That is the main hump or the mind set that one has to learn to get over. I had to as well. If one can till the ground one can plant it. Actually if there is good residue cover you can plant before you can even till. We dont use any attachments either, only the openers cut through the residue, even corn and milo stocks, we plant 2 1_2 " deep for corn and 2"+ for beans and milo. I went ahead and planted beans in standing wheat stubble, it was a bit damp underniethe, but it worked great. (easy as carpet farming when I was a child) In the residue the slot does not open back up in when it dries down. We use a IH cyclo 800 and a 900 planter. There are a set of Rebounders on them to keep the seed from bouncing when gets in the slot. Any planter can do this, Deere, Kinze, White. The ground we have is a silt_clay_loam. Used to be called Sharpsburg. The NRCS (SCS) infiltration rate for this soil after it is wetted is .28" an hour from the 1960's soil guides which most still use this data yet today. There have be tests done on our property, that show we can take in over 4" an hour after it is wetted with out runoff. We have no tillage pan after this long of no-tilling and our yeilds rival the irrigated acres in our area. FSA reported averages. The organic matter content of our soil has increased from 2.4% to 4.6% (last checked 3 years ago) in this time frame. Which means our carbon content has risen and the effect of that is the nitrogen cycle will have more availability for the crop over the season. Yes there are some around me that are just starting to get tillage done Thursday, but they falling behing quick. I have a bad feeling we are going right into summer from this cold wet spell. The tilled ground is going to dry up as deep as it was tilled. I have always put it this way. When a road is being built, the construction companies, do whatIJ Disk the ground and pack the ground to get the soil structure and the organic matter content out of the soil. So it is a solid base. Can roots penetrate through that very wellIJ Tillage does the same thing it is actually packing the ground, one does not think this is happening due to what it looks like on the surface. The fines in the soil are being sifted down to the tillage pan blocking the small passages in the soil structure(that is what essentially makes up the tillage pan) and keeps anything from passing through it, including water, which makes the fields to wet to get into. So tillage has to be done to dry them down. Ooo what vicious circle we get into. We recommend to buy a ripper on a farm auction(the type that heaves the soil, not one that makes huge clods) Rip everything once. Then sell the ripper and dont till again. Yes there will be some spots that may need ripped again in a couple years. like naturally low areas or field entry points. Those will go away in time. Also we recommend to always drive on the same rows. Always. Tractors, combines, grain carts stay on the same rows. We also dont recommend duals. (oh boy that one is going to get some comments) we have found that a Front wheeled assisted tractor, singled, with the correct ballasting will out pull a dualed tractor. But one has to adjust the ballasting when changing from pulled equipment to mounted equipment. Duals turn out to be a steam roller. Yes tractors look cooler with duals, but they are hurting the soil. The other thing related to this, is your HP needs fall off also, if you are not tilling. Our 6 row narrow IH 800 cyclo takes 9 hp per row to pull in tilled soil. It takes only 3.6 hp per row in no-till to pull this planter. So your fuel needs will go down. Final note. NoTill will not happen over night. One year of notill will not heal your soils up. One has to be committed to do this from now on. The benefits start showing up in year 5-7. Ok, will take my lambasting now!
I hope everyone gets done in good time, no matter their practice. later!
