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Michaela Paukner:

Welcome to the No-Till Farmer Podcast, brought to you by Yetter Farm Equipment. I'm Michaela Paukner, Managing Editor at No-Till Farmer. In today's episode of the podcast, I'm joined by Dan Forgey, the 2022 No-Till Innovator Award winner in the Crop Production category.

Here's Dan talking about the 10,000-acre South Dakota operation he manages, why crop diversification is so important, and why he has a passion for soil.

Dan Forgey:

My name is Dan Forgey and I'm in Central South Dakota, Gettysburg. A relatively low rainfall environment, average 18 inches. I've been with Cronin Farms for 53 years. We tilled for half of that, 26 years, then we started no-tilling. Basically, right now, I was the farm manager and the agronomy manager and now I'm semi-retired. I take care of the agronomy work on the farm, which I just love to work with the soil. Anyway, that's kind of the story. We're very diversified, but we're really a big believer in soil health.

We have 640 acres irrigated out of the 10,000 acres, and then we have a little over 8,000 acres of native prairie along the Missouri River breaks. You can see some of that in the background. That's our pivot in the background. We irrigate out of the Oahe Reservoir, which is a tremendously big reservoir, but irrigation is fairly small, but we do that just to [inaudible 00:01:53] lift. So it doesn't cost a lot to... It costs, but not near as much as if you have a lot of lift to get the water to your pivots.

When we first started irrigating, we weren't no-tilling, and there was no question. We said, "That's how we're going to be guaranteed. We've got feed for our cattle in the wintertime is by irrigating." Because we didn't think we could grow a crop and we were black fallow, we fallowed a fourth of our ground. What I'm saying is, we kept it black all year long because we were trying to conserve moisture. We had no idea of what we were doing. That's what I'm getting back to. This deal between the Dwayne Beck, the no-till, the soil health, the water filtration, you're breaking the plow layer, that's all such a tremendous part in our journey in soil health and where we are today.

Michaela Paukner:

What type of livestock do you guys have now and how many?

Dan Forgey:

They've got 850 head of mother cows, and then they'll background them calves. What they'll do is they'll wean them and then they'll feed them up a little bit, then they'll sell them, but they'll always wean them and then feed them some and then sell them in two months after they're weaned. The one thing we're working hard on, and I did a lot of research on it, we've done a lot, is grazing cover crops in the wintertime. I've got a really good study I'll talk about in my presentation about where we had this one field and we just took it and put cover crop and then we grazed it in paddocks and how every variety in our mix is what I had at there. The purpose. I had either micro eyes, I friendly plant or like enhanced phosphorous uptake or whatever and I had all that done.

Then we went right through where to the very end to show you how much we could save over feeding through the wagon. We found out one thing is the cows will come to the farmland and well they're just coming about right now. Then you have to be prepared because we don't want to overgraze. I mean that's just on our farmland. I say we need to leave at least a third of our residue on our cover crops so on our farm ground we don't let the cows overgraze. I think that's really important, especially in our delicate situation with their moisture. Yeah, it's a little different when you're get 25 inches. The cattle, they are compliment because you look at it this way, you use the cover crop and the cover crop will bring up the nitrogen where if you're in a high rainfall environment, that's good because it doesn't run into the drain tile your nitrogen is, it comes up on top.

For us where we don't get wet enough to leach out, I mean just so it's in that cover, say you got 30 units in the ground and then the cover takes it up and you only got five units in and the rest is in the cover, how do you get that back? Well, if you let the cows eat it, then the cattle, they'll take the cattle use 20% and they'll give back 80 in manure and urine. I just think there's really a benefit to running cattle on the soil and we're really, but in our environment with caution because that get back that overgraze, you really have to wash that overgraze.

Michaela Paukner:

How did you first get connected with Cronin Farms?

Dan Forgey:

I'm on the fourth generation on the farm and I was raised not too far from there, and Dan that would be, well, Dan's the second generation, he hired me and I just went to work there and we raised a lot of pigs. We raised pigs on pasture. What you do is you just had these little a huts and I don't know if you've seen them, where you pig out on grass and these pigs are raised out in these little huts, just little shelters.

We raised a lot of pigs and then we came through and we were so busy working and then all of a sudden we had a drought and then the interest rates were high and then Dan and then Monty, the third generation farmer, was taking over and everybody just decided it was time to... We had to try something. That was a big step in the no-till. I don't mean, I've said this before, but you stop and think where you don't have anybody or anything written in. It was pretty vague about what was going on with no-till. Now 98% of our land in this mid-corridor, South Dakota is no-till and a lot of that is from Dr. Duane Beck.

Michaela Paukner:

Wow. What are you all growing out there with such a diversified operation?

