Most people who meet Doug Har­ford are so im­pressed with his precision farming knowledge, they as­sume he holds a doctorate in agricultural engineering.

Many people are finding no-till doesn’t push a farmer’s “hot button” like it did a few years back.

It's not that Ray McCormick wants to deal with vast amounts of water each growing season. The Vincennes, Ind., no-tiller really doesn’t have a choice.

Higher fertility, narrow rows, soil-testing changes, higher plant populations, insect-resistant hybrids, yield monitors, soil additives and no-tilling corn into wheat stubble were among the unique ideas used by the top finishers in the three no-till categories in the 1997 yield contest conducted by the National Corn Grower’s Association.

While some farmers tend to have difficulty no-tilling corn in rotations, a pair of Purdue University researchers are finding row cleaners and avoiding planting in the old rows can make continuous no-till corn feasible. In addition, some ideas they’ve come up with can help if you are following a more traditional crop rotation.