In a lot of ways, farming success comes down to efficiency How efficiently can a farmer make use of his time? How efficiently can he make use of his inputs? How efficiently can he make use of his available resources? When it comes specifically to those available resources, there is one that stands above the…
In our previous video of the Jorgensen Land and Cattle Economics Case Study, Nick Jorgensen discussed some of the economic savings they were able to realize in their long-term, no-till fields where typically Organic Matter measured over three percent. What the Jorgensen land and cattle operation was able to do in this analysis was save…
This past week, we were blessed with another opportunity to visit the Mount Rushmore State and pick the brains of several leading farmers in East River. Unlike trips of the past, this go around we paid less attention to the isolated nuts and bolts of farming. These oft-discussed “nuts and bolts” include individual topics like…
In the previous three videos we have looked at and discussed some soil temperature data from the 2016 growing season in Vermillion, SD. In this video we speak to some long-term no-till farmers from Crooks in the east to Box Elder in the west of South Dakota and gauge their opinions. While all recognize that…
In our previous video we saw that by the end of the season, there is no difference in the number of heat units and temperature as seen by a conventional versus a no-till soil. In fact any differences in cumulative heat units between the two systems disappears by the first week of July. In this…
It’s been said that what comes easy doesn’t last, and what lasts doesn’t come easy. This adage is especially true when it comes to change. Any change worth making isn’t going to be done overnight and it isn’t going to be realized without difficulty. One Iowa farm is showing the Midwest though that, when it…
In this video, we recap the last 11 videos on our Merit or Myth Series that deal with residue and tillage. We sum up the information provided by our farmers and researchers, from West River to East River of South Dakota. As we consider the statement: “Farming without tillage and with surface residue is not…
Dr. Randy Anderson, Research Agronomist with the USDA-ARS in Brookings, SD, shares with us his spiral of soil regeneration. The concept of the spiral had its genesis in Dr. Anderson’s work in no-till where he observed a number of interactive biological effects at work. In this second video, Dr. Anderson walks us through the benefits…
This is the first part of a three part series in Dr. Anderson’s 10-minute talk on his spiral of regeneration. Dr. Randy Anderson, Research Agronomist with the USDA-ARS in Brookings, SD, shares with us his spiral of soil regeneration. The concept of the spiral had its genesis in Dr. Anderson’s work in no-till where he…
