Kettle Moraine, WI | Patriot81 - 5/17/2024 18:32
My question is…what do they do about tillage on the headland?
Also, the incessant need to moldboard plow before every crop as well as pulling that little packer/finishing tool behind and beside the plow.
So many ways that wouldn’t work here…must be a “there” thing…
Kinda like removing all the straw from the field with self loading forage wagons only to pile it on the turn row and let it compost…they then spread it back on the field several months later. Seems like a lot of time, effort and money to make it easier to do tillage to me, but what do I know…
To think the ground there has been tilled similar intensity for hundreds of years and still get good yields. Cooler, moderate climate, different main crops, quick succession crops, must all have something to do with that. Getting to breakdown a soil and use it's carbon is a New World thing evidently.
The packer thing not only making the next pass smoother but the reconsolidation process closes air pockets and I believe reduces soil carbon oxidation thus reducing organic matter loss.
The picking up straw, composting, and returning the compost. I recall Dr. Goldstein when at Michael Fields Institute here in Wisconsin did a study 10+ years ago and I recall from his talk at La Crosse conference that concluded leaving the residue out in the field versus harvesting and composting it retain more soil carbon when factoring the fuel used. iIRC it was because the stabilization of carbon over residue left out would gas off back to atmosphere when breaking down.
Edited by thinkstoomuch 5/18/2024 08:41
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Europeans and their tiny headlands
