Food Plot Terminology

Just to clear things up a bit. If you are doing no-till plots you are using one these.



Throw and mow is not "no-till" farming even though you aren't breaking ground.

As Josh has so eloquently pointed out should be seed and mow

And if you are throwing you are using one of these

Yes you are.

This thread is about to go down hill QUICK!!

I have to disagree with you on this one NH. So does Ray in the first few seconds of this video. No-till is not about equipment, its about the understanding of the principles of soil health. Farmers who no-till sometimes use airplanes to overseed rye into standing crops. This is still "no-till" farming even though its not using that machine in your first pic. I don't think you have to use a drill to call it "no-till". I think its just what the name implies....not tilling.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWXCLVCJWTU

Just for the record I'm conventional tillage. No till no yield!

Well you do have regular drills and "no till" drills. So I agree with both party's.

I call that a no-till drill, just one form of no-till planting...as is any other method you deliver the seed to the ground w/out first breaking the ground.

No-till, means exactly that. Not tilling the soil, however you plant. No-till does not mean no yeild, you just have to know what your doing.

I think I know what I'm doing but thanks Blumsden.

"The no-till operation continues to have higher yields on average. We have split a farm in half, tilling one side and no-tilling the other side...the side that was no-tilled raised 10 to 15 bushels more per acre
than the tilled side.”

http://notill.okstate.edu/publications/notillcroppingsystemsoklahoma/chapter06.pdf




"Conventional tillage is not essential for high corn yields, says Tony Vyn, Purdue agronomist. He’s researched no-till corn for 33 years.“Your tillage system has less consequence for high yields than hybrid selection, optimum plant density and fertility levels.”

http://cornandsoybeandigest.com/tillage/boost-profits-no-till-reducing-tillage-saves-25-30acre




In general, no-till treatments resulted in the same or higher yields than the conventional treatments (810 lb/ac vs. 637 lb/ac on average, respectively)


http://lubbock.tamu.edu/files/2011/10/compareconventional05.pdf

Let me warn y'all of this. Data from Ohio or Midwest is useless in AL. Not all ground can be no tilled. I see after and help farmers make decisions on thousands of acres in N Al and no till is not suitable on every farm. Different soil structure, organic matter, compaction, CEC I can go on and on. Just be careful no tilling takes patience and mistakes WILL be made. Also there's not a darn thing wrong with tillage when done correctly.

Okay, hate to get technical but notice I said FOOD PLOT. If any of you are aerial seeding your plots let me know I want to come video it.

I was only comparing no-till (which implies use of no-till equipment) vs. seed and mow food ploting. Not any other practices. I understand that there is little to no tillage involved in either and hey maybe things are changing but until CNC OR blumsden called seed and mow, no-till on here, no one else did and I have dang sure never heard it in farming or plotting circles.

Maybe I am the one that is wrong

Err body gets way too wound up about "food" plots anyway. It's not rocket science.

Are you saying you tried it, and it didn't work for you? I'm saying there are certain things you can do to make sure it works. You said no-till, no yeild. I have great yeild, with no-till. I wasn't trying to be a smart a**, sorry if it came off that way.

Case in point...the post starting this thread. Seems the anti-"no-till" folks are as adamant about their process being better than the "no-till" folks.

I say, go plant your food plots however the heck you want and with whatever equipment you have available to you!!

That's exactly what it boils down to.

I would love to have a no-till drill, but i'm a food plotter, not a farmer, and i'm not about to spend thousands of dollars for a piece of equipment, that i would use sparingly. I found another way to do it. I used to disk all my fields, and had great plots. I no longer spend hours and hours disking fields, and i still have great food plots. This way, saves time and money, and also improves your soil. If you don't care about that, thats fine with me. I really, really don't care how anyone puts in their plots. Just offering an alternative.

Nope, my way is not better, just different. I actually do several acres of throw and mow every year and several acres of no-till and several acres of conventional tillage. It's like Matt said, in some soils some practices just does not work well.

I am always excited to see food plot topics of any kind on here but especially no-till ones because not many folks do it.

