If you had any reason to doubt that agriculture will be fingered for the environmental problems affecting major U.S. waterways, those doubts should have been removed last month.

Like many no-tillers, Ben Fehl has seen the value of tiling both rented and owned ground. Major benefits from tiling include increased yield, less soil compaction, improved soil and water quality, reduced soil erosion and greater economic return.

It’s often said that no-tillers choosing cover crops for their farm operations should have goals in mind. One could be scavenging nitrogen in the soil and holding it for the next cash crop, rather than letting this expensive nutrient run off fields into local watersheds.

If you want confirmation that leaving residue on the soil surface is key to making no-till work, look no further than eastern Colorado.

Like many no-tillers in North America, Australian no-tillers are concerned with the impact of changing climate and drought conditions. However, no-till and several other innovative ideas have helped the country’s wheat growers deal with reduced water supplies while boosting yields over the past 3 decades.

We’ve always felt Indiana is a strong state for no-till adoption, which is evidenced by the strong readership we have there among farmers and the record crowd the National No-Tillage Conference drew in Indianapolis last year.

Data from a recent cover-crop survey offers solid evidence that no-tillers are ahead of many other farmers when it comes to recognizing the value of keeping their ground covered throughout the year.

For an established no-tiller to find that “higher gear” and push their operation to a higher level of profitability, it might be necessary to step outside of the daily grind to find a source of new ideas.

As summer has begun to heat up across the U.S. this week, it made me think of a really interesting question I heard at the National No-Tillage Conference several months ago.

Most no-tillers work very hard to farm sustainably and be good neighbors by farming responsibly. But if you make a habit of fighting the good fight when applying pesticides, your job just got a little tougher.