On this week’s edition of Cover Crop Strategies, brought to you by SOURCE® by Sound Agriculture, listen in as we count down the top three most-played episodes of 2022, featuring insight the economic returns of grazing beef cattle on cover crops, the costs of cover crops compared to tillage and soil compaction, and reducing fertilizer use with cover crops.

This week’s podcast, sponsored by NewLeaf Symbiotics, features Liz Ripley, Cover Crop Specialist with Iowa State University. Ripley will discuss how cover crops reduce nitrate losses from corn and soybean fields, cover crops and the 4Rs of nitrogen management, how growers determine the correct type of fertilizer to use, and more.

Kansas State University researchers are finding mounting evidence to indicate the importance of pairing cover crops with improved fertilizer management for controlling phosphorus runoff from farm fields. But in something of a surprise discovery, recent research has found that cover crops increase the dissolved phosphorus in runoff, which they say heightens the importance of using best management practices when applying phosphorus fertilizer – especially in areas where soil erosion and sediment loss are not a concern. Read more in this article from Kansas State University Extension.

In this video from Penn State University Extension, learn more about interseeding cover crops into cash crops such as corn. Find out about the machine they developed that does interseeding and fertilizer application at the same time.

Wind storms are carrying topsoil away from valuable farmland, and that wind erosion is extremely detrimental to the agriculture industry. Soil degradation is contributing to erosion, and using fertilizer to bridge the gaps of nutrients in the soil may be more harmful than helpful.

As fertilizer costs increase, farmers want to either lower their fertilizer costs or find ways to conserve soil nutrients. Cover crops can help do both things. Read more in this article from Ohio's Country Journal.

Can manure be successfully used as fertilizer for cover crops? The answer is yes, but how manure is used depends on your goals and situation, says Pennsylvania cover crop expert Steve Groff. A few considerations when applying manure to cover crops, particularly in the spring, includes application timing, the growth stage of the cover crop, application rate, application method, and more.