This dang sure wasn't meant to start a feud which way of doing food plots was best... They all work just fine. It's not like any of them are new.

Y'all can be so aggressive and defensive about the topic of the "no-till" system. It's one thing to offer advice to people who are curious but it is as if y'all have an agenda to push. I think that is why people enjoy arguing with y'all so much about it because it is easy to get y'all stirred up.

I just enjoy friendly debate myself. No feud here.

Way to go Nighthunter, ruining hunting season for yet another group of nice people.

I don't have any agenda. I guess from now on, if anybody needs something specific they can pm me. Don't want to come off as being aggressive. LOL

"In the northern part of Alabama in the Tennessee Valley area, a lot of cotton is grown. We initially came into the area and worked with farmers to develop a system to help them do a better job of using conservation tillage practices without losing yield," he explains. Producers had adopted no-till practices, but yields were down in some cases by as much as 50%.

"Our research found that by planting a cover crop, producers could go back and actually increase yields by 5% to 10% over conventional-tillage practices," he says. "Today, more than 80% of the acreage in that area uses conservation-tillage practices."

In the Coastal Plains area, which is prone to hardpan formation, early results indicate a 10% to 15% yield increase in cotton and corn when using a cover crop and in-row subsoiling, a common conservation practice for the region.

"We've found that good cover crop management in the Southeast pays dividends in increased yields and better soil health," Raper says.

http://www.no-tillfarmer.com/pages/Featu...Cover-Crops.php





On fields where he also planted cover crops, McCormack said his yields were event better. “Looking back, plowing up my fields was reducing my yields.” Like a growing number of farmers across the nation, McCormack is sold on the benefits of improving soil health. He plans to continue experimenting with different varieties and combinations of cover crops, including planting multiple species on nearly all of his 6,000 no-till acres this fall.

http://southeastfarmpress.com/grains/tennessee-grower-sold-no-till-cover-crops

http://southeastfarmpress.com/soybeans/no-till-system-can-increase-soybean-yields

http://southeastfarmpress.com/no-till-leads-way-top-north-carolina-corn-yields

This is a classic case of finding some literature and selectively citing it to support your argument when it really doesn't. Did you read the article? Yes it was printed by Oklahoma State but your quote above was found in the article, not as testimony, but as an observation by an individual that had been interviewed. This article was about planting wheat with a no-till drill versus traditional tillage. This article was not even remotely close to the sow and mow method.

Allow me to quote the summary of the article for you:
"The economics of no-till relative to conventional tillage depend on farm size. The list prices of effective no-till grain drills are from two to three times greater than the list prices of conventional drills. No-till equipped air seeders list for 30 to 40 percent more than con- ventional air seeders of the same width, but the dif- ference in drill/seeder cost decreases as the size of the drill/seeder increases.
A general finding of the case study is that if 4.5 pints of glyphosate per acre can successfully control weeds, no-till for continuous wheat production is cost-competitive with conventional tillage. While the costs may be similar between the systems, pro- ducers must also consider potential differences in yield and revenue. For a field that is relatively free of weeds, the glyphosate system as budgeted may work for one or two years. However, most experi- ment station trials conducted in Oklahoma of no-till versus conventional tillage for continuous wheat managed to produce grain, have found that weeds often become a very serious problem after two or three years. Most studies have also found that in a continuous wheat system in regions with annual rainfall in excess of 26 inches, wheat grain yields are often less in the no-till plots. The cost savings from switching to no-till may be insufficient to offset the expected yield loss. For these reasons (weeds and yields), no-till is not currently recommended for continuous monoculture wheat managed to pro- duce grain. However, some growers have been able to manage weed problems by using a rotation that includes wheat for forage-only (graze out) along with wheat for grain."

Yes I read the article and the argument has nothing to do specifically with the throw and mow method. There was a statement made that "No-till equals no-yield" and that's just not true. I posted numerous links to back up my position. Are you saying that I'm wrong or is this just a classic case of you trying to play a game of gotcha? Seems as though I'm not the only one selectively choosing.

