Disclaimer: My approach with my small tillable acreage is not profit-driven. Having the tillable land farmed has a definite positive impact on game populations on my land in the hills of eastern Ky, good farmers do not seem to be in abundance in the area, and I don't "need" the cash rent to pay the bills.
I only have ~12 tillable acres, and it is not high quality ground - heavy clay, and some is low so is often wet in spring and at harvest time. I have always had the farmer leave ~1 acre of beans standing. First 7 years, the farmer was one who rented from a lot of folks and wasn't the best farmer. Going rate per acre when I started out in 2012 was $75/acre in the area. I told the farmer $300 cash and leave an acre standing every year. Those first seven years were hit or miss, based mostly on his poor farming practices - late planting, ill-timed herbicide application, and (I suspect) little fertilizer. One year he "forgot" the rate and paid $200 rather than $300. It was to the point where it was entertaining just watching to see how he could screw things up. One year we were there the day before firearms opener, he showed up to begin harvesting beans, took the turn too short and dumped the bean head into the creek. Still, in spite of all the shortcomings, the deer and turkeys took notice that our property was the place to be from December to March. Year 8 he never showed up at all and never returned phone calls. Not a problem for me as the small amount of cash means little, and the land got a year off.
A neighbor just down the road crop farms as a side hustle, and had asked about farming my tillable. His fields always looked clean, his farming was on time, and he holds down a good-paying day job. I called him up and offered him the same deal I had given the other farmer, telling him I want it to be a good deal for both of us. He jumped on it, he's farmed it since, and does an awesome job. I never wonder if he'll get around to paying rent.
For whatever reason, no one else in the neighborhood seems to leave crops stand, and very few folks grow any corn at all, ever. This time of year, my acre of standing beans is immensely popular with the deer. Fifteen bucks are hitting it over the last four weeks, which is a LOT for my area. Most years that acre (and the spilled beans in the rest of the fields) feeds critters through late February, unless there's a mast crop failure - in which case the turkeys live in it all day every day and beans run out by Feb 1.
