cover crops

Anonymous-0 · Jul 10, 2013

I see alot about cover crops and building soil microbes and health and what not. I do not hear anybody talk about a potential downside to the fact that every crop gets burn downed with herbicide. Is plowing under a cover crop just a no no? I can see how it could reverse some of the good that the cover did. I use a common 3-4 crop rotation and also use some covers (mainly for water retention). Im just not in love with drenching all my ground with herbicide every spring.

Ecnerwal · Jul 10, 2013

If what you are "seeing a lot about" is doing that, perhaps you should look around more to broaden what you see. Certain flavors of no-till (as promoted by herbicide companies) may go that way, but there are other approaches.

You can plant a cover crop that winterkills. Given enough time to grow but not set seed, and a winter that will kill it, it holds the soil through the winter but is not growing come spring.

You can certainly plow them under. Pretty normal to, actually. "mow and incorporate" (ie, till or plow) is the operative phrase for most crops mentioned in this New York guide, for instance.

http://www.hort.cornell.edu/bjorkman/lab/covercrops/

Anonymous-0 · Jul 10, 2013

I was referring more to the "cocktails" with rye in
them that gets six feet tall. I myself havent tried
them yet, Ive only tried crimson in corn, and red
clover in wheat and peas&radishes after wheat.

Fergienewbee · Jul 10, 2013

I have a small--1/3 acre--plot that has a lot of spotted knap weed. I mowed it and plan to spray as soon as I see growth. I think I'll plant some oats as a cover crop and then plow them under in the spring. Should get a little deer and rabbit feed out of them this fall.

Larry

cover crops

Anonymous-0

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Ecnerwal

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Anonymous-0

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Fergienewbee

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