Oops

Anyone up for a LGBT dog hunt?

You must not read Aldeer, it's the only way any seed can be properly planted and it's the only way to build organic matter in your soil and it's so easy that it's impossible to do it wrong and it works every time.

Nut up and prove someone wrong instead of just resorting to sarcasm and being an asshat. That seems to be the default response on here when you don’t know how to defend your position in a debate….either that or just throwing out credentials. How about posting some facts to support your side of the argument instead.

I've got two facts for you.

Resistant Pigweed and Cogongrass (Jap Grass for the dirt road S AL residents)

RP was CREATED by No Till farming practices and over use of one particular kind of herbicide, and Cogongrass can only EFFECTIVELY be controlled with tillage.

I say this and now will admit to using a hybrid method of BOTH practices. We spray all our plots 4-8 weeks ahead of planting. We MAY mow some of them first depending on how much DORMANT stuff is present and tall in the plot. Roundup only works on living green weeds, as it has to be taken into the plant to work.

Then we come back at planting and spread seed and fertilizer (sometimes in the same mix, although there are dangers to that), then we disk ONCE, lightly, to cover the seed and fertilizer we just spread.

WE prefer to get our fertilizer UNDER the ground! as it CAN wash away when left on top (seed can too).

There are pluses and minuses to every kind of way of doing it and no one is the right way EVERYWHERE! I would be hesitant to use the throw and mow method on a hillside type plot, but excessive tillage there would be just as bad.

There is no real WRONG or RIGHT way to do everything everywhere, but some people get almost evangelical (Pentecostal?) and start crowing about how THEIR way is superior to everybody else's.

THAT is what people respond to negatively IMHO. YMMV.

As to the DANGERS referenced above about mixing seed and fertilizer! I will expand on that a little.

It's almost comical to watch the reactions you get sometimes when you mention mixing seed and fertilizer (I mean in bulk, in a buggy, versus sacks in a spin spreader), to people who've ALWAYS done it the hard way.

"I don't know how much we'll be putting out that way, or what if we RUN OUT!?", is the most common response.

There are two answers to this. IF you know the acreages of your plots! and how to drive X number of feet away from plot edges and from your last pass, a buggy is MUCH easier on everybody.

The caveat I referenced above is, I HAVE BEEN TOLD (by people at the Co-op's who presumably should know), that IF you mix seed and fertilizer together in a buggy, it needs to be spread within a few hours of being mixed. Supposedly if it sits mixed too long (say overnight), the fertilizer will react with the seed and ruin the germination (growing ability) of the seed.

It's never happened to me, but I've never let it set overnight either.

Your nutrients will go where the water goes. That’s why good soil structure and proper water infiltration are so important. Does a 2 inch rain soak up into your plot or does the water runoff?

No argument on the gly resistant weeds. I will “preach” with you on that one. I think we should all start being a little more mindful of our chemical use. You can read nearly any thread about planting food plots now and spraying is involved. Many times its multiple sprayings. I’ve cut my method down to only spraying once in the fall and I’m thinking about trying to eliminate it as well. I just may have to plant a little later than I normally do. In the spring I use the mature rye as a weed suppressor and I rotate crops once its went to seed. No need for gly that way.

Good stuff!…….

X2
IF you have a good bit of acreage, good roads and fields this is the best option in my opinion. Its easier,faster, and cheaper per acre. If you pull soil samples you can have the fertilizer custom blended to meet the soil requirements.

Robert D......Here is my problem with disking in nutrients to keep them from washing away. How many times have you worked your tail off to prepare a nice seed bed for your plots?



Only to get hit by this a few days later.......



....and then that pretty seed bed ends up looking like this. Even though I disked my fertilizer in...most of it still washed away along with the topsoil that's no longer there either. Your nutrients will go where the water goes. Proper soil structure and water infiltration are key. My future infiltration is now ruined in the pic below. I have a surface like concrete.

