No-till Farming with Corn and Cover Crops in Southeastern MN

Tom Pyfferoen discusses how he uses no-till practices in corn with cover crops on his 1,000 acre farm in Olmsted County, Minnesota.
Videography by Dan Balluff.

Time Stamps:

00:00:00 USDA NRCS Introduction
00:00:20 Tom Pyfferoen Introduction
00:00:40 Forage & Fertilizer Value
00:01:10 No-tilling
00:02:18 Residue Managers
00:03:15 Tillage
00:04:05 Soil Testing
00:04:28 Weed Pressure
00:04:57 Field Days
00:05:07 NRCS's role

[brandonmusser]

Good job good way to bring everything to the people

[matthijshierink]

Keep going on with this! I hope to bring also this story to a higher level in my country and hope finally that some farmers will choose this path

[lanceklessigregenerativeag]

Awesome video and tons of practical insight shared by Tom!
Personally, I've been blessed to visit several of Tom's farm over the past couple of years and he has some very nice soil....It's healing!

"The ability of that ground to take water has the been greatest benefit"...…..SPOT on as we go to cover crops and No-till!

Long live the Soil!

[kadelbachorganicfarms]

We are starting the process on our farm this year. Learning all we can this winter. Great video!!

[jimmydykes]

Last year was my first time go I g no till.I had a cereal rye and vetch cover crop that I crimped.It was very difficult to plant into because I let it get too far but after a lot of work on my planters and a lot of head scratching I finally got things working.Yes I had to be persistent or what you might call hard headed but I was determined to show those who said I couldn't do it that I could.I had some very good sweet corn that had some of the healthiest stalks ever.I can hardly wait for spring to get here now.

[margaretarross]

Wonderful video, lots of film "showing" results beyond narration. This is the kind of film that captures attention.

[TheRipeTomatoFarms]

Great video! Love to see the larger scale no-till farming.

[vivalaleta]

Beautiful. So glad to see the no till message being illustrated in my state. Now if you'd think about diversity next.

[Freefarmer]

The use of cover crops under irrigation looks very feasible and the benefits are unlimited. Wish we could make it work up here in southern Alberta on dryland.

[travisbroesder]

This video convinced me to use cover crops in the future. And no-til seems like a money saving planting method.

[sallymoen]

I just read a book about farming on the prairie in South Dakota (when it was first opened for settlers in land lotteries), and how the successful farming was done using similar systems. The prairies were deep grassy lands, and tilling the land worked well the first year, but since there wasn't enough regular rainfall nor riverwater to irrigate the crops, and there wasn't good reintroduction of nutrients to the soil, crops did eventually fail to thrive, and many settlers gave up their land claims. I think if no-till ideas had been spread in those years, there never would've been a Dust Bowl farm loss in the Midwest states.
The more I find out about no-till farming, the more I want to know. It has such global applications, but especially in more arid climates. Thank you for this video.

[millllllou]

what are the differences when it comes to weed pressure and options for dealing with them? does the method you use require more herbicides or can this be avoided?

[jjime]

SAP analysis is better than soil test it will tell you what is in the plant it is just like a blood test will tell you a person’s health rather than just feeding a person food that may not be needed for optimal health

[farmertim]

Is that water hemp at 7:22 and if it is how do you deal with getting rid of that weed.

[bigal]

Say you have a cover crop and you plant corn in it, do you repeat the process? Plant a cover crop every year? Looks like the layer of cover crop would get too thick. Do you have issues with the current cover crop on the ground shading the next cover crop from the sun?

[ironmyno]

I'd like to see, the whole.picture of the dollar value of the pros. Fuel, seed, fertilzer, irrigation, herbicide, pesticide reduction.

[gregkortbein]

Been No-tilling for over 20 years. I would never go back to tillage. To many rocks and to much erosion.

[peterclark]

When you have created a haven for Earthworms you will be successful. Every inch should crawling. They are the Regen Ag fulcrum animal. What I saw was monoculture cover crops but it is 18 months since this video so maybe the penny has dropped by now. Hard pan - aggressive deeper rooting plants. Any standing water is evidence of hard pan.

[nasrinjahan]

Could this method useful in India region?

[yanikivanov]

this is crazy....some countries are having hard time to cultivate and plow....so much unnecessary fuel is being burned