As planting time arrives and the tractors are rolling I remember when we first started No Till farming and we were really one of the first to do so and this was in 1979 in fact I was awarded the conservation farmer of the year in N MO that year. No till farming or as it was called back then, trash farming is the process of farming by slicing the dirt and planting the seed in the soil and then covering it up with a roller. This replaced the plow and the many trips over the ground with a disk or other implements. With No Till farming you plant into the left over stubble from the previous year and the idea is to keep the soil covered up and to prevent as much soil erosion as possible. It is a common thought that you could easily lose an average of 3 tons of topsoil every year due to erosion and for anyone that has been to New Orleans you can see half of the state of Missouri in the Mississippi delta. . There are so many topics on erosion and conservation which I will devote to future Land Link articles but for right now my point is that when we started No till farming we had been told that we are one inch of topsoil away from extinction. There are of course trade offs with everything and one is that with No Till farming you have to rely alot more on chemicals and there again are so many future Land Link articles that can deal with this and again that feeds to my obsession with owning land with clear clean water but for right now we are talking the basic of erosion and how important that one inch of soil is. Please read the following article as I thought it was fascinating and thought provoking. Thank you and everyone hang in there. The Corona is here but there have always been problems but the sun always comes up the next day.

Thank you,
Drennan Bailey

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