Do you want me to pick and choose snip-it's from articles and copy and paste information off the internet to "prove" my way is better? I base what I do off of my experiences. I've tried both methods of planting. I've used drills, spread seed and bush hogged over it and I've settled on traditional means because it works better in our soil and I can build organic matter faster in a much deeper layer of soil than can be done with no til planting. I hope your methods are easily adaptable to a variety of conditions because you've preached your methods hard enough that you've got quite a few people on here following your advice. Let's see how that works out for them in the long run.

Cant we all just get along

If long-term results are what’s used to judge then I’ll be more than happy. I suspect though that criticism will rain in shortly after the first failure. Many people who claim to have done it both ways have done one way all their life and the other way they gave a try one day. Changing the dynamics of soil function takes time and patience. Patience for many folks doesn’t extend past the first bump in the road.

I suspect that you suspect that I've not planted enough no til to form an opinion, but you'd be wrong about that.

Here's what I don't like about your approach. You seem to have an agenda. You preach the benefits of no til (and there are benefits of no til) but you seem so focused on proving that your way is right that you have given very little information regarding what happens when it doesn't work. You seem to have quite a few people here who are going to follow your advice. I hope for your sake that they don't experience one of those "bumps in the road" you alluded to. Also it takes YEARS of no til practices to reap the benefits from it. Not many people have a long term lease or own the land they hunt on, so most people can't have the patience (your word) to see those benefits. When people try scattering seed on a unprepared seed bed on the hard red clay food plots that are prevalent on 75% of the state then they're likely in for their "first failure." (your words again)

Folks it's as simple as this: SOMETHING has to hold moisture to the seed you sow, and it really needs to be covered with SOMETHING, or you're likely going to have a TOTAL FAILURE of your food plots. If you have turkeys in your area, you dang well BETTER cover the seed with SOMETHING. SOMETHING can be DIRT or it can be THATCH. If you don't have enough of one, use the other.

Only on Aldeer can a thread about foot plots turn into a cock swinging contest.

Well....at least we're talking about food plots and not cocks.

Not the way I thought this would go. I knew it would start a discussion but I didn't think it go quite that downhill.

It’s all good. I thought the thread was going well. A little entertainment never hurt a thread about dirt anyways and the one thing you can be guaranteed of is that people will always slow down to rubberneck at the train wreck. It’ll just strike up more interest in the long run.

The biggest problem is that as soon as you use the words “I disagree”…folks start getting butt hurt.

I'm outa town , away from the puter a couple of days and come home to this..... again. I'm not gonna quit using my beloved Taylor Way disk, guess I'll see the rest of you plowing thick heads in food plot hell.

X3 If I weren't in a area where it's pretty much impossible to use a buggy , I'd be all over this. I spread fertilizer once with a buggy and coming off steep hills is a little more excitement than I want . I have some friends that are close to the Co-op and plot down in the valley (flat land) and the buggy fertilizer/seed spreading works very well for them. BTW, they disc as well, a 100HP+ JD and 12' disk, least I'm gonna be amongst friends in food plot hell.

Correct Sir. Get yer soil PH right, scratch the ground with a plow, throw and mow or no-till with a fancy planter, fertilize and relax. Doesn't 't matter if ya only have a leaf blower and rake, 4 wheeler and tiny disk or a 200hp JD with real farming equipment , it ain't hard folks!

2Dogs have they ever mixed the seed and fertilizer the day before they spread it?

I never have so I really don't know if that particular caution is for real or just an old wives tale.

Not sure, but I think they do it the day of.

I think where the problem would be is if it's hot the N turns liquid on ya. Can be a big problem in this part of the world.

Furflyin……Here’s what I don’t get. There's always folks who jump into the discussion telling about how much experience they have or how many acres they farm..... but the discussion into anything deeper concerning the finer details of soil health never goes any further than…”Just trust me, I’m a farmer" or someone throwing out credentials. By all means, share some of your trials and tribulations with us. Why will no-till not work? What cover crops have you tried? What failed?…etc..etc. …Did you have issues with hard pans and compaction?

I'm not going to debate you all night long. I don't have a photographic record of everything I've ever planted. I'm not the one trying to sell people on a different method.

