Drought and no-till

tr250

Member
Location
Northants
anyone else having trouble with drought in no-till? The soil just doesn't seem to have got wet last winter where the cultivated fields I have seemed to established better as it seemed to get wetter quicker. Before I started no-tilling I would of said it would be the other way round. Any thoughts as I'm no expert but that is my findings this year
 

ih1455xl

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
northampton
Got a couple of fields of winter wheat where there's a lighter corner and there's hardly a crop there whick I think is down to drought had a extra bit of liquid n and a bit of mop but still behind the heavier the land the more it's benifited from no till
 

Will7

Member
anyone else having trouble with drought in no-till? The soil just doesn't seem to have got wet last winter where the cultivated fields I have seemed to established better as it seemed to get wetter quicker. Before I started no-tilling I would of said it would be the other way round. Any thoughts as I'm no expert but that is my findings this year

Not exactly the same situation but I had massive cracks in the ground last year which I was encouraged to “chip” some soil aggregates into so I disced them at 1” deep. This worked well and created drainage channels, but I feel the water has run to those cracks too easily and into the land drains rather than being absorbed by the pre-existing columns. Time will tell
 

Fuzzy

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Bedfordshire
anyone else having trouble with drought in no-till? The soil just doesn't seem to have got wet last winter where the cultivated fields I have seemed to established better as it seemed to get wetter quicker. Before I started no-tilling I would of said it would be the other way round. Any thoughts as I'm no expert but that is my findings this year
We have Easter weekend coming up, so expect plenty of rain.
 

foxbox

Member
Location
West Northants
anyone else having trouble with drought in no-till? The soil just doesn't seem to have got wet last winter where the cultivated fields I have seemed to established better as it seemed to get wetter quicker. Before I started no-tilling I would of said it would be the other way round. Any thoughts as I'm no expert but that is my findings this year

I think we're seeing similar to you. We established 3 fields of WW using direct drilling and the remaining wheat into min-tilled ground; the min-tilled stuff looks fantastic but the DD is very patchy. Two of them are 2nd year DD straight into permanent pasture, the 3rd is 3rd year wheat into former permanent pasture.

My view is that we suffered from the remnants of the drought in the autumn as we've got bare areas where it appears seed never established, it's especially noticeable where very shallow ridge and furrow is still visible.

I also wonder if we're seeing a lack of available N for the growing crop over the winter? In the min-tilled stuff the crop has grown nearly all winter; it's certainly not shut down for a long time like most years and if the same applies to the DD stuff then presumably the bacteria breaking down the old turf will also have been active during this time? In reality the DD wheat did stand still; it's looked poor until the urea applied in late Feb became available at which point what is left of it has lept forwards. It's a scruffy looking crop though and I'm glad it's our second year of trying it as we'd have scrapped it if it was our first experience.
 

rob1

Member
Location
wiltshire
I think we're seeing similar to you. We established 3 fields of WW using direct drilling and the remaining wheat into min-tilled ground; the min-tilled stuff looks fantastic but the DD is very patchy. Two of them are 2nd year DD straight into permanent pasture, the 3rd is 3rd year wheat into former permanent pasture.

My view is that we suffered from the remnants of the drought in the autumn as we've got bare areas where it appears seed never established, it's especially noticeable where very shallow ridge and furrow is still visible.

I also wonder if we're seeing a lack of available N for the growing crop over the winter? In the min-tilled stuff the crop has grown nearly all winter; it's certainly not shut down for a long time like most years and if the same applies to the DD stuff then presumably the bacteria breaking down the old turf will also have been active during this time? In reality the DD wheat did stand still; it's looked poor until the urea applied in late Feb became available at which point what is left of it has lept forwards. It's a scruffy looking crop though and I'm glad it's our second year of trying it as we'd have scrapped it if it was our first experience.
it only has to look good on one day,to be fair even after 8 years of dd i look at my crops and they arent as even as ploughed/min tilled crops at this time of the year but they do catch up and even out
 

foxbox

Member
Location
West Northants
it only has to look good on one day,to be fair even after 8 years of dd i look at my crops and they arent as even as ploughed/min tilled crops at this time of the year but they do catch up and even out

Totally agree; the DD stuff has bare patches in it though which aren't present in the min-tilled stuff, hence my frustration. That said, we've had plenty of years without full establishment using other systems and without the complications of the last 18 months worth of weather too.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 80 42.1%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 67 35.3%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 15.8%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

  • 1,294
  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
Top