On this edition of Conservation Ag Update, brought to you by CultivAce, we honor the life and legacy of Bill Richards — the ‘Grandfather of No-Till’ — who passed away Tuesday at the age of 93. Bill reflects on his no-till journey during one of his last recorded interviews, and No-Till Farmer editor Frank Lessiter shares some perspective on Bill’s impact on no-till in the U.S.

In the Cover Crop Connection, Conservation Ag Operator Fellow, Ray McCormick showcases his conservation buffer in Vincennes, Ind., which includes unharvested soybeans and a cover crop mix of annual ryegrass, balansa clover and crimson clover. 

Lewiston, Minn., no-tiller Luke Miller steps into the Farmer Feature spotlight to showcase his unique rotation which includes double-cropped soybeans with triticale.

In the Ahead of the Curve segment, Verdant Robotics’ Curtis Garner unveils the company’s new Sharpshooter smart sprayer.

California no-till and strip-till pioneer Tom Barcellos checks in with a look at his planter in the Video of the Week. And finally, Tennessee No-Till Innovator Adam Daugherty shares a special message about the 2025 National No-Tillage Conference in Louisville, Ky.

This episode of Conservation Ag Update is brought to you by CultivAce.

CultivAce is a West Coast manufacturer and distributor of a comprehensive line of foliar and starter fertilizers. CultivAce offers innovative solutions that drive agricultural crop yields and cultivate profitableoutcomes.

With a relentless focus on delivering the highest quality foliar and starter fertilizers, we are committed to empowering growers with the tools they need to achieve remarkable results. CultivAce is built on two fundamental principles: products must be the highest quality, and they must make the grower money. If a product doesn’t meet these standards, CultivAce doesn’t manufacture it.

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TRANSCRIPT

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‘Grandfather of No-Till’ Bill Richards Dies at 93

We begin with some sad news — No-Till Legend Bill Richards passed away at his home Tuesday at the age of 93. Often referred to as the Grandfather of No-Till, Richards started no-tilling near Circleville, Ohio in the 1970s and never looked back.

He served as NRCS chief from 1990 to 1993. During his tenure, no-tilled acres in the U.S. increased from about 17 million to more than 42 million acres. Richards reflected on his no-till journey a few years ago at the Conservation Tillage and Technology Conference.

“I’m going to chuckle — It took me about 30-40 years to transition because we had to make our own equipment. We didn’t have all the wonderful machinery and technology that they have today. We went through all the steps from making our own planter to meeting Jon Kinzenbaw (Kinze founder) and getting the no-till coulter, that was the big breakthrough. No-till is an opportunity for agriculture to really deliver the conservation benefits that are needed and more importantly improve soil quality, productivity and all the things that go with we learned from no-till.”

The No-Till Legend was honored at the 25th National No-Tillage Conference. No-Till Farmer editor Frank Lessiter shared some perspective on Bill’s legacy.

“I paid my first visit to Bill’s operation in 1973. At that time, he was already successful with no-till and was following the controlled traffic system to reduce soil compaction concerns. He was among the early adopters of no-till in southern Ohio. He says that no-till changed his life and today the family is no-tilling about 3,000 acres. Bill saw the value of running wider equipment in order to run tires and permanent wheel tracks very early. In 1973 when I visited, they were running 60-foot-wide planters to no-till 31 rows of 20-inch corn in the days when most growers thought that narrower rows meant 30-inch spacing. His contributions to the no-till movement started on the home farm but he later had a tremendous impact while serving in Washington D.C. as chief of the Soil Conservation Service. In that position, he convinced many government officials and farmers across the country that no-till was here to stay and could make the environment better for us.” 

We have much more on Bill’s legendary career on No-TillFarmer.com. 

>Ray McCormick’s Conservation Buffer

Earlier this week we paid another visit to this year’s Conservation Ag Operator Fellow, Ray McCormick in Vincennes, Ind., and one thing about Ray is that even when it’s the “off season,” he’s still thinking ahead for next season and doing what he can with cover crops to improve his corn crop for next year. Let’s take a look at one of his fields.

“Good morning, we’re here in southern Indiana and this is where my grandfather lived and had a farm and this is what we do for conservation. We have unharvested soybeans so there should be a covey of quail right there. So we leave some unharvested soybeans for the birds — there’s a few birds in there right now. And then we have a cover crop — and this is our annual ryegrass, balansa clover and crimson clover. And you can see we put this on with our platform and we’ve got a beautiful stand there. And then along the muddy run, which is not muddy anymore, is our native prairie grass plants so that’s our conservation buffer along the stream. Unharvested soybeans for the birds and then our cover crop taking care of the soil to grow us a big corn crop next year.”

