One-Pass Till Planter

One-Pass Till Planter PLANTING EQUIPMENT No-Till & Min-Till 12-5-8 "Last year we put just 91 hours on our tractor to do all the fieldwork involved in planting 1,300 acres of corn and beans," says Jim Reeser, Chenoa, Ill., who teamed his Deere Max-Emerge planter up with an Eversman rototiller to build a one-pass planting rig. Before he put his tiller-planter together, Reeser felt he had too much investment in tractors and tillage equipment. "Now all we own is this tractor, the tiller and the planter. We cut fuel consumption from 5.5 gal. per acre for conventional tillage to just 2/3 gal. per acre now," he notes. The till-plant rig is 30 ft. wide and plants 12 rows on 30-in. centers. He plants directly into cornstalks and bean residue. In stalks he tills and plants at 4.4 mph and in bean stubble he moves at 6 to 7 mph. He sometimes uses the rig to plant 12 rows of corn alternating with 12 rows of beans by putting beans in 6 planter boxes and corn in the other six. Reeser says the key to success with his tiller-planter was learning to work the ground shallow. He tills about 3 in. deep and plants 2 in. deep. "That's similar to other no-till and ridge till planters. We get a good mixing job on top that reduces runoff and erosion." Starter fertilizer is placed with both corn and beans. Reeser notes that he's reduced herbicide rates to just 2/3 of standard recommendations and, in some instances, applies none. He never chisel plows or subsoils and says compaction has been virtually eliminated. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jim Reeser, Chenoa, Ill. 61726 (ph 815 945-7100).

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