Foggy's Deertopia Proving Grounds - Happenings

[SD51555]

Was just thinking about this situation. Before going "no till"......I would now be disking or tilling my land and making dry "black dirt" to plant into for summer crops such as beans or corn. I'd be as dirty as a pig at the end of the day.....and just stirring up dust.....and further drying out my "soil"......as I needed to get planted before the potential rain on the way. It would be a mad dash to get it all done. So I'd make passes with tillage, dragging, planting and often dragging some more to cover seeds...then a trip with the cultipacker. Argh! Sometimes it would rain....and sometimes not. (There were even times I'd do the whole process again as the rain never occurred....and weeds took over.)

Then I'd fight weeds all summer so they would not take over my plots. And I would spread fertilizer in a effort to get a decent crop.

I cannot beleive I would do this stuff each year. Seems I was only chasing my tail as things got progressively worse. lol.

No-till and my drill have made life much easier.....and better for my land. Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

 

[Foggy47]

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The deal is......until Tar River offered a small no-till drill there really was not much I could do without buying a bigger tractor to pull such a thing. And then a bigger tractor would not fit under my door at my pole shed.

I was not really very aware of things like the Great Plains minimum till drills which could be used for no till. Some things like the "firminator" were somewhat unknown to me. Had I thought some of those things would work....I would have done so earlier. I had considered doing a cut-down drill converted to 3-point for a few years.....but never took action until Tar River came along.

Issues with pigweed became the final straw in my "old tillage ways".

It was a pretty big leap of faith for guys like me to adopt these new implements and practices. That is why we gotta keep telling this story....so it becomes more widespread.