More than 100 years ago, long before all the Y2K hype, talk of the millennium and the existence of no-till, Charles Down’s great grandfather bought a farm. He tilled the soil, used draft horses and walked every step of the 240 acres behind his plow. The farm prospered and was systematically inherited by the next generation.

As urban areas stretch further into the countryside, adding more acres often requires no-tillers to buy or rent land located miles from their center of operation.

When you see the number of no-till acres growing significantly in areas outside the Corn Belt, one of the interesting things is the complexity of many rotations. No-tillers in other areas of the country are getting more crops into their rotations and are making them work.

A few weeks ago, I spent several days in Denver, Colo., sharing ideas with agricultural leaders about the importance of agricultural research. This was at a meeting where attendees advised the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) on assessing soil resource research programs and planning future research needs.

To help the 660 attendees at the mid-January National No-Tillage Conference in St. Louis make critical decisions on controlling weeds and insects in no-tilled corn for 1999, technical representatives from American Cyanamid, Zeneca Ag Products and Monsanto outlined new compounds and label changes.

During the recent U.S. Grains Council annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., veteran no-tiller Jim Andrew asked an intriguing question of three chemical company presidents composing a panel discussing the impact of biotechnology on agriculture.

Try as you may, it's difficult to find any bright spot among the nationwide growth of no-tilled acres during 1998 to talk about.

If you're wondering what attachments might be the perfect fit with your no-till drill, check out the rock-solid advice from these No-Till Farmer readers.

At last months seventh National No-Tillage Conference in St. Louis, there was considerable interest in the soybean intercropping program used by no-tillers Keith and Doug Thompson of Osage City, Kan. With this unique doublecropping program they intercrop soybeans into standing wheat in early April.