Strip-Till Farmer’s 11th annual Strip-Till Operational Benchmark Study, with responses from 215 strip-tillers across the U.S., shows that strip-till yields didn’t take much of a dip in 2023, despite much of the country experiencing dry or drought conditions. 

The average strip-tilled corn yield was 204.1 bushels per acre in 2023, less than 3 bushels shy of the 207-bushel average in 2022 and almost 27 bushels higher than the USDA average of 177.3 bushels per acre.

“Those numbers speak for themselves,” says Michael Petersen, former NRCS soil scientist and independent consultant with over 35 years of strip-till research experience. “That’s almost a 30-bushel improvement over the USDA average. That’s incredibly significant. I’ve been working in strip-till since 1986, and I’m still shaking my head that more people still don’t get how good of a concept it is. But hey, I’m biased.” 

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73.2% of survey respondents also no-till some of their acres, while 27.4% vertical-till, 24% practice conventional tillage and 5% mulch-till. Although strip-tilled corn yields were better than the 195-bushel no-till average, survey respondents reported higher corn yields of 211.1 bushels per acre on…