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Lodi, California

I was just wondering, if you are low on a nutrient, but you feed your covercrop with that nutrient as a foliar and as a drench, will tilling the covercrop which is high in the particular nutrient add that nutrient to the soil? Thanks!

1/25/2014 6:46:12 PM

Menomonie, WI ([email protected])

Yes. Some cover crops are better than others, some also pull nutrients from the soil and sub soil. I would have to pull my books out, for the exact ones.
Buckwheat is one of them..
Alfalfa is Excellent but would take a year to grow.

1/25/2014 9:21:52 PM

Colorado

One of the vegas lecturers said that the weeds that grow well in your soil will pull up low supply nutrients. They can be tilled in ahead of the plant.I liked that no weeding vs no till.

1/25/2014 11:53:40 PM

Mnt.pleasant ,tennessee

Farmers round here plant soy bean after there corn.it pulls nitrogen out the air& puts in soil.from what ive known of cover crops.it was the cheaper way to fertilize than buying synthetic ferts.seems if you fertilize plus plant cover crop itll throw your nutreints way up.&if you have hard pack ground low in om then plant a radish speices to bust ground up& till in for om.well thats how ive taken it from farmers round here about why they use covercrops

1/26/2014 9:02:43 AM

Nottingham, UK

It would be interesting to know what capacity a cover crop has for nutrients. What is the ceiling value as that would determine how they are fed

1/26/2014 1:30:17 PM

Mnt.pleasant ,tennessee

Dandy that would be good to know .soil tested mini plots could be done then test after cover crop & see what it did.

1/26/2014 6:25:32 PM

Partlow,Va

Like Yardman says..Any legume will add nitrogen to the soil as it takes it from the air. But I don't think you will ever have a + on any other nutrients unless you supplement with nutrients because the crop will use em up and you could/should be at a - when all is said and done. Does that make sense? The cover crops job is to reduce runoff,leaching of nutrients, provide roots; which airieate(sp) and also grow/maintain a myco. colony. Worms and beneficial mycrobes love roots as well. I guess in summary I don't think you could raise one nutrient, or if you could it would be more trouble than it is worth.

1/26/2014 6:40:48 PM

Anamosa, IA [email protected]

Ashton, here is a link to a very good cover crop tool. http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/nrcs142p2_006029.pdf It covers a lot of different different cover crops, some you probably haven't considered. It tells you which ones are compatible with mycorrhizae, good at scavenging nitrogen, fix nitrogen or "mine" mobile nutrients that are deep in the soil profile.

1/26/2014 11:41:42 PM