Frank Martin likes to keep things simple. He uses older combines with no yield monitors and he isn’t into using a lot of precision mapping on his 800-acre farm.

Canadian no-tillers often complain their growing season is too short to add cover crops to their rotation or diversify their cash crops.

My family farms on what is known as the Comanche Flats just northwest of Billings, Mont. As the name implies, the terrain is relatively level — in fact, the plow horses my great grandfather used to work the land were likely grateful for — so erosion isn’t a major concern for us.

When Roger Black switched to no-tilling in south-central Kansas more than two decades ago, he was searching for ways to reduce erosion in his silty-loam bottomland fields, as well as reduce fuel and labor costs.

I was born into no-till, you could say. It’s really all I’ve ever known. My grandfather was a big proponent for the environment and was an advocate when my Dad pushed for reducing tillage on our farm in the early 1990s.