For some time, Luke Linnenbringer felt like he was on a treadmill trying to farm profitably in a conventional-tillage system with degraded soils and stagnant yields. In fact, he was ready to stop cropping nearly a decade ago.

“No-Till is not a machine, not a crop and not residue. Instead, no-till is a combination of all the critical things you need to produce the best crop with the least cost and the most sustainability. That’s been our farm goal for the past quarter century.”

Joe Kern and his father, John, admit they’re still dealing with a learning curve. But through working with no-till practices they’re transforming their “clay pot” soils into acreage that recently produced up to 240-bushel corn and 80-bushel soybeans.

When Shawn and Shane Tiffany took over the former Black Diamond feed yard in 2007 it wasn’t in terrible shape, mostly because of manure applications that kept organic matter in the soil. But after going to a cover crop field day 8 years ago, the brothers didn’t want to just settle.

When Matt Griggs decided to embark on no-till practices more than a decade ago he was already dealing with a degraded soil resource. More than 100 years of conventional tillage and a monoculture of cotton on his family’s rolling farm ground had caused erosion and stripped soils of organic matter.

With planting season not as far away as it might seem, editors at No-Till Farmer recently talked with Nebraska Extension ag engineer Paul Jasa about a range of topics related to no-tilling corn. From ensuring proper seeding depth and spacing, to choosing the right planter and seeder attachments, to the location of the new rows, Jasa explained what steps no-tillers may want to consider to achieve better and more consistent. Here are the highlights of this discussion.