. Agri-news. Agriculture. Overcoming problem land (cont'd) 2 "Over the years and as time permitted, the blow-holes big enough to hide the living room in were filled and reclaimed," he says. One more tool he quickly learned to use was soil testing and applying recommended fertilizers. His first fertilizer experiment resulted in a foot of higher growth, twice as many tillers and yield jumps of up to 10 bushels per acre. From then on, fertilizer management played a big part in his farming and reclamation work. Now Auch, 52, along with his son Kevin, 26, farm 3300 acres of their own and
. Agri-news. Agriculture. Overcoming problem land (cont'd) 2 "Over the years and as time permitted, the blow-holes big enough to hide the living room in were filled and reclaimed," he says. One more tool he quickly learned to use was soil testing and applying recommended fertilizers. His first fertilizer experiment resulted in a foot of higher growth, twice as many tillers and yield jumps of up to 10 bushels per acre. From then on, fertilizer management played a big part in his farming and reclamation work. Now Auch, 52, along with his son Kevin, 26, farm 3300 acres of their own and rented land. There are only two ways to farm the sandy land, they say. "One is to continuously crop it. The other is to summerfallow, but only if it includes seeding fall rye, so no land lies unprotected during the second winter of the fallow season," says Kevin. Fall rye is the crop they favor, not for its price, but because it's hardy, does well on sandy soils and leaves. KEVIN AND DON AUCH IN STANDING STUBBLE more residue than spring wheat. In spite of nearly 10 years of drought in the area, half of their land is continuously cropped and half summerfallowed every other year. If it's not too dry, almost all of the stubble is bladed in fall. "This is done for weed control, but mostly to improve moisture retention when we're lucky enough to get a spring snowmelt," says the elder Auch. Anhydrous ammonia is applied through applicators built on a noble blade. Extra phosphate fertilizer is applied to the hill tops with a spreader. "We'd like to be able to deep band it in, but the tillage would bury too much of the stubble," Kevin says. (Cont'd). Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Alberta. Alberta Agriculture. Communications Branch; Alberta. Alberta Agriculture. Print Me
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Keywords: ., aprjul, bookcentury1900, bookleafnumber22, booksubjectagriculture
