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There are other reasons to put cover crops into your system.

Tom Bechman 1, Editor, Indiana Prairie Farm

July 5, 2012

2 Min Read

One farmer attended a recent field day on cover crops because cost-share money is available in his county to establish cover crops. He hasn't tried them before, but he does no-till. He figures that with help to cover the cost of seed, it's time the tries the practice on his own farm.

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Doing something just to get government money may not be the best reason, but it you're also interested in achieving other benefits at the same time, it may be an acceptable one. Years ago farmers who tried cover crops were those who were mainly sticklers for soil conservation. They didn't want their fields exposed during the winter with no live cover where the soil would be an easy target for soil erosion, especially after soybeans, since the crop leaves such little residue.

Today, more people are using them, often but not exclusively in no-till systems, to seek help in opening up the soil for deeper rooting, and to capture nitrogen, either left over from the year before, so it doesn't wind up leaching into tile lines and running off into bodies of water, or to grow nitrogen as a legume taking N out of the air.

Dan Towery, an agronomist with his own company, Ag Conservation Solutions, LLC, says it's important to know what benefits you're after before you start down the road with cover crops. What you're trying to accomplish will impact which crops you try, and perhaps which varieties of those cover crops. All annual ryegrass, for example, isn't created equal. Some varieties are much more adopted to typical winters in Indiana than others. This past winter dos not qualify as a typical winter, and cover crops that don't survive normal winters survived this past winter in some cases.

Still, even if you're not doing it primarily for soil erosion concerns and you're on rolling land, you need to keep that objective in mind, Towery says.

"You wouldn't want to plant only covers that winterkill going into winter," he says. "

Then the soil would be bare and unprotected fro the rest of winter and spring. That's one reason why we often suggest mixing more than one cover crop together when you seed in the fall. You want to make sure you still have a cover crop living in the winter and spring so that the soil is protected from soil erosion."

About the Author(s)

Tom Bechman 1

Editor, Indiana Prairie Farm

Tom Bechman is an important cog in the Farm Progress machinery. In addition to serving as editor of Indiana Prairie Farmer, Tom is nationally known for his coverage of Midwest agronomy, conservation, no-till farming, farm management, farm safety, high-tech farming and personal property tax relief. His byline appears monthly in many of the 18 state and regional farm magazines published by Farm Progress.

"I consider it my responsibility and opportunity as a farm magazine editor to supply useful information that will help today's farm families survive and thrive," the veteran editor says.

Tom graduated from Whiteland (Ind.) High School, earned his B.S. in animal science and agricultural education from Purdue University in 1975 and an M.S. in dairy nutrition two years later. He first joined the magazine as a field editor in 1981 after four years as a vocational agriculture teacher.

Tom enjoys interacting with farm families, university specialists and industry leaders, gathering and sifting through loads of information available in agriculture today. "Whenever I find a new idea or a new thought that could either improve someone's life or their income, I consider it a personal challenge to discover how to present it in the most useful form, " he says.

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