Three years ago, Stark City, Mo., farmer Kip Cullers set the world record for soybean yields at 160 bushels an acre, nearly four times the average soybean field in the U.S.

While the fear of failure keeps many farmers from pulling the trigger on game-changing decisions, the lessons of conservation farming were drilled into Blake Vince’s head by his father at an early age.

Faced with expensive fertilizer prices, fickle weather and the threat of activist regulators, no-tillers are using nitrogen stabilizers and other nutrient enhancements more than ever to avoid the losses between application and crop uptake.