Here's the results on one small area that I worked on to improve soil fertility and soil composition. I took an area on a farm that we bought where the soil was very poor and would barely grow weeds and turned it into a rich, organic rich soil in 3 years. I planted it in soybeans the first summer and they grew about a foot tall and that was it. Each fall I planted Ryegrass and Crimson clover. Each spring for 3 years I turned the biomass under and then planted beans again. This is what the beans looked like during the 3rd summer. Hard pans and compaction are much more likely when soil is worked when it is wet. This area has alfalfa growing on it now. It's thriving due to the prep work that I did over a few year period. This is a picture of production soybeans, NOT forage beans.



I never said no til won't work. You push it as a cure all. It's not. In the truest sense of the term no til farming is done with a no til drill or no til planter. There are NO commercial farmers who use a spread and grow approach to planting seeds. There is a reason for that. It's not a reliable method of planting. Ryegrass, fescue, clovers, brassicas and etc can be spread into an existing pastures or bushogged weed stands and grow just fine due to the small size of the seed. Throw and grow does not involve tilling but it is not the same as no til farming. Throw and grow is NOT a good idea in areas where turkeys are abundant. It is also not a good idea on plots that have no organic matter build up, like most food plots in this state.

Hard pan and soil compaction are a function of soil that is overworked and worked when it's wet. Weekend warrior food plot planters will likely not have to worry about it since they primarily just cut the soil with a disk. If they cut it to a powder each year, then yes they may encounter.

Here's a 1150 lb cow in the same bean patch for size comparison of the beans.

Advantage Fur, that may be the finest bean field on Sand Mt! Didn't know sand could grow beans that look that good!

I wish I had comparison pictures of 3 years earlier. It took intense soil improvements to get the patch where it would grow beans like this. The first year the beans only got about mid shin high, and I innoculated them the first year.

Nice looking beans. Thanks for sharing Furflyin. Have you given radishes a try? They would be a great addition to add to your rye and clover rotation for the purpose of producing organic matter deep in the soil profile. This one is just a medium sized one compared to the size that they can get. Lots of good worm food.

Nothing gonna grow where that bammer hat is laying for a while

Yes, I've planted Diakon radishes. I am going to try some Ground Hog radishes too. They do a great job of pulling nutrients back up to the top of the soil and also aerate the soil.

That’s a good point Fur….In the same way that the radish helps improve aeration, it also helps improve water infiltration. Here’s where our opinions may part ways though. A radish improves soil aeration and water infiltration by growing deep into the soil and creating a channel down through the soil profile. Its when the radish begins to decay that space is created between the soil and the shrinking radish bulb. It’s this space that’s created that allows the oxygen to move down deep into the soil. It’s the space between the decaying radish and the soil that allows water to run down into the soil and infiltrate much more efficiently. The same thing occurs when worms begin to tunnel in the soil. An elaborate conduit system is formed that will allow large amounts of rainfall to infiltrate into the ground instead of ponding and running off. This is part of good “soil structure”. If we come in and till, then all of that structure is lost. All of that space between the radish bulb and the soil is gone…..all the worm tunnels are destroyed. You no longer have that structure present anymore. It all collapses when the soil is disturbed and soil particles pack together again. When this happens then our field loses its ability to handle water as efficiently. Water movement plays a huge role whether we’re talking about moisture availability to the plants, erosion potential, movement of nutrients, etc....

FurFlyin, you have incredible looking plots. Thanks for not swearing the disk away, either.

Here's an illustration that kinda helps show what I'm talking about. You can see how the channels that were left in the soil by the radish would allow air and water to infiltrate. This reminds me of another benefit too of having that structure remain present. The channels allow for the roots of future plants to follow their path down deep into the soil. This only happens though if you leave the structure intact.

The decaying matter is still there creating space as it decays when you disc. Discing it into the soil is not removing this material.

