Turlock farmers have been no-tilling for five years

Michael and Adam Crowell of Bar-Vee Dairy in Turlock, Calif., have been no-tilling their winter small grain, twin-row corn and sorghum sudan for five years.

They use a John Deere 1590 no-till drill to seed wheat or triticale in the fall and also they use the same drill to establish a sorghum sudan triple crop following corn chopping. Corn is direct seeded with a Monosem twin-row planter that staggers two seed lines every 30 inches in flat plantings (pictured below right).

One problem that has surfaced in the Crowell’s CT system is the natural consolidation or settling of their largely sandy soil that has created low spots where irrigation water tends to collect resulting in poor crop growth.

To address this problem, they will do a shallow landplaning following this summer’s crops. 

Planting a no-till farm.

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