Cover crops provide many benefits, ranging from soil health to erosion control, and can also be an important tool in an integrated weed management program. However, termination of cover crops is an important factor to consider to ensure that they don’t hurt your cash crops yield, said Andy Luke, University of Missouri Extension regional field specialist in agronomy. Read more in this article from KMA Radio.

Clemson researchers have found a cover crop mixture that can reduce costs for South Carolina farmers, rejuvenate farm soil and help conserve the state’s water supply if included in crop rotations. “Farmers in the southern United States grow cover crops primarily for biomass production and erosion control. We wanted to determine which cover crops would be most beneficial during the winter seasons in South Carolina," said Clemson graduate student Ricardo St. Aime.

Adding basalt rock dust to farmers’ fields could help soils to store four times more carbon dioxide (CO2) and increase crop yields, according to new research by academics at the University of Sheffield. The study, published in Global Change Biology, found that adding the dust increased yields of the cereal crop sorghum by as much as 20 percent. Read more in this article from Technology Networks.

An increasing number of growers are ‘planting green’ or have asked questions regarding this practice. ‘Planting green’ means the corn or soybean is planted directly into a growing cover crop (most often a small grain like rye or wheat) without killing it by herbicide or mechanical means first. Read more in this article from University of Nebraska Extension.

The weather is different these days than when Eric Odberg was a kid. There’s less snow, wetter springs and hotter, drier summers, he says. Read more in this article from the Capital Press.

As interest and integration of cover crops accelerate, the industry has been challenged in its ability to provide easy to access, comprehensive information. Recently, cover crop application company GO SEED developed the Cover Crop Information Map to provide a free, centralized platform for knowledge exchange.

Researchers used the Canadian Light Source (CLS) at the University of Saskatchewan to look at where carbon ends up in soil and are contributing to an effort to mitigate the effects of drought for California farmers. Samantha Ying and Michael Schaefer, both from the Department of Environmental Sciences at University of California (UC) Riverside, are part of a team set on untangling the mystery of a practice upon which farmers have relied for centuries to reduce water use—cover crops. Read more in this article from Yorkton This Week (Yorkton, SK).

Advanced conservation practices are used on more than 50 percent of farmland across the nation. Conrad, MT, wheat farmer Ken Johnson explained how he works to reduce erosion on their family farm. Read more in this article from the Sidney Herald.

“I knew we were already doing good things for the environment and not getting recognized. And I wanted to reframe what we were doing, and get really serious and focused about what we were doing with carbon," says farmer Johnny Parker, Sandy Lake, Pennsylvania. Read more in this article from Lancaster Farming.

The world beneath our feet is very much alive. In a single teaspoon of soil, there is an estimated one billion microbes including bacteria, fungi, nematodes, protists and micro-animals. All of these microbes serve a purpose in the complex ecosystem underfoot. Read more in this article from the Sabetha Herald (Sabetha, KS).