Dwayne Beck has always preached working with nature instead of against it, which shines through in many of the talks the former manager of the Dakota Lakes Research Farm in Pierre, S.D. has given at agricultural events across the world. 

The No-Till Innovator and Living Legend reviewed many of those concepts during the 2025 National No-Tillage Conference, and we’re sharing some of those in this article. Beck continues to emphasize the need for improving soil health and rotational diversity to farm productively without injuring the environment.

1. Infiltrating Water

Beck says no-till work on the research farm got started because of irrigation. During the 1970s many growers were trying to irrigate crops on their hills “and just kept running the water back to the river because somebody told them that tillage made water go in the ground. And there’s still people out there that believe that.

“We did a big experiment to figure out how to make water go in the ground. We found out no-till was the way to do that.”

When Beck went to design a system for Dakota Lakes he didn’t look at another farming system but analyzed the native prairies around him. He encourages other growers to do the same. Beck says the farm still uses some herbicides, but insecticides haven’t been applied for more than 18 years. 

“Look at what the native vegetation is where you farm because that tells you what you can do there. Not what you want to do, but what you…