Look into sheet composting and lasagna gardening.

I just lay cardboard slipsheets over the weeds and dump lots of compost and mulch materials on top and plant in that. Perhaps not as appropriate for an entire field but great for home garden beds.

Eventually weeds and grass will find their way into the beds and then it is either time to pull them or re-layer with newspaper or cardboard again and put more mulch and compost on top.

Yes, it's important to know the scale you're interested in. If you're talking about tractors, I assume you are not talking about a back-yard garden.A lot of no-till agricultural methods require liberally dousing the soil with herbicides.

I don't know of any large-scale farms that could practice mulching to the extent that home gardeners often do.

Wayne

Wayne, because the "experts" recommend people practicing no till use lots of herbicides does not mean the practice itelf requires that. I have a distant cousin that grows vegetables using no till and, because he is organic, does not use any herbicides. Due care in handling the soil is necessary and each field has a crop rotation that does include at least one year of a cover crop only (sometimes refered to as a fallow year) and she has fewer weeds than her neighbors that spray, often.

There is a god article in the current edition of Mother Earth News. www.MotherEarthNews.com

I don't know if it would be something you can use since I don't know how much land you are speaking about, but at least it is a start.