It is great to see the pictures of farming in your area. I farm in south west Kansas. No longer use steel track Cats to farm with. Use Cat challengers. Do not use the MT 800 series as the MT765s have enough power for us. Used to use a D8H to help out, but have not used for the last 2 years.

We do not plow or farm deep any more. On rougher ground, kill weeds and grass with chemicals, apply NH3 with V Blade and plant with Great Plains 40' HD drill. Would have horrible soil erosin otherwize. The better laying land use 36' tandem disk and the apply NH3 V blade. We do little summer fallowing, only when rotating milo to wheat. We no-till milo or grain sorhgum.

Please keep pictures coming. Always enjoyed traveling through the Palouse.

Darrol W. Miller

Hey Darrol, were there many steel tracked cats used in your area?

I assume you have primarily wind erosion problems? Water erosion is a problem here but really plowed ground isn't the problem it is the winter wheat ground that was worked down fine. We usually no-till winter wheat or do light tillage, this year we did more fall tillage before planting due to more spring crop residue (had canola and 7ft pea vine stubble to plant into instead of lentils) We don't fallow anymore either. 28-30" precip here so it is a two or three year rotation, winter wheat, spring wheat or barley, then broadleaf crops.

Yes, there were a sizable amount of Cats used as farm tractors. 20,22,D2, D4,gas 35 and Diesel 40. Late 40's three D6 Cats. We have a lot of sandy land, which was one reason for the crawlers. There is a 9U D6 and my D8H left. We do not have much wind erosion, but have some soil loss from water. We have a 22 to 23 inch average rainfall with most of it in the summer months. We have a lot of terraces and water ways. Our rotation is 3 years of wheat and 3 years of milo, then back to wheat. We have trouble with downey brome in wheat and sahtter cane and johnson grass in milo, hence the rotation. Had good crops last year and this year.

North Idaho Farmer: In the middle nineties, the farm program forced us to plant the same ground to continious wheat. By plowing, we could keep the downey brome down. We are no longer forced to do this, so the plows are sitting in the yard. The one picture with the white fertilizer tank behind is a 45' blade appying NH3.

Darrol