I’m not saying that the radish is lost and doesn’t provide any OM…..I’m saying that the “structure” it created while growing is lost. Look back at the last illustration. All of those root tunnels are lost when tillage occurs. The radish is chopped into finer pieces and the decaying process rapidly speeds up. Now, for the purpose of feeding the next crop in line this can be seen as having positive effects because the rapid decay releases nutrients that are quickly available and able to feed the next crop. However, from a long-term perspective, any further OM gains are going to be hard to achieve due to the rapid burning of the OM. Slowing down the decay won’t have the quick nutrient release seen with tillage but over the course of several rotations, the overall fertility will increase to higher levels than what could initially be achieved with only a a single quick burning of OM. In other words, you are going to sacrifice some of the nutrient release to the first crop following a cover crop in order to build higher levels of OM over time and reach higher overall fertility levels year round….not just after a quick OM burn. I don’t doubt that Fur has seen OM increases from using cover crops. I suspect though that if he tested his OM% he would see it reach, or has already reached, a small plateau where he is not actually growing OM any further beyond just what each single cover crop is burning and providing. This small peak is just a fraction of the soil’s true potential.

Fur…..Have you thought about adding some diversity to your bean patch? Sunn hemp, pearl millet, buckwheat, alyce clover, and milo are all good options. From the standpoint of growing OM, its always good to add in a “grass” specie. Grasses are your major carbon producers. Sunn hemp even though not technically considered a grass specie is still a good producer of carbon. This pic was taken a few weeks after planting. It never made it to maturity....too many deer on too few acres.

Here's that field a little later in the summer. The heavy deer browsing in these fields is actually creating a situation where I'm not left with enough above ground biomass.

When you get your %OM tested during your soil test, do you include the duff layer or do you scrape it off like a normal soil test?

I doubt that the OM from my fall food plot is all used up because I disc my plot to plant my next fall plot. The structures have been there from September last year, until this September when I disc. Shortly after my discing, more structures are starting to form from the root system of the new fall plot. Without the material breaking down, the plants can't use their nutrients that are left behind. Maybe this is why the throw and grow method takes time to build up useable nutrients in the duff layer.

You don’t want to have to keep “rebuilding” the structure though with every crop. This creates undue stress on the crop through having to use energy that it would not have otherwise had to if the root channels were already there. Having that structure in place gives the next crop an advantage especially during years when plants may be stressed. They can easily reach deeper depths during drought periods where hopefully more soil moisture is present. Again this goes back to water infiltration.

Lets just say we planted corn in behind the radish. Instead of asking the corn to trail blaze its own way down into the soil…. we leave the root tunnels behind that the radish formed to give the corn roots an already established pathway deep into the ground. This is one of the main functions for using radishes. They are your trailblazer down to depths of 3-4 ft. It allows the roots of the corn crop to easily reach depths that it might otherwise have never achieved. This is another side note to also consider…..The radish has not only blazed a trail of tunnels deep into the soil profile, buts its also taken OM deep into the soil profile. There is no need to turn OM under to get it to the root zone when you have large radish bulbs rotting at depths of 3+ ft…..depths deeper than most mechanical means are capable of placing OM.

Yes…..this is one of the reasons its hard for farmers to convert over to no-till. There is a lag time in nutrient availability. The upside though is that long term, once that nutrient lag “catches back up”…your efficiency and overall fertility becomes greater with the no-till due to all of the advantages that we’ve been discussing….improved water infiltration, improved moisture retention, improved nutrient holding capacity, etc,,etc,,. It just takes a little time to get everything cranked up and going. There is a link further back in this thread that actually goes into looking at the economics of it from a farming perspective. For us as food plotters though transitioning is not that big a deal. You just need to have a little patience while the rebuilding process starts taking place. Its like a lot of other things in nature...it takes time to change.

Firstly, corn lying on top of the ground at our place gets eaten.


I'm having the best of both worlds. I'm getting my radishes with their long root growth and I'm cutting in the material that's growing above the soil. My discing depth is not disrupting the 3-4' root growth of the radishes. Disced earth will allow the water to infiltrate to the root tunnels of the radishes.

