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than wheat.Yields are usually equal to, or greater than yields in conventional tillage systems with winter fallow. Balansa clover, a promising cover crop for the South, reseeds well in no-till cotton systems (see Up-and-Coming Cover Crops, p. 158). 1 Year: Rye/Legume>Cotton. Plant the rye/ legume mix in early October, or early enough to allow the legume to establish well before cooler winter temperatures. Kill by late April, and if soil moisture permits, no-till plant cotton within three to five days using tined-wheel row cleaner attachments to clear residue. Band-spray normal preemergent herbicides over the cleaned and planted row area.Cotton will need additional weed control toward layby using flaming, cultivation or directed herbicides. Crimson clover, hairy vetch, Cahaba vetch and Austrian winter peas are effective legumes in this system. Multiyear: Reseeding Legume>No-Till Cotton> Legume>No-Till Cotton. Subterranean clover, Southern spotted burclover, PARADANA balansa clover and some crimson clover cultivars set seed quickly enough in some areas to become perpetually reseeding when cotton planting dates are late enough in spring.Germination of hard seed in late summer provides soil erosion protection over winter, N for the following crop and an organic mulch at planting. Strip planting into reseeding legumes works for many crops in the South, including cotton, corn, sweet potatoes, peanuts, peppers, cucumbers, cabbage and snap beans. Tillage or herbicides are used to create strips 12 to 30 inches wide. Wider killed strips reduce moisture competition by the cover crop before it dies back naturally,but also reduce the amount of seed set, biomass and N produced. Wider strips also decrease the mulching effect from the cover crop residue. The remaining strips of living cover crop act as in-field insectary areas to increase overall insect populations, resulting in more beneficial insects to control pest insects. ▲ Precautions • Watch for moisture depletion if spring is unusually dry. • Be sure to plant cotton by soil temperature (65 F is required), because cover crops may keep soil cool in the spring. Don’t plant too early! • A delay of two to three weeks between cover crop kill and cotton planting reduces these problems, and reduces the chance of stand losses due to insects (cutworm), diseases or allelopathic chemicals. • Additional mid-summer weed protection is needed during the hot-season “down time” for the reseeding legumes. DRYLAND CEREAL-LEGUME CROPPING SYSTEMS Soil moisture availability and use by cover crops are the dominant concerns in dryland production systems. Yet more and more innovators are find- ANNUAL and PERENNIAL MEDIC cultivars can fix N on low moisture, and can reduce erosion in dryland areas compared with bare fallow between crop seasons. 40 MANAGING COVER CROPS PROFITABLY
Start Where You Are In many instances, you can begin using cover crops without substantially altering your cash crop mix or planting times or buying new machinery. Later, you might want to change your rotation or other practices to take better advantage of cover crop benefits. We’ll use a basic Corn Belt situation as a model. From a corn>soybean rotation, you can expand to: Corn>Cover>Soybean>Cover. Most popular choices are rye or rye/vetch mixture following corn; vetch or rye/vetch mixture following beans. Broadcast or drill covers immediately after harvest. Hairy vetch needs at least 15 days before frost in 60 F soil. Rye will germinate as long as soil is just above freezing. Drill for quicker germination. Consider overseeding at leaf-yellowing if your post-harvest planting window is too short. If you want to make certain the legume is well established for maximum spring N and biomass production, consider adding a small grain to your rotation. Corn>Soybean>Small Grain/Cover. Small grains