The first time i heard about no-tilling was at Kansas State University in 1973. We talked about studies being done in Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Missouri and other places where no-till first took hold. I came home from those discussions and thought about putting no-till to work on our farm, but we faced a tough challenge. Based on KSU’s no-till handbook, our clay soils (shallow topsoil, super-tight subsoil) are classified as “needing special management” for no-till.

Perhaps you haven’T thought about the amount of dust you generate in a given day. But lawmakers have, and that’s why the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is taking a hard look at the amount of dust generated on farms and how this dust affects both air quality and human health.

It's somewhat ironic that trying to farm right out of college during a period of bad flooding in northeastern Saskatchewan led me several years later to cropping systems research in a semi-arid area where I could really use some of that excess water! Along the way, I did graduate studies in forage genetics at the University of Guelph in Ontario and at the University of Minnesota.

No-tillers could gain income for their crop residue as the United States seeks energy independence and relief from soaring oil prices.

Although more than 40 percent of soybean acreage in the United States is now no-tilled, debate still centers on whether no-tilling or conventional tillage produce the best soybean yields. Extensive data crunching is swaying the debate toward no-till.