Dan Forgey:

We're kind of switching up a little bit. It used to be we'd have like 10 or 11 crops and that really got complicated and we found it was a little more than what we could handle. Usually what we try to do is when we raise a crop, we try to have it sold before we plant it and that worked very well. We'd have spring wheat, winter wheat, eat sunflower, soybeans, corn, and then we've had flax and we've had barley, we've had four inch wheat, we've had lentils, we've had field peas, we're very diversified and that's the way we're doing it is our diversification is a big driver in our soil health. We also with it on that rotation we have is we also help with our weed control and then that's a big part of the... Then we'll put our cover crops in on part of our rotation. Cover crops will be a rotation for us, usually behind winter wheats double.

Michaela Paukner:

Thinking back to when you first switched over to no-till, what was driving your decision to try it out?

Dan Forgey:

Our biggest driving factor was Dwayne Beck and he's the one that got us started. He got his PhD working on our pivots down at the river. The main thing is you got to remember, we were in the eighties and in a lot of interest and we just had to figure to find out a different way to do things. We were the second person in the county. Ralph Holzer was the first, we were the second person in the county to go to no-till. You got to remember back then there any of these conferences or anybody you could go talk to, you were on your own. The more you learned, the better you got. That's one reason why I really strive. Anybody that wants help with the soil health no-till or whatever, if I can, I'll help them because the struggle we went through, if I could make it easier for somebody else on their journey with soil health, I'll sure help them.

Michaela Paukner:

Definitely. What are some of the things that you're doing now or maybe in the past couple of years before you retire to help people in your area get a handle on adopting no-till in these diversified rotations,

Dan Forgey:

Spend a lot of time on the phone taking phone calls and then I speak quite a bit at the South Dakota Soil Health Coalition Annual Conference. I speak at the Soil Health School. I'll speak in a few places around the state. I also go out of state once in a while to speak and basically it's just a journey, and as I said before, there's mistakes to be made and if I can help people not make that mistake. One of my big goals is to get people to where you're not going to do this overnight. It's going to take a few years to get, it's not like you're going to do this in one year, and take small steps. Take small steps because just try things and then if it works, try a little bit more the next year, but just do it in small steps.

Michaela Paukner:

That's good advice. What do you think is step number one for most people?

Dan Forgey:

I think of step number one is the diversity. I really think you need more of a crop rotation. I know I'm going to step on a lot of people's toes by saying that corn and beans is not really a rotation, but I think you need to get a small grain either I like what they're doing into east cereal rye, we can't plant cereal right on our farm because we're winter wheat producers. We raise winter wheat seed, but I really think the no-till and the diversified. If you're not no-till and you get diversified in your rotation and then you start to no-till. Either one or the other first because I think no-till is you're just not disturbing the surface and your water infiltration, your aggregation, you increase organic matter. We no-till on our pivots at the river, they've been like everything else for 26 years and it's just really a... but between no-till and diversified rotation, it's kind of a toss up. If I was in the east in the corn belt and someone had just said, I'm not going to no-till, I'd really try to have them focus on diversification.

Michaela Paukner:

What do you say to farmers who say, well, it's too cold here for cover crops or cereal rye or it won't work here? What's your response to that?

Dan Forgey:

If people are negative on cover crops, I mean the best thing you can do is find somebody close to them that's trying cover crops so they can actually go out and visualize what's happening because I can sit here 400 miles away, 500 miles away, 700 miles away and I can say, "Boy, you got to do this," and then they try and they say, "well, it didn't work," but there's people, there's organizations that can show you what's happening with this cover crop and what it's doing to the soil health and different cover crops you could plant. I really advise to take advantage of that. Find somebody close because there's always a little gym in there that you can find a producer that's doing the right thing and that's what I would recommend.

Michaela Paukner:

Good ideas. It always helps to actually see something working versus just hearing, "Oh, this will work," but then not knowing...

Dan Forgey:

Yeah.

Michaela Paukner:

Well will it on my land where I am?

Dan Forgey:

Yeah. We get back to the cereal rye and I really think that's a good fit in the corn belt because you're getting in there, you're getting something growing right away, keeping that excess nitrogen towards the surface. Getting a, I love rye, it's got a very fine rip mass, just a tremendous rip mass. I just wish we could grow it out here, but it's just with, as I said it's seed wheat, you cannot...

Michaela Paukner:

Why can't you with seed wheat?

Dan Forgey:

Because if you have any rye at all and you're wonderfully seed, it's completely rejected as seed, and then another thing is once you get rye, you have rye where in the corn, bean, or in the east, that's no big deal, but with us when we have wheat in a rotation, you have rye, then the rye will stay in the soil and then you'll leave. The seeds will even come up a couple years later. The main reason is just seed production with wheat.

Michaela Paukner:

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The nomination form for you for this innovator award, it said your mission is to take care of the land. Talking about taking care of the land in soil health, why is that such a big driver for you and motivator throughout your career?

