Here is the conclusion to the Cover crop conundrum story:
As a farmer that was formerly using conventional methods to grow corn and soybean and as a manager for a conventional seed-testing company, Dirk Peterson had to drastically change his personal farm management when he transitioned to organic production. New crops, new pest management, new equipment, and the addition of cover crops are just some of the challenges he faced. This particular decision case study, however, focused on cover crops and the difficulties Dirk was having.
For multiple years, weather was not a friend to Dirk. The reliance on tillage as the cover crop termination method coupled with wet, sometimes saturated, soils made spring cover crop termination difficult. In 2014, Dirk and his agronomist came to the conclusion that the poor germination of his organic corn was the result of the combination of weather conditions and seed corn maggot pressure. There was a slightly higher seedling count in the winterkilled cover crop plots, but the stand was still poor. The result was that basically the entire field had to be replanted which pushed the corn planting date well into June. Another disappointing year, to say the least.
What could Dirk Peterson do? The National Organic Program has specific rules about a certified organic farm’s rotation and the use of cover crops. On top of that, Dirk personally does not want to altogether abandon cover crops. At the time of this publication, the farmer was looking into a few different alternatives to his cover crop conundrum. First, he was contemplating putting alfalfa back into the rotation. However, this would require that he market the alfalfa forage to other farmers since he did not have livestock. A second option was to still utilize cover crops, but to plant cover crop species that would winterkill, such as oats, radish, and field peas. This could possibly require the addition of early-harvested cash crops such as the canning peas and small grains that Dirk grew before. A third option discussed was keeping a winter cereal grain in the cover crop mix, but instead of winter cereal rye, use winter triticale or winter wheat. These two species tend to be less aggressive in the spring and are not quite as winter hardy.
Acknowledgments
This project was supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Organic Transitions Program under award number 2013-51106-21005.
This project was also supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Marketing Service, National Organic Program under the Transition to Organic Partnership Program (TOPP) in the Midwest region.
Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and should not be construed to represent any official USDA or U.S. Government determination or policy.