D2—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, January 24,1981
No-tellin’ what you’ll learn about no-tillin’
No-till is revolutionary crop production practice
LANCASTER Perhaps
the most revolutionary crop
production practice to be
adopted by farmers in the
Mid-Atlantic region in recent
years is no-tillage, stated
Allan Bandel, Extension
Soils Specialist at the
University of Maryland
“In Maryland for
example, fewer than 10,000
acres of no-tillage corn were
reported in 1970. But, in
more recent years, 50 per
cent or more of Maryland’s
com is estimated to be
grown either by no-tillage or
by some reduced tillage
system Some Maryland
counties, particularly in the
Piedmont, have reported 75
percent to 85 percent of their
com acreage to be grown
without use of the moldboard
plow, Bandel said
There are many ad
vantages with no-tillage
including less soil erosion
from wind and water,
savings m time, energy, and
labor, less root lodging due
to wind and ram, firmer soil
to support heavy harvesting
machinery, greater drought
tolerance, and also higher
yield potential and greater
nitrogen fertilizer efficiency
Ordinarily, any one of
these advantages should be
sufficient to encourage
farmers to convert their
farming operation to no
tillage And the additional
benefit of higher potential
yields from no-tillage than
from conventional tillage
com from the same amount
of nitrogen fertilizer should
provide enough incentive to
make “no-tillage believers”
of even the most doubting
farmers, he exclaimed
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moldboard plow to prepare a
seedbed has many
variations, some of them not
strictly no-tillage Some
variations might more ac
curately be referred to as
minimum tillage because
some act of stirring the soil
takes place at some point
during the cropping
sequence.
For instance, some far
mers disk before seeding a
winter cover crop. Others
may use a chisel plow once
or twice over the field, then
disk to smooth the seedbed
before planting with a no-till
planter
Regardless of the degree
of tillage employed before
planting, if a moldboard
plow is not used to turn the
soil, then the practice is
usually included with the
minimum tillage - no-tillage
group
In conventional tillage
where a moldboard plow is
used, old crop residues, and
surface applied lime and
fertilizer are incorporated
into the entire plow layer
Where there has been
absolutely no tillage, or a
minimum of tillage before
planting by disking or chisel
plowing, incorporation of
crop residues and fertilizer
materials is minimized
Most of these materials
remain at or very near the
soil surface. Herm lies the
major difference in fer
tilization principles between
the two tillage systems.
Until no-tillage became
practical, there was no
alternative but to broadcast
the lime and most of the
fertilizer Then, if broadcast
before plowing, the fertilizer
would be plowed down Or, if
broadcast after plowing, the
fertilizer could be in
corporated into the surface 2
to 3 inches of soil by disking
Research results often
demonstrated that plowing
corn the fertilizer could
increase com yields by 8 to
10 bushels when compared to
leaving it on the surface or
disking it in It was con
cluded that at least part of
the beneficial effects from
plow-down fertilizer oc
curred because the fertilizer
was located in the active root
zone and was thus more
readily available to the
plant This was particularly
advantageous in a dry year
With the fertilizer
nutrients at or near the
quickly dried out surface
soil, nutrient exchange
between the soil and the
roots was impeded, if not
halted together Even if the
roots were present in dry
soil, it is not likely that op
timal nutrient exchange
would occur between the
root and the soil without
adequate moisture being
present.
How then, can a com plant
growing with absolutely no
soil tillage and no soil
fertilizer mixing produce as
well, if not better, than its
cultivated counterpart 9
The research conducted on
thisqui"-' 1 f ir r ’om
being complete, said Bandel.
Apparently, even though
the fertilizer is not mixed
with the plow layer, there
are other no-tillage related
factors that compensate for
this apparent disadvantage
For instance, studies have
indicated that surface soils
remain cooler and more
moist under the no-tillage
mulch than under con
ventional tillage. The higher
soil moisture content at the
surface could itself account
for more plant root activity
in the vicinity of the surface
applied fertilizer
It is also possible that by
minimizing soil-fertilizer
mixing, soil contact with the
fertilizer granule is also
minimized, thus reducing
fixation of phosphorus and
potash It is conceivable that
phosphorus and potash
fertilizers may actually be
more efficiently utilized by
the plant growing under no
tillage than under con
ventional tillage conditions
But there is no research
presently to either support
or deny this theory No-
tillage development is still in yet been completed to
its adolescence, and provide all of the necessary
adequate research has not (Turn to PageUp