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Wet harvest has growers again thinking about tiling installation
 
Wet harvest has growers again thinking about tiling installation

By DOUG GRAVES
Ohio Correspondent

POMEROY, Ohio — With the fall harvest season coming to a close, farmers with lower-than-expected yields will often take a closer look at their soils. Usually a harvest season with wet ground will result in fewer days in the field and smaller yields.
The use of drain tiles have proven to increase both these numbers. Brian Simmons of Meigs County in Ohio can remember planting and harvesting days before his father added drainage tile.
“What a difference the tiles made,” mused Simmons, who had tiles installed by a local company after his father died four years ago and left him with all family farm operations on his 350 acres. “I noticed my highest yields over the tile lines.
“The result I found from using tiles are good agronomic conditions, mellower soil, deeper plant root zones, less compaction and more timely planting to maximize the growing season. Without tiles our fields were oftentimes a mess in those low-lying areas.”
Simmons noted the tiles also result in earlier harvest, less surface soil erosion and less runoff of nutrients such as phosphorous.
“I noticed a 30-bushel corn yield drop midway between my 50-foot tile spacings and decided to tile the rest of the field on 30- to 35-foot spacings. I saw a remarkable improvement,” he said. “The optimum distance between tile lines varies depending on soil type, topography and other factors.”
Most farmers add tile to their fields after fall harvest, while the ground is damp but not frozen.
“You will find very few farmers who have never tiled their fields,” said Miriam George, owner of George Farm Drainage in Waynesville, Ohio. “The good farmers go ahead and tile. Occasionally we get called to a farm that has never been tiled.
“We mostly have repeat customers, meaning these farmers are adding tiles each planting season. They find out where there is too much moisture on the fields and go from there.”
George and her staff service not only Warren County but adjacent counties as well.
“Tilage pays off even in dry years,” Simmons added. “A few years ago we had a drought with only 4 inches of rain during the entire growing season. One tiled field yielded 145 bushels per acre despite the drought. Another field with the same soil type that wasn’t tiled yielded only 100 to 120 bushels per acre.
“One reason tile benefits crops in dry years is that lowering the water table in the spring causes plants to develop a deep and vigorous root zone.”
Gerald Mitsch, owner of Mitsch Farm Drainage and Bulldozing of Crown Point, Ind., sees no slowdown to his farm tiling business. “I would guess that 80 to 90 percent of the farm community is tiling their land these days. Tiling is a good process, but it can be expensive,” he said.
Simmons recalls when he planned to install pattern tile on his acreage three years ago. At the time he was quoted a price of $700 per acre. That was when his land was worth $3,000-$4,000 per acre.
Now that the ground has doubled in value, “The price doesn’t look so bad,” he admitted. “I have even found out that even 100-foot spaced tile has increased by yields by 50 percent in some poorly drained fields.”
Tiling contractors can be found in each state, and there are many of them. In some areas, demand for tiling has outstripped local contractors’ capacity.
Rather than wait a year or more to get their tiling done, some farmers have purchased their own add-on pull-behind tile plows. These plows can be mounted on a tractor or pulled behind it, as the names suggest. They range in cost from $2,600-$20,000 and are handled by manufacturers of small machinery.
To assist with proper grade control, a laser system can be purchased for $10,000-$20,000. A tile cart will cost $3,000-$5,000. Labor, backhoe and machinery costs also need to be figured into the equation.
“Each job is unique and many factors go into cost calculations, including soil texture and structure, soil permeability, terrain, topography, rocks, distance to the main outlets, size of the mains, number of acres tiled, type of tiling machine and area competition,” Simmons explained.
“Because large, self-propelled tile plows can install twice as much tile per minute than open trenchers, contractors with tile plows are generally more competitive for large jobs such as pattern tiling entire fields.”
12/17/2014