Southeast and Muscatine Island Research and Demonstration Farms

2025 Southeast Research Farm Strip Tillage Field Day—Success Story

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Abstract

There are many reasons why farmers are interested in adopting strip till. It serves as a compromise between conventional and no-tillage, allowing farmers to manage residue prior to planting, while reducing soil erosion and nutrient loss, and likely reducing fuel and labor inputs. According to the Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) and their OpTIS software partnership, conservation tillage data is provided from 2015 to 2021, with the newest dataset released in 2023. This dataset shows for the North Central and Central Iowa Crop Reporting Districts that reduced tillage has increased by 23 and 24% respectively since 2015. Both no-tillage and strip-tillage or reduced tillage acres rapidly increased from 2015 to 2017 but adoption rates have since leveled off, and even declined slightly from 2018 to 2021 in the Central Iowa Crop Reporting district. The slowed rate of adoption is most likely due to several factors including concerns about reduced yield, however, one of the biggest barriers identified by farmers is the lack of opportunities to evaluate different pieces of strip-tillage equipment in the same field conditions.

How to Cite:

Rieck-Hinz, A., (2026) “2025 Southeast Research Farm Strip Tillage Field Day—Success Story”, Iowa State University Research and Demonstration Farms Progress Reports 2025(1), 17-18.