The "lazy man's" corn planting method can boost your yield by more than 40%
In March of last year, something unusual happened in Shengchan Village, Qingshan Town, Taobei District, Baicheng City.
Male and female villagers from 21 households all sat neatly on the kang in village head Guo Xiaoguang's home, and solemnly pressed their fingerprints onto a contract for implementing protective tillage with whole-stalk corn cover. Watching the villagers leave one by one, beaming with joy, the stone weighing on Guo Xiaoguang's heart finally lifted.
In 2010, Guo Xiaoguang attended a protective tillage class in the district taught by experts from the city's Agriculture Committee, and his mind suddenly opened up. He happily showed the promotional materials he brought back to the villagers and told everyone about the many benefits of protective tillage. Unfortunately, the villagers had no interest in it at all, thinking that the protective tillage Guo Xiaoguang talked about was pure "humbug."
What surprised Guo Xiaoguang was that not only did the villagers not accept it, his own family did not accept it either. His father had always been the most supportive of his work, but this time he opposed it most fiercely: "What protective tillage? Can you farm well with corn stubble all over the field? Don't listen to outsiders' nonsense."
At the most difficult moment, Guo Xiaoguang's maternal uncle was moved. His uncle said: "I've carefully read the materials. Although we haven't tried protective tillage, the Americans have been doing it for 70 or 80 years, and the benefits are laid out clearly. If they can do it, why can't we? Besides, you're a college graduate, so you must see farther than we do. Your uncle will follow you."
Just like that, Guo Xiaoguang, his uncle, and several other relatives became the first people in Shengchan Village to "eat the crab."
What farmers believe in is not propaganda; they look at results. Soon, the taste of this "crab" was savored by other farming households.
Sun Fuli had the most say about this. Because his plot was right next to Guo Xiaoguang's farmland. During spring planting, Sun Fuli arrived at the field early, clearing stalks, dragging stubble, raking stubble, plowing, forming ridges... busy as could be. What puzzled him was that Guo Xiaoguang on the neighboring plot showed no movement at all. It was not until half a month later that the exhausted Sun Fuli saw Guo Xiaoguang appear. He had not done a single one of the pre-planting tasks; he simply deep-loosened the soil with a machine and then sowed directly.
From spring planting to autumn harvest, Sun Fuli observed carefully the whole time, and finally figured it out: "This protective tillage is really something!"
"Xiaoguang didn't work many days from spring to autumn, used half the diesel I did, and irrigated one less time, yet his crops grew better than mine and his harvest was bigger than mine. My yield per hectare was 8000-8500 kg, Xiaoguang's was 10,000 kg per hectare, and some households did even better, reaching 11,000 kg per hectare... Also, as layer after layer of corn roots and stubble rot away, the soil gets more and more fertile. In a few more years, I'll be even less able to compare with them..."
The success of Guo Xiaoguang and several farming households made protective tillage suddenly a hot topic among the villagers.
Drought resistance, labor saving, cost saving, income increase, soil building... The benefits of protective tillage were visible and tangible, so the villagers' enthusiasm naturally ran high. The number of households in the village willing to implement protective tillage increased from 7 in 2010 to more than 80, and the number of purchased "Hanhai No. 2" protective tillage seeders increased from 7 to 24; the area under protective tillage also increased from 27 hectares to more than 170 hectares, accounting for more than half of Shengchan Village's corn planting area!
With the help and support of experts from the Baicheng City Agriculture Committee, Guo Xiaoguang decided to go a step further: "Using stubble cover for corn is only the primary form of protective tillage. The higher standard is to implement alternating strip fallow with whole-stalk cover, and strive to carry out large-scale contiguous operations."
What Guo Xiaoguang had not expected was that this round of mobilization went unusually smoothly.
The 21 households gathered at Guo Xiaoguang's home, smoking pack after pack of cigarettes and drinking pot after pot of tea...
"With so much straw covering the ground, no matter how hard the wind blows, it won't stir up dust anymore."
"Exactly. Rainwater and snowmelt in the soil can no longer be lost the way it used to be, and on top of that, without disturbing the soil, how could it not resist drought?"
"With alternating strip fallow and wide-narrow row sowing, we can increase seedlings by at least 10 percent. If the number of seedlings increases by 10 percent, isn't that a 10 percent increase in yield?"
"Not only that. One hectare of land has 30,000 to 40,000 jin of straw and stubble. If it all rots in the field, how much fertilizer would that become?"
The villagers' attitude gave Guo Xiaoguang confidence. He handed everyone a contract: "Land is the lifeblood of us farmers. None of us has tried alternating strip fallow with whole-stalk cover. If something unexpected happens, it will be hard for me to face everyone. If you really are willing to farm this way, press your fingerprint on it. If not, there's still time to change your mind."