A recent report from USDA’s Agricultural Research Service has some interesting insights on the benefits of crop rotations, but researchers caution the “long view” is needed to fully capitalize on such improvements.

If anhydrous ammonia is to be applied in the fall, several factors must be considered, including soil texture, temperature, and soil moisture. Consider the following guidelines.

Bill Kellogg is trying to do something about the chronic algae blooms in America's southernmost Great Lake. Instead of scattering fertilizer atop his fields, Kellogg now uses a strip till machine that knifes fertilizer pellets 8 inches into the soil — deep enough that heavy rains won't wash it away.

The U.S Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in Nevada is offering financial and technical assistance to help agricultural producers apply conservation practices through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program Classic (EQIP Classic) and Inflation Reduction Act (EQIP IRA), and the Agricultural Management Assistance Program (AMA). More than $16 million is available to producers through EQIP and AMA.

Whether growers are just looking to tweak their no-till/strip-till operation or planning for big changes, there will be something for nearly everyone at the 33^rd annual National No-Tillage Conference that kicks off in January. The full program has been released for the 2025 conference, which is scheduled for Jan. 7-10 in at the Marriott Downtown in Louisville, Ky.

Farm profitability and environmental stewardship can go hand-in-hand when planting cover crops, according to Purdue University’s Shalamar Armstrong.

“The conservation stewardship contract was a boon because that yielded us $138,000, so the machine was paid for, and I even had enough money left over to take my wife to Dairy Queen. What a deal,” David Legvold says.

Move residue, debris and any vegetation from the soil surface at the sample site. Failing to do so may cause an incorrect (too high) organic matter measurement.