Cover crops proved themselves foul weather friends during the Great Drought of 2012. A groundbreaking farmer survey conducted in the Upper Mississippi River watershed showed that during that year’s brutal… Read more »
Posts Tagged: row crops
Prepping Prairie Strips for the Real World
Gary Van Ryswyk’s concern for how his farming methods impact the landscape is obvious. A practitioner of a no-till system that avoids disturbing a field’s surface as much as possible,… Read more »
Nitrogen Pollution’s Farm Policy Roots
By Adam Warthesen, Land Stewardship Project Talk about ignoring the elephant in the room. When Minnesota environmental officials announced the results of a new major nitrogen pollution study on Thursday,… Read more »
Rolling Our Land To Death
I sat in a farmhouse one afternoon last month as a hot wind lifted rich topsoil from surrounding fields. On the drive in, I’d noticed a surprising amount of rill… Read more »
Why is James E. McWilliams Ignoring the Facts on Sustainable Ag?
History Professor James E. McWilliams’ recent doubled-barreled attack on sustainable livestock production and the local food movement in general is so contradictory and full of factual holes, it’s tough to… Read more »
Crop Insurance: A Safety Net Becomes a Threat
When it comes to the crop insurance sweepstakes, southwest Minnesota farmer Darwyn Bach is a winner. But he concedes that his good fortune presents a quandary, since the way the… Read more »
Denying the Science, Derailing the Solutions
I talked to a Todd County farmer yesterday who uses 100 percent no-till and other conservation measures to raise his crops. Conserving soil is important to him, and so he’s… Read more »
Stripping Erosion Control to its Bare Essentials
While walking through a knee-high prairie planted on a central Iowa hillside Tuesday, I happened to look down. Trapped amongst all that vegetation was an impressive amount of rich, black… Read more »
What Lies Beneath Doesn’t Lie
Spring flood predictions are in the air, and you can bet that within the next several weeks a whole lot of that wayward water will be taking Grade A Midwestern… Read more »