CSI Agronomy

I hereby copyright  CSI Agronomy, Operation Stripe, and Living In Your Fields, HyMark Consulting LLC, 2013.  I really like these titles.  I dreamed about the  third one.  I got the idea from the first one from Dr. Jerry Hatfield at NNTC.  We pull plants, plunk them down on the table and try to figure out what killed them.  Operation Stripe is my term for planting 2 hybrids of dissimilar origin but 4 days apart in maturity side by side.

CSI Agronomy has shown we are not producing crops as well as we could.  The prognosis for American agriculture isn't very good unless we really get our act together.  We have beat the soil to death with tillage in this country and pretty much the world.  Genetic pools for crops have become very small as we have only selected a yield lines for yields and injected them with traits.  We have a crop production system that has failed us the last 3 years in weather stress.  We are going the wrong direction!

I showed a favorite picture of me pulling soil samples in wheat behind the house.  I got to thinking, that same spot looks 3 times greener and 3 times healthier today than it did a few years ago.  What is the difference?  Biological activity is the difference!  Keeping my soil covered each year has really increased my soil biological activity.

What if we have another 100 years of these strange weather cycles?  That's excactly what Dr. Hatfield's lab looked at and the likelihood is very large.   The outcome is not very good!  Will we have to rule that man can't till anymore?  I imagine that would create another Civil War.  That very idea is being proposed by some scientists and leaders in the world.  LuAnn saw the idea on Google World News last week.

We have to start somewhere to try and improve our soils and quit turning our rivers brown every time it rains.  We need to bring these dead soils back to life.  Who is going to do it?  Those 1250 farmers in Indianapolis last week represent the few that are leading the way.  They quickly learned the benefits of notill farming and now are adding cover crops at a rapid pace.  Why?  Not just because it is good but because it makes us money, too.

Yield is Genetics X Environment X Management.  We have a limited gene pool, we can't control the weather and now the government is going to tell us how to farm?  I think we better show them how to farm, first!  We can't show anything if we don't change and very few are willing to make these changes.

I am sure I just stirred up Crop Talk.  I posted this about the Farm to Plate Conference I attended in Riverside, Iowa.  I link you to a non GMO corn sample I was sent from my friend Keith.  I would imagine the non GMO corn was raised on soil that was GMO soybeans the year before.  My email and phone is already ringing from my sharing of this report.

How can we keep doing the same farming practices that are failing in front of our eyes and expect better results?

Ed

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Prayer

This morning our faith group talked about God and prayer.  Who is God?  How does prayer work?  Jim gave a great example.  He quoted Mose Yoder, an Amish man in northeast Ohio.  Mose said "I don't know how prayer works, but I don't know how electricity works, either.  I am not going to sit in the dark before I figure it out."

We compared that to the Bible and the book of Acts.  One said ACTS stands for adoration, contrition, thanksgiving and supplication.  Another said God answers prayer.  Sometimes he says NO, sometimes he says SLOW, sometimes he says GROW and sometimes he says GO.  That made great sense to me.  I am often too quick to accept the answer NO.  I sometimes understand when he says SLOW, you are not ready.  Sometimes I understand GROW, often in fact, because I am always growing.  I have seen that all my life.  I love it when he says GO because I am always ready to proceed before he is!

Yesterday I gave my talk at NNTC on soybeans.  I explained that I was the pinch hitter and not the first chosen speaker.  I had nominated Kris Nichols to speak on soil biology.  She is ill, so I opened my presentation with prayer.  I asked God to heal Kris so she could speak next year.  I asked for Gods words to be spoken, not mine and that God's will be done, not mine.  My will often messes things up.

Thank you for answered prayer!  I asked you to say a little prayer for me yesterday at 9 AM and I felt the answer!  I can tell you from the way I felt and the way people listened and wrote, that was God speaking, not Ed Winkle.  My dear friend and NNTC committee member rushed up and said, Ed, that was the best presentation of the whole conference!  I was astonished.  I knew it wasn't bad but I did not know how well it was received.  Usually I get questions in the corner for an hour but yesterday was two hours before I said halt.  It was 11 o'clock and I had to clean out my room and check out.

