It's a bit more challenging to fit cover crops into a tillage system, but there are opportunities if you create them, says Steve Groff. The Cover Crop Coach and Holtwood, Pa., grower will share different ways row crop farmers and even vegetable farmers in the U.S. and overseas are getting cover crops seeded into tilled fields to control erosion and replenish soils.

Soil tillage on farms may significantly reduce the availability in crops of ergothioneine (ERGO), an amino acid produced by certain types of soil-borne fungi and bacteria that is known as a “longevity vitamin” due to its potent antioxidant properties, according to new research by an interdisciplinary team at Penn State. The study is among the first to demonstrate that soil disturbance can directly impact a key dietary factor associated with long-term human health.

Lee Briese, a crop consultant from North Dakota, shares tips on how growers can prevent their soils from becoming saline in the first place.

Soil compaction is a common and constant problem on most farms that till the soil. Heavy farm machinery can create persistent subsoil compaction. Scientists have found that compacted soils (a) physically restricted root growth; (b) decrease root zone aeration; and (c) reduces drainage, (d) increased losses of nitrogen from denitrification, (e) increases soil erosion. Read more in this article from Ohio's Country Journal.

After corn is chopped and combines move through fields, crop residue and stubble remains, leading some growers to tillage processes, yet soil experts continue to encourage growers to leave the stubble for the sake of soil health. According to the most recent Agricultural Resources Management Survey on the production practices of corn, cotton, soybean and wheat, data shows that roughly half (51%) growers used either no-till or strip-till at least once over a four-year period. Read more in this article from the Star-Herald (Scottsbluff, NE).

Results from a nearly 30-year ongoing study show that no-till agriculture produces improved crop yields over the long-term. The study shows two key results: Practicing no-till agriculture improves crop yield over time.

Some farmers claim that you need to “open up and fluff up the soil with tillage” so it can take in moisture and that no-till just makes the ground hard making it difficult for water to get through. Tradition may make you think that is the case. Read more in this article from the Dodge City Daily Globe (Dodge City, KS).

Soil microbes are living, working barometers of soil health. They are responsible for turning atmospheric nitrogen into forms plants can use, and for releasing nitrogen back into the air. Read more in this article from the Wisconsin State Farmer.