farm management strategy or another. I will do what I’ve proven makes me money, which is a function of both cost of the practice and the yield and income I can achieve. This, of course, will be different on every farm, but this is our journey. 

Crusting and cold soils were our concerns in corn. We experimented with vertical tillage to smooth the way for the planter and warm up soil in spring. 

Initially we used a Precision Planting To-The-Max vertical tillage tool. It was just a rotary reel with no disc blades. We had success, but there were times we needed it to do more leveling, especially where we had installed tile. When conditions were very dry and the soil got hard, it also struggled to penetrate. 

We switched to a Great Plains TurboMax. It has blades we can run at an angle of 0-7 degrees. This system delivered some weed control benefit and penetrated even the rare spot of hard, dry soil on our clay-loam rises. We weren’t looking to be overly aggressive. The goal was to barely disturb the top 2 inches of soil. 

Vertical tillage wasn’t expensive, as it doesn’t require a ton of horsepower and it gave the corn a yield boost. But I’m always one to keep watch for better practices to boost the balance sheet.

Strip-Till Curiosity

I enjoy reading, listening and asking questions. This is how I got interested in strip-till. I’d seen evidence the practice worked well in our region, and it likely had the potential to improve yields by placing some nutrients underneath where the corn would be planted. 

Wiping away residue in a narrow strip would also warm and dry our heavy soils faster so we could get in the field sooner and get more even emergence. 

I now run a 12-row Case IH 5310 strip-till bar and pull a trailing fertilizer cart. It was cost-effective as I purchased it used from out West. It works great in big fields but isn’t ideal for smaller fields because we can’t maneuver well to get into the corners. We just use vertical tillage in those fields.

The unit uses B-33 mole knives followed by concave covering wheels. The potash and phosphate took its toll on the electric motors, so we switched them out for hydraulic motors. A concave dome-shaped rolling basket brings the soil to center and builds a slight ridge. This serves to maintain the integrity of the strip over winter, but it will be flat by planting. 

Nutrient Management

The Case IH unit allows me to variable-rate two products at the same time. We apply no more than a maintenance rate of 120 pounds per acre of potassium (K). In some locations we don’t even need phosphorus (P) as we raised hogs for years and we’re still reaping the benefits of decades of manure application. We do occasionally put down 25-30 pounds of P just to see if it makes a difference. So far, it doesn’t. We sidedress the bulk of our nitrogen (N).

My planter runs heavy because we do a fair amount of banding. I use Precision Planting Conceal units to dual band N 2 inches off both sides of the row right where the crown roots will end up and 2 inches below. I apply 8 total gallons of fertilizer — 5 gallons of 28% UAN mixed with and 3-3.5 gallons of ammonium thiosulfate (ATS). Each side of the row gets 4 gallons of the aggregate. 

I also stream a low-salt starter fertilizer in the row for a good start using FurrowJet. It has three nozzles to apply product directly in the furrow behind the disc openers and 0.75 inches off either side of the furrow. We’re using this system to test biological products. So far, the jury is still out.