As far as stressing the crop, I didn't notice it last year. I say last year, because last year is the first time that we limed our fields to soil sample requirements. No lime was required this year. I guess we'll have to see how it goes this year. All I know is our plants have looked as tall and healthy as the ones that you post. I'm not sure our deer are smart enough to know the difference, if I changed methods.

In the end all you can do is weigh the options and decide what works best for you. One of the reasons I chose to go with the throw and grow no-till method was not only for the benefits in soil health but also for the time and money savings that I gain through having a much simpler planting method. This a great benefit when trying to plant a large hunting club full of plots all in one work weekend like many folks do. Again though, I’m just putting the info out there…..each individual will have to make their own decision.

I do that too some, but most of the grasses I grow are in the winter. Here's another summer patch. Sunflowers, corn, and iron and clay peas.



Here's corn and beans in the same plot.

We can post pretty pictures back and forth all day but in the end it doesn’t really tell the whole story when we start talking about the finer details of soil health and how the results were achieved. One of the most important things to look at is something that’s really hard to see and that’s the efficiency with which our fields are using the nutrients we apply. Many folks have figured out that if you just keep dumping out enough fertilizer and get some timely rainfall, then you can achieve “pretty” results in most years. However, with the price of inputs like fertilizer and fuel…..the efficiency in how we got there can make a big impact on your wallet. When you talk about dealing with large hunting clubs like many of us do, food plot budgets only extend so far and you really want to get the most bang for your buck. Whether its been farmers or food plotters, a vast majority of folks have been horribly inefficient with their use of water and nutrients over the last few decades. Just google and read about the nutrients that have leached into the major rivers. Its not all about whether or not someone can grow a “pretty” crop…..it’s a lot about how you got there and the efficiency with which are using the resources you apply. The problem is we are just not able to see the inefficiency in our fields. Look in the waterways though and you can. No, I doubt us food plotter are contributing large amounts to that fertilizer in the Mississippi river.....but many folks are using the same inefficient methods.



http://investigatemidwest.org/2012/11/01/the-story-of-nitrogen-a-trip-down-the-mississippi/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fertilizer-runoff-overwhelms-streams/

http://www.usnews.com/news/national/articles/2008/06/06/dead-zones-grow-in-the-gulf-of-mexico


Another “pretty” pic…..back to you Fur.....

CNC,


What are the fertilizer recommendations for your plots per your soil sample results?

I'm done with the back and forth. I posted pictures to show that I have been successful growing superior food plots on land that is inferior to most. At the end of the day I don't really care how you plant what you plant. I'll do it the way that works best for me, and I hope others do what works best for them too, without taking what I say, or what you say as the gospel truth.

Oh, and anyone who couldn't grow a crop of crimson clover mixed with some rye needs to quit planting food plots.

I haven’t sent my test in for this fall yet but just looking at a single test is not really going to tell you much from the standpoint of what your probably looking for. It will likely give the same general N recommendations that it gives anyone else depending on what you’re growing. My Ca will likely show good to high this time because I just applied some lime back in the spring. P will likely be good and K recommendations will depend on how well my soil held on to and recycled the last potash I applied. The efficiency numbers that you are looking for will be something that you just have to monitor over time on your own plot. What I will be looking for in my sandy soil is an improved ability to hold on to my Ca and K overtime. I’ll also start looking for the need to apply less N while still getting good results. Nitrogen usage is something that’s not on a soil test but you can generally eyeball deficiencies in your soil by looking at plant color. I’ve been experimenting with adding different amounts of N to my field to see what effects different rates have as well as trying to identify at what point I’m applying more than my soil can handle. Like I was saying, my soil is very sandy and has a low holding capacity.

I went and ran my disk for hours today. I just like the tractor seat time and the smell of fresh worked dirt.

Did you end up buying a disc? I know earlier in the year, seems like you were looking and mentioned buying a new Tufline.

I did. Bought a 10 ft Tufline. So far I like it. My 65 HP kubota pulls it with no problem at all.

….but Fur…..It’s not just crimson clover. Its crimson and durana mixed. Doesn’t the white compliment the crimson well? Rowwwww Tide!!!!!