LuAnn had the best picture of the entire conference of Keith's pods on stems.  We have never seen any thing like it, 31 pods on one raceme.  Usually we have 3-4 pods left on a node!  I can't upload that picture today and it should be my picture for this blog.  Maybe I can upload it elsewhere and post the link here.

My presentation flowed like water because I worked hard, I studied, I prayed and asked for intervention.  It worked.  I was immediately asked to do three more presentations in other states. One I had just presented at 3 years ago and they asked me how I learned that much in 3 years?

How is that for an answer to prayer?  What's your prayer for the day?

Ed Winkle

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Dr. Jerry Hatfield

After all these years and all the emails, I can see why my friend Paul Reed and Jerry are friends.  They are both very smart people of the same mindset.  I can learn from them both.

Jerry gave a presentation tonight, the title is so long I don't remember how it goes but it was about the varied heavy but seldom rainfall we are receiving in the midwest.  And, it is how farming interacts with those events.

Is your soil farmed in a way to receive sudden cloudbursts that are infrequent?  I can answer NO but I know many are worse off than I am.  I must get better and let my soils and my fields speak for themselves.

He had one slide that was scary to me and one I must corner him on.  It was a long range prediction from his government body, the former National Soil Tilth Laboratory, that predicts this will continue and that 2080-2090 could be very tough years.  Nothing like what we saw in America this year!  This will impact my grandchildren or great grandchildren.

I congratulate two friends for receiving the coveted NoTill Innovator Award last night, Darryl Starr and Dan DeSutter.  They are better men than I but God used me to help them a tiny bit on their path to success.

I am reminded that I must keep limited soil disturbance and plant a crop the day I harvest at all cost.  This is key to biological improvement.  I must add a half ton of gypsum to my soil each year to add calcium and sulfur to enhance my chemical and biological activity.  Others don't see the need for gypsum every year.  I must continue to secure the best seed I can find and enhance the seed with chemical and biological protection and plant it correctly on the best days I am able.  This is after a rain event and before a major predicted rain event.

I must scout fields with diligence and Live In My Fields(copywrite HyMark Consulting LLC 2013).  That could be fun and life changing with the grandkids and my network of friends.  I want to see the autocopter fly my fields and learn what the 4 images tell me about them.

Most of all I must turn it over to God and follow his will, not mine.  That is the most challenging goal because my mind gets wrapped up in details and lofty goals in a hurry.  It really works for me though and has made for a great life.

Say a little prayer for me at 9 AM that I might share his words.

Ed

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Stuctured Water

I have become very interested in structured water I have heard about and learned more about here at the NNTC.  We know very little about the water we add to our spray tanks.

To put it simply, some farmers are structuring their water by using reverse osmosis by Vatche's unit at Pursonova water in San Francisco.  The final step is spinning the water backwards as it enters the spray tank.

So, one unit reversis the osmosis of water, the second unit structures the water and the third piece is a cone that spins the water backwards from normal gravitational flow of water.  The results I see is less water needed for a pesticide or fertilizer to work to full capacity.  These folks are killing weeds with a fraction of the amount of chemical I am using and the fertilizers look many more times effective.

I don't have time to add links to this blog today but hope to later or discuss it later here if there is enough interest of my readers.  Reverse osmosis I basically understand but structuring water is new to me.  Normal water looks like a blob under the microscope but structured water looks like a crystalline structure, more like a snowflake looks like under magnification.  Remember no two snowflakes look alike?  We are wasting and misusing our most precious resource.

I am interested because years ago I remember learning about the neutralizing of some pesticides like glyphosate and many insecticides by pouring the chemical in typical spray water from a well.  Some farmers caught their own rain water and claimed improved results.  I am sure they did.  This Monsanto technical water said use a water pH of 5 or risk losing the herbicide.  I know for sure much glyphosate has been sprayed that had no power.  I remember helping an orchard farmer get control of mites by acidifying is water for Guthion insecticide.

