Has interest in no-till planting peaked and is it waning fast? I ask that question because I see a lot of tillage being done this fall. I see farmers who were huge proponents of no-till for 10 years or more and are now doing tillage with chisel plows or elaborate cultivators. I saw tillage demonstrations at the Outdoor Farm Show in Woodstock with many farmers showing interest in the eight cultivators doing their thing. Farm publications feature numerous colourful ads about new and improved tillage machines. Tillage, tillage, tillage!
The Ottawa Rideau Regional and the Frontenac County Soil and Crop Improvement Association organized a bus tour to Kaiser Lake Farms at Napanee for September 26. The event was well publicized for members of the eastern Ontario Soil and Crop Improvement Associations. It made up most of the front page of the Soil and Crop News, which serves Grenville, Lanark, Leeds, Ottawa-Carleton, Renfrew and Frontenac counties.
In addition to a visit to the Kaiser Farms, there was also a stop scheduled at MacKinnon Brothers Brewing Co. at Bath where cold beer could be sampled. Yes, we enjoyed a “few” cold glasses of beer as it was a hot day.
There was no cost for the bus trip — a big coach. There were pickup points at Arnprior, Carleton Place, Smith Falls, Elgin and along the way to Kingston.
I love going on bus trips and I’ve been on many over the last 50 years. How many people do you think were on the bus for this outing to Napanee? Seven farm folk from Renfrew County got on the bus in Arnprior; five at Carleton Place and similar numbers at the other stops for a total of 26 people.
Would more people have gone on a bus tour that featured tillage demonstrations? Definitely!
Kaiser Lake Farms in the Bay of Quinte Peninsula near Napanee is well worth spending a day on a bus. It has 1,200 acres of crop land in one huge block with a gravel road going around the perimeter and roads through the middle. The Kaisers gave a wagon tour around their farm and through the centre to see the crops.
Kaisers Lake Farms is a no-till operation. They have one machine that’s been modified and it plants their corn, soybeans and wheat. Eric (father) and Max (son) were among the first in the province to stop tilling, which they did 12 years ago over their entire acreage. “We saw the merit of the idea for our heavy clay soil and it’s worked very well,” Eric said as he showed the group the large no-till planter.
With no-till, seeds are planted directly into the soil and no tilling is involved, which saves labour and fuel costs, decreases soil erosion, reduces the loss of topsoil and improves drainage. There was no tillage equipment to be seen in Kaiser’s huge machine shop where the group watched a video and ate lunch.
The corn and wheat from their crop operation is used at the Kaiser’s feed mill, which in turn supplies their layer and pullet operation. “Being able to use the crops here on the farm instead of trucking them away helps reduce environmental impact,” Max noted.
The pizza noon lunch was paid for by sponsors as was the beer at MacKinnons. We weren’t told who the sponsors were.
