If you farm somewhat poorly drained soils with clay in them – the kind that crust when conventionally tilled – you know soil compaction is an issue. Some people say get rid of the soil compaction, then go to no-till.

Barry Fisher jumped into a pit in a soybean field with his knife in hand to show that even no-till with cover crops won't solve all your soil compaction problems right away, maybe not even in a few years. They may help lessen the effect, but they won't eliminate it.

Compacted soil: Barry Fisher shows farmers at a field day that even no-till with cover crops can't erase the effects of soil compaction overnight. The cover crop and no-till system helps, but it takes time.

Fisher inspected a pit in a field that has been no-tilled continuously for many years, with annual ryegrass used as the cover crop for the past six years. He was still able to find compacted layers of soil. He also could demonstrate that some soybean plants had roots that were growing sideways across compacted plates, at least for a while.

Admittedly, he wanted to find soil compaction, and the pit was dug in sprayer tracks. However, the farmer applies in the same tracks every year. It's a version of the 'tram' or controlled traffic concept Purdue and Ohio State University ag engineers promoted 30 years ago. The area under the tires is sacrificed, but the remainder of the field between the tracks remains track free.

"The point is that just converting to no-till and cover crops won't solve all your problems, especially on this type of soil," says Fisher, an agronomist for the Natural Resources Conservation Service. He specializes in working with farmers on no-till and cover crop systems.

"Some roots get down below the layer, and some worm channels do as well," he says. "It just takes longer and you don't find as many of them as you would if the soil wasn't compacted."

Cover crops and no-till may still be a good answer for these soils, he notes. It's just that you can't expect results as quickly as if the soils were free from serious soil compaction.