Dan Forgey:

I always think that, I always want to say this as we're farming for the future. With me, there's not a lot of future left. I hope there's quite a bit of future left, but you look at the younger generation. Let's them started off right to stop the soil from blowing, to bringing in more carbon, quit releasing carbon with the tillage. The main thing is just to make it a better world. I've seen what's happened on our farm, especially in the last 26 years, so if I could get somebody else... And I've helped quite a few, I'm not trying to boast, but I've helped quite a few people on that road, and if I could keep on doing that, that's my goal. That's my goal.

Michaela Paukner:

That's a great goal. Talking about how the land has changed over the 26 years since you adopted no-till, when did you start to see those changes in terms of how many years and then what were the changes that you were seeing?

Dan Forgey:

In the first five years, you could see changes. Our main focus then was it was taking less diesel fuel and we didn't really understand what we were doing. We understood what we were doing, but not really. Then the second 10 years it got better because things started happening. We started getting a little better weed control and we were growing better crops and we could not believe that we couldn't grow it on a crop every year because like I said, every fourth year we had our land laid idle and black fallow and there's a lot of places in the United States, they're still farming that way. Then we came on and then things really started ramping up for us after that, up to 15 years. Then from 20 years on, it's just unreal how the soil's treating us. It's something that it's hard to explain.

You always say you get done with something and you get done with the crop and you'll say, "I can't believe that we got that with no more rain and whatever we did," and what it is the soil's paying you back. One other thing that's really happening to us is we're cutting back on fertility. Our nitrogen rates have dropped significantly, our phosphorous rates have dropped significantly, and what we found out with a lot of tests, side by side tests that when we fertilized too much we're actually losing yield because I really take it, and I'm not a scientist it's just what I'm observed or whatever, but the way I look at it is what's happening is we're not letting the soil work for itself. What we're doing is we're just overloading it. We're putting a soil on welfare by putting too much nitrogen down.

The way I look at it, we need nitrogen, but we really put too much fertilizer on. I think when you give us some fertilizer and then let the soil do the rest, I think everybody's happy, but we found out on four or five different yield studies with SDSU, South Dakota State University and the NRCS, Jason Miller NRCS that we're actually, by increasing nitrogen we'll be losing yield. I think it's just that we're making the soil lazy. It's just the soil wants to work, the soil wants to do anything, so any way you can do to put green out there to bring in carbon, to help the soil do what it wants to do, the better off you're going to be.

Michaela Paukner:

That's really interesting, with those studies. How often were they looking at that? What did the study look like and then how are you testing on the farm to see what your rates are?

Dan Forgey:

How them studies were set up and one of them was a five-year study and we've had two-year studies. How they're set up is they'd put different nitrogen rates out and they'd apply them in different ways of applying them. All they'd do is that... The college here calls for 1.2 nitrogen per a bushel of corn, which I feel is too high. They'd do something, they'd take it from no nitrogen, zero nitrogen, and then they'd go up, they'd zero nitrogen and then maybe use eight tenths of a pound end per bushel and then go to one pound per bushel and then go to 1.2 just about all the time on our place. Now, this is long-term no-till all the time on our place that we had a negative effect. It wasn't a lot, but it'd be five or six bushel when you had too much in you would have a negative effect.

Michaela Paukner:

Interesting. You're losing money not only on the yield but then also on what you spent on that input.

Dan Forgey:

Correct.

Michaela Paukner:

Ding twice.

Dan Forgey:

One other thing I'd like to add is that we have been soil sampling for 25 years. We do our own and every acre gets soil sampled every year. We've got a software where we zone sample, so we'll set up zones in the field. I really feel that not every part of the field needs fertilized the same. Sometimes you're over fertilizing something and I think that's really a negative effect. Then one thing I think that we need to work on more and with that zone, I think on some of this ground where you can, with your cover crops, you could bear more rate your cover crops. We've got it capable of a three tank cart and you could do three different products in a field by if it's a salinity or if it's over the top of an OEL where it doesn't have a lot of residue, you could put a high carbon. I just think that's a step we need to take as a farm. With me, there's always something I want to do.

Michaela Paukner:

You see the next step for the management of Cronin Farms as incorporating more of the variable rate?

Dan Forgey:

Correct. We're variable rate in every acre, very rate cover crop. One thing too is we really focus on the high residue like our crop in rotation and is 75% high residue crops. We're in a dryer environment, we've got to have a soil armor to stop the evaporation, to keep the soil cooler. That's our whole goal of this thing is to, and that's why we're pulling off some of these yields we are is with lack of moisture because we're stopping the evaporation. We're stopping the evaporation by having soil either when if we stubble corn, whatever. That's why we really focus on we need a high residue.

Michaela Paukner:

When you're thinking about managing such a diverse rotation, what are the things you need to consider to be successful at that?

