No till notes: 'Cheat grass'

I wish I had all the money I’ve spent over the years trying to control cheat grass on our farm. Cheat grass has been a problematic weed in winter wheat production for as long as anyone can remember.

My grandfather and father were battling cheat grass when I was a young boy starting out farming. We were conventionally tilling our ground in a winter wheat/ summer fallow cropping rotation. Dad would use a stubble mulch farming practice to maintain more residues on the soil surface. This would usually involve a couple of early season disking of the field, followed by a chisel plow, then field cult...