Wait……I know what you’ll like Fur……Brassicas.

Like I was saying…..A pretty picture is nothing more than that….its just a pretty picture and just throwing one or two our there for folks to ooohh and ahhhh at doesn’t scratch the surface of someone’s true knowledge of the subject. Like I said in the beginning…...there's plenty of people quick to jump in with their credentials or how many acres they farm or telling how much they know…….but there are very few who ever actually back it up. They tend to start saying stuff like “I’m not going to debate all night”…or “I don’t have a photographic memory and cant remember all things I’ve done”…or :”I could go on and on about it but I’m not going to”.



2Dogs…..Are you still keeping score?

Sweet!

As always CNC very impressive. Lots of respect for what you do. I always enjoy your posts

I've read where you said a healthy soil only has to be "topped off" with nutrients. How many lbs of K and P, recommended by a soil test, do you consider "topping off?"

Nice turnips, root crops grow well in sandy soil, that's why they grow Taters on Sand Mt. I'm still likin' Furs beans.

Therapy my friend. Nice disc you picked up by the way. Congrats!

It sure is. Thanks again

You buy new? I'd love to have a good 8 or 9 ft wheel disk. I had a 10 ft JD , but it was just a little too wide for our mountain roads, so I sold it. They do pretty work.

Every soil is going to be different. You may naturally have a soil that holds onto nutrients better than my sand pit. Therefore the rate at which my nutrients leach from the soil may vary greatly from your soil. I can’t just give you absolute numbers that will fit everyone’s individual prescription. This is something that you will have to use your own soil tests to assess. If you have gotten tests done every year then look back over the tests and look at how well the soil held onto the nutrients after you applied them. Then compare those trends moving forward. The goal for all of us is to try and build up a bank of stored nutrients and then efficiently recycle those nutrients through the plant and back to the soil without having to continually add mass amounts of inputs that will ultimately get used very inefficiently and end up in the ditch.

I will say this too…..Looking at a soil test is just one of the many ways in which you can monitor improvements in your soil health. The majority of them will be things that you monitor in the field with your eyes and hands.

Thanks Clayton....I appreciate the comment.

I was asking about your plots not mine. How much fertilizer do you consider alot or a little to add to your plots?

N2TRKYS - I believe your question is being avoided...

I don’t think you understand enough about soil tests to understand what you are asking and trying to compare. However, to appease the hoard….I will add 50 lbs of 34-0-0 at planting time and I may or may not add 50-100 lbs of 0-0-60 just depending on how well my soil test shows that I’ve held onto the potash I applied back during the spring. I'm sure my summer plot has taken up some of that K. Now that’s pretty irrelevant but you guys can draw what ever anecdotal conclusions from it that sound best to you.

What are you talking about? I asked you what you deemed "topping off" for your plots. You have been practicing throw and mow for a while. What's wrong with asking that question? That's why I asked, cause I would've thought that adding fertilizer Spring and Fall would be excessive.

A couple of short videos to throw into the discussion

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apyyIS31tVU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNwdmECsKuo

Here are a couple longer videos on the general subject of soil health. They are long but they do a very good job of explaining the principles behind of this. For those that are interested, these videos will really help you to understand things better....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4_Qa0D3E1A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhtQ7kfCXTc

Do any of these videos feature your soil test or your food plots and why you're having to add fertilizer Spring and Fall?

Refer to previous explanations on CEC values and sandy soils.....

I know about the cation exchanges. Our soil improved from last year's soil test to this year's test. I was just asking about your plots. You answered my question with your fertilizing schedule. Thanks.

You outta change your handle from CNC to CEC!!

Where the hell is blumsden???.....

He found a tractor with a disc and is enjoying himself

I got better things to do, than to try and convince a bunch of hard cases to try something new. I really don't care how anyone plants their plots.

I would still consider them "no till" but leave out the drill part.

Dayum blumsden…..It sounds like you’ve done went and gone sour on us. I hear you though.....

Jerremy,
Why are you always starting chit?