could be oats, wheat or barley. Cover could be vetch, field peas or red clover. If you want the legume to winterkill to eliminate spring cover crop killing, try a non-hardy cultivar of berseem clover or annual alfalfa. If you have livestock, a forage/hay market option or want more soil benefits, choose a longer-lived legume cover. Corn>Soybean>Small Grain/Legume> Legume Hay, Pasture Or Green Manure. Yellow sweetclover or red clover are popular forage choices. An oats/berseem interseeding provides a forage option the first year. Harvesting the cover crop or incorporating it early in its second season opens up new options for cash crops or a second cover crop. Late-season tomatoes, peppers, vine crops or sweet corn all thrive in the warm, enriched soil following a green manure. Two heat-loving covers that could be planted after killing a coolseason legume green manure are buckwheat (used to smother weeds, attract beneficial insects or for grain harvest) and sorghum- Sudangrass hybrid (for quick plow-down biomass or to fracture compacted subsoil). These crops would work most places in the Corn Belt. To get started in your area, check Top Regional Cover Crop Species (p. 47) to fill various roles, or Cultural Traits and Planting (p. 50) to find which cover crops fit best in your system. ing that carefully managed and selected cover crops in their rotations result in increased soil moisture availability to their cash crops.This delicate balance between water use by the cover crop and water conservation will dictate, in part, how cover crops work in your rotation. Cover crop features: perennial medics persist due to hard seed,providing green manure and erosion control; field peas and lentils (grain legumes) are shallow-rooted yet produce crops and additional N in years of good rainfall. An excellent resource describing these rotations in detail is Cereal-Legume Cropping Systems: Nine Farm Case Studies in the Dryland Northern Plains, Canadian Prairies and Intermountain Northwest. See Appendix C, Recommended Resources (p. 163). In an area of Montana receiving 11 to 12 inches of rainfall per year, where summer fallow is the norm, some farmers and ranchers are using cover crops and longer rotations to eliminate fallow. Greg Gould believes he can do without summer fallow because his rotation has improved his soil’s water-holding capacity. While most farmers in his area think water is the limiting factor, he thinks it is the condition of the soil. CROP ROTATION WITH COVER CROPS 41
Page 1 and 2: $19.00 Managing Cover Crops Profita
Page 3 and 4: SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE NETWORK THE
Page 5 and 6: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This book represent
Page 7 and 8: FOREWORD Cover crops slow erosion,
Page 9 and 10: HOW TO USE THIS BOOK Think of this
Page 11 and 12: BENEFITS OF COVER CROPS Cover crops
Page 13 and 14: decompose quickly, especially in wa
Page 15 and 16: Expect excessive field traffic arou
Page 17 and 18: 5. Settle for the Best Available Co
Page 19 and 20: ORGANIC MATTER ADDITIONS The benefi
Page 21 and 22: Cover Crops Can Stabilize Your Soil
Page 23 and 24: generally a good idea to kill a leg
Page 25 and 26: • For perennial legumes that have
Page 27 and 28: MANAGING PESTS WITH COVER CROPS By
Page 29 and 30: The farmers get weed control by fla
Page 31 and 32: insects. This approach has been use
Page 33 and 34: • Subterranean Clover (Trifolium
Page 35 and 36: does no direct tillage, but aggress
Page 37 and 38: eplace the cover crop before beans,
Page 39 and 40: as buckwheat, cowpeas, sorghum-suda
Page 41: the couple harrows every two to thr
Page 45 and 46: INTRODUCTION TO CHARTS The four com
Page 47 and 48: pH Preferred. The pH range in which
Page 49 and 50: Chart 1 TOP REGIONAL COVER CROP SPE
Page 51 and 52: Chart 2 PERFORMANCE AND ROLES conti
Page 53 and 54: Chart 3B PLANTING Cost Cost/A Inoc.
