Roger Wenning

Taking the long view on soil health has allowed this Indiana farmer to drastically transform his land and yields.

- By Lisa Foust Prater Executive Editor, Family & Rural Issues [e-mail]

Roger Wenning's soil challenges began more than 100,000 years ago, when an Illinoian glacier came to a stop in the middle of what is now his 900-acre southeast Indiana corn, soybean, and wheat farm, resulting in drastically different types of soil on either side of the ice's path.

The glacier left behind Clermont and Cobbsfork soil, which the USDA describes as very deep silt loam with poor drainage. In the hilly fields untouched by the glacier, years of tillage caused erosion. Wenning made it his mission to understand and improve his soils. Big changes have occurred, but they didn't happen overnight.

SF: When did you start your soil sustainability efforts?
RW: I began grid-sampling my fields on 2.5-acre grids in the mid-'80s and started figuring things out, doing some no-till and cover cropping. We had a large hog operation, but got rid of the hogs in the early 2000s. That cut out the need to work manure, so we've been 100% no-till with cover crops ever since. Nutrient management is a big part of it, too. It's all one big system.

SF: You were cover cropping before it was cool. What has that done for your soil?