What's Up Here?

This quarter section east southeast of Pendleton, Oregon, has been cultivated in the same unique pattern for at least 20 years. Does anyone have any ideas as to why?

Attachments:

Whats Up Here.kmz (1.07 KB)

Sept 8, 2015 2:25:32 GMT washi said:

This quarter section east southeast of Pendleton, Oregon, has been cultivated in the same unique pattern for at least 20 years. Does anyone have any ideas as to why?

This is known as Contour Plowing


Contour ploughing or contour farming or Contour bunding is the farming practice of plowing and/or planting across a slope following its elevation contour lines. These contour lines create a water break which reduces the formation of rills and gullies during times of heavy water run-off; which is a major cause of soil erosion. The water break also allows more time for the water to settle into the soil. In contour ploughing, the ruts made by the plow run perpendicular rather than parallel to slopes, generally resulting in furrows that curve around the land and are level. This method is also known for preventing tillage erosion. Tillage erosion is the soil movement and erosion by tilling a given plot of land.



Contour Plowing 


Picture Below in street view, shows the slopping landscape.

Sept 8, 2015 5:33:26 GMT ET_Explorer said:

Sept 8, 2015 2:25:32 GMT washi said:

This quarter section east southeast of Pendleton, Oregon, has been cultivated in the same unique pattern for at least 20 years. Does anyone have any ideas as to why?

This is known as Contour Plowing


Contour ploughing or contour farming or Contour bunding is the farming practice of plowing and/or planting across a slope following its elevation contour lines. These contour lines create a water break which reduces the formation of rills and gullies during times of heavy water run-off; which is a major cause of soil erosion. The water break also allows more time for the water to settle into the soil. In contour ploughing, the ruts made by the plow run perpendicular rather than parallel to slopes, generally resulting in furrows that curve around the land and are level. This method is also known for preventing tillage erosion. Tillage erosion is the soil movement and erosion by tilling a given plot of land.



Contour Plowing 


Picture Below in street view, shows the slopping landscape.

Maybe.  But I didn't think so.  I've seen a bit of contour plowing in my time, and I didn't think that was what was going on here.  It doesn't account, for example, as to why the field is divided into two interlocking halves.

Don't know for sure Washi, but all the properties there look reasonably small and I was wondering if because of that, the folk that own this one have come up with a novel but productive way of crop rotation to work and rest the same field on a continuous basis.
It appears that the zigs and zags are cropped alternatively annually.

Interesting area, I see that some of the other fields close by are divided into equal parts, and even one of the large crop circles there is divided into two.

Hi NS,

Crop Rotation was my only guess, but it doesn't seem to be a common practice hereabouts. You can get a pretty good look at the crops, but I can't tell what is being grown. There's no reason for me to think it's anything other than wheat. This area is some of the richest dry land wheat land in the world. I seem to remember hearing something once about top soil 23 feet deep. Anyway, I guessing guess that the soil is pretty fertile even without rotation.

The Department of Agriculture used to (maybe they still do) have a program to pay farmers to keep land fallow, in order to keep prices high enough so that low prices wouldn't put all of the farmers out of business. Maybe that's what's going on.

ET may be right about contour plowing. There isn't much of a slope in this field, but if half is not being planted, a little extra protection wouldn't hurt, and the zigzag pattern follows the elevation gradients on a topo map.

I found some other striped fields west of Pendleton. You can see the crop if you enter Street View at the icon.

Attachments:

More Field Stripes.kmz (895 B)

What about intercropping?
Instead of having a monoculture which might be more vulnerable to pests and other factors, planting two or more crops in close proximity reduces these threats. This does however not explain the odd shape in the first file, but maybe it's an even more effective design than having straight lines.

That's interesting, washi, and I've never seen that anywhere else, either. My impression, like nostranger, is that it's a unique method of crop rotation - maybe in combination with siggi's intercropping idea.  How about if I throw this in: maybe boredom with back-and-forth-and-back-and-forth played a role. Wellll, it's possible...

Something else kind of interesting nearby:

Old drive-in theater.kmz (808 B)

Edit: Just remembered I have a Panoramio friend who lives in Pendleton. I'll ask if she has any idea, meanwhile will hint that she could drive out there and ask the farmer!

Hi Diane,

As I said to siggi in a note, all the places where I could see the striped fields in Street View show one stripe planted and the alternate fallow, so I doubt that intercropping is what we're seeing.

Ah, the drive in! Brings back a cherished memory of the time my friend demanded that I drive half the way home to LaGrande, while he and his date sat in the back. Nervous about driving his parents' car, I was pulled over by a red light while driving through Meacham. Turned out to be the back of a train waiting to uncouple a helper engine. I expect my face was as red as the lantern.

Hahaha - I can just picture it! 

Yes, you're right about the field. I didn't factor that in to my theory!