Page 55 and 56: Chart 4B POTENTIAL DISADVANTAGES Sp
Page 57 and 58: ANNUAL RYEGRASS Lolium multiflorum
Page 59 and 60: prolonged heat, cold or drought.Tha
Page 61 and 62: crop for establishing a forage or l
Page 63 and 64: arley plants from fungus, armyworm
Page 65 and 66: can increase the fertilizer replace
Page 67 and 68: cultural and local considerations t
Page 69 and 70: (339), and by 99 percent in a Calif
Page 71 and 72: Killing & Controlling Nutrient avai
Page 73 and 74: ye/vetch/crimson clover,for example
Page 75 and 76: • In the Corn Belt and northern U
Page 77 and 78: Wheat Offers High-Value Weed Contro
Page 79 and 80: BUCKWHEAT Fagopyrum esculentum Type
Page 81 and 82: Rotations Buckwheat is used most co
Page 83 and 84: plants fractured subsoil compaction
Page 85 and 86: press some species of nematodes. Sp
Page 87 and 88: Incorporated sorghum-sudangrass res
Page 89 and 90: lodge soil particles. Sunlight is u
Page 91 and 92: Crimson-Berseem Clover Combo Works
Page 93 and 94:
in water-use efficiency in the tria
Page 95 and 96:
Microorganisms mineralize, or conve
Page 97 and 98:
COWPEAS Vigna unguiculata Also call
Page 99 and 100:
control if you go with rows, using
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drought-tolerant sorghum-sudangrass
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several winter annual legumes that
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In Ohio, crimson clover mixed with
Page 107 and 108:
FIELD PEAS Pisum sativum subsp. arv
Page 109 and 110:
Chill tolerant. Austrian winter pea
Page 111 and 112:
In a “Flexible Green Manure” cr
Page 113 and 114:
values from 13 to 34,but were gener
Page 115 and 116:
year Maryland study that also inclu
Page 117 and 118:
possible, but remember that hairy v
Page 119 and 120:
especially in winter grains. With w
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less biomass than overwintering sta
Page 123 and 124:
Jess Counts on GEORGE for N and Org
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after mid-April planting in souther
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second cutting. Regrowth comes from
Page 129 and 130:
RED CLOVER Trifolium pratense Also
Page 131 and 132:
MANAGEMENT Establishment & Fieldwor
Page 133 and 134:
it function more like a biennial th
Page 135 and 136:
Subclover cultivars often are descr
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trample in the seed. Subclover ofte
Page 139 and 140:
Crop Systems Interseeded with wheat
Page 141 and 142:
SWEETCLOVERS Yellow sweetclover (Me
Page 143 and 144:
difficult to establish annual cover
Page 145 and 146:
Spring seeding provides yellow swee
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enhances soil fertility, texture an
Page 149 and 150:
WHITE CLOVER Trifolium repens Also
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for several freeze-thaw cycles. Mak
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COMPARATIVE NOTES • White clover
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Fall planting. Most growers seed at
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combining with a belt-type rubber p
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Then seed the remainder while walki
Page 161 and 162:
screening, a number of farmers have
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the seed is relatively expensive. B
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Dyer, David A. 1998. Conservation L
Page 167 and 168:
OTHER RESOURCES Cover Crops On The
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Cal/West Seeds Box 1428 Woodland, C
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Pick Seed Canada P.O. Box 304 1 Gre
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SARE Northeast Region Office Univer
Page 175 and 176:
APPENDIX F REGIONAL EXPERTS These i
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David W. Wolfe Cornell University 1
Page 179 and 180:
Bob Burdette Southern Seed Certific
Page 181 and 182:
Shiou Kuo Washington State Universi
Page 183 and 184:
20 Bird, George. 1997. Personal com
Page 185 and 186:
59 Clark,A.J. 1993. Managing hairy
Page 187 and 188:
102 Fernholz, Carmen. 1997. Persona
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141 Helm, J.L. and Dwain Meyer. 199
Page 191 and 192:
186 Koume, C.N. et al. 1988. Screen
Page 193 and 194:
226 Mohler, Charles L. 1994.A livin
Page 195 and 196:
267 Plumer, Mike. 1997. Personal co
Page 197 and 198:
309 Shrestha,A. et al. 1996.“Annu
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352 Varco, J.J., J.O. Sanford and J
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Bulk Discounts: Except as indicated
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INDEX A Alfalfa, 10, 42, 84, 88, 94
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performance and roles, 48-49 planti
Page 207 and 208:
sorghum-sudangrass hybrids, 85 subt
Page 209 and 210:
subterranean clovers, 133, 137 swee
Page 211 and 212:
comparative notes, 71 crop systems,
Page 213 and 214:
crimson clover for, 102, 103 crop r
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