As I sit here at my desk, I find myself not in the countryside of eastern Oregon where my family raises dryland wheat and barley, but rather in the vast city of Quito, Ecuador.

A malfunctioning planter led Jack Maranville to discover the benefits of skipping rows in his corn fields.

Equipment choices might be the most common subject among no-tillers. Or maybe it’s the weather. Or maybe how the weather changes soil conditions, and thus equipment choices. Whatever, it’s all covered in these excerpts from recent postings at Farmer’s Forum, the online bulletin board at www.no-tillfarmer.com.

The harvesting of corn residue, referred to as stover, as ethanol fodder will focus on “flat soils with high yields in wet areas. That’s where to start,” according to Jim Hettenhaus, a chemical engineer who works on ethanol-related issues with the U.S. Department of Energy and private companies.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, many farmers in south-central Nebraska began drilling irrigation wells as they began flood irrigating row crops in furrows.