750a poor crops

willy · Apr 2, 2014

After a long time trying to find the right drill for direct drilling, and visiting numerous crops established by varying drills I have come to the conclusion that the tine drill is far superior.

Ok you can't drill so well into cover crops. But cover crops I think are a little overrated without livestock anyway. I thought the 750 a was going to br the ultimate but frankly most crops drilled with it look sh!t, what I've seen.

And after no till bills talk it gave me reassurance that the tine drill and a little more soil movement are not neccacarily bad things. And so for me the claydon and the dale are the right choice and I think are actually far too underrated.

SilliamWhale · Apr 2, 2014

I dunno though you can look at it various ways. Lee had a Claydon was no good for him, it went. Bloke down here bought a 6m Claydon in a fit of enthusiasm lasted autumn of 2012 and then it went. It was a poor year for it of course. Does it mean the Claydon is rubbish? No, course not. They all work with the right operators.

I could do with a tine drill on the odd occasion but nothing that a bit of subsoiling with a grassland subsoiler can't aid me with.

All drills have strengths and weaknesses. You tend to get the conditions you design your system around in my view. So if you like lots of loosening with the drill you probably will continue to need loosening with the drill etc. and if you try to do min disturbance you may accept at times things don't have the "bounce" that cultivation gives early on.

Its a bit like discussing who has the nicest wife to be honest.

warksfarmer · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
After a long time trying to find the right drill for direct drilling, and visiting numerous crops established by varying drills I have come to the conclusion that the tine drill is far superior.

Ok you can't drill so well into cover crops. But cover crops I think are a little overrated without livestock anyway. I thought the 750 a was going to br the ultimate but frankly most crops drilled with it look sh!t, what I've seen.

And after no till bills talk it gave me reassurance that the tine drill and a little more soil movement are not neccacarily bad things. And so for me the claydon and the dale are the right choice and I think are actually far too underrated.

After phaffing with this dd malarky on and off for nearly 15 years I think, then i believe minimal soil disturbance is whats required. Without doubt grass weeds are a major issue and you will continue to battle them if you disturb the soil. Ok rotation can help but ultimately the less soil movement the better. No tine drill offers minimal soil disturbance. The dale is one of the best but having seen it work at clives then it still moves to much soil. As will said if you need to loosen then use a subsoiler in front of the drill, not on the drill.

Also these drills with leading tines are only happy on nice soil. Put them on heavy soil and they lift wet sh!t to the surface and struggle to cover the seed as they peel the soil around the seeding coulter. If they are working for people on what they call heavy soil, then I am afraid its not heavy soil at all.

willy · Apr 2, 2014

Lee I think this heavy soil light soil is a bit of a excuse. From your photos it might be heavy but you have something that is far more consistent than any soils that are over here. On the heavy stuff if you are pulling up wet crap then shallow the tine out.

Also I remember you saying that your best yields were from the claydon drilled crops. I am not saying the jd is a bad drill, but why are so many crops from a disc drill so bad. We have tony Reynolds over this way and his crops are always hopeless on heavy land with the disc drill and he has done so much damage to the direct drilling uptake around this area, as people only here about the failures.

warksfarmer · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Lee I think this heavy soil light soil is a bit of a excuse. From your photos it might be heavy but you have something that is far more consistent than any soils that are over here. On the heavy stuff if you are pulling up wet crap then shallow the tine out.

Also I remember you saying that your best yields were from the claydon drilled crops. I am not saying the jd is a bad drill, but why are so many crops from a disc drill so bad. We have tony Reynolds over this way and his crops are always hopeless on heavy land with the disc drill and has done so much damage to the direct drilling theory.

This is why one mans heavy land is anothers sand pit because you'd have to shallow the tine out of the ground! There is no nice stuff in the profile as its riddled with magnesium which makes it wet and sticky. We can make tilth out of of it by opening it up then letting the weather do its work. We then end up with about an icy of crumbled soil on the surface.

If we go direct into the stubble on this soil we are putting seed onto smeared wet soil. The drills can cover it and the crop fails - seen it with wheats, barley, beans and osr.

Wrong way around my worst yields came from the claydon drill. Best yields on one field came from the CS drill - but its one field ........ Consistent yields come from moving the soil and sowing with a vaderstad but this comes with other issues such as weed burden so the ability to slot seed in the right conditions such as after a cover crop or in a dry autumn is where we need to be. If conditions are not right then out comes the cultivation equipment as dd drills are only part of the system unless you have nice land.

shakerator · Apr 2, 2014

750a mineralises no nutirents

dale claydon etc probably 50kg/ha N

put the nutrients on for fair comparison

thats the difference IMHO

warksfarmer · Apr 2, 2014

shakerator said:
750a mineralises no nutirents

dale claydon etc probably 50kg/ha N

put the nutrients on for fair comparison

thats the difference IMHO

To be fair we did place 34.5% N with the CS - think the rate was 50kg/ha.

SilliamWhale · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Lee I think this heavy soil light soil is a bit of a excuse. From your photos it might be heavy but you have something that is far more consistent than any soils that are over here. On the heavy stuff if you are pulling up wet crap then shallow the tine out.

