Cover Crops

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Gear Up For Roundup Ready Alfalfa

This new technology offers no-tillers new opportunities for longer rotations, higher forage yields, improved crop quality and unique weed control options.
With expected Environmental Protection Agency approval later this summer of Roundup Ready alfalfa, no-tillers will have a exciting new tool to add to their management arsenal. Having proven valuable with soybeans, corn, cotton, canola and other crops, adding the Roundup Ready technology to alfalfa offers many new forage cropping opportunities.
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What I've Learned from No-Tilling

No-Till Saves $35 To $40 Per Acre

This Idaho grower relies on no-till to overcome drought worries, higher input costs, increasing land costs and other management concerns.
We started no-tilling almost by accident in the late 1970s in southern Idaho. One of our spring barley fields was set back by frost and didn’t grow very tall.
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Annual Ryegrass Cover Crop Reaches Depths To Aid Yields

Advocates point to extraordinary root development that improves soil structure while helping crops reach water and nutrients several feet below the surface.
Annual ryegrass works hard as a cover crop. It sends roots down as far as 6 feet in no-till fields, breaking through compaction layers to reach deep water and nutrients, and it leaves improved soil structure and higher organic content in its path, according to Mike Plumer.
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What I've Learned from No-Tilling

Cash In With No-Till's "Opportunity Time"

No-till provides more time for off-farm work, to crop more acres, have more fun with the family or devote extra hours to other farm enterprises.
My first experience with no-tilling began back in 1978 when I conducted a study for my master’s thesis on planter performance with various tillage systems. I visited 150 producers and observed their planters being used in the field.
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Taking Cover With No-Till Profits

Sometimes the best way to increase the bottom line is to start from the ground up.
With all of the talk about modifying no-till planters and adjusting fertilizer rates to increase profits, some believe that one of the best kept secrets to a successful no-till operation lies in the ability to keep plants in the soil as long as you can.
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What I've Learned from No-Tilling

No-Till And Cover Crops Stretch Both Ends Of The Growing Season

When vegetable processors saw no-till yields were consistent and harvesting conditions were better than in conventionally-tilled fields, they came around to this veteran no-tiller’s way of thinking.
We've been no-tilling for nearly 20 years, but the history of conservation on our vegetable farm goes back to the mid ’60s. That’s when we first walked away from the moldboard plow.
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Rolling Cover Crops Gives Mixed Results

The idea has plenty of potential, but there are still some bugs to be worked out.
Will a cover crop residue roller – considered essential in South American no-till fields – add value in the northern Great Plains? Dr. Dwayne Beck is studying that question under environmental conditions that are the equivalent of being several hundred miles north of tropical Paraguay and Brazil.
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