Dan Forgey:

For one thing with us is you always have a market. You don't ever plant something and then say, "Well, what am I going to do with it?" Another thing is the past chemical you use. The one thing, and it might be wrong and it's not wrong, it's just by the way I do things is you go through there and you find... If you have a weed, instead of just attacking it, go and find the chemical, it'll take it out. You say, "Well, how can I help this with rotation? How can I put a crop in there that'll help that?" When I say we don't have a set rotation, I really watch what we rotate. I'll change something. If you've got a Downey Roam or a cheat grass, then I'll try to rotate out of it. I'll put a field P or something in there to take care of that grass instead of going to the shed and get a chemical to do it.

Michaela Paukner:

That is a very innovative approach to managing weeds. We're hearing so much about the weed pressure that's coming in 2023. I think that's something that other farmers could definitely learn from.

Dan Forgey:

When you put a cereal grain in your rotation, you just think about it. You're doing a whole different type of chemical program, you're getting a lot of chemicals that you don't use in the corn, bean rotation in there. That really helps as far as the water hemp. As far as rotations, I just think that, and planting different crops, I'm a believer of it. I know that... and I'm not saying that what we do, you can do where they get 35 inches of rain either, but all I'm trying to say is I think that people have to look over the situation and say, "How am I going to handle this? How can I do this?" Instead of trying to fix the problem after you forgot it, try to figure out what's causing the problem. That's kind of the way I go about things.

Michaela Paukner:

When you're looking at, like say you're scouting, you find, oh, particular weed that's a problem, when are you making those decisions about how you're going to rotate to solve that problem with the weed

Dan Forgey:

I think about that all the time. We'll see how far it goes, what we do it, how bad is it? A" lot of times I'm a year or two ahead on the rotations, but it's not just, oh, I think we should." You see what I mean? There's a lot of thought, a lot of time. Another thing I want to emphasize, and I said it about four times now, is this is what's working on our farm and we'll work on someone else's farm. I don't know if it will, but is there some of these things they should be looking at it? The main thing is to have them look to see what's happening and what's happened on their farm. How can they change things up? I think that'll take them a long ways if they start doing that.

Michaela Paukner:

Yeah, for sure. I think, like you said, with that study that you did, you were using recommended best practice, which turned out not to be the best for you and how you really need to tailor those suggestions to what you're dealing with specifically.

Dan Forgey:

One other thing too is you never want to sit back and say, "Well, I've got it made. I'm at the top of the hill. I'm done, I've done everything." You always have to keep trying different things and keep alert on what you're doing because we're such in a changing world.

One other thing I'd really like to emphasize on is if you think you're too old or know too much to learn, you're in trouble. You're really in trouble. You always have to be open, and I really like to hang around good people. We had our soil health conference in Sioux Falls. Don Murkowski and Dr. Ray Ward and Dr. Dwayne Beck and all them guys are just so... Any time I could be around people like that, that's where I want to be because them are the guys if... They might not have all the answers, but they'll sure get you thinking and let you figure out what you're supposed to do. It's one thing I'll just say is the generations we got now, they never went through all that growing pain. The kids that are, I'm going to call them kids, they're 35, 40 years old, but a lot of them, they don't know where this came from. They just think this is normal. I think that's where I'm gifted, not gifted, that's the wrong word for it.

I really feel that I've learned by the hard knocks where I've learned from mistakes of myself and others. A lot of them, when people go try to do things like there's some planting soybeans on corn, or soybeans on sunflower stocks, I'll just say, "Now wait a minute here." Another thing about our rotation, I want to bring this up and I know I'm going to is... In our area, have sunflowers work very well. The one thing that everybody says, had one producer say, "Well, I don't like sunflowers because they use all the deep nitrate and the deep moisture." My take on it is if you don't use it in our environment what's going to use it? It just goes after... That's where that's a benefit. Every crop we use, there's a benefit to, and I really emphasize that and use it.

Michaela Paukner:

The younger guys who haven't gone through those hard knock times, what can they learn from somebody who has

Dan Forgey:

For one thing is go slowly, but move ahead, try different things. Especially if you're not, try to put a cereal in your rotation. Always think about soil. Always think about your soil. Your soil is alive. Always remember that whatever you do, your soil's alive and you're taking care of it and you have to feed them. The main goal is there's this day and age is to bring in carbon. I think we really have to, any way we can bring in carbon and not only bring in carbon, but hold the carbon in our soil. I think that's something we really have to focus on. No matter what age, that's a message that have to be talked about.

Michaela Paukner:

Thanks to Dan Forgey for today's conversation, and congratulations on your No-Till Innovator Award. The full transcript and a video for this episode are available no-tillfarmer.com/podcasts. Many thanks to Yetter Farm Equipment for helping to make this no-till podcast series possible from all of us here at No-Till Farmer, I'm Michaela Paukner. Thanks for listening.