I see one consistent throughout this thread, conventional tillage. I wonder if some no till plots have any different outcome? I do feel your guys pain and pray you get your needed rains!
For the first time in my regular plots I attempted a throw and mow in sections of the field. In one field I devoted the best strip down the middle to TnM, in another I tried this method along the sides, mainly to avoid any plowing around some pear trees.
As I have documented in my property thread, I tilled and then ran over the plots with a chisel plow. The chisel created a furrow that the seed and fertilizer found as I covered with a drag harrow. What little rain we had in two months also settled in those furrows and I was amazed at the wheat, oats and rye. Nothing in the test sections.
My hope now is that this bit of rain we are now getting will again bring back some green in those furrows, but I have no idea what will happen in the test plots, as the turkeys and crows have covered that area.
I might add that the whole area is sandy loam, so there was not much moisture for the TnM areas to preserve.
I guess you would call my method conventional tillage, but to me the chisel altered the method to be as much like a seed drill as I could get with equipment I had. I fully believe the best method is to Mow, and then drill with a seeder. Most of us cannot avoid that method.