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| There are so many different issues that affect this. Some of them may not be all that relevant for your conditions. All of these comments are made from the perspective of the Dawn unit obviously and may not be true of other products.
Residue- In 200+ plus bu corn the residue is very fluffly right after harvest and will settle leaving not so black of a strip. While getting through it is not typically a problem most customers want the blackest strip possible.
Compaction- In the fall one notices greater variation in the levels of compaction between where the grain carts and combines ran versus where they did not. This variation is often much smaller in the spring. Having different rows running in soils with dramatically different compaction levels makes it hard to properly set a machine for uniform performace. Rows in tire tracks are ALWAYS clumpier.
Berm height/soil density- Spring strips will usually dry faster than strips made in the fall. (with the Dawn unit at least) This is due to the settling of the berm over the winter and therefore having less air entrained in the soil. Evaporation is going to be a function of the exposed surface area of the soil and temperature. Consequently you don't have to worry about planting into a valley with spring strip till which sometimes happens. When you do it in the spring you can till the ground more highly. In the fall a clumpier strip will minimize the extent to which the berm settles. Also because you are not worried about settling, it lets you make a much wider berm. A taller narrower berm will settle less over the winter. I would stipulate that by definition a taller berm must be a narrower berm at the same time.
Erosion- By minimizing the time period between strip tilling and planting you limit the chance of suffering erosion. The planter row unit firms the soil back up after it runs over so it is not so loose.
A one pass system- I have heard lately of a lot of people doing different things to "freshen" fall strips in some instances when they were made in less than ideal conditions. This is obviously not necessary.
To summarize: I think that tillage for compaction management and tillage for seedbed preparation are typically not done optimally by the same tool and don't need to be done on a one to one basis.
Thanks JDB | |
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Tempted in strip till...got questions!