Very cool to see all those birds and other wildlife out in his field, helping to improve the soil health. And be sure to catch the final installment of the Conservation Ag Operator Fellowship to learn how Ray’s harvest season wrapped up. You can find that article in the upcoming February issue of No-Till Farmer’s Conservation Tillage Guide.

Minnesota No-Tiller Double-Crops Soybeans & Triticale

Time now for a good old fashioned Farmer Feature. Let’s head out to Lewiston, Minn., to catch up with longtime no-tiller Luke Miller.

We joined him in the cab as he harvested triticale in early June. Miller grows feed for his 700 cows. And he has a pretty unique rotation. Luke, tell us about it. 

“One thing that we’re doing that’s unique is we’re double cropping. Our rotation is corn silage, seeded triticale following corn silage. We harvest triticale in spring and then double plant to soybeans.”

“After the corn silage harvest, we come in with a Great Plains drill with 7.5 inch spacing, seeding 100 pounds of triticale per acre. After the crop is harvested in spring, we no-till soybeans in 15-inch rows with a Kinze planter.”

“This is just something that we’ve been experiencing. The last couple years, the protein count of our triticale has been down a little bit in the 13% range when it used to always be in 16%. We don’t know if that’s just because it’s getting diluted or we’ve been shorting iut on nitrogen. This last year, when we seeded we put down 50 pounds of urea to see if we couldn’t get the protein content of the triticale to increase.”

“We actually just got done, this is our last triticale harvest of the year. We’re putting it in this bunker here. We’re just pushing it in, packing it down and covering it with plastic later this afternoon.”

Ahead of the Curve: Verdant Robotics Sharpshooter

Let’s talk tech now as we go Ahead of the Curve with Verdant Robotics. The company showed off its new Sharpshooter at the FIRA Conference a few weeks ago.

Dubbed the only robotic precision application system that aims before it shoots, Sharpshooter uses Bullseye Aim & Apply Technology. It’s capable of spraying targets ranging from the size of a dime to a dinner plate at a rate of 120-480 shots per second. And as Verdant co-founder Curtis Garner tell us, it can be used for more than just weed control. 

“The main thing you should know about Verdant — we’re not just a weeding machine. We do that well and that’s the first thing the grower can get an ROI on. We can do a lot more for them. Weeding, thinning, applying crop protectants. Whatever they need, we’re here to provide value. As far as dealers, we’d love for dealers to reach out. We look to partner with folks for sales and service. So, reach out, would love to have a conversation.”

Video of the Week: No-Tilling in California

Staying in California for the Video of the Week. West Coast strip-till and no-till pioneer Tom Barcellos checks in with an up-close look at his planter. 

“This is our 1710 John Deere MaxEmerge planter. What you see in California is a 3-point integral planter that’s drawn. We have smaller fields. We don’t have these vast, large fields where we can run 20-30 rows. 10-row, 30-inch. We also have an 8-row 30. We use the same fertilizer attachments as much as we can on our equipment, so we don’t have to carry a large parts inventory. You’ll notice there’s no row cleaner here because we don’t have a lot of that top residual.  We run fertilizer, wavy coulter, and we have some good downpressure springs. The downpressure springs do a good job in the strip-till area. When we do no-till, it’s critical, the moisture in the soil because sometimes we don’t have a lot of organic matter in that top 2-3 inches where we want to have that seed placement. The wavy coulter does a good job of opening the soil, but you don’t want it to be dry enough so that it doesn’t seal well. We’ve used some Schlagel finger closers before. Typically, we do 95-98% strip-till now, so we kind of got away from that.”

Have an interesting photo or video from your farm? Or a story you’d like us to feature on the broadcast? Send me an email at Nnewman@lessitermedia.com.

And that will wrap things up this edition of Conservation Ag Update. Until next time, for more stories visit no-tillfarmer.com, striptillfarmer.com and covercropstrategies.com. Before we go, let’s send it out to Dave Hula for a preview of his upcoming presentation at the National Strip-Tillage Conference. Thanks for tuning in! Have a great day!

Of course, I’m sure not everyone was so lucky with the weather. Shoot me an email—nnewman@LessiterMedia.com— let us know how harvest is going in your neck of the woods.