Cover Crops for Sustainable Agrosystems in the Americas

Scholberg, J.M.S.; Dogliotti, Santiago; Leoni, C.; Zotarelli, Lincoln; Cherr, C. M.; Rossing, W.A.H.

doi:10.1007/978-90-481-8741-6_2

Cited by 31 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 132 publications

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“…Cover crops sequester and store nutrients that might otherwise be lost to leaching or runoff, maintaining fertility within the system. In particular, densely-rooted cover crops scavenge nutrients from deep in the soil profile, providing fertility for future crops [58][59][60]. Leguminous cover crops fix nitrogen from the atmosphere, providing a source of fertility needed by subsequent cash crops, without reliance on outside inputs [58,59,[61][62][63][64].…”

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In particular, densely-rooted cover crops scavenge nutrients from deep in the soil profile, providing fertility for future crops [58][59][60]. Leguminous cover crops fix nitrogen from the atmosphere, providing a source of fertility needed by subsequent cash crops, without reliance on outside inputs [58,59,[61][62][63][64]. With the contribution of both above-and below-ground biomass, cover crops can increase soil organic matter, which in turn has the effect of improving soil structure and aggregation.…”

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Deep-rooted cover crops can penetrate and loosen subsurface compaction [58,59] and living vegetation and surface residues serve a protective role, minimizing erosion from wind and water [58][59][60]62,65]. Improvements in soil structure and reduced need for chemical inputs also both lead to reduced nutrient leaching, which can ultimately improve water quality [58,62,[66][67][68][69].…”

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Particularly when paired with high biomass reduced tillage systems, cover crops can be a highly effective weed control option for organic farmers, as demonstrated by cover crop-based reduced tillage systems [33,58,59,61,62,70]. Beyond high biomass reduced tillage systems, planted in rotation with cash crop production, cover crops provide weed suppression through resource competition [58], niche disruption through modification of light, soil temperature, and/or soil moisture [24,28], and allelopathy [58,62,71]. Cover crops can have positive or negative impacts on pest and disease problems, with certain cover and cash crop combinations (either simultaneously or sequentially) either attracting more pest insects, or conversely, more beneficial predators that reduce pest populations.…”

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Cover crops can have positive or negative impacts on pest and disease problems, with certain cover and cash crop combinations (either simultaneously or sequentially) either attracting more pest insects, or conversely, more beneficial predators that reduce pest populations. Similarly, cover crops may disrupt a disease cycle or prevent disease from spreading, or serve as an alternate host for the pathogen [58,59,61,62,71].…”

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Cover Crops as an Agroecological Practice on Organic Vegetable Farms in Wisconsin, USA

Silva

Moore

2017

Sustainability

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Global agricultural and food systems face the challenge of feeding a growing world population in the face of finite and diminishing resources. To guide the redesign of agricultural systems, farmers and policymakers are increasingly turning to agroecology. Organic agriculture has historically integrated agroecological practices within its regulatory framework; however, questions remain as to the extent to which organic farmers are maintaining and expanding agroecological practices. In this paper, we will address convergences and divergences of agroecological and organic practices. Using cover cropping as a model agroecological practice, we conduct a preliminary assessment on the degree to which organic vegetable farms in Wisconsin, USA are integrating agroecological concepts into their farm management, drawing upon the results of a 2013 cover cropping practice survey. The survey data demonstrates varying degrees of complexity and diversity in cover cropping practices, potentially illustrating the desire of organic farmers to promote a high degree of agroecosystem services. Farmers' integration of cover crop diversity and complexity was not correlated to farm size or revenue. These results offer preliminary evidence that Wisconsin's organic vegetable farmers are integrating agroecological practices on their farms, even as growth in the organic market continues to occur.

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Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Green Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Cover Crops as an Agroecological Practice on Organic Vegetable Farms in Wisconsin, USA

Silva

Moore

2017

Sustainability

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Introducing grazeable cover crops to the winter wheat systems in Oklahoma

et al. 2020

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Fields are typically kept fallow after winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) grain harvest in the U.S. southern Great Plains (SGP). Introducing summer cover crops to the system could increase soil conservation and farm profitability if grazed. The objective of this research was to evaluate cover crops' forage yield, residue cover potential, weed suppression, and effect on wheat production. Monocultures and grass-legume mixtures of cover crops were established in mid-June of 2016 and 2017 near Chickasha and Perkins, OK. At 6 weeks after planting (WAP), three cutting regimes based on stubble height were used: severe (2.5 cm), recommended (legumes: 7.5 cm, grasses and mixtures: 15 cm), and no cutting. Cover crops regrowth was chemically terminated at 14 WAP; winter wheat was no-till seeded in mid-October; then harvested in early-June 2017 and 2018. Cultivar Triple Treat sorghum−sudangrass [Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench × S. bicolor var. sudanese] and grass−legume mixtures showed the greatest available forage dry matter. Grasses and grass−legume mixtures had greater forage dry matter residue and weed suppression than legumes. Results indicated that exceeding 6.4 ± 1.2 Mg ha −1 of total dry matter (TDM) produced during the summer, a wheat grain yield penalty of −50.1 ± 15.8 kg ha −1 resulted for each increment of 1.0 Mg ha −1 of TDM produced. Also, a wheat protein content penalty of −1.9 ± 0.5 kg ha −1 resulted in each increment of 1.0 Mg ha −1 of TDM produced when exceeding to 5.7 ± 1.0 Mg ha −1 TDM threshold. Findings suggest N uptake by high-biomass grasses and mixtures might result in deficient water and N availability for wheat production.

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Do diverse cover crop mixtures perform better than monocultures? A systematic review

Florence

McGuire

2020

Agronomy Journal

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Multi-species cover crop mixtures have been increasing in popularity. It has been hypothesized these mixtures produce more biomass, suppress more weeds, scavenge more N, conserve more soil water, stimulate more soil biology, promote higher yields of subsequent crops, and have higher production stability than the best of their monoculture counterparts. This systematic review synthesizes a growing body of cover crop mixture research to assess, for these metrics, whether cover crop mixtures can perform better than their constituent species when planted alone. Searching three databases, we identified 27 studies which compared cover crop mixtures (containing at least three species) to all their constituent species. The studies contained 119 sampled cover crop plantings that met our eligibility criteria. From these, we extracted 243 full comparisons of the bestperforming mixture and best-performing monoculture for the selected metrics. In 88% of these comparisons, the monoculture and mixture performed comparably. In 10% of the comparisons, the monoculture did better, and in 2% of comparisons the mixture performed better. Overall, there are few published studies documenting the superiority of cover crop mixtures over monocultures for our selected metrics. Abbreviations: CC, cover crop; CV, coefficient of variation; LER, land equivalent ratio; RYT, relative yield total. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.

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Cover Crops for Sustainable Agrosystems in the Americas

Cited by 31 publications

References 132 publications

Cover Crops as an Agroecological Practice on Organic Vegetable Farms in Wisconsin, USA

Cover Crops as an Agroecological Practice on Organic Vegetable Farms in Wisconsin, USA

Introducing grazeable cover crops to the winter wheat systems in Oklahoma

Do diverse cover crop mixtures perform better than monocultures? A systematic review

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