By John Finnie, Kenton, Manitoba

My name is John Finnie and I farm about 35 miles northwest of Brandon, Manitoba. I have been zero-tilling all of my acres located in the Harding clay soil zone, for about 5 Years. I have a mixed grain and livestock operation, small by today's standards, and fairly diversified. I'm a partner in a 50 cow dairy operation; seed approximately 800 acres of wheat barley, canola, peas, and lentils; and also have a 40 cow/calf beef operation. The soil type is a heavy gumbo clay that holds moisture very well, but because of the rolling terrain is quite prone to water and wind erosion. I started farming in 1976 and for the first 10 years, grew reasonably good crops under conventional tillage. I knew there was a problem with water erosion, but like most others had accepted it as a fact of life, never thinking that maybe I could do something to stop it.

Ironically, those ten years were dry years, but when it rained, it rained hard. Under conventional tillage, there wasn't enough cover on the surface to keep the water from running off and taking the dirt with it. It was especially prone right after seeding, before the crop was established at the time of year when we usually get most of our rain. I had stopped summerfallowing in the mid seventies and grew high residue crops like wheat, oats, and barley. I thought that would stop water erosion, but it didn't. It wasn't unusual to find 2 or 3 feet of wash dirt deposited in the bottom of the ravines that run through my farm after getting 1 inch of rain in 15 minutes. Cone was the soil, fertilizer, and water that could have been used to grow a crop.

In the late 80's we went through a series of hot, dry, and windy growing seasons. 1989 was the worst, and the one that made me think there has to be another way. I knew that in a dry season ~ would have to save every drop of water that came our way. That meant trapping: as much snow and rainfall as possible. I minimum tilled for 2 years leaving standing stubble in the fall, then seeding directly into it the following spring, using wide sweeps on our Bourgault air Seeder. That slowed down the erosion problem and trapped more water but the perennial weeds got out of hand within 2 years. Also, a heavy rain within days after seeding still caused water erosion problems.

I decided to go one step further. Using Round-Up as a burn-off before seeding and narrow knife openers on the air seeder. That made a tremendous difference in controlling erosion and retaining moisture. It made it possible for me to grow low residue, high value crops like peas, lentils, and canola, as long as I rotated between a high residue tall stubble crop arid low residue short stubble crop. Now, the only place I see erosion is on the access roadway where there is so much machine or vehicle traffic that it kills the vegetation. I have noticed a dramatic improvement in crop yields on the eroded knolls mostly, I believe, because of additional moisture retention.

Most of the many grassed waterways on my farm have been removed, because they arenÃt necessary anymore, as long as there is plenty of standing, anchored crop stubble in place to hold the soil. If you have to use a tillage implement to level the gullies, do it in the spring so you can establish a crop that year to provide cover as soon as possible. Don't work across them with a deep tiller and spread grass sod over the whole field that will start to grow immediately and cause no end of headaches down the road. I prefer to spray the gullies heavily with Round-Up prior to seeding straight through. Sometimes I will go back and double seed the length of the gully to provide better competition with the grass and ensure adequate stubble cover. Use common sense, if it is too deep, or handles too much better, leave it alone.

NUTRIENT LOSS

The best way to prevent nutrient loss from wind and water is to keep the soil and whatever else you have applied to the soil exactly where it is SQJ posed to be, on the field. The main nutrients in question are water, fertilizer - N,P,K,S, micro-nutrients, organic or synthetic, and also crop residue that eventually will become nutrients. If you are removing crop residue for livestock use, try to put it back when the livestock is finished with it in the form of manure.

There are a multitude of different forms of Fertilizers and just as many ways to apply them. Do your homework. Find out which nutrients are prone to leaching, denitrification, and/or volatilization. Determine which can be placed with the seed and how much? Soil testing is very effective in determining what nutrients you already have, and what and how much more needs to be applied. Try to stay within application sidelines, as over application is expensive and could cause groundwater contamination. Under application will result in lower yields.

There are many variables to consider - soil type, moisture availability, equipment availability and cost, fertilizer availability and cost, crop selection and rotation. Every farm will have different circumstances and requirements. Use common sense, base your decisions on your own information and circumstances. Make your operation sustainable both short and long term.