Also I remember you saying that your best yields were from the claydon drilled crops. I am not saying the jd is a bad drill, but why are so many crops from a disc drill so bad. We have tony Reynolds over this way and his crops are always hopeless on heavy land with the disc drill and he has done so much damage to the direct drilling uptake around this area, as people only here about the failures.

Are they genuinely rubbish or do they just look so? What is his rotation?

willy · Apr 2, 2014

SilliamWhale said:
Are they genuinely rubbish or do they just look so? What is his rotation?

Crops at Oakham genuinely struggle., the crops at thurlby on the other hand do well, but this is kind soil.

He does have a wide rotation, but it does tend to vary depending on whats failed.

SilliamWhale · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Crops at Oakham genuinely struggle., the crops at thurlby on the other hand do well, but this is kind soil.

He does have a wide rotation, but it does tend to vary depending on whats failed.

Are your soils as tricky as the ones at Oakham?

warksfarmer · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Crops at Oakham genuinely struggle., the crops at thurlby on the other hand do well, but this is kind soil.

He does have a wide rotation, but it does tend to vary depending on whats failed.

I've seen those soils and yes not ideal but not heavy.

willy · Apr 2, 2014

SilliamWhale said:
Are your soils as tricky as the ones at Oakham?

Yes and no. But that's not the point other people's are and they see 10 years of failure and think this is not acceptable

Clive · Apr 2, 2014

well I ran tine zero-till alongside disc zero-till - I sold the tine drill so draw your own conclusions from that !

however I will say that this is a soil type and rotation dependant decision. There is no simple right answer for every farm as Will says its like comparing wives !

the point made above is important with zero disturbance that you really must consider the lack of N mineralisation and either be doing something about that within your rotation or add the ability to place fert with the drill if you want consistency, I believe this is why the CS has done so well in NZ

PS - if you want to see some decent 750a crops I can show you a few

warksfarmer · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Yes and no. But that's not the point other people's are and they see 10 years of failure and think this is not acceptable

They had a couple of drills on that farm though. Are the crops failing from both or is it the complete system of no till that is failing?

Clive · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
Lee I think this heavy soil light soil is a bit of a excuse. From your photos it might be heavy but you have something that is far more consistent than any soils that are over here. On the heavy stuff if you are pulling up wet crap then shallow the tine out.

Also I remember you saying that your best yields were from the claydon drilled crops. I am not saying the jd is a bad drill, but why are so many crops from a disc drill so bad. We have tony Reynolds over this way and his crops are always hopeless on heavy land with the disc drill and he has done so much damage to the direct drilling uptake around this area, as people only here about the failures.

doesn't he run a great plains double disc drill ? - I'm not a fan of them either and I'm not surprised crops are not the best on heavy land after it, what is his typical heavy land rotation ? its possibly far more to blame than the machinery

SilliamWhale · Apr 2, 2014

Don't blame the drill willy blame the management. It can never be the drills "fault" its only a lump of metal at the end of the day.

shakerator · Apr 2, 2014

The difference is they have the happyegg operation/muck at thurlby

martian · Apr 2, 2014

willy said:
After a long time trying to find the right drill for direct drilling, and visiting numerous crops established by varying drills I have come to the conclusion that the tine drill is far superior.

Ok you can't drill so well into cover crops. But cover crops I think are a little overrated without livestock anyway. I thought the 750 a was going to br the ultimate but frankly most crops drilled with it look sh!t, what I've seen.

And after no till bills talk it gave me reassurance that the tine drill and a little more soil movement are not neccacarily bad things. And so for me the claydon and the dale are the right choice and I think are actually far too underrated.

I'm now sorry I didn't show you some better crops willy...a lot of ours did look a bit sad after that wet winter but are romping away having got hold of a bit of fertiliser.

No-till Bill's favouring of knife coulters in the drylands of Oz has a lot to do with creating tiny ditches so that the seed sits in the dampest possible environment to get a good start (assuming they get a shower around drilling time). They are keen to leave a slightly corrugated finish with the seed at the bottom of the rill, and you get the added bonus that most of the fertiliser prills land along side it when you topdress, as well as a certain amount of protection from the wind for the young plant

Jim Bullock · Apr 2, 2014

If you are on a free-draining soil or you are lucky enough to have a dry year then a disc drill works well. However conditions have changed over the last decade and now we get these extreme rainfall conditions I am afraid it just does not work well on over 50% of our soils, especially those with a high silt content...no matter what... they slump...the clays and the sands - like Clives are easier to deal with. So it might seem like a backward step but we are going to try a McConnel Seederator, a Sumo DTS and any other strip till machine that might be available in our area

... because we have got to add a bit of air to some of our soils to get a decent crop. I know 2012/13/14 have been exceptional but it is the situation we have to live with and I cannot go on for ever believing that I am going to create the perfect soil. So I am looking to purchase a 3 meter strip tiller which I can use when I need to move some soil and then when conditions are right we can use the (Kuhn) disc drill. I am afraid I cannot be doing with all the evangelical No-Till doctrine as it only really works if you have a consistent soil type and a predictable climate (usually with extremes of temperature) I have proved to myself it does not produce a positive financial return year upon year.. You have to be flexible so I am afraid to say we will be adding a tined drill to our armoury.

chaffcutter · Apr 2, 2014

I'm surprised if anyone persisted with poor results for such a long time, he must believe that he is learning or improving something good to be so persistent?

750a poor crops

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