Imagine the implications to agriculture by just structuring our spray water.  Imagine we could pick up 300 or more percent effectiveness of our fertilizers and pesticides?  Ponder that awhile.  That is a statement like I should apply a half ton or so of gypsum on my fields every year or should I spray tank cleaner on my fields every year to control weeds and expect better results?

This looks like another very important addition to my farm or any farm.  I understand it enough to know I must do it remain sustainable and econonomically competitive.

In the coming days, let's learn more about structured water.  Ask questions and share results.

Todays picture is of the Quebec notill farmers who visited our farm the summer of 2010.  They can be proud of their "Queen of Conservation," Odette Menard.  Her presentationis linked on my Crop Talk post called NNTC.  One of the farmers even posted a picture of my bean field on Crop Talk from their visit.

Thanks,

Ed Winkle

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Harry, Henry and Floyd

Harry, Henry and Floyd are 3 men of agriculture I talked to yesteday.  Those are great old names, aren't they?  Harry Young has the NoTill Plaque on a roadside near his farm where notill really started in America in 1962 near Herndon, Kentucky.  His son and his grandson opened the 21st NNTC up, describing how notill has changed their lives and their farm.  I think everyone sitting there felt the same way.

Social media is so powerful now that my old friend Dr. Howard Doster was at home in Ohio when he saw a Tweet that his student Harry Young Jr. was speaking in Indianapolis.  Once again his dear wife Barbara got him here on time to listen to his former student at Purdue!  It sounded like the beat my land speed record from east of Cincinnati to downtown Indianapolis.

Before his talk I was part of two bus loads of notill farmers that got a wonderful tour of ET or Equipment Technologies in Brownsville Indiana.  We got to see Apache sprayers built from the ground up and received free spraying lectures and a lunch from City Barbeque as they often provide their dealers and customers.  Did you know an Apache sprayer loaded with product weighs less than a dry John Deere sprayer?  This is critical to notill.  Their philosophy matches the modern notill farm of simplicity, speed and light weight, ready to tackle any issue.  Their sprayer reminds me of Gleaner combines, simpler, lighter and stronger.  The big Gleaner weighs 6,000 pounds less than the equivalent John Deere.

In the seat ahead of me was Derek Hines of Maine, his wife, his son Keith and his 9 month old son Floyd.  Floyd reminded of Floyd's Toy pulling days when my oldest son Matt was little but he really reminded me of our grandson Finnegan by his face and his demeanor.  He listened to me pretty well for a 9 month old.   That reminds me of little Katherine!

Derek is renting worn out potato ground to notill soybeans and barley.  He was interested in what I had to say because his barley yields have tanked.  I mentioned SabrEx and he became very interested.  I explained he could get SabrEx on his beans too by innoculating with GraphEx SA which includes SabrEx.  I could tell he needs more disease control at seedling stage to harvest.  Potato ground is pretty dead because they spray so much fungicide.  He needs more soil health by keeping the ground covered and inoculating his seed for disease control.  We never had time to talk about the importance of calcium.

I got to talk in lenghth with Henry Apple of Bowling Green, Ohio at the FHR Hospitality suite.  He was allowed to miss class at his senior year at Bowling Green High School to attend the Farm to Plate Conference at Riverside, Iowa in December and now the NNTC!  His dad is a very progressive farmer with an innovative soybean seeder.  He took a worn out piece of ground and put on 3 tons of burnt calcium lime 8 years and now it is one of his best fields.

With all the young people here I say agriculture and notill has some good young hands coming up.  We need to nurture those hands and minds and keep sound agriculture at the forefront.

The hotel is overwhelmed with over crowding but so far we are getting along.  My French friend Odette Menard just gave a wonderful presentation on earthworms.  I will try to get her to put it on Slide Share and get her night video of earthworms on YouTube!  It was worth the price of admission!

