We begin this week in northern Kansas with 2025 Conservation Ag Operator Fellow Michael Thompson. He’s been dealing with some compaction issues in his end rows and turn rows where there’s heavy grain cart and tank traffic. Michael found a solution in the form of an AerWay vertical tillage machine. Let’s see how it works.

“We’ve been long-term no-till since 2000. We’re starting to see a drag in those crops, that they’re not doing as well. I think they don’t have enough air in there. There’s not enough water getting into those places and enough biology happening. We just replaced all the blades on this AerWay. Going to put some saddle tanks on there and dribble some compost extract behind it when we’re running in high traffic areas to try to relieve some of the compaction zones in the field. This will just bring some air into the mix right away. Just sort of a temporary fix. We’ll get back to cereal rye hopefully more on those high traffic areas. This is something I’m trying just to see if we can alleviate some of those compaction zones without full-fledged tillage.”

Read more about Thompson’s journey through the 2025 growing season on No-TillFarmer.com.

Watch the full version of this episode of Conservation Ag Update.