Ed

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Day 1

I think the NNTC has broke a new record of 1100 attendees.  I went to sign in and Darrell said here is your 15 year pin, Ed, thank you for your continued support.  I asked him where 15 years went?

I had attended a couple of times when I was selected as NoTill Innovator of the Year in 1999.  I had helped so many farmers convert to the Martin Till system of notill planting corn and soybeans I got nominated and selected.  It was a great honor to receive the award in January 2000 that changed my life forever.

I had just met LuAnn and all of this fell upon me, a great grace from Heaven.  I had floundered through the 90's, helping my children get through high school and get into college.  It was fantastic, wonderful times.  I got my award along side Jon Kinzenbaugh of Kinze Mfg.  It was surreal.

Through my own fault, I suffered a lot of hardship the following years but continued to receive great graces.  Alice Musser gave me a big hug and I said how are you doing Grandma?  She said great. how are you doing Grandpa?  I also said great, we just held our 11th grandchild, Deirdre.  She was a little bit jealous.

What did I learn today?  Number One, the Internet has changed my life for the good.  Number 2, notill is the only reason I am farming and enjoyed the blessings of farming the last umpteen years.  Number 3, we know enough to this day to be dangerous.

I have seen so many familiar faces here at the National NoTillage Conference yet guys my age want me to meet their sons and grandsons!

I have one thing in the back on my mind, Steve Groff told me he got 202 bu out of and 83 day northern hybrid.  That allowed him to shell early and plant another cover crop record early.  I have several pages of notes already.

I have so many ideas spinning in my head but one will stick out for years.  The best crops I saw this year across the US had  years of gypsum applied to it.  It was non GMO corn and soybeans.  When I see a picture of crops now I look for pink leaves in corn versus tall, green corn with brown husks right near it.

How do you do that?  Come to the NNTC and learn how or better yet, put the Farm to Plate conference on your agenda for the first week of December. 2013.

I hope you had a great day like me,


Ed Winkle

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Travel

It's time to pack up and head for Indy. Part of me doesn't want to go. Can you believe that? Yes, it's a lot of work and responsibility. So, LuAnn, yes, even little ole me doesn't even want to leave home some days!

LuAnn wrote two very nice pieces on travel on WIA or she calls wea.  It stands for Women In Agriculture and the forum is on www.agriculture.com  She is a highly kudo's poster on that forum because she has many friends there and she is an excellent writer.

"The thing about travel is the desire to experience sensory pleasures that are completely different from your own environment. Viewing natural landscapes or a work of art, tasting local cuisine or wines, listening to music or theater of a region or locality, touching objects that are foreign or unfamiliar or touching natural objects from a different environment,.... That is what makes travel valuable. Even the air smells different in different places. Who would think that something as simple as breathing in a new environment could be so much fun??!!

It enables us to step outside of our comfort zone and stretch our world view. The phrase "broadening your horizons" accurately describes the experience.

I understand that people have an aversion to tourist traps but those are not what I consider true travel. I would consider a Disney World experience a vacation, but I would not consider it a cultural experience.

To enjoy travel you have to be flexible, curious and adventurous. We've met some very seasoned travelers who admit they once did not like to stray to far from home but they became travelers through a passion or hobby. One couple had a passion for Civil War history, another for flowers and gardens. Those interests fueled their desire to explore.

For us, our love of agriculture and my photography has taken us places. Our desire to see the land of our ancestors has motivated us. I cannot begin to explain how connected I felt in Paris and in Nova Scotia. Those were the lands of my people.

I would sacrifice a lot to afford to travel. I cannot imagine the person I would be without the sensory experiences I have enjoyed.

My motto is "you can't truly live life from a recliner in front of TV or behind a book". There is no substitute for been there done that. Even the smallest adventure can yield the biggest benefits. "

Going to Indy or NNTC used to be a big adventure for me.  Now it's only small and it seems more work than benefit this week.  I do have a lot of good friends myself though counting on me and I know I will pick up some good ideas.  I always do.

I will see some of you in